May 18, 2012, 2:33 AM
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Two weeks ago, US Congressman Joe Walsh published an op-ed in the The Washington Times in which he called for the US and Israel to abandon the two-state solution.
After running through the record of Palestinian duplicity, failed governance, terrorism and bad faith, he called for Israel to apply its sovereignty to Judea and Samaria. In his words, Israel should "adopt the only solution that will bring true peace to the Middle East: a single Israeli state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Israel is the only country in the region dedicated to peace and the only power capable of stable, just and democratic government in the region."
The evidence that the two-state paradigm has failed is overwhelming. The Palestinians' decision to reject statehood at Camp David in 2000 and launch a terror war against Israel made clear that they had not abandoned their refusal from 1947 to accept partition of the Land of Israel with the Jews.
So, too, the Palestinians' election of Hamas in the 2006 elections, and their missile war against Israel from Gaza in the aftermath of Israel's complete withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, all made clear that they are not interested in a Palestinian state. Rather, their chief desire is Israel's annihilation.
Consequentially, there is no chance whatsoever that the two state paradigm can work.
Indeed, the fact that there is no Palestinian leader willing to recognize Israel's right to exist makes clear that if a Palestinian state is established in Judea and Samaria - in addition to the de facto Palestinian state in Gaza - that state will be in state of war with Israel. All territory under its control will be used to attack the rump Jewish state.
Given the abject failure of the two-state paradigm, it is abundantly clear that for all the complications that may be associated with the application of Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria, it is a better option for Israel than Israeli surrender of the areas.
Walsh's op-ed is not his first statement of support for Israeli annexation. Last September, ahead of the UN general assembly, Walsh authored Congressional Resolution 394 supporting Israel's right to annex Judea and Samaria in the event that the Palestinians asked the UN to recognize a Palestinian state outside the framework of a peace treaty with Israel. Forty-four other congressmen co-sponsored the resolution.
And this makes sense.
The Palestinians' decision to turn the issue of Palestinian statehood over to the UN constituted a substantive breach of the treaties the PLO signed with Israel. Those agreements stipulated that both sides agreed that their conflict would be solved through negotiations and not through unilateral actions. By ending negotiations with Israel and turning the issue of statehood over to the UN, the Palestinians canceled their treaties with Israel. Consequently, Israel is no longer bound by those accords and is free to take its own unilateral actions, including applying its laws to Judea and Samaria as it did in Jerusalem and the Golan Heights in the past.
FOR HIS unstinting support for Israel, Walsh has been subject to an unbridled assault by leftist American Jews. Ron Kampeas from JTA, for instance, attacked Walsh, accusing him of being no different than Israel's enemies who seek to destroy Israel by ending its ability to define itself as a Jewish state through what they refer to as the "one-state solution."
Kampeas blasted Walsh for suggesting that Palestinians unwilling to live under Israeli rule could move to Jordan which, with its 75-percent Palestinian majority, is effectively the Palestinian state. To back up his condemnation, Kampeas quoted Robert Wright's excoriation of Walsh in The Atlantic.
There Wright wrote, "Offhand, I don't recall a member of Congress in my lifetime saying anything so grotesquely at odds with American ideals about ethnic relations and for that matter basic human rights."
For its part, the Jewish-run anti-Israel lobby J Street is mobilizing its supporters to bring about Walsh's defeat in the November elections by soliciting contributions to his Democratic challenger. J Street executive director Jeremy Ben-Ami wrote that "Walsh's prescription amounts to a call for an end to Israel as the democratic home of the Jewish people."
It is hard to know where to begin a discussion of this assault in which Jewish Americans attacked one of Israel's strongest supporters simply because he had the temerity to recognize reality and call for the US to support an Israeli victory against our enemies who seek our destruction.
First, it is important to consider the claim that Walsh went against the grain of American ideals by suggesting, "Those Palestinians who wish to may leave their Fatah- and Hamas-created slums and move to the original Palestinian state: Jordan. The British Mandate for Palestine created Jordan as the country for the Palestinians. That is the only justification for its creation. Even now, 75% of its population is of Palestinian descent."
