lfeiner1 Jul 11 2002 EST

lfeiner1 Jul 11 2002 EST

chrisona 7/11/02 7:04pm

If they are unable to have commercial and trade relationship with the outside world, as they would be in your "autonomous neighborhoods", they will be part of the Israeli polity. Many countries have regions that are largely autonomous in the sense you describe, the Kurdish region of Iraq, the Pashtun region of Pakistan. In fact, in many countries, much of territory is controlled by local tribes, ethnic groups, landlords, crimelords and bosses. But they are still part of the polity of the country in question. Your definition of the Palestinians as being "outside the Israeli polity" under your arrangement is purely linquistic and doesn't correspond to political reality.

lfeiner1 - 09:09am Jul 17, 2002 EST

chrisona 7/11/02 7:29pm

What you are suggesting is in fact the most likely outcome of the conflict, a single state with Palestinian "autonomous neighborhoods" eventually evolving into a single state based on a cantonal, federatal arrangement. My point is that it will be a single state, and eventually the Palestinians will have representation in the governance of the whole polity. This is the outcome predicted by Sari Nusseibeh if a Palestinian state is not achieved within the next two years, which is probaly won't be. A two state solution is the kind of thing that people like to talk about endlessly. It's like the "new economy", or the "regime change in Iraq", everybody says its inevitable, but nobody knows how to get from here to there. As a top official of a key US ally admitted recently "Iraq is over. The window is closed" (Time 7/22/2). (A realization which is probably sending the market higher today). People like to play "let's pretend", but the reality finally sinks in. The fact that Bush is no longer talking about a two state solution as a certainty but as dependent of reforms which are supposed to happen under impossible conditions, shows that official thinking is starting to change, but that a new policy has yet to jell. Right now Israel has a green light for reoccupation, but the American red lines clearly stop at ethnic cleansing or a massive death of Palestinians. The Americans haven't even insisted on a settlements freeze. The upshot. A single state for Arabs and Jews, the South African model

chrisona - 11:41am Jul 17, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 7/17/02 9:09am

As usual, an interesting post, Feiner.

a single state with Palestinian "autonomous neighborhoods" eventually evolving into a single state based on a cantonal, federatal arrangement

If the Palestinians can lose the terrorists in their midst.

The upshot. A single state for Arabs and Jews, the South African model.

You need to climb out of this box. I see Israelis and Palestinians working together more seamlessly than this, once the terrorists are laid to rest. The Palestinians are enterprising people, well-educated by ME standards. There is no practical reason why Israelis and Palestinians can't make their little part of the world work for them. (And what a demonstration to the rest of the Middle East: as the Arab countries compete with sub-Saharan Africa for the bottom rung developmentally, the curious Israeli/Palestinian effort succeeds impressively.)

"Iraq is over. The window is closed."

The real problem with Iraq is that it would threaten U.S. power projection in the Persian Gulf--if it had WMD. I think it would be far more reasonable for the U.S. to work relentlessly to get UN weapons inspectors in there and then work on turning Saddam instead of threatening to destroy the country. As it stands, U.S. policy toward Iraq is a complete botch job, possibly leading to worse. And if the lords of war ever do make a move on Iraq, they'd better plan to start distributing smallpox vaccinations the same day.

lfeiner1 - 11:19am Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24686

chrisona 7/17/02 11:41am

I agree about the Jewish/Arab state. It would be far more successful than South Africa, both the Jews and Arabs are intelligent and enterprising. And obviously, from a demographic point of view, the Jews would be far stronger in a Jewish/Arab state than are the whites in South Africa. There will be peace, when both sides realize that this is the only solution. I don't believe that the granting of rights to Palestinians within a single Jewish/Arab state comprising all of British Mandatory Palestine would be the "dismantling of the Jewish state"

As for an invasion of Iraq. No matter what anyone says it is simply unimaginable at this point. The US would have to assume at the outset that Saddam is capable and willing to torch the oil fields in order to deny us the revenues to finance an occupation. We would have to assume that he was willing and able to launch scuds at Israel with biological or chemical weapons. This means that the US would have to secure the oil fields intact and disable the scuds at the very outset. This means that the strike would have to massive, overwhelming and would have to achieve complete suprise. Impossible conditions under the circumstances. And even if the US successfully secured the oil fields and disabled the scuds, then the situation could degenerate into Somalia times a thousand. And what would happen if another crisis broke out (an Indo-Paki war or a flare up on Korean peninsula) while the US was bogged in post-war Iraqi chaos? In other words, the Iraqi invasion is a dead letter or at least one would hope so..

lfeiner1 - 09:29pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24854 of 24861)

1. Israel to deport relatives of militants in violation of international law which prohibits both deportation and collective punishment

2. DOW DROPS 400 POINTS

If you think there is no relationship between these two stories, think again. Bush's inability to stand up to Sharon is causing a massive global loss of confidence in US ability to lead the world, and foreign investors are fleeing. Today they fled into gold.

