It's Annexation Time. (Middle East and Terrorism)

Saturday, January 23, 2010
by Michael Freund

Flu season may be upon us, but it appears that Mahmoud Abbas has come down with a far more serious ailment. Based on his peculiar behavior of late, the Palestinian leader is clearly suffering from political schizophrenia.

Just a few weeks after threatening to resign from his post as chairman of the Palestinian Authority, Abbas has now indicated that he intends to pursue a unilateral declaration of statehood.

"The Palestinian leadership calls on the world to support this step," said chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat on Monday, as Abbas left for Egypt before heading off on a tour of South America to drum up international backing for the move.

And so, the man who barely a month ago was ready to throw in the towel has now decided to throw down the gauntlet. First he vows to sail off into retirement, and then he tries to crown himself president of an independent state, in the process tossing aside any chance of a negotiated peace.

Abbas's volatile and unstable behavior should put to rest once and for all the notion that he is a viable partner with whom Israel can reach a lasting agreement. Despite being 74 years old, he still hasn't decided what he wants to be when he grows up, let alone figured out where he is going.

But the chairman's volatility is more than just a quirky personality issue or an unruly psychological phenomenon. It is a potent and dangerous reminder of the ease with which the Palestinians can generate international pressure on Israel in an attempt to squeeze out further concessions.

Indeed, the Palestinian leader's zigzag has had the effect of casting the spotlight sharply on the contentious issue of the fate of Judea and Samaria. If Abbas succeeds in winning United Nations recognition of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, it will further upgrade the perceived illegality of the settlements to an entirely new level in the eyes of the world.

Furthermore, it will mark the end of the peace process as we know it, which has been predicated on the basic assumption that the two sides would negotiate the final outcome with each other rather than predetermine it.

Abbas's attempt to vault towards statehood on his own, with utter disregard for Israel and its position, is a sure enough sign that he wishes to bury any chance of returning to talks.

For far too long, Israel has been overly vulnerable to such machinations and games. By leaving the status of Judea and Samaria open for discussion, the Jewish state has given the Palestinians too much leeway for mischief-making and malice, which they have only been more than happy to exploit.

In light of Abbas's latest charade, it is clear that Israel needs to put an end to this farce, once and for all.

We need to send a clear message to our foes, one that will put them on the defensive and strengthen Israel's hand. And there is no better place to start than with our own unilateral measures, chief among them the annexation of all the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.


OVER THE past 16 years, nothing has been gained by keeping the settlements issue on the table. Nor has dangling the possibility of expelling masses of Jews from their homes along the lines of Gush Katif brought the Palestinians any closer to making a deal.

Instead, it has only served to whet the Palestinian appetite for more land, and subjected hundreds of thousands of Israelis to intolerable uncertainty regarding their future.

Hence, Israel should move ahead with steps to formally and legally incorporate all of the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria into the Jewish state. This will serve as a tangible and reasonable response to the Palestinian attempts to circumvent the bilateral negotiating process.

More importantly, it will at last delineate the Israeli stance on the final disposition of these communities. This will effectively close off the troublesome debate within Israeli society over the future of the settlements, which has bred so much division and disunity, and ultimately enable us to present a more unified stance vis-à-vis the rest of the world.

In recent days, a number of leading Israeli politicians have thankfully begun to voice such proposals. The talented and articulate environment minister, Gilad Erdan of the Likud, told Israel Radio on Tuesday that if the Palestinians adopt a unilateral stance, then Israel should also consider "passing a law to annex some of the settlements."

Likewise, Likud MK Danny Danon called for annexing all of Judea and Samaria with the exception of the Arab-inhabited cities.

Of course, annexation should not merely be viewed as a tit-for-tat response to unilateral Palestinian moves, for that casts it in a negative light, presenting it as merely a punitive or retaliatory measure.

In reality, annexation is justified for the simple reason that this land belongs to us, and to nobody else. The act of asserting Israeli sovereignty over the Jewish communities of Judea and Samaria would mark the closing of a historic circle, reviving our formal dominion over these areas after an interlude of nearly 2,000 years.

These areas are ours by Divine right, and we should not shy away from asserting as much. The Palestinians do not hesitate to invoke their beliefs, so why on earth should we? Just think how refreshing it would be to hear an Israeli leader stand up and declare this most elementary of truths to the world: that the Land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel because the God of Israel said so.

Who knows - maybe if we finally stand on principle and start affirming our faith, then perhaps we will at last begin to earn the respect and support that we so rightly deserve.