The fact of the matter is that the two-state paradigm rests on the assumption that the Palestinian state will be ethnically cleansed of Jews before it is established. Whereas Walsh somehow stands in opposition to American ideals for suggesting that the Palestinians may voluntarily immigrate to Jordan, Kampeas, Ben- Ami and their cohorts have no problem with the concept of a Jew-free Palestine and the forcible expulsion of up to 675,000 Jews from their homes in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem simply because they are Jewish.
Aside from their pernicious hypocrisy and moral blindness, what stands out in their assaults on Walsh is that they cannot tell the difference between Israel's enemies that seek its destruction through the so-called one-state solution, and Israel's friends, who want it to defeat its enemies and live with security and peace. For the likes of Kampeas and Ben-Ami, there is no difference between Walsh and Israel's worst enemies.
PART OF this problem is their apparent unquestioning acceptance of the myth of a demographic time bomb. They seem not to have noticed that the Palestinian claim that by 2015 there will be an Arab majority west of the Jordan River is a complete fabrication.
The truth is that if Israel applied its laws to Judea and Samaria tomorrow and all the Palestinians in those areas received Israeli citizenship, Israel would still retain a two-thirds Jewish majority. Moreover, all the demographic trends for Israel, including increasing birthrates and positive immigration rates, are positive. And all the demographic trends for the Palestinians, including decreasing birthrates and negative immigration rates, are negative. According to Israeli demographic researcher Yoram Ettinger, by 2030, Jewish will likely comprise 80% of the population of Israel, Judea and Samaria.
So Ben-Ami's argument that Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria means the end of Israeli democracy is simply incorrect.
But aside from their hypocrisy and refusal to accept simple arithmetic realities, what stands out most clearly in these leftist American Jews' assault on Walsh is how they have become addicted to the fable of the two-state solution. Their addiction to this fable - that argues that after a century of Palestinian devotion to the annihilation of Israel, the Palestinians are suddenly willing to meet Israel halfway - is what propels these Jewish activists to attack anyone who points out reality. It is what drives them to brand as a foe anyone with the temerity to suggest a better way forward.
The beauty of the two-state fable is that it puts the onus to make peace on Israel's shoulders.
If it is true that the Palestinians want to make peace, then Israel must make peace. And if all the Palestinians require to make peace is for Israel to quit Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem, then that is what Israel must do, together with the 675,000 Jews who live there.
The real tragedy is of course not that the likes of Kampeas and Ben-Ami maintain faith with the fairy tale of Palestinian willingness to live at peace with Israel. The real tragedy is that this myth has been the official policy of the government of Israel for the past 19 years. Since then prime minister Yitzhak Rabin launched the peace process with Yasser Arafat in September 1993, to greater or lesser degrees, every Israeli government has kept faith with the two-state solution lie.
It hasn't mattered that the Palestinians rejected statehood and peace not once, but twice. It hasn't mattered that the Palestinians received Gaza lock, stock and barrel with no strings attached and used the territory to launch an illegal missile war against Israeli civilians. The fact that both Arafat and his supposedly moderate successor Mahmoud Abbas rejected partition and maintained their devotion to Israel's destruction did not stop Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu from bowing to US pressure and embracing this fool's game.
People like Kampeas are the first to bemoan Israel's sorry state in the realm of public diplomacy. They decry Israel's hasbara efforts as pathetic and failed. But what they fail to acknowledge is that it is the two-state trap that makes the construction and execution of an effective public diplomacy strategy impossible.
To maintain faith with this failed policy, Israel's leaders and representatives are not merely required to ignore the history of the past 90 years of Palestinian rejection and aggression.
They are required to ignore current events.
They are forced to ignore not just what happened in 1947, but what happened at 7 o'clock in the morning.
And this brings us back to Rep. Walsh. There may be things to criticize about Walsh's policy argument. For instance, he calls for the conferral of "limited voting power" on the Palestinians under Israeli sovereignty. In truth, there is no reason for them to receive anything but full voting rights.
