by Philip Averbuck
Always a master at misdirection and diversion, President Obama and his flacks have taken pains to assert that his new "1967 lines as a basis for peace" formulation for Israel's borders is, hey, "nothing new."
Nixon
When the Nixon Administration considered the situation (the 1970 "Rogers Plan"), the objective was to wean Egypt away from the Soviet orbit, and dealt only with Egypt's territorial losses to Israel in 1967. In case Barack hadn't noticed, these territories were completely returned to Egypt by 1982, pursuant to the Camp David Accords of 1978. The Rogers plan did not address any of the Jordanian territories (Judea and Samaria, so-called "Palestine") captured by Israel in 1967, much less even suggesting a "Palestinian" state. That would have been seen as an outrageously provocative and unfriendly act by then-King Hussein, a US ally, who was at that time obliged to respond with extreme force to an attempted "Palestinian" putsch against him; he drowned the putsch in the blood of at least 5,000 Arafat loyalists.
Carter
When the Carter Administration considered the problem, Egypt had already broken with the USSR, and had independently approached Israel to seek peace talks. The Carter Administration did little more than put a heavy thumb on the scale to ensure a favorable result for Egypt, which by any normal reading walked away from the table with negotiating windfall after windfall. However, the Camp David Accords also did not address the disposition of the Jordanian territories captured by Israel, except to declare that they should receive a period of "autonomy" before their final status was determined.
It is important to note that, at the time of the Nixon and Carter diplomatic efforts, the two strongest Muslim nations in the Middle East (Turkey and Iran) were both strong American allies, and both semi-open allies of Israel. This reality has turned 180 degrees today, to the point that Turkey's membership in NATO is an open scandal and an absurdity, as it is now weaving together its operational activities with Iran. Barack may have not noticed the dozens of kissy-face visits of Erdogan to Iran or Ahmadinejad to Turkey in recent years (and many more high-level military and security visits), but that is to his everlasting discredit. Israel has noticed them, of course. The new anti-Israel Iranian/Turkish alliance alone makes all of the earlier State Department calculations utterly irrelevant.
Reagan
The Reagan Administration started in 1982 to seek territorial concessions from Israel, but that position was soon abandoned as new Sec. of State George Schultz moved up the learning curve and reviewed the devastating intelligence and weaponry captured by Israel from the PLO in Lebanon that summer. Not to mention the unprecedented trouncing that Israel laid on Syria, which had been supplied with the latest Soviet weaponry. Shortly after Israel's Operation Peace for Galilee in Lebanon, President Reagan addressed the nation on Sept 1, 1982 -- you be the judge how similar this sounds to Barack Hussein Obama in 2011:
I have personally followed and supported Israel's heroic struggle for survival, ever since the founding of the State of Israel 34 years ago. In the pre-1967 borders Israel was barely 10 miles wide at its narrowest point. The bulk of Israel's population lived within artillery range of hostile Arab armies. I am not about to ask Israel to live that way again....Beyond the transition period, as we look to the future of the West Bank and Gaza, it is clear to me that peace cannot be achieved by the formation of an independent Palestinian state in those territories, nor is it achievable on the basis of Israeli sovereignty or permanent control over the West Bank and Gaza. So, the United States will not support the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, and we will not support annexation or permanent control by Israel.There is, however, another way to peace. The final status of these lands must, of course, be reached through the give and take of negotiations. But it is the firm view of the United States that self-government by the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza in association with Jordan offers the best chance for a durable, just, and lasting peace.
So, to summarize: the Reagan Administration firmly rejected the idea of Israel returning to the "wasp-waist" 1967 lines; firmly rejected a Palestinian state; and supported the idea of Jordan negotiating with Israel for the final territorial disposition. No Palestinian state.
Bush I
The first Bush Administration was indeed set to pressure Israel in 1990, but Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait -- wildly supported by the "Palestinian" Arabs -- derailed them. However, even the unfriendly-to-Israel patrician George H.W. Bush rejected a Palestinian state, telling Arab journalists in 1991:
Q. What do you mean by political rights to Palestinian people in your speech?The President. About political rights? Listen, there will not be peace until the whole question of where the Palestinians have a right to be is taken care of. And some say "state." It's not been our position in favor of the state, and there we differ with many of our Arab friends.