When Sharon won the election, financier George Soros predicted a global financial meltdown. He didn't draw the connection, but he certainly thought it.

lfeiner1 - 09:41pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24858 of 24859)

ljnelson36 7/19/02 12:14pm

Why should Israel agree to anything at all? Especially when Israel and its supporters control the US. Even today Wolfowitz is in Turkey trying to "charm" Turkey into supporting a US invasion of Iraq. He assured Turkish officials that the US will "not tolerate" a separate Kurdish state in Northern Iraq. It's hard to imagine how the US would prevent such a development without a prolonged occupation of Iraq, including the mountainous regions of the north. The US now has a 150 billion dollar deficit and a ballooning trade deficit and a plummeting dollar. The question of how a US debacle in Iraq is going to be financed is one of the questions driving investors into gold. Driving down the stock market, worsening the US budget deficit, making an occupation of Iraq even more costly in an ever worsening spiral. Wolfwowitz, Perle, Feith, Pipes, Krauthammer, along with Sharon, architects of the coming global chaos.

lfeiner1 - 09:47pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24859 of 24859)

hatul.mastul 7/19/02 9:34pm

No its Bush's fault for not having the guts that Bush senior had to stand up for US interests against a sectarian lobby which puts the interest of a foreign country ahead of the US. And as far as the Arabs are concerned, most of the Arab countries do America's bidding.

lfeiner1 - 10:04pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24873 of 24873)

innatyso 7/19/02 9:54pm

what else can Israel do?

What couldn't be justified by a question like that? If the deportations are tried and fail then the question pops up again

what else can Israel do?

Mass deportations of Palestinian officials. Doesn't work?

what else can Israel do?

Deny food to the Palestinian population. Doesn't work?

what else can Israel do?

Ethnic cleansing of the population. Jordan is destabilized and missiles with nasty stuff in them come flying over the border.

what else can Israel do?

Have we come to the end of the line yet? Or is their now something Israel can do?

lfeiner1 - 10:59pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24923 of 24924)

hatul.mastul 7/19/02 10:49pm

Everybody makes mistakes. And the Israel lobby is not the only sectarian lobby that has caused the US to make foreign policy mistakes. There was also the China lobby in the 40's that delayed for decades the reapprochment between the US and China as well as the Cardinal Spellman lobby which got the US involved in Vietnam because of its close relations with Diem. And Bush junior has sacrificed American interest and global economic and political stability to domestic pressure groups in other areas as well, such as his senseless steel tariffs and his subsidies to big agriculture.

lfeiner1 - 11:06pm Jul 19, 2002 EST (#24924 of 24924)

bgold4 7/19/02 10:50pm

No I'm not blaming Sharon for Enron. I saw Sharon's election as an "omen" of coming global political and economic instability and I liquidated my stock holdings when he got elected, which is why my retirement was not brought to a quick end. The problem is a world superpower that puts domestic pressure groups and electoral considerations ahead of dealing with the presssing global problems that are bearing down on us. And, as I said, in addition to the Israeli lobby there are many other sectarian interests that distort US global management

lfeiner1 - 07:57pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#177 of 204)

From today's Washington Post:

Following the same tactics he has employed for a quarter-century, Sharon has been asserting in public that he accepts Bush's diplomacy -- and meanwhile is quietly overseeing a plan of settlement construction designed to make any two-state solution impossible. Since Sharon took office less than 18 months ago, 44 new settlement sites, including more than 300 units, have been established in the West Bank -- including nine in the past three months. In contrast, the previous Israeli government under Ehud Barak thickened existing Israeli settlements in West Bank border areas, but did not allow new outposts. Despite a budget crisis caused by the continuing bloodshed, Sharon's government is pouring new money into the program: The new budget calls for $64 million in subsidies this year to induce Israelis to move to settlements, plus $19 million in funding for settlement development. That doesn't count the nine roads Israel is building for use by settlements, at a cost of $50 million, or the border fences being constructed around greater Jerusalem -- fences that are advertised as security measures but will have the practical effect of roping off new tracts of land for settlement expansions. On June 20 -- four days before Bush's peace initiative speech -- tenders were announced for the construction of 957 new units in the settlements. Sharon also has a consistent strategy for handling American and other international inquiries about his program: straight-faced denial.

