2010 Complete Election Coverage: Israeli, Palestinian leaders anxious

No to Normalization

September 20, 2009

http://www.dundeesblog.blog...

In an op-ed in The New York Times (9/13/09) entitled "Land First, Then Peace," Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal explains well the Arab position on the Israeli occupation. This position is based on justice and fairness.

Since 1967, Israel has illegally occupied Palestine and parts of Syria and Lebanon. The occupations and colonization (settlements) are in violation of international law, UN Security Council Resolutions and the Geneva Convention. For this reason, numerous nations do not recognize Israel, and for that matter, neither does Hamas. Hamas has been criticized for this, but it is important to note that Israel's ruling Likud Party Charter expressly opposes a Palestinian State in Palestine.

The Saudi prince writes, "The Arab world, in the form of the Arab peace initiative that was endorsed by 22 countries in 2002, has offered Israel peace and normalization in return for Israeli withdrawal from all Arab territories including East Jerusalem---with the refugee issue to be solved later through mutual consent."

This Arab plan is exceedingly generous since Israel gets 78% of Palestine, whereas the original 1947 UN partition divided Palestine roughly equally into a Jewish state and an Arab state, with Jerusalem left as an international city since it is holy to three religions. Palestinian President Arafat accepted this Arab peace initiative in in 2002, but the Israelis prefer continuous occupation out of greed for Palestinian land, water resources, etc. as the Jewish settlements keep growing and metastasizing.

The Israelis of course want creeping normalization without ever having to give up any land, and thus the Arab states are being pressured to make concessions. The prince is correct to just say no.

This war is older than the US, Older than England, France, geeee, it is 5,000 years old= If The Hebrew and The Philestines can't fish together by now, then The Whole World Should Just Wash Our Hands Of Their Stubborn Leaders!

Israel has some nerve, if they want to get rid of our help, then let it be so.... fight alone.....

mvpeach10: Sep. 22, 2009 - 9:39 AM EST

what would we expect our leadership to do if Mexico were lobbing rockets into our residential neighborhoods on a daily basis?

Israel illegally occupies Palestine and parts of Syria and Lebanon in violation of international law and UN Security Council Resolutions. We do not illegally occupy Mexico in violation of international law and UN Security Council Resolutions. If we did, they would no doubt respond with rockets. After the Nazi occupations of World War II, the UN was established to prevent such land grabs. The days of occupation and colonization are over.

mvpeach10: Sep. 22, 2009 - 9:39 AM EST

if you want to live in peace but the leader of a super power is demanding that you give up everything you have and in part acquired after being attacked by all of these surrounding enemies who lost the war against you, would you comply?

The occupied territories were acquired after Israel started the 1967 war. Israel was not attacked. This is another lie.

And, as UN Security Council Resolution 242 states, the acquisition of territory by war is inadmissible. This resolution calls for Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories. And the settlements are in violation of the Geneva Convention.

And if Israel wants to live in peace, the Arab League has had a peace plan on the table since 2002. Where is Israel's?

mvpeach10: Sep. 22, 2009 - 9:39 AM EST

yet you know someone with enormous power is pressuring you to grow weaker

Everyone with any sense realizes that Israel would only grow stronger if it were at peace with the Arab/Muslim world.

mvpeach10: Sep. 22, 2009 - 11:22 AM EST

The land you refer to became part of Israel after all the unprovoked attacks against them

You are the ignorant one. Israel started the 1967 war. The land grab was due to that. The UN Security Council Resolution 242 calling for Israel's withdrawal was issued in 1967.

Bill Clinton spoke at Hunter College in New York on Tuesday, challenging President Bush to send American troops as part of an international peacekeeping force to the Middle East. What many Americans don’t know is that U.S. forces might as well be there already.

From 1990 to 2000 U.S. military aid to Israel totaled over $18 billion. No other nation in the world has such a close relationship with the U.S. military and arms industry.

The UN, Amnesty International and other groups have raised questions about the extent the to which U.S. military aid is abetting human rights abuses by Israeli forces operating in the West Bank. These debates will no doubt continue for some time. In the mean time, however, there is another aspect of the American-Israeli relationship that may have an even greater impact on U.S. and Israeli security in the long run: the ongoing transfer of American arms technology from Israel to potential U.S. (and Israeli) adversaries around the globe.

From the most sophisticated warplanes to tank engines, artillery systems and armored vehicles, the United States is Israel's one-stop shopping center. Last year alone the U.S. sold one hundred top-of-the-line F-16s to Israel for a total of over $3 billion. That same year Israel purchased 9 of the newest Apache helicopter version equipped with the Longbow Radar system. The helicopter-buying spree didn't end with the Apaches. Israel bought fifteen Cobra attack helicopters last year along with twenty-four Black Hawk transport helicopters.

Besides selling aircraft, the United States is also Israel's preferred vendor for missiles. Although Israel has designed its own version of the U.S. air-to-air AIM9 sidewinder missile, the Python 3, it still relies on the U.S. for its ground attack technology. Two years ago Lockheed Martin sold Israel approximately 80 AGM-142D Popeye air-to-surface missiles. Israel also buys the AGM65 Maverick air-to-surface missile produced by Hughes and Raytheon.

In addition, the U.S. sells Israel the engines for its "indigenous" Merkava main battle tank. In 1999 Israel purchased 400 power packs for their Merkava fleet. The Merkava was developed by Israel so that it wouldn't have to rely on "fickle" countries like Britain, France or Russia when it was in the midst of a conflict.

