May 3, 2014
Did anyone really think that John Kerry’s nine-month effort to produce a Palestinian mini-state would ever work? If so, they were either ignorant of the Mideast, naïve, or deeply cynical.
The best one could say about Kerry’s fiasco was that it was a charade designed to show America’s Arab allies that Washington was really making an effort to resolve the nearly seven-decade suffering of the 5 million homeless Palestinians.
In 2002, I wrote that the latest Arab-Israel peace initiative – called “the roadmap to peace” – would be a dead end in the desert. So it was, and so was each ensuing peace spasm as Washington beseeched, begged , implored, cajoled and pleaded with Israel to allow creation of a small, semi-independent Palestinian state on the Israel-occupied West Bank.
Oooops! New Jersey governor Chris Christie, the Republican frontrunner for president, went to Las Vegas to lick the hand of Uber Zionist media mogul billionaire Sheldon Adelson. While kow-towing to Adelson, who made his billions by exploiting poor people’s addiction to gambling, Christie made what could be a fatal faux pas.
The New Jersey governor referred to what the United Nations terms the “Israeli-occupied West Bank” as the “Israeli-occupied West Bank.” Adelson, a chief financier of militant Jewish settlers on the West Bank and Golan, went ballistic. No, no, no! It’s Judea and Samaria, thundered the casino mogul, given to the chosen people by God himself!
Poor Christie slunk back to New Jersey. His plain speaking may cost him the presidential nomination. Adelson repeated his offer to give a sufficiently pro-Greater Israel Republican candidate $100 million.
This sickening tale of dirty money and an American political process totally corrupted by now unlimited money explains why Israel has no intention of signing a peace deal with the Palestinians. Why should it?
First, Israel’s ruling Likud Party and its even more extreme allies have vowed there will never be a Palestinian state. Period. In their view, all of Palestine belongs to the Jews, even if they hail from Russia, Morocco, Poland or Lithuania. As the late Gen. Ariel Sharon so often proclaimed, the true Palestinian state is Jordan. There will be no return to pre-1967 borders.
Second, Palestinians don’t exist, as the late Israeli PM Golda Meir was so fond of saying: they are merely landless Bedouin. How ironic that the Jewish thinker Arthur Koestler wrote much the same about the Jews, calling them descendants of nomadic Khazars.
Third, as Sharon used to boast, “don’t worry about the US. I control the US!” Israel’s right wing has turned the US Congress into performing seals. Any US official or politician deemed insufficiently pro-Israel has a short career. Israel’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu even humiliated President Obama and VP Joe Biden – and was cheered by Congress.
Fourth, Israel holds all the cards. US Mideast policy is determined by the potent Israel lobby. Israel grows rich from US aid ($3-5 billion annually) and new energy discoveries. Its economy thrives and its tech sector is a world leader. Israel has annexed the region’s key water sources.
Militarily, Israel could conquer much of the Mideast in mere days. Israel’s American allies, known as neocons, engineered the Iraq war that destroyed Israel’s most capable Arab enemy. Now, thanks again to the neocons, the other serious enemy, Syria, lies in ruins.
Egypt, the Arab world’s leading power, is now run by a brutal fascist regime that is secretly allied with Israel. Distant Iran offers no current military challenge to Israel. Besides, nuclear-armed Israel has unlimited American military and financial backing.
Palestinians are split between the useless PLO – a sock puppet for the US and Israel – and Hamas, locked up in Gaza. They pose only nuisance value to Israel. The only serious remaining Arab fighting force is Lebanon’s Hezbollah – but it is only effective when fighting at home.
Israel’s right is quite prepared to enforce an apartheid state where Arabs have few rights and no political power. It’s no coincidence that Israel and apartheid South Africa were the closest of allies.
Finally, Israel’s Zionist hard right has always been reluctant to fix the nation’s borders with Syria and Lebanon. Who knows what Israel’s final borders will look like. Some on Israel’s hard right see golden opportunities in a collapsing, fragmented Arab world.
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copyright Eric S. Margolis 2014
This post is in: Iran, Iraq, Israel, Mideast, Palestine, Syria, Venezuela
Margolis is one of the few American analysts who dares to speak the truth about Israel.
Great article as always. You will rarely find such truths in print in the mainstream media. Not only does the Pro-Israel lobby have Congressional leaders in their pocket, they also keep a close watch on media portrayal of Israel. it takes great courage to write an article that portrays Israel as the bully it truly is. Such career limiting articles are rarely penned by those who seek a career in journalism. Sadly for every Eric Margolis we have 100 scumbag Charles Krauthammers and Ezra Levants spinning half-truths. Eric, I thank you for your selfless courage in writing your articles.
Like a parasite on a host`s body, Israel has fastened itself onto the US and its military might and uses it for its own end. This plan has been in the making for a long time and we are ever getting closer to the day, that the US also becomes disposable, after it has lost its financial might in the world and is rendered powerless. But there are a few chess pieces left on the board for the final check-mate and those pieces may prove to be an unpleasant surprise. Amazing, what can be accomplished with a little blackmail and the American politicians left themselves wide open for that. Democracy has been non existent for some time already, but the gullible sheeple believed the propaganda. What a shame on a nation, that once was the example and epitome of freedom and democracy, neither of which still exists. I watched a few videos of Dr. Paul Craig Roberts and what he had to say is downright scary. He is not just any body or a nobody. He served in the government for 25 years and also under Reagan.
I can see two outcomes of the present state of affairs; either we are finally getting that long hoped for world peace and justice, or total annihilation. Maybe the US will use its newly dreamt up mandate for the right of a first strike, but it cannot avoid retaliation and that will be the scenario, that made Khrushchev say: “The living will envy the dead”.
It’s not in the interest of the Americans or the UN (aka the Americans) to have a peaceful settlement. The UN should be pressing Israel by force, if need be, to withdraw to their original boundaries, but, it’s not going to happen. The territories they’ve invaded should be relinquished and the settlements razed or provided to the Palestinians, and again, it’s not going to happen…