Can the Bush administration do anything about this? Indeed it can

The only direct American challenge to Sharon's adventurism was led by Bush's father and his secretary of state, James A. Baker III. The first Bush administration, also seeking an Israeli-Palestinian accord, made clear that it didn't accept the fuzzy official statements and Potemkin tear-downs that Sharon practiced, then as now; instead it demanded that the construction program stop, and it cut off a U.S. loan-guarantee program to Israel when it didn't. Israel's supporters in Congress squawked, but thanks to the dispute, Sharon and his then-prime minister, Yitzhak Shamir, soon were voted out of office, replaced by the peacemaker Yitzhak Rabin.

lfeiner1 - 08:06pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#186 of 187)

In fact, if the Bush junior administration were to get really tough on Israeli settlement activity it would be the best possible signal to foreign investors that the administration plans to end its obsession with domestic political poll numbers and spend domestic political capital in order to deal with the looming global economic and political crisis. This would send foreign capital back into the US financial markets and be the best possible tonic for the ailing stock market. And if Bush were to fire Karl Rove, roll back the steel tariffs and agricultural subsidies, learn to pronounce "nuclear" and "malfeasance", then maybe global economic confidence can be restored and American's retirement anxieties alleviated.

chrisona - 08:06pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#187 of 203)

lfeiner1 7/23/02 7:57pm

The settlers are coming! The settlers are coming! Apocalypse in the near or possibly medium term!!

lfeiner1 - 08:20pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#202 of 202)

chrisona 7/23/02 8:06pm

Bush is pandering! Bush is pandering! Global economic and political crisis, possibly the worst since the Great Depression and World War II, is looming. Bush is pandering while the world unravels. Actually, this crisis started in the early 70's with the global slowdown and the drop in return on assets. The conditions for rapid global growth established in the late 40's had played themselves out and sustainable growth awaited sustainable development in the non-Western areas of the world. There were three decade-long periods of unsustainable growth. The inflation led growth of the 70's. the debt-led growth of the 80's. And the "bubble led" growth of the 90's. While each of these periods led to rapid technogolical advance, particularly in information and digital technologies, none were sustainable. All ended in crisis. Now the US is out of "quick fixes". The problems of global development have to be addressed in order to assure future growth. And future growth is necessary in order to provide the wherewithal to address the looming global environmental crisis. The solution requires sustainable, environmentally sound growth in the world as a whole. This is not possible without global cooperation, and this cooperation is not possible without cooperation with the 1/5 of the human race of the Muslim persuasion. The US unbalanced policy in the Middle East is making this latter aspect of global cooperation much more difficult.

Steel tariffs, and other destructive, narrow self-serving policies belong on another forum

If Bush doesn't start spending political capital in all areas, then the crisis will not be medium term, but rather will be pushed up.

If you don't believe me, watch what happens. Remember, I predicted the stock market collapse back in June.

hatul.mastul - 08:25pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#205 of 212)

For a Free and Democratic Lebanon

lfeiner1 7/23/02 8:20pm

Collapses happen. Stocks go up and down and so does the economy.

The US had massive growth for over a decade and it's slowing down now. That's part of the cycle.

The Muslim world has it's own problems and does not base it's policy on the US middle east policy anyway. Their problems largely stem because they are autocratic, theocratic, closed and paranoid socities.

Furthermore the US should sell people/countries out to appease terrorists and dictators.

lfeiner1 - 08:42pm Jul 23, 2002 EST (#211 of 212)

hatul.mastul 7/23/02 8:25pm

From the end of the Napoleanic wars to 1914, there was a long period of prosperity and growth. Of course, it was punctuated by business cycles. From 1880 to 1914, the crisis became more serious and the political pressures built up. They exploded in 1914. The 1914 to 1945 period was a period of crisis, contraction, upheaval and war. After the war, growth resumed. And yes there were business cycles. But the last three growth cycles were not the natural investment cycle. Each of the spurts of growth was facilitated by a US government monetary, fiscal and political gimmick. In the 70's it was growth through monetary creation. In the 80's it was growth through debt creation. In the 90's it was growth through a series of government inspired "bubbles", the Asian bubble, and when that collapsed the rush of fleeing Asian capital into the US financial markets to finance the internet bubble. The government has run out of tricks. And we are now entering a period where basic structural problems have to be addressed. A period very much like the pre-WWI period. If they are not addressed, a look at the 1914-1945 period shows us the possibility that the whole thing could fall off a cliff. And yes, US cooperation with the Muslim world (and the Hindu world, and Asia and Latin America) is a big piece of the puzzle. And I believe the crisis will occur sooner rather than later if Bush doesn't wise up.

