THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XI, Issue # 36, January 28, 2009
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
EXPLAINING ISRAEL'S STRATEGIC MISTAKES
By Dr. Daniel Pipes
ISRAEL'S GREATEST NEED: ISRAELI POLITICAL LEADERS WHO UNDERSTAND THE
COUNTRY'S STRATEGIC IMPERATIVES
FULL STORY:
In an article earlier this month, "Israel's Strategic Incompetence in Gaza," I made three points: that the Israeli leadership
unilaterally created its current problems in Gaza, that the war against Hamas meant ignoring the much larger threat of
Iranian nuclear weapons, and that the goal of empowering Al-Fatah makes no sense.
These arguments prompted an earful from readers, who made interesting points that deserve answers. Slightly editing
the questions for clarity, I reply to some of them here:
"Your article was a real downer. Do you have any uppers?"
The Middle East is a source of nearly unmitigated bad news these days. Two rare positive developments concern
economics: Israel has finally, thanks for the reforms carried out by Binyamin Netanyahu, weaned itself from the
debilitating socialism of its earlier years; and the price of energy has gone down by over two-thirds.
"Accepting that your opinions are true, the title and tone
of the article can only encourage Israel's enemies. More
careful language would have been more to Israel's
advantage."
I try to offer constructive criticism. Even if Israel's enemies do find encouragement in my less-than-boosterish analysis,
I expect this is more than offset by my helping Israelis realize their errors.
"The enemy of Israel is its traitorous leadership that is
intentionally working to destroy the Jewish state and
bring upon world Jewry another Holocaust. To refuse to
make this clear and to continue to suggest incompetence
is the problem, is to enable the leadership and, thus,
become a traitor oneself."
If one is a traitor to Israel by not seeing its leadership as "intentionally working to destroy the Jewish state, and bring
upon world Jewry another Holocaust," then color me guilty. I see the leadership as incompetent, but not malign, much
less suicidal.
"Here's an exit strategy from Gaza: Israel should lease a
strip of land from Egypt to be used as a buffer zone."
Great idea – except there is zero chance of Cairo agreeing to it.
"Your analysis wrongly deals with Israel as an independent actor, when the U.S. government has a major role
limiting Israeli actions."
I addressed and rejected this point with regard to the Gaza withdrawal at "Sharon's Gaza Withdrawal – Made in
Washington?" but your assertion is broader than Gaza and deserves a full-scale analysis.
My brief reply: The idea that Washington forces bad ideas on an unwilling Jerusalem offers solace, implying, as it does,
that the Israeli leadership knows what to do, but cannot do it; unfortunately, it is out of date.
Yes, from 1973 to 1993, that was indeed the pattern. Since the Oslo accords, however, the Israel leadership has not just
been a willing accomplice of its U.S. counterpart, but has often taken the lead -- e.g., Oslo itself in 1993, the withdrawal
from Lebanon in 2000, the Camp David II meetings in 2000, the Taba negotiations of 2001, and the Gaza withdrawal of
2005.
Aaron Lerner sums up this point in "American Pressure Is Not the Problem," arguing that "Israeli diplomatic initiatives
have been, almost without exception carried out with American approval only ex-post," then providing examples.
"What if the most efficient elements of Israeli society,
the military, were in charge in Israel?"
But the Israeli military has been largely in charge since the fundamental reorientation from deterrence to appeasement
that took place in 1993 – Rabin, Barak, and Sharon dominated the past 16 years, along with many other ex-generals in
the country's public life. In Israel, as around the world, the military tends to absorb the warmed-over Leftisms produced
by civil society.
"This is not the time to look backwards and place blame;
rather it is time to move on and fix the problem."
Assigning responsibility for mistakes is not just a matter of finger-pointing, but crucial if one is not to repeat them.
"What must Israel do now?
In another column this month, "Solving the ‘Palestinian Problem'," I endorsed the Jordan-Egypt option, whereby the
former takes over the West Bank and the latter Gaza.
"You ask, ‘Why did Olmert squander this opportunity
to confront the relatively trivial danger Hamas presents,
rather than the existential threat of Iran's nuclear
program?' The answer lies in the New York Times
article on January 11, ‘U.S. Rejected Aid for Israeli Raid
on Iranian Nuclear Site,' which explains that the U.S.
government prevented Israeli efforts to destroy the
facilities at Natanz."
The analysis at "Israeli Jets vs. Iranian Nukes" suggests that the Israel Defense Force does not require U.S. approval to
cross Iraq or additional U.S. ordnance to strike Iranian targets.
"It is so easy to criticize; do you really think you could
do better? If so, why not go to Israel and enter the
political life there?"
A sports writer need not star on the field before he critique players – and neither must a Middle East analyst climb the
slippery pole of Israeli politics before offering strategic analysis. As for the legitimacy of my offering views while living
in the United States, see "May an American Comment on Israel?"
"What do you think of other alternative plans making the
rounds, both of which call for no Palestinian state to be
established and for Palestinian Arabs to be paid to leave
and resettle in the country of their choosing, other than
Israel. The "Israeli Initiative" is by Knesset member
Benny Elon and the other is from the Jerusalem Summit,
authored by Martin Sherman, a professor at Tel Aviv
University."