But you have to be blind to reality to view him as anything other than a friend of Israel.
Happily, not everyone in Israel remains paralyzed. Members of Knesset have launched repeated attempts in recent months to debate legislation calling for Israel to apply its sovereignty over all or parts of Judea and Samaria. Next Wednesday, MK Miri Regev is holding a conference to launch a new Knesset caucus calling for the adoption of this policy.
IN RECENT years, poll after poll has shown that the majority of Israelis do not believe that the two-state paradigm will bring peace or that if a Palestinian state is formed, it will live at peace with Israel.
And yet, because of the choke-hold that Kampeas and Ben-Ami's Israeli counterparts have held over the national discourse, the Israeli people have been given no other option to consider. Rather, we have been told over and over again that giving our enemies a veto over our rights, land and security is the only alternative.
Walsh and the 44 congressmen who co-sponsored his resolution are Israel's friends. We should take heart in their willingness to buck consensus and support us. And we should give careful and responsible consideration to their reasonable and supportive policy recommendations.
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Rep. Joe Walsh sounds like a real mensch and possessed of a rare courage.
'every Israeli government has kept faith with the two-state solution lie.'
Israel has a knack for wasting precious time on her worthless idol which never delivers the promised goods but easily seduces stupid little Israeli politicians of which there is an over abundance.
Eventually Israel will come to the realization that America is not God and their faith will be re-directed away from the impostor to the only One who is able to bring true and lasting peace to Israel and the world.
"assault in which Jewish Americans attacked one of Israel's strongest supporters" - This goes way back in history. Renegade Jews always viciously attacked those true to the faith or national identity, including philo-Semitic gentiles. Marranos did everything to destroy the few Jews still remaining in Spain and Portugal, while those German Jews standing up to Hitler between the mid-1920s and mid-'30s were accused by their brethren of provoking Hitler and of being responsible for the Nazi anti-Semitism and persecution of the race.
Actually they would demand the expulsion of more than 675,000 Jews, as their (first step) would be everything captured in the Six Day War, including several enormous Jerusalem neighborhoods. But that's ok. Next step is the rest of the country, so the numbers all ultimately add up to 7 million.
Well Caroline,
Congressman Walsh certainly gave you a nice fat target to hide behind and utilize to make your own case for enfranchising a greater Israel. I have never considered the Prime Minister of Israel as a victim of US policy pronouncements. Netanyahu and the others that went before him whether their politics was on the left or right all have demonstrated that they express their own minds. Two States may not be easy and as always there is enough truth in what you say to point out just how hard it will be. But that doesn't deny the importance of negotiating a positive agreement that will retain the major settlement blocks, guarantee security and provide a huge majority of both peoples with the ability to live in freedom and peace.
G-d bless Joe Walsh for daring to speak out against the mainstream and G-d bless you Caroline for your courage and astuteness in presenting the true facts. You and your supporters are constantly facing an uphill battle against the libelous Left (including Jews) who incredibly believe their own hype about peace being a "two state" solution. It is past time for change within the Israeli government. We are the masters of our own destiny and are beholden to no one except G-d. Shabbat shalom.
The freedom loving peoples in the Middle East are best of to have Gaza, West Bank shifted to Israel. The people in these areas are politically held hostage by fascist Hamas. If the Egyptian Brotherhood where to interfere than Israel is obliged to the Free World to hold the Sinai this time. Russia is exploiting the hot mic incident skipping the G8 meeting preemptively compensating the eminent US Iran stalemate. On the Camp David meeting msr. Hollande will stick to quit Afghanistan but welcomed for his US style quantitative easing monetary policy basically blowing up the Euro zone which will lead to new relations with the islamic world all in the bigger scope if Romney gets elected. It is scary that people like Bono can make 1.5 billion with Facebook while the world is suffering under the liberal elites in power today. This notwithstanding that the islamic world will go behind an Iron Curtain and the Western world will become islam-oil independent and the fundamentalism will expand.