But maybe it's futile discussing long term econo/political trends with Americans.

lfeiner1 - 09:49am Jul 24, 2002 EST (#347 of 347)

chrisona 7/23/02 9:55pm

I am not at all reluctant to critique Arab and Muslim policy. Two fine books I can recommend that do just that are:

· Critiques in Current Intellectual Fashion, (1998), Samir Amin, MR Press

· The Two Fundamentalisms, (2002), Tariq Ali, Verso Press

Samir Amin and Tariq Ali are Egyptian and Pakistani scholars who are more qualified than I am to do this.

Reforms in the non-western world can only be carried out within the non-western world and by the non-western world. But the US can do a lot to facilitate or obstruct the process and right now the US is obstructing the process. I am an American and consider myself more qualified to critique American policy, and because Israel is a first world, western country, more qualified to critique Israeli policy. And that is what I am doing.

Remember that in the late 90's, Bush senior was confronted with a savings and loan crisis, a Latin debt crisis, the Iraq-Iran war, the Iran-contra scandal, and the junk bond scandal. During Bush senior's term, Communism fell, the savings and loan crisis and the Latin debt crisis was dealt with, 90% of the NAFTA and GATT agreements were negotiated, Saddam was driven from Kuwait and the Madrid process was started. This set the stage for the recovery of the 90's. The economy and stock market began its rise in 92 during the Bush administration. But because he took Israel on about settlements, his poll numbers plummeted and he was defeated. With every passing year, his reputation grows, like Truman's who also ended his term isolated and unpopular. Bush senior was a problem solver who was not afraid to spend political capital. Bush junior puts his poll numbers above anything else, while the world unravels.

Yes the Muslim world needs reforms, and yes if they don't reform, we can't help them. But the country that most determines the world's destiny is the US and US leadership is failing and it is failing because it is pandering to sectarian interest groups, as the steel tariffs, the tariffs against Canada, the farm subsidies, the war mongering, the denying of money to the UN population fund, and the pandering to Sharon demonstrates. Bush is terrified of being called a "globalist" like his father. He should look at what his father accomplished and what he is now squandering.

And BTW if I blasted Bush for his criticism of the Israeli attack on Gaza, and for pandering to Arabs, and said that was destroying the stock market, you would agree. That is because I am worried about global stability and everyone else is just worried about Israel's public image.

lfeiner1 - 06:06pm Aug 16, 2002 EST

From Aluf Benn in today's Ha'aretz

A top aide to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Friday that Israel is urging U.S. officials not to delay a military strike against Iraq's Saddam Hussein. Ha'aretz reported in its print edition Friday that Israel is pressing the U.S. not to defer action aimed at toppling the regime in Iraq.

What is ignored in this GOI statement is that Saddam already has the weapon of mass destruction that he needs. Namely Israel itself. By pledging to attack Iraq in the event of even a non-lethal Iraqi attack on Israel (in response to an American invasion), Israel has placed in Saddam's hand the flushometer with which he can flush the entire region down the drain if America actually does attack

This is why many Republican supporters of Bush are beginning to have doubts

Senator Hagel who was among the earliest voices to question Mr. Bush? approach, said today that the CIA had absolutely no evidence·that Iraq possesses nuclear weapons. He said he shared Mr. Kissinger's concern that Mr. Bush's policy of pre-emptive strikes at at governments with weapons of mass destruction could induce India to attack Pakistan and could create the political cover for Israel to expel Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza.'You can take a country into a war pretty fast,'Mr. Hagel said But you can't get out as quickly, and the public needs to know what the risks are' He added, Maybe Mr. Perle would like to be in the first wave of those who go into Baghdad New York Times 8/17/2

One of the reasons for the widespread doubt about "regime change" in Iraq is doubt about the motives of the Defense Department Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith cabal which is leading the charge. It is a fear that these folks want regional chaos as a cover for ethnic cleansing.

mbdvr1727 06:24pm Aug 16, 2002 EST

The problem is the alternative is to wait for Saddam to die of old age, or be overthrown without American help.

I would take this one at face value: the U.S. administration's readiness, and Israel's support, for getting rid of Saddam sooner rather than later is likely based on serious intelligence that he is coming close to being ready (and is certainly willing)to use at least biological and chemical (nuclear I suspect not yet, I think we would hear from the IAF again first) weapons in the region. Time is (at least for a few years) Saddam's ally.

