Prof. Ya’akov Peretz Golbert
Source: Israpundit
The Israeli cabinet will be asked to follow Prime Minister Netanyahu down the path of appeasement of America at the expense of Israeli legitimacy, dignity and security. It will not be “just this one time.” This capitulation will be followed, as it always has been, with the demand for more and more capitulations, ever deeper and more dangerous to Israeli security.
Nor is it as if Obama is an aberration that Israel has only to wait out and his administration will be replaced with one firmly in tune with Israeli security. Obama’s policies are not different from those of his predecessors. It is only that he is more abrasive and more openly hateful toward Israel. Condoleezza Rice worked for George Bush, remember, as did Colin Powell. Clinton could not do enough for Arafat and the Palestinian cause but he smiled at us and said nice things the whole time. Who can forget the open hostility of the Bush-Baker team? Israel’s great friend, Reagan, was the one who opened the door to the PLO. Need we talk about Carter? Henry “Let-them-bleed” Kissinger denied Israel its victory in the Yom Kippur War. He worked for Nixon, remember. In fact, the State Department and the whole American foreign policy establishment have been anti-Israel since the Balfour Declaration, as has been amply explained by the late Shmuel Katz, among others. (It is all conveniently compiled and copiously documented
a thttp://www.hirhome.com/israel/hirally.htm.) Each concession to Israel’s enemies weakens Israel and makes it more difficult to stand up to the next demand. Clearly, however, the day will come when Israel will have to say “no” to America. The sooner, the better, even though Israel is extremely isolated at this moment.
Part of the explanation for Israel’s hesitation in taking out the Iranian nuclear threat seems to be the fear that Israel will not be able to survive the resulting diplomatic fall-out. The world will immediately condemn Israel for its “aggression” and even states that fear a nuclear Iran will join in. Sanctions may well be imposed, both diplomatic and economic, and Israel will be utterly isolated. A universal boycott might be imposed. Even collective military action such as was turned against Serbia cannot be ruled out. So goes the fear.
The alternative, however, is a slow death imposed incrementally by means of what is called, in Orwellian deceit, the “peace process,” which is the contemporary equivalent of “Arbeit Macht Frei.” The idea of reliance on the “enlightened nations of the world” to extricate Israel, and indeed the world, from another descent into barbarism and brutality is a vain hope. Europe has decided to surrender and anyway is quite comfortable with the notion that the world is better off without Israel and the Jews. America is currently being led resolutely in the same direction, which anyway was always the orientation of the State Department. Nor is Israel the only country to feel exposed and abandoned by the withdrawal of America power.
(See, e.g., Peter Lee, South Korea reels as US backpedals,
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/LG24Dg01.html).
Israel, however, does not have to accede. Israel is not without alternatives or without recourse. Israel is able to go it alone, against the will of the USA, the “Quartet”, the UN and the Arab League. There are several powerful tools in Israel’s hands.
Israeli military technology. Not many people realize that Israel is the country of innovation in hi-tech munitions and in asymmetrical warfare. Israel is practically in a position to embargo hi-tech weaponry from any country in the world, including the US. The Popeye missile is hardly even the threshold.
Israel’s military technology is very advanced and many of Israel’s technologies and products are unique and superior. The world will not likely boycott them. As the worldwide jihad expands, Israel’s expertise and experience in combating Islamic terror will become a more and more marketable commodity. The non-Islamic world has reason to realize that Israel’s war against Islamic terror is their own war and not colonialist apartheid oppression, as it is portrayed.
Israeli governments seem chronic in their underestimation of the value to the world of Israeli military technology. Israeli electronics took apart the best Soviet made anti-aircraft systems in Syria back in 1967, to the shock of the Soviets. Development of Israeli military technology has accelerated since then. Many of those technologies have been acquired in secret by the United States, in some cases via threats and intimidation.
Likewise, intelligence supplied to the United States by Israel has been invaluable. Yet, to Americans, seeing only billions of dollars of “aid” being given to Israel and not seeing that, in fact, the US gets more than its money’s worth, Israel looks like a beggar at the gate.
On the other side, Israel has come to see itself as a welfare dependent on the American dole. Israel has to insist that acquisition by foreign governments of Israeli arms technology, consultation and training (in urban warfare in Iraq, for example) and other strategic cooperation be done only in public and not secretly. Insisting on legitimacy means refusing to be treated like the “other woman” in order not to offend the Muslim states.