As an American Jew it is nice to know we have a few friends here , and Mr. Walsh speaks the truth Now the question is not whether the US congress will agree, for even if they will, there is not much they can do, when Obama is president , as he makes foreign policy, not the Congress.
I am more concerned with the government in power- who still hold to a 2 state solution. In the past few months Bibi has made very bold moves that have weakened Yesha, and ultimately all of Israel, and world jewry s for that matter. He has turn down the legislation to limit the Courts of their crushing power which is destabilizing Israel. He also turned down legislation to stop the funding of NGOs which are a fifth column. Then earlier in the week is Regev bill to legalize all of the outposts In Judea and Samaria was turned town. Now he has not only made a bed with Mofaz, but he wants to consolidate his power by bringing Kadima members into the Likud, which would also break Kadima. Such a move would strengthen and give Bibi virtually complete control.
What deals were made with MOFAZ, what controls has he been given, does anyone even know. And suppose one evening when Israel slumbers there is another secret “coup” and Israel wakes up to seeing a peace deal with the PA. and 300,000 Jews plus 200,000 Jews in E. Jerusalem to be given their vacating orders???
What dear sweet Rep. Walsh does not understand is that Israel is not a democracy, because those who are in power were not elected.
Jews can no longer rely on the US for much anymore, and even if we could, the root of the problem is inside Israel itself.
It is much easier to take over by lowering the drawbridge from inside the castle, then having to attack from outside the gates.
Israpundit » Blog Archive » Let us embrace our friends
deborah Lurya
"In truth, there is no reason for them to receive anything but full voting rights." In saying that, Carolyn, you recognize the crux of the problem with a one-state solution, whether it is the one proposed and promoted by enemies of Israel (elements within the PA and its supporters), or the one being proposed by Rep. Walsh. How does Israel retain _both_ its Jewish character and values, and its status as a fully democratic, egalitarian state with an ethnically diverse population? You say that fears of a "demographic time bomb" are overblown, but what if they are not? Or, what if the demographics of a united state change to favor the Arabs in coming decades? What then?
Even if Jews continue to prevail demographically in this hypothetical single state united under Israeli sovereignty, and even if some of the current Arab residents want to leave and go to Jordan or elsewhere, what becomes of those who want to stay? Full citizenship, you say. And what if some of those who want to stay are terrorists, still bent upon Israel's destruction? In a united single state, does Israel tear down the border security fence that now sets off Judea and Samaria from lands west of the Green Line? Does Israel ease all restrictions on travel for its newly enfranchised Arab citizens resident in areas east of the Green Line? Does Israel open all areas to settlement by any citizen, including Judean or Shomroni Arabs who might want to move into Ma'ale Adumim or Talpiot or for that matter, Jaffa or Haifa? And if those restrictions which once grated on the Arab residents of Judea and Samaria are eased, will terror cease, or will Israel have just made it that much easier for terrorists to infiltrate Jewish neighborhoods and wreak havoc there?
Or would all those security-based restrictions remain, long after the people they affected were due to be given full citizenship rights, finally giving truth to the current slander that Israel is an "apartheid" state?
I don't know the answers to those questions, but I don't think either you or Rep. Walsh has fully considered them. And I _do_ think that the "leftist American Jews" you excoriate _have_ brought those serious issues into the equation and realize they are not even close to being answered by Rep. Walsh's facile "one state solution."
I don't disagree with you about the PA's unwillingness to recognize Israel's right to exist and its continuing campaign for Israel's destruction and Jew-hatred, nor can I quibble with the fact that Jordan was carved out of the Mandate territory by Britain and is overwhelmingly Palestinian in population. Nor do I want to see a "solution" that would once again require a Judenrein ethnic cleansing of the territory of a future Palestinian sovereign state in Judea and Samaria -- Jews should have the right to live there, or anywhere, if they want, and I deplore world media and opinionmakers for failing to make more of that issue to condemn the racist Jew-hatred of the PA. But none of those points are relevant to what would happen if, chas v'shalom, Rep. Walsh's vision came to be.