That said, I remain concerned that removing Saddam does not remove the problem. It is a pretty good illustration to leaders of nation-states that developing these capabilities will be of no benefit. But that does not take the future bin Ladens out of the equation. We are nearing the time (if not already there) when you do not need the infrastructure or support of nation-state to do bad things. I'm not so sure you will even need a patsy state (Taliban Afghanistan, e.g.) for cover

lfeiner1 06:38pm Aug 16, 2002 EST

mbdvr1727 8/16/02 6:24pm

I would certainly not take this at face value. The Perle, Feith crew were the same people who were advising the Reagan administration in 1981 to back an Israeli invasion of Lebanon in order to install a pro-Western Maronite regime. The Reagan people fell for it and the result was the rise of Hezbullah. The US certainly has to be prepared to invade Iraq because it would have to if there were a destructive WMD attack in the US from any foreign source, but I certainly don't trust the "we have to do it now or else" crew. They're trouble makers with an agenda. Armey opposes it, Kissinger opposes, it, Eagleburger opposes it, the main Kurdish leader opposes it and every other country other than Israel opposes it. Saddam is dangerous and untrustworthly that's for sure. The motives of Sharon/Perle/Wolfowitz/Feith et al are equally dangerous and untrustworthy and not to be taken at face value. They are widely suspected of wanting cover for ethnic cleansing. This is one of the reasons for the widespead lack of international support for an invasion of Iraq. The Perle cabal does not merit the trust for such a venture and the rest of the Bush crew does not have the competence. Does waiting lead to the possibility of a calamity later? Yes. But invading now ensures the certainty of a calamity now

shimshik 06:51pm Aug 16, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 8/16/02 6:38pm

Does waiting lead to the possibility of a calamity later? Yes. But invading now ensures the certainty of a calamity now

Yes Mr. Chamberlain! Will you also promise us "peace in our time"?

most_just 06:31pm Aug 16, 2002 EST

RE lfeiner1 (# 7980)

"...Saddam already has the weapon of mass destruction that he needs. Namely Israel itself. By pledging to attack Iraq in the event of even a non-lethal Iraqi attack on Israel (in response to an American invasion), Israel has placed in Saddam's hand the flushometer with which he can flush the entire region down the drain if America actually does attack"

I fail to see how you can characterize Israel as a weapon of mass destruction. Further, I fail to see how you can call Israel's statement that it will defend itself a mechanism by which Saddam can plunge the region into a war. If, by saying this, you mean to say that if Israel jumps in to defend itself (after being attacked) that other Arab states will then jump in on the side of Saddam, then you a placing upon Israel all of the responsibility for maintaining a peace that would otherwise fail on account of the irresponsibility of others. Kind of like the "arab street can't be contained" arguments. I can't agree that this is Israel's responsibility, and reject any suggestion that she does not have the right of self-defence when attacked.

lfeiner1 - 07:30pm Aug 18, 2002 EST

most_just 8/16/02 6:31pm

Think of what a regime change and nation building in Iraq would entail. The US would have to secure the oil fields, the Kurdish regions and the Jordanian border from day one. It would have to warn Saddam that use of WMB on Americans or allies would lead massive retaliation in kind. On the other hand, it would have to leave Saddam and his people a way out, safe passage, if they do not resist the US military actions. It would make no sense to corner him. A regime change would involve state building on a massive scale and massive economic aid and trade concessions to a new Iraqi regime if and when it was in place. It would have to involve coordination with the world's major central banks to contain the global economic repercussions. It would have to involve cooperation with Iran to contain developments in South Iraq, cooperation with Saudi Arabia to contain turmoil in the oil markets. It would require massive contingency planning on responses to possible crises elsewhere while we were bogged down in Iraq, such for example an Indo-Paki conflict or a China/Taiwan conflict. It would require the willingness to make enormous financial outlays and impose a surtax to finance the effort. The US has neither the national resolve nor the international support for such an effort. When a president like Bush promises tax cuts, Medicare drug benefits, a balanced budget and unilateral American regime change and state reconstruction in Iraq, there is no way anyone can take him seriously

And of course, Israel has the perfect right to defend itself if Iraq attacks. But by setting the bar so low as an Iraqi attack which produces no casualties, it gives Saddam the ability to draw Israel into the war very easily and thus strengthens his position enormously and renders much more difficult a US attack, which won't happen anyway.