I applaud these efforts at creative thinking. The Elon plan resembles my Jordan-Egypt idea, except it focuses exclusively
on Jordan "as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinians" and involves Israeli sovereignty on the West Bank,
something I do not call for. The Jerusalem Summit plan calls for a "generous relocation and resettlement package" for
Palestinians to leave the Israeli-controlled areas; I expect this will find few takers.
"There are real leaders in Israel. To mention just one –
Moshe Feiglin. What about him?"
He brings important ideas to the Israeli debate, but he is not "at the upper echelons of Israel's political life," as I put it in
my article, and so I did not include him in my generalization.
"Where is Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu in all this?
Is he not a hawk who is repelled by the thought of
giving away Israeli land for ANY reason?"
If I voted in Israeli elections, I would vote for him next month. That said, we saw him in action as Prime Minister
between 1996 and 1999 and I judge his tenure a failure (in contrast to his subsequent stint at the Finance Ministry,
which was a success). In particular, I recall his poor performance vis-à-vis Syria (which I uncovered in a 1999
article, "The Road to Damascus: What Netanyahu Almost Gave Away"). Perhaps Netanyahu has matured as a
leader but, the old adage, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me," implies Likud might have
recruited a fresh face.
"Now that General (Ret.) Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon has
entered politics, I believe there is hope for Israel's
future."
Former IDF Chief of General Staff Lt. General Moshe Ya'alon joined the Likud Party in November, 2008.
I admire Ya'alon and hope he will have an important post in the next government. He comes as close as any Israeli
leader to understanding the country's strategic imperatives. For example, when asked for his definition of victory,
Ya'alon replied that it consists of "the very deep internalization by the Palestinians that terrorism and violence will
not defeat us, will not make us fold."
But, when one looks closely at his main analysis, "Israel and the Palestinians: A New Strategy," Ya'alon does not
work to gain such a victory over the Palestinians. Rather, he wants to reform the Palestinian Authority so that it can
better control territory, effect law enforcement, strengthen its judicial authority, acquire a democratic spirit, and
improve the quality of life of its population.
"Economic convalescence, an effective rule of law, and democratization are essential conditions," he writes, "for
the rehabilitation of Palestinian society." He concludes that a reorganization of Palestinian society in accordance
with his ideas "could feasibly serve as the foundation for a future settlement that would realize some of the hopes
that were pinned on the Oslo process." I conclude, therefore, that Ya'alon's goal is not victory, but another attempt
at Oslo-style compromise and resolution.
"What has happened to the Israelis that they
no longer fight smart?"
Good question. I offered one reply a half-year ago:
"The strategically brilliant but economically
deficient early state has been replaced by the
reverse. Yesteryear's spy masterminds, military
geniuses, and political heavyweights have
seemingly gone into high tech, leaving the state
in the hands of corrupt, short-sighted mental
midgets."
But this does not explain the whole situation, which results from a deep mix of fatigue and arrogance. The best
analyses of this problem are by Yoram Hazony, The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel's Soul, and
Kenneth Levin, The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People Under Siege.
"Daniel Pipes should try to defuse tensions between
Israel and the Arab neighbors."
Attempts at defusing tensions have been a central focus since the Kilometer 101 agreement of 1973. They have failed
because they try to finesse a decisive conclusion to the Arab-Israeli conflict. I favor a decisive conclusion, for it
alone will end the conflict.
© Daniel Pipes 2009
Originally Published in Front Page Magazine, January 28, 2009
Republished with the Permission of Daniel Pipes
Reprinted from the Daniel Pipes Mailing List, January 28, 2009
Article URL: http://www.danielpipes.org/article/6154
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Israel & the Arabs -- The Israeli-Arab Conflict
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
Islamism & Jihadism -- Radical Islam & Islamic Terrorism
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
U.S. National Security Strategy
Dr. Daniel Pipes, a Ph.D. in Islamic History (Harvard University, 1978), is the Founder and Director of the Middle East Forum,
the Founder of Campus Watch, a signatory of the Project for the New American Century, a former board member of the U.S.
Institute of Peace, a former adjunct scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a Golden Circle supporter of the
U.S. Committee for a Free Lebanon, a former member of the U.S. Department of Defense Special Task Force on Terrorism and
Technology, and a former lecturer at the U.S. Naval War College, Harvard University, the University of Chicago, and the
University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Pipes was the Director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute from 1986 to 1993.
Author or co-author of eighteen books, Dr. Pipes is a regular columnist for Front Page Magazine, the New York
Sun, and the Jerusalem Post. His analyses of world trends and of forces and developments in the Middle East
have appeared in numerous North American newspapers, including the Washington Post, the New York Times,
and the Wall Street Journal. He frequently appears on American network television, as well as at universities and
think tanks, to discuss the Middle East, Islam, and the Islamist threat to the U.S.A. and the West. He also has appeared on
BBC and Al Jazeera, and has lectured in approximately twenty-five countries.
Dr. Pipes is a Polish-American Jew whose parents fled Poland in 1939, immigrated to the U.S.A., and assimilated well into
American society and culture. His father is Richard Pipes, an American historian specializing in Russian and Soviet history
and serving as Professor of History at Harvard University from 1950 until his retirement in 1996. During the Cold War, the
worldview of Richard Pipes was strongly anti-Soviet and anti-Communist.
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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