Clinton
It in fact isn't until the sixth (6th) US President following the 6 Day War (Clinton) that the idea was finally floated to give the "Palestinians" a state with borders approximating those of West Bank Jordan on June 4, 1967. At the same time, the PLO under Yasser Arafat had made a tactical decision to peacefully engage Israel on the surface, while secretly maintaining a strategy based on the mass murder of Jewish civilians. This clear but unrealistic strategy was based on the assumption that enough "independent" non-PLO, arms-length terror-bombings and shootings would bring Israel to its knees where entire Arab armies had failed. The strategy culminated in "the second intifada" of September 2000 (which was finally militarily liquidated in April 2002), leaving even the notoriously concessionist Clinton (who had invited Arafat to the White House more than any other foreign official) completely empty-handed, and embarrassed.
Therefore, it is arguable that Obama is indeed following the precedent of one (1) US President, Bill Clinton...a precedent which collapsed in blood and chaos.
Bush II
Finally, we have the 2nd Bush Administration. There has already been a lot of discussion about George W. Bush's letter of April 14, 2004, to Ariel Sharon, essentially endorsing the annexation of "already existing major Israeli population centers," which has been studiously ignored by Obama & Co. Secondly, it is important to note that the same letter placed as precedent to any Israel compromises the following conditions for the Palestinians:
Palestinians must undertake an immediate cessation of armed activity and all acts of violence against Israelis anywhere, and all official Palestinian institutions must end incitement against Israel. The Palestinian leadership must act decisively against terror, including sustained, targeted, and effective operations to stop terrorism and dismantle terrorist capabilities and infrastructure. Palestinians must undertake a comprehensive and fundamental political reform that includes a strong parliamentary democracy and an empowered prime minister.
Needless to say, every single one of those conditions have gone wretchedly unfulfilled.
But there's more. Just as the new Turkey/Iran axis requires an entirely new calculation for both Israel and the US, so the 2005 Israeli withdrawal from Gaza (16 months after the Bush letter), which has resulted in a Hamastan-Gaza serving as a missile-firing range requires yet another calculation.
And that's not all: the post-2006 buildup of Lebanon with Iranian missiles (estimated to be at least 60,000) has to result in yet another calculation. And neither of those calculations can result in greater demands of Israel, unless they are in fact blatantly hostile demands.
So, what else can go wrong since 1967? Ohhhhh, I don't know...How 'bout the overthrow of the one neighbor (Mubarak's Egypt) with which Israel had a relatively solid peace treaty, and its replacement with a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated government? Does that development call for greater pressure on and territorial compromise from Israel?
But wait, there's more. I haven't even mentioned Iran's nuclear missile program, and its openly proclaimed plan of genocide against Israel, have I?
And I haven't even mentioned the recent Fatah/Hamas alliance, the prevention of which was the central and explicit objective of the Rabin/Clinton strategy since 1993. (A strategy which had drearily failed, on other grounds, long ago.)
Is there any small country on earth that should face such a crescendo of deadly threats and be pressured to give up its territory? What kind of "friend" would do such a thing? If Hussein Obama had even a trace of sympathy for Israel, he'd be threatening the new Egyptian government every single day that, should they abrogate the Camp David Accords, the United States will materially support Israel's recapture of the Sinai, not to mention cutting off our billions in aid to Egypt.
"Nothing new," says Obama, and his brain-wiped bootlickers like the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg join the chorus. Well, in fact the entire region has had so many new -- and purely hostile -- changes since 1979, that it qualifies as nothing less than malicious madness to pretend that a "let bygones be bygones" approach will lead to more peace, security, and justice.
It is beyond crystal-clear: for Israel to even approximate the 1967 border lines will give such encouragement, high terrain and favorable borders to its bloodthirsty enemies that Neville Chamberlain's work "on behalf of" Czechoslovakia will be re-examined as wildly successful in comparison.
Nothing new? To quote the great Herman Cain: Obama is treating us as if we're stupid. Well, are we?
Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/05/obamas_revisionist_history.html
Philip Averbuck
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
No comments:
Post a Comment