Withstanding international pressures. Israel need not fear international pressure, even boycotts and sanctions. There are too many other countries in positions similar to Israel’s with regard to Moslem minorities and external defense to isolate Israel for long. India, for one, has growing and developing ties with Israel owing in part to the fact that its history of appeasement of its Moslem minority has not bought it peace and security. It has need of technology sharing and joint projects with Israel and that would likely continue despite international sanctions. Long ago, Israel scrapped the jet fighter project, the Lavi, under US pressure and closed Beit Shemesh Engines. But Israel makes its own rocket engines, which function under more extreme conditions than jet aircraft engines. Israel certainly could also make engines for jet aircraft. India is eager for closer cooperation with Israel and making military aircraft in partnership with India alone would create a market large enough to enjoy economies of scale. China and Japan have found collaboration with Israel very productive for other reasons.
An Israel-India Alignment. President Obama, in his arrogance, has hectored not only Israel to surrender to Islamic demands, but also India, whom he told that the reason they do not have peace with Pakistan is because India has not surrendered Kashmir. This he could actually say when Pakistan is in grave danger of being taken over by the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
In fact, Israel and India are natural allies in many ways and complementary to each other in many ways. Their combined resources, brain power, technology and manufacturing capacity would be a formidable combination from the outset. If ties with India were to be pursued with utmost urgency and Israeli foreign policy reoriented immediately to make India the central point, India could replace both the US and Europe in Israel’s foreign and defense policy.
Additional states for such an alignment. There are other states that President Obama has already alienated which could be brought into such a grouping. Colombia, with the assistance of Israeli military advisors, is near to victory against Marxist rebels. They have found that President Obama’s emissaries have been in contact with the rebels, even before he was sworn into office, with a view to actually taking their side. Almost the same story is taking place in Sri Lanka.
Taiwan is another pariah state with which Israel might develop important relations. Israel has a choice between Taiwan and China, of course, but China is not averse to doing deals that are inimical to Israel’s vital interests and, if pushed to decide, Israel might consider whether a permanent relationship with Taiwan might not be more advantageous.
Short term strategic cooperation with India. In the immediate future, Israel and India might do something of utmost importance together, that being the twin threats of Iranian nuclear weapons and Pakistani nuclear weapons. The former directly threatens Israel. The latter directly threatens India, particularly if Pakistan becomes a failed state, which it almost is already. If Israel and India help each other, it might be possible to eliminate both nuclear threats. To fly from India might not bring Israel closer to the Iranian nuclear plants but it would have the advantage of not having to cross airspace under American control. It is not clear to me whether it is necessary at all to use manned aircraft for the purpose when Israel has both ballistic missiles and cruise missiles that could do the job.
Nor is it necessary to destroy the nuclear facilities themselves. The nuclear facilities cannot function without infrastructure. They are useless without electricity and water and raw materials. Israel can certainly cripple Iran’s infrastructure, bomb the Majlis and the mullas and the Presidential Palace and even hunt down the scientists involved in the nuclear project. And the same is true of Pakistan.
Of course, the world would be outraged and might even apply serious sanctions against Israel and India. Both Israel and India could withstand those. It would require considerable economic reorientation and restructuring but it is high time that took place anyway. Both countries would emerge stronger, more independent and more democratic for having done so.
Israel can expect to meet concerted opposition from the world to these measures. Israel can be expected to be condemned, vilified and loathed. Israel can even expect that there might be sanctions imposed. On the other hand, submission and obsequiousness and “goodwill gestures,” “confidence building measures,” territorial concessions, unconditional unilateral withdrawal from southern Lebanon and Gaza and restraint have brought nothing but condemnation, vilification and loathing, deligitimation and calls for Israel’s destruction (meaning genocide) when it defended itself. As long as Israel still exists, more concessions will be demanded of her. In contrast, Israeli and Jewish prestige and acceptance were never higher than following the Six-Day War when the nations feared and respected Israel.
The same is true of India. Who believes that territorial demands on India would cease if India were to relinquish Kashmir? “Mughalistan” is already an objective with a plan to separate the whole of northern India into a continuous Muslim state incorporating everything from Pakistan to the eastern border of India and even a part of the coast of Myanmar.
(See http://factindiablog.wordpress.com/2009/01/04/moghulistan/ )
Nor would demands stop there. India, like Israel, was under Islamic rule for centuries and is, therefore, in Dar al Islam, the domain of Islam and Muslims consider India’s existence illegitimate and an affront to Islam. Anything resembling peace can only be achieved the way Spain and Portugal achieved it for five centuries and that is by being so strong for so long that the Muslims take it off the agenda for the foreseeable future. In the age of global jihad, it will not even come off the agenda but there is nothing to be gained from trying to appease it.
