Barak Meet Barack…
by Gerald A. Honigman
Oh, I’m sorry…You’ve already met.
I see.
Perhaps that helps explain some things…
Israel’s Defense Minister, the much-decorated war hero, Ehud Barak, came out with a statement a few days ago that was…well…not worthy of him. They were words of a politician depending upon low blows designed to further his own political future–not the mark of a truthful, courageous man. They were also words that neither Israel nor its people needed to hear right now.
In a speech given on Israel’s Memorial Day on May 19th, Barak proclaimed that there was no way forward in negotiations other than to allow for Palestinians to have a state of their own.
“The world is not willing to accept… that Israel will rule another people for decades more…There is no other way, whether you like it or not, than to let them rule themselves.”
Now, who pray tell was he talking to?
Do most Israelis need his wisdom to enlighten them on this issue? Has Israel not bent over backwards, sideways, and forwards to arrive at a fair compromise which would allow for precisely what Barak was chastising its people about?
Think of the words Barak deliberately chose to state to a world that he knew would be quick to pounce. Sure enough, they were headlines all over soon afterwards.
The message…
“When are those oppressive Jews finally going to grant freedom to those poor Arabs?”
Indeed, it’s the same message most of the world hears constantly.
Israel’s own Defense Minister didn’t need to repeat the lie.
So, what’s up?
Not long ago American President Barack Obama held a very amicable meeting with Ehud Barak. Contrast this with his abruptly leaving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to go to dinner with his family so Bibi would have time to reconsider the alleged error of his ways–not prostrating himself and his country enough to the demands of the Obama White House.
Barak is a Labor Party rival of Likud’s Netanyahu.
Recall that Foreign Minister, Kadima’s Tzippi Livni, was a relative favorite of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice not long ago. Rice also liked to scream at Jews–as her successor now Hillary does– who do not “cooperate.” Of course, Tzippi’s boss, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was pliable enough, so it really didn’t make that much difference back then. In 2008, Livni ran a close race against Netanyahu at about the same time America was electing Barack Obama.
The point?
There is no doubt that Barack prefers Barak.
Ehud, the war hero, already yielded Israel’s right to secure, defensible , real borders promised via UNSC Resolution 242 under pressure from President Clinton at Camp David and Taba in 2000.
While Arafat still rejected the deal, Barak’s offer became the starting point for all subsequent “negotiations” from that point forward.
Thus, Israel seemingly agreed to a return to the ’49, U.N.-imposed armistice lines which made it a mere 9-15 miles wide at its strategic waist–where most of its population, capitol, parliament, industry, and so forth are located…a constant temptation to those who would see it dead. As I and others have repeatedly written elsewhere, that was not supposed to happen–and all of the architects of the final draft of 242, former Presidents, and so forth agreed.
Thus, Barak’s caving in on crucial matters of Israel’s security now allows Barack to demand that Israel indeed abandon any hope of a fair territorial compromise.
Barack demands that Israel accept the Saudi “Peace” Plan and has repeatedly stated that Israel would be crazy to reject it. That plan calls for a total return to the ’49 Auschwitz/armistice lines followed by Israel being inundated by allegedly “returning” Arab refugees. After doing this and exposing the necks of its kids again, the Arabs might “normalize” relations…
“Peace” indeed, President Obama…of the grave.
And that’s what the mess regarding Jews building in Jerusalem is all about–not apartment buildings.
It’s about whether Israel gets the territorial buffer promised to it via 242 or doesn’t–and on lands that Jews have historical claims to as well as Arabs.
The issue is not–as Barak shamefully suggested in his Memorial Day speech–that Israel wants to rule Arabs and deny them rights. If he wants to lecture on this topic, tens of millions of native Imazhigen (“Berbers”) in North Africa are being told that they must name their children with Arab names and are not even allowed to speak their own native language. There is similar, blatant subjugation being committed by Arabs against tens of millions of other, non-Arab peoples in the region as well. But, despite this, like the rest of the world’s hypocrites, an either uncourageous, ignorant, and/or politically scheming Barak can only take Israel to task for its alleged crimes.
No, the current nastiness is not about Jews building in Jerusalem–a place they’ve been doing such things for over three millennia now.
Rather, it is all about whether the birth of that Arab 22nd state–and second, not first, one in “Palestine” (Jordan sits on most of the territory)–demands, at the very least, the gross endangerment of the sole, resurrected nation that the Jews finally got to have for themselves.
President Obama’s Gang of Three would like nothing more than to see Netanyahu’s government topple so to get a “more cooperative” Israeli leadership emerge. That’s what Barack’s coziness with Barak is all about.
Ehud caved in once, and Israel wound up in the predicament it’s now in just struggling to get some sanity in its borders and having to fight the most powerful leader in the world over this. It wasn’t always this way. Check out just this one of many articles for starters and see what former American presidents and other leaders had to say about Israel’s future borders:
Now, unless he can stick to his job of defending the country without harming it on the world scene in the process, perhaps it’s time for Barak to return to the kibbutz. His distinguished military career, unfortunately, has been followed by one anything but that considering his recent political maneuvers–unless he’s judged by Israel’s enemies. His Memorial Day remarks only poured more undeserved fuel on the vast anti-Israel fire.