Everyone knows that the status quo is unstable and not a long-term solution; but it will have to do, and we will have to keep playing the game, for centuries if need be, until the Palestinian people finally grow up and agree to co-exist peacefully with Israel and with those Jews who choose to remain in Shomron or Judea even after their homes become part of a new Palestinian state. And only then can Israel allow such a state to be brought into being.
People such as Thomas Friedman and Ehud Olmert always use the threat of a one-state solution to blackmail Israel into playing the part of 1938 Czechoslovakia.
Finally, a more determined push in the Knesset to get legislation in place to claim the land of Israel for Israel. Wary, however, of the tendency of Netanyahu (and those who have his ear) to block said legislation at the gate. The push needs to be resolute and dogged in its efforts to nip at the heels of Israel's leadership until it steers those at the helm in a direction that they don't seem to want to go in.
If we are going to expose the two-state solution lie, then we need expose some other lies that go along with it.
Israelis seem to think that their only choices are either a state of ‘Palestine’ without any Jews or that the muslims need to be integrated into Israeli society. Why think so small? Muslims are not going to become nonviolent, no matter what you give them. Giving them a state or giving them Israeli citizenship will not suddenly make them peaceful because they do not want to be peaceful. Gaza made that painfully clear.
Israel has allowed the muslim leaders to agitate for years and all this indoctrination cannot be suddenly turned off. Michael raises some valid points, namely that the muslim problem is not going to go away when Israel annexes Judea and Samaria.
The only solution is to kick the muslims out lock, stock and barrel. Rather than having Israel deal with thorny, difficult problems for the foreseeable future, just eliminate the problem in its entirety. Think of how many Jewish lives would be saved.
France kicked out the Roma Gypsies, the liberals screamed bloody murder, but they could not keep the momentum up when it became a fait accompli. And so it will go with the muslims and their supporters. When they are gone, and no longer have access to a thousand microphones, no longer can get free publicity, can no longer can agitate, can no longer be used as a weapon to bludgeon Israel over the head, the liberals will move on and find another pet project. The foreign NGO’s will no longer have a cause to push and the whole muslim issue would become yesterday’s news.
The Saudi’s will not even let Jews off an airplane in their country. Why not take a page from their book? It would not make us evil, just practical. They do not want us subverting them, we do not want them subverting us.
The truth is, this is not just s solution for Israel, but should be done in every free country. The muslims was shariah law, let them go to countries that practices it. Those that want freedom and democracy should not have to fight a continuous low level war over such basic principles. A war, I might add, that we are all losing.
We need to get on with our lives and the muslims should get on with theirs. What has been proven countless times is that we cannot do it together.
Long Live America, Long Live Israel
True enough, however, Israel is faking it on so many planes and in essense, just bought time. It has put off what it should have never put off for one day, it's vital interests.
I remember being very perturbed at Begin's decision to withdraw Israelis from Yamit and give to Egypt the final third of the Sinai. I felt it was obvious, Egypt would reneg. Oslo was even more obvious. Rabin appeared to be a sputtering drunk under some hypnotic trance promulgated by the manchurian, Peres.I would'nt trust either of these guys to park my auto.
The entire transaction to withdraw Israelis from Gaza was another example. Both Ya'alon and Netanyahu played along with Sharon for long enough to give Sharon his way, despite their last minute defections. There was no mechanism to re-evaluate the withdrawal in the final months, weeks and days when it was obvious what would happen. How can these leaders and the gov't be so bloody incompetant and arrogant.
Caroline, I know you can not answer everything the say about your articles, but why don't you answer this Pressman rebuttal of your article?http://mideastmatrix.wordpress.com/2012/05/18/that-is-not-what-happened/
I think it will help everybody when in need to confront similar opinions, quite frequent in any case.
CBG responds: Because his allegations are ridiculous, have been repeatedly proven wrong. Just because he repeated the same old nonsense doesn't mean I have to refute his contentions.
great comments, as usual. wonder of there's any way we can give congressman walsh the 'thumbs-up' just to let him know j-street does not speak for all jews.
The erudite and nonpareil Caroline Glick always imparts and expresses the compelling truth !
Brien Comerford