Thus, I actually praised Israel for doing this when they did it, because I think that a unilateral US attack on Iraq at this point would be a disaster. My quarrel with Israel and its "amen chorus", Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith, Ledeen, Gaffney, Kristol, etc. is that they then insisted that the US had to invade Iraq soon. Given the fact that Bush is trying find a face saving way to back down from this limb, this whining and mewling on the part of the "amen chorus" is nothing but malicious trouble making. Perle, Feith, Gaffney, Ledeen etc, having been thoroughly dressed down by people such as Scowcroft, Hagel, Kissinger, General Schwartzkopf, Armey, Eagleburger, people with far more substance and ability, are now trying to brazen it out to save their undeserved reputations as strategists. And of course, Israel is giving itself carte blanche to threaten action on some Iraqi installation, ala Osirak, as a lever to ward off administration pressure on Sharon toward diplomacy.

lfeiner1 - 07:42pm Aug 18, 2002 EST

shimshik 8/16/02 6:51pm

Chamberlain at Munich is an interesting comparison to Iraq. Actually Hitler was furious at Chamberlain for signing the Munich agreement. Hitler wanted war right then and he wanted to give Britain as little time as possible to prepare. He didn't want Chamberlain to sign the agreement. The time to stop Hitler was when he went into the Rhineland not at Munich. Chamberlain was a damn fool for promising "peace in our time", but it was in Britain's interest to delay the war as long as possible while it got its radar systems fully operational and beefed up its Navy and Air force.

Conversely the time to have stopped Saddam was to have supported the democratically elected Iraqi Karim Kassem government against the Baathist coup in 62, even though the government was slightly left of center. Now is not the time to rush into a regime change. Our position in the Middle East has deteriorated too much. We now have to prepare for an invasion if necessary, building up the necessary alliances, and making a sober analysis of all the repercussions, costs, and sacrifices and making sure that the American people are willing to pay them. If a botched invasion leads to regional global chaos, the anything can happen anywhere, an Al-Qaeda government in Pakistan or Saudi Arabia for example.

lfeiner1 08:31pm Aug 27, 2002 EST

melech3a 8/26/02 6:43pm

And if nobody trusts the motives of the Perle cabal which simply wants chaos as a cover for ethnic cleansing, nobody trusts the competence of the Cheney types, (the corporate oil kleptocrats, of the same ilk who brought us Enron and Worldcom). For example in his recent speech Cheney said "We don't have the luxury of waiting". Does that mean we don't have the luxury of the tax cut, that we don't have the luxury of a balanced budget, that we don't have the luxury of Medicare drug supplements? Cheney would have been a tad more convincing if he had spelled that out. Cheney also said that we didn't have to worry about chaos and instability because Middle East expert Fuad Ajami said there would be no chaos and instability. I'm sorry, but I'm afraid that just won't cut it. Cheney would have been more convincing if he had said that there would be no chaos and instability, because the US was prepared to put in whatever muscle, resources and financing was necessary to make sure that there was no chaos and instability, that the US would be prepared to spend whatever was necessary and to take whatever casualties where necessary to ensure a successful regime change and rebuilding, damn the tax cut, damn the deficit and damn the American casualties.

Everyone says that we can't wait until Saddam has nukes because then it will be too late. You know what? It's already too late. Nobody trusts the boobocracy that runs the US government to carry out a regime change, and rebuilding without touching off regional and global chaos.

yehudi_adam - 08:28pm Aug 27, 2002 EST
Ignoring facts does not make them any less true.

hanumanbagus 8/27/02 8:23pm

It will certainly be easier than Desert Storm since the Iraqi arm forces are much weaker than they were in 1991.

He has less than one-half his aricraft.

About one-third the size of army - the legendary Republican Guard numbers in the dozens, not hundreds - and they are the real fighting force loyal to Saddam - the last army was surrendering to Italian news crews.

He has not modernized in over a decade - this will not be a major force for the US to defeat.

The US by contrast will field a vastly superior fighting force than the military in 1991

lfeiner1 - 08:41pm Aug 27, 2002 EST

yehudi_adam 8/27/02 8:28pm

Yeah and everyone thought Somalia would be a pushover, everyone thought that the Israeli invasion of Lebanon would bring about a friendly pro-Western Maronite government, everyone thought that the invasion of Afghanistan would destroy Al-Qaeda instead of sending it into Pakistan and Kashmir where it is more dangerous than it was in Afghanistan.