Michael Freund writes the Fundamentally Freund column for the Jerusalem Post. He served as deputy director of communications & policy planning in the Israeli Prime Minister's Office under Benjamin Netanyahu from 1996 to 1999. He is founder and chairman of Shavei Israel (www.shavei.org), which reaches out and assists "lost Jews" seeking to return to the Jewish people.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Egyptian Chutzpah...(Building the wall!)

by Herbert I. London

How do you spell chutzpah in Arabic? The Egyptian government has railed against Israel for erecting a security fence in the West Bank for years, protesting, its construction in the United Nations and every other international body, and usually employing the phrase “apartheid wall.”

But now, mirabile dictu, Egypt is building a wall of its own along the border of the Gaza Strip -- and, as one might guess, will not entertain any criticism of this project.

The Israeli barrier was built to prevent suicide bombing and other terrorist activities against Israelis; by contrast, the Egyptian fence is designed to stop Palestinians living in Gaza from entering Egypt.

One might well ask why President Hosni Mubarak would want to keep his Arab brothers locked inside the poverty-stricken area of Gaza, among the most congested places on the globe.

He contends, with some legitimacy, that Hamas’s presence in Gaza could be a destabilizing factor in Egypt if the border were porous. Yet Hamas poses a threat to Israel even more formidable than its threat to Egypt. The stated Hamas goal is “Liberate Palestine,” not “Occupy Egypt.” Moreover, if Hamas were an existential threat to Egypt’s national security, why has Mubarak been negotiating with Hamas leaders for years, and why has he been at the center of talks over reconciliation with Fatah?

In fact, by keeping the border crossing into Egypt closed, Mubarak is sending the Palestinians to Israel for help. In the Byzantine world of Middle East politics Arab leaders want the Gaza Strip to remain exclusively an Israeli problem.

The irony, of course, is that the millions of dollars required to build the new fence could have been employed to build hospitals, schools and housing. Palestinians crossing the border generally do so in search of employment or to be reunited with families residing in Egypt. At the moment even medical and humanitarian aid cannot get through the Rafah border crossing and human rights activists are invariably stopped at the border as well.

Recognizing the potential embarrassment of this security fence, Egyptian leaders denied its existence, until photographs made such denials laughable. The Egyptian fence is actually a ten kilometer underground metal barrier that will cost approximately $500 million. Whether it turns out to be a real barrier remains to be seen. Palestinians involved in the smuggling of contraband material are extremely adept at bypassing barriers. If anything, the Egyptian wall will probably escalate tensions in Gaza: it is the cap on a boiling pot of soup.

Palestinians in this tiny strip of land suffer from Hamas terrorism, lack of jobs, lack of basic facilities, congestion, and a host of corrupt and misguided leaders. Nonetheless, Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas has defended Egypt’s right to build a separation wall. Irony of ironies: this is the same Abbas who condemned Israel’s “Apartheid Wall” and urged the international community to tear it down.

In the Middle East, lies are verbal instruments to manipulate opinion.

And as this event on the Gaza border suggests, this time oppression is not a matter of Israelis against Palestinians, but Arabs against Palestinians.

The next time an Arab ambassador rises at the United Nations to criticize Israel, he should be reminded of the manifold ways Arabs contain, constrain and exploit fellow Arabs. If the term “apartheid” is used as a condemnation of Israel, it should be hurled back at Egyptians who sanctimoniously - and hypocritically -- engage in the very actions they once condemned.

Herbert I. London

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Another Peace Process in Our Time.

by Rick Richman

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas — currently in the 60th month of his 48-month term, a declared non-candidate for re-election (in the event there is ever another Palestinian election), presently governing only half of the putative Palestinian state — has told Haaretz that a peace agreement could be reached within six months if Israel will make more pre-negotiation concessions.

Peace could be reached not only in our time but with four full months left over to complete Netanyahu’s 10-month settlement freeze. Abbas will hold the football himself.

Not even those on the Left in Israel believe in this process any more. Ari Shavit, writing in today’s Haaretz, notes that:

There’s one small problem: Similar things were said to us when the Beilin-Abbas agreement was formulated in 1995. Similar things were said to us on the eve of Camp David 2000. Similar things were promised us when the Geneva Initiative was signed in 2003. Similar things were promised us when Israel went to Annapolis in 2007.

Six months is in fact exactly what Abbas promised at the beginning of the Annapolis Process in 2007, only to reject still another Israeli offer of a state 12 months later.