Transactions between the U.S. and Israel are not necessarily worrisome by themselves; after all, as Israel has proved, there are a host of countries willing to sell the weapons it needs. Currently, Germany is Israel's source for submarines, and if Israel really needed fighters, Russia is always looking to make a buck and always seems to have a surfeit of aircraft and other excess defense articles.

The real danger comes in Israel's habit of reverse engineering U.S. technology and selling to nations hostile to U.S. interests. Israel's client list includes Cambodia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, the South Lebanon Army, India, China, Burma and Zambia. The U.S. has most recently warmed up to India and is now in fact competing with Israel for arms sales there, but the other Israeli customers remain dubious at best.

Perhaps the most troubling of all is the Israeli/Chinese arms relationship. Israel is China's second largest supplier of arms. Coincidentally, the newest addition to the Chinese air force, the F-10 multi-role fighter, is an almost identical version of the Lavi (Lion). The Lavi was a joint Israeli-American design based upon the F-16 for manufacture in Israel, but financed mostly with American aid. Plagued by cost overruns, it was canceled in 1987, but not before the U.S. spent $1.5 billion on the project.

Last April, when the Navy EP-3E surveillance plane was forced to land in China after a Chinese F-8 fighter flew into its propeller, photos show Israeli built Python 3 missiles under the fighter's wings.

If Israeli weapons sales to China induce misgivings, including the most recent U.S. blocked sale of Israel's Phalcon airborne radar, the beneficiaries of Chinese arms transfers of Israeli-American technology are even more disturbing. In 1996, as disclosed in the UN Register of Conventional Arms, China sold over 100 missiles and launchers to Iran, along with a handful of combat aircraft and warships. Even worse, in 1997 the New York Daily News reported that Iraq had deployed Israeli-developed, Chinese PL-8 missiles in the no-fly zones, endangering American pilots.

Americans deserve to know where their money is being spent, and how money allocated for friends and technology shared with friends can all too easily end up in the wrong hands, threatening all parties involved. At a minimum, discussions on a new security framework for the Middle East should include plans to monitor and restrict Israeli transfers of U.S.-origin military equipment to potential adversaries. Otherwise, this deadly technology could come back to haunt U.S. and Israeli forces in future conflicts.

Granting these morons an audience is stupid and un-American. Has anyone in our government read the articles of freedom. Our founding fathers said in "God we trust" not in Yahweh we trust or in Allah we trust. They knew better than to claim divine knowledge and tried to give us guidance on the matter. As Americans we are supposed to have the wisdom to rise above this crap. Netenyahu has his Torah and Abbas has his Koran and they are both prepared to shove their beliefs down each others throats, at the point of a gun if neccessary. Want world peace? Burn all the Torahs and all the Korans, lock these nut jobs up in padded rooms and keep their meds adjusted. Don't give them a bully pulpit to claim God is on their side and the other side deserves to die because they don't agree, its insanity and as Americans we should know better. In a court of law beliefs carry no weight, so why should they matter outside of a courtroom. These bozos have been going at it since the dawn of time based on "gut feelings" and are more than happy to drag anyone into the stupidity they can. To quote Joe Friday " just the facts ma'am, just the facts" I say send them packing and tell them not to comeback for our help until they have something more concrete than a "belief".

HowdyPez: Sep. 23, 2009 - 11:26 AM EST

Again, go and see for yourself, don't rely on what you read and hear.

Thank you for the excellent post. Here is a 2007 entry from my blog on this subject.

What Americans Don't Know

November 10, 2007

http://www.dundeesblog.blog...

Americans are told that Muslims hate us because they hate our freedom and democracy, but this is not the case. They hate us because they believe we hate them. The truth is that their hatred is based not on ideology but on reality, the facts on the ground. Currently Gaza is a concentration camp, and the West Bank is even worse.

The book, "Lords of the Land," by two Israeli scholars, was reviewed in "The New York Times Book Review," October 14, 2007, by Adam LeBor. LeBor writes that the West Bank is "a lawless place, where the Jewish settler, rifle in one hand and prayer book in the other, is undisputed king. The settlers have their own roads, guarded by the Israeli army, water, electricity, supplies and ----occasional if well-publicized crackdowns aside---substantial impunity from the law. Much of the land on which their settlements stand, was, as Idith Zertal and Akiva Eldar detail in this important book, simply stolen. The settlements are illegal, in contravention of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which forbids an occupying power from transferring its civilian population to occupied territories." LeBor notes that more than a third of the West Bank is "now off limits to Palestinians." The book also documents the minimal sentences handed down to settlers who kill Arabs. These sentences consist of a few months community service or a small amount of time in jail.

Meanwhile the settlers are protected by the Israeli army whose violent behaviour has been described in a recent study by Nufar Yishai-Karin, an Israeli psychologist, as reported by Conal Urquhart in "The Observer," October 21, 2007. Yishai-Karin interviewed soldiers who recounted incidents of brutality and murder. They described shooting innocent Palestinians and leaving them to die, brutally beating little children, breaking their bones for no reason. Urquhart writes that one soldier told of a woman throwing a clog at him, "I kicked her here[pointing to the crotch], I broke everything there. She can't have children. Next time she won't throw clogs at me. When one of them [a woman] spit at me, I gave her the rifle butt in the face. She doesn't have what to spit with anymore."

Of course, Americans know none of this. Jerome Slater's article "Muting the Alarm over the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict" ("International Security" Vol. 32, no.2 (Fall 2007), pp84-120) documents the coverage in the Israeli newspaper "Haaretz" versus "The New York Times," and shows that the Israeli media is more balanced in its coverage than is the US media. Americans are kept in the dark.