If you want world support for this kind of thing, you don't get it by saying "Aw shucks it will easy. We'll throw out Saddam and a stable, democratic Iraq will pop up immediately". You get it by anticipating everything that could go wrong (and things always go wrong) calculating the resources needed to deal with them and tripling them. In fact, I pray that Cheney's testosterone filled, chest beating is all a lot of blah, blah, blah designed to throw red meat to people like you, while the Bushies try to find a way to back out of this. It's Bush's version of Clinton's "new economy"

yehudi_adam - 08:48pm Aug 27, 2002 EST
Ignoring facts does not make them any less true.

lfeiner1 8/27/02 8:41pm

hanumanbagus 8/27/02 8:41pm

We've already seen what invading Iraq is like and the 2002 Iraq is weaker than the Iraq of 1991.

In 1991 there was no mission to take out Saddam - only to get Saddam out of Kuwait. If this time around the announced mission is a regime change, then the troops will not stand and fight - because they know going into it that Saddma will not survive the war - not so in 1991, and evenso there were many defections.

No, this will be a short war - and it needs to be done.

lfeiner1 - 06:14pm Aug 28, 2002 EST

yehudi_adam 8/27/02 8:48pm

this (the invasion of Iraq) will be a short war and it needs to be done

Yes the war will be short. The regional and global consequences uncertain, but potentially very dangerous, as dangerous as any danger posed by Saddam. And just why do you think that all these people from the Bush senior administration are telling Bush junior not to do it? Just what do you think Bush junior discussed with Bush senior at that golfing expedition? Did Bush junior say "Please dad, just butt out of my Iraq regime change plans". Not at all. He said "Dad I'm in a jam again, you know like the DOI thing. I need your help again. Get me out this Iraq thing. I can't control the Perles, the Wolfowitz's and the Feiths" (He might have used a different word for those folks but he wasn't on a moderated forum)

lfeiner1 04:22pm Sep 4, 2002 gjames9142 9/2/02 10:27pm

I suspect that this administration wouldn't seriously consider going to war, unless they were absolutely sure that Saddam didn't have any military capability. UNCSCOM inspector Scott Ritter said at a Congressional hearing that Saddam had bubkes and there is no way he could get anywhere near developing nukes without us detecting it. So if this administration is at all serious about regime change, then they must be absolutely sure that the military aspect of this will essentially be a non-event. If they are not, then they are bluffing pure and simple.

But even assuming that Saddam just folds and the US walks in. We will then be the government of Iraq. We will be responsible for state building and reconstuction. Is the US Congress and the administration really ready to shell out the money that would be necessary? Are we really ready to make the trade concessions? The track record of this adminisration is not very good. They promised Pakistan trade concessions on textiles to get its support against Al-Qaeda and then reneged. Rumsfeld said that we had to show the rest of the world that we are not faint hearted. We've shown them exactly the opposite. This administration has dealt with the outside world by pandering to every country that has an important domestic commercial or political consituency (Israel and Saudi Arabia for example) and scolding everyone else.

I wonder if Cheney and Rumsfeld and the other narrow-minded, corporate meatheads that run this show realize just how fragile the world financial system is right now. Everyone is looking for the next engine of global economic growth and nobody can figure out what it is. The financial markets are drifting along on the hope that some growth engine will turn up, (China? India?) other than regional and global chaos. When Blair said he backed the US on Iraq, the stock market went down 335 points.

chrisona 04:34pm Sep 4, 2002 EST lfeiner1 "William Safire (Moderated)" 9/4/02 4:22pm

We will then be the government of Iraq. We will be responsible for state building and reconstuction.

What? Crusaders and Jews restructuring an Arab Nation? How will the Arab world respond to such a development?

gjames9142 04:46pm Sep 4, 2002 EST (# 916)

lfeiner1 9/4/02 4:22pm

Quite so. The best-informed people on the subject of Saddam's arsenal are the Israelis, and from I can glean from their press he is in worse shape militarily than he was at the time of the Gulf War.

unclej0 09:31pm Sep 4, 2002

lfeiner1 9/4/02 4:22pm

When you are disoriented and overwhelmed with negativity and anxiety, a few moments of prayer may help.

Even the agnostic mind can find comfort in the 23rd psalm or the LOrd's Prayer. Recite them as though explaining them to a small child, which is what you will, in effect, be doing.

lfeiner1 06:01pm Sep 5, 2002 EST (# 944 unclej0 9/4/02 9:31pm

When you are disoriented and overwhelmed with negativity and anxiety, a few moments of prayer may help

Indeed they might. Unloading all my stock holdings when Ariel Sharon became the Likud candidate for Prime Minister didn't hurt either.