Shavit encapsulates in a single paragraph the reason there is currently no prospect of peace, with or without additional Israeli concessions, made before or after negotiations begin:

With Hamas controlling the Gaza Strip, arming itself to the teeth and enjoying the support of about one-third of the Palestinians, it has the right to veto any diplomatic progress. With Fatah unwilling to recognize the Jewish nation-state and objecting to a demilitarized Palestinian state, there is no chance for a peace treaty.

Perhaps one day there will be another Palestinian presidential election, with a candidate campaigning on a platform calling for recognition of a Jewish state and acceptance of a demilitarized Palestinian one. Perhaps one day the Palestinians will elect such a person. But today there is no such candidate, nor even another scheduled election. The Palestinian peace movement consists of recycled interviews with Haaretz.

Rick Richman

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

US provides Massive Foreign Assistance to Her Enemies

September 5, 2009

by D. L. Gary-Pandol, Strategic Solutions for a new Middle East

Did you know that there has never been a time in American history that a president has chosen to sign into law, legislation that contributes $960 million in foreign assistance to the enemies of the United States, within a 12 month period, and at a time of deep economic crisis?

The first public announcement came on July 24, when Secretary of State Clinton, declared she wanted to “personally announce the delivery of $200 million” for the budget needs of the Palestinian Authority, (PA), under the present leadership of Mahmoud Abbas. By directing these contributions to the PA, the President may be in direct contravention of the 2009 Omnibus Appropriations Act, (P.L. 111-8), Sec. 7039, (b) and (c).

Section 7039 (b) of the federal statute prohibits the funding and economic support of any “individual, private, or government entity, or educational institution . . . [that] advocates, plans, sponsors, engages in, or has engaged in, terrorist activity . . . .” Furthermore, Section 7039, (c) (1) notes, that funds cannot be granted to the West Bank and Gaza that “. . . may be made available for the purpose of recognizing or otherwise honoring individuals who commit, or have committed acts of terrorism.”

To circumvent these important stipulations in Sec. 7039, in a Whitehouse memorandum, Presidential Determination, No. 2009-23, Obama signed a waiver of restriction on providing funds to the Palestinian Authority stating it was in the national security interests of the United States to do so. Is funding groups like the PA in the national security interests of the American people?

Just what is the Palestinian Authority and who is Mahmoud Abbas? The PA is the political offshoot of the Palestine Liberation Organization, (PLO), a terrorist group, known to have murdered several Americans and Israelis and has a history of working with and supporting other radical organizations. Mahmoud Abbas has been the Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization since November 11, 2004, following the death of Yasser Arafat. In their early years, Abbas and Arafat were active inside Egypt with the Muslim Brotherhood until Egypt expelled both men in 1950. The Muslim Brotherhood, a radical Islamic terrorist group, even by Egypt’s standards, has been around since the early part of the last century and considered a forerunner of HAMAS, the Islamic Resistance Movement, and another major Palestinian terrorist organization that now controls Gaza following Israel’s disengagement from the area.

Yasser Arafat, referred to as the Father of modern terrorism, soon founded Fatah, also a terrorist organization, and in 1961, recruited Abbas into its ranks. During the late 1950s, early1960s, many wealthy Palestinians were enlisted into the movement from several Persian Gulf countries including Qatar and Kuwait and it was later suggested that Abbas provided the funding for the Munich Massacre in which 11 innocent Israeli athletes were murdered at the Olympic Games in Munich, Germany in 1972. Later on 23 November 2008, the PLO’s Central Council chose Mahmoud Abbas as their President. He ran on the Fatah ticket and he remains the PA President, Chairman and Fatah chief. On a personal note, Abbas chose to name one of his three sons after Yasser Arafat, a man who stood for the use of terror over the course of a lifetime.

Both within the PA and the PLO, Fatah remains the largest Palestinian political and military faction and espouses a leftist, socialist agenda, maintaining a number of terrorist groups such as Force 17, Black September, Fatah Hawks, Tanzim, and Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades. While doing research for this piece there was another Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade attack, Wednesday, August 12th in Binyamin, Israel. While Abbas has stated publicly that the group had been disbanded, the group in fact remains actively engaged. Moreover, at Fatah’s Conference in August, Fatah reaffirmed its endorsement of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade and announced that it would serve as Fatah’s military wing.

On the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations prior to 1989 and designated a terrorist group under Israeli law, Fatah decided to publicly renounce terrorism in 1988. Fatah was subsequently removed from the State Department’s list, but never ended calls for violence nor did they stop terrorizing Israeli citizens. Their strategies and objectives have remained unchanged. For example, this summer, during the PA’s Fatah General Conference, Fatah’s internal charter, Section 17 was left unabridged. It states: “Popular armed revolution is the imperative and the only way to liberate Palestine.” [See Middle East Media Research Institute, Inquiry and Analysis, No. 541, August 13, 2009, at memri@memri.org., for an in-depth examination of Conference results].

Furthermore, both the print and electronic media have been and continue to be under the control of the Palestinian Authority. Their themes remain the same i.e., for all Palestinians to initiate “violence and terror” as it is “capable” . . . that the goal of the Palestinians has never been peace, rather “. . . peace is a means; the goal is Palestine,” the total elimination of a Jewish state in Israel. For extensive coverage of PA television programming and interviews of PA and Fatah officials, other news publications and broadcasts, please see Palestinian Media Watch at www.pmw.org.il.

The Palestinian Authority, the ruling entity over Palestinians living in Judea and Samaria, (the West Bank), has named schools, street names, city squares, soccer fields and even soccer tournaments after terrorists to honor and glorify their deeds. Even through television programming, special broadcasts air to venerate terrorism. In March of 2009, there was a “television special” to celebrate a terror attack and pay tribute to Mughrabi, a terrorist who murdered 37 people. The broadcast referred to Mughrabi as a “hero”. [www.pmw.org.il/Bulletins_May2009.htm].

So while the United States government continues to fund the Palestinians, one of the largest per capita recipients of foreign aid worldwide, the American people must challenge the U.S. government with the question? Has this massive welfare system of huge cash donations or incentives, stopped terrorism against Jews and Americans around the world over the last 60+ years? No, indeed!

Next question: Then why does Washington embrace a foreign policy approach that provides massive amounts of foreign aid to the Palestinians and in particular, the PA, in the belief that this will bring stability between the West and the Islamic world? Answer: The conventional wisdom in Washington from the “experts” purports that vast sums of money will buy influence and thus, modify and moderate behavior.

However, contributions have never stabilized and/or moderated Palestinian behavior. The PA together with Palestinian terrorist groups continue their strategies unabated and with widespread support from the local population. Moreover, Palestinians still manage to cling ideologically to America’s enemies such as North Korea, Chavez’s Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, Syria, and Hezbollah.[info@pmw.org.il]

What the Whitehouse and Congress have not been telling the American people is that the PA/Fatah and the PLO have not been representative governing bodies, but corrupt, political and military machines that continue to work with militant forces using terrorism to achieve their goals and silence their opposition.

Perhaps now is a good time to open an investigation into the merits of President Obama’s Presidential Determination No. 2009-23 indicating that support for the PA is in the national security interests of the United States?

Consider the historical record as well. After conducting research at the National Archives, records indicated that during the first quarter of the last century monies had been solicited by Muslim Arabs who came to live in an area the League of Nations called Palestine under the British Mandate. Likewise, donations poured in from around the Muslim Arab world, years before the rebirth of Israel in 1948. Donations to the Muslim Arabs with the new “Palestinian” identity and passport were needed to wage a war of terror against the non-Muslim, Jewish population, a people who had lived there since time immemorial. How extraordinary that a century later contributions still go to the Palestinian movement and into the coffers of militants who still terrorize the Jewish people.

In summary, many Israelis believe that they will remain in a state of war, a war of attrition waged by the Palestinians, as the Obama administration and this Congress fund terror groups through governing entities like the PA.

The incitement to hate and kill Jews and Christians continues among the Palestinian people and their leadership, the PA and Fatah. The electronic and print media, schools and mosques, summer camps for children, in point of fact, every aspect of the life of a Palestinian is socialized to hate Israel, the Jews, and the American people. (Recall the scenes of street celebrations as the Palestinians danced and passed out candy to celebrate the deaths of over 3,000 people on 9/11).

Does the American taxpayer want their dollars spent on Palestinians and the terrorist groups they continue to support and maintain? Are the national security interests of the United States and Israel served by prolonging a massive welfare system for people that remain committed to war against the West?

In reality, no nation can purchase stability and peace with a people brought up in an environment of hate and determined to wage war and destruction.

It is a time for action. According to the Congressional Research Service, Congress is currently considering FY2010 appropriations legislation (H.R. 3081 and S. 1434). These bills will give an additional $500 million in assistance to the Palestinians.

Let your United States’ Representatives and Senators know your views. And email the President at President@Whitehouse.com.

Note: I have quoted on USA TODAY comments from this article on numerous occasions! I have posted this article on my profile page of USA TODAY! It is the best demonstration and example of President Obama's intentions towards both Israel and for the Palestinians. The liberals usually go silent when this information is posted - they are simply unaware of how dangerous Obama's foreign policies and aid to our enemies is to the United States and our ally, Israel. BeeSting