If the US invasion of Iraq is not a quick military knockout with no Scuds on Israel and no torching of Iraq's oil fields and no destabilization in surrounding regimes, then I can tell you right now that we are looking at a global financial and economic meltdown right then, right there.

Even if the invasion goes off without a hitch, there will be a long, extremely costly US occupation and rebuilding which will tie down US resources as global crises mount elsewhere and the meltdown will be more gradual.

lfeiner1 - 06:36pm Sep 9, 2002 EST

trajan1c 9/8/02 8:33pm

The fact is that Bush's policy towards Iraq has been very puzzling to say the least. If Saddam is so close to nuclear weapons, just what was Bush doing for the last year and a half? He certainly didn't come into office talking about an immediate need to oust Saddam. He spent 6 months talking about tax cuts, educational reforms, stem cells, and 'smart sanctions' before 9/11 occurred and we were distracted by the war on Afghanistan. So it is rather puzzling that if the situation is so dire, just why the Bush administration dithered so long. Another puzzling thing, is Bush's visit with his father after which many of the people in his father's administration told him not to invade Iraq and Bush senior said nothing. It looks like Bush junior asked his father to exert counterpressure against the hawks in his administration and Bush senior's silence does nothing to dispell that notion. The third anomaly is the speechs give by Rumfeld and Cheney. They don't just say that Iraq is very close to nukes and we and international community have to do something. That proclaim a totally new principle of international relations; that the US of all the world's countries has the right to unilaterally intervene to change a regime if it feels that the regime might pose a threat in the future. If we want the help of the rest of the world, then why are we trying to ram a totally new principle of international relations down everyone's throat now, one that they are sure to object to? Why not just get their help with the immediate problem, and deal with the new principle later on?

In other words, "something doesn't add up". Or as Eagleburger said "nothing connects" (in Bush's statements.)

In today's New York Times, Michael Gordon speculates that the basis behind the US policy of regime change is not the imminent development of nuclear weapons, but rather the military powerlessness of the Iraqi regime. The US thinks that a takeover of Iraq and the installation of a pro-US government would be easy and would essentially put a US mandate over the Middle East. This is very reminiscent of America and Israel's plan in 82 to invade Lebanon and install a friendly Maronite regime. (And look what happened to that.)

I offer a Le Carre type speculation of my own. Namely, that the US has already made a move on Saddam at the outset of the Bush administration and 9/11 was the result. Specifically it set into motion Wolfowitz's plan to use a CIA sponsored Shia group in Southern Iraq coupled with US air power to grab Saddam's southern oil fields from him. Saddam then notified Al Qaeda what was happening and Al Qaeda took it from there, becaue although Al Qaeda certainly doesn't like Saddam it would like a US/Shia alliance even less.

In this scenario, the US is trying to justify retroactively a policy it has already practiced covertly and behind the backs of the Congress and the international community.

But on the other hand who knows? Maybe this is all an electoral ploy by Bush. The main question I have is: "Is there more than meets the eye here or less than meets the eye"

lfeiner1 07:09pm Sep 9, 2002

btanne1696 9/9/02 6:51pm

Not at all. I am saying that the statements emanating from the Bush administration are so confusing and inconsistent they are leading to widespread doubt that this country really has the resolve to implement a successful regime change and rebuilding in Iraq. And the United States has a long history of intervening in countries and making things worse. We created and armed the Jihadists in Afghanistan and then just left them there in 1989 when the war was over. We secretly bombed the Cambodian countryside in the early 70's which was as good as turning it over to the Khmer Rouge since they controlled the bomb shelters. And when Bush talks about a tax cut, Medicare drug supplements, a balanced budget and a costly regime change in Iraq, it just doesn't sound serious.

I am not questioning the necessity of the operation. I am questioning the competence of the operating team.

lfeiner1 - 04:01pm Sep 12, 2002 EST

So you support Israeli Tourism Minister Benny Elon' suggestion that the US give the Palestinians green cards. I don't have a problem with that. But that's up to the US. You asked me what could Israel do. I take that to mean, what Israel under its own power could do. Sharansky suggests that Israel itself build a Palestinian state with a new moderate Palestinian leadership and I believe Ben 77 would second that. I don't know if Israel has the resources to get into that kind of state building. I believe that in the absence of outside intervention, the conflict will drag on and eventually end up with some kind of binational state stucture of some kind or other, maybe some kind of federation with a Palestinian region and an Israeli region.

What many on both sides of the conflict are waiting for is some outside intervention to impose a settlement in their favor. Arafat was waiting for the internationalization of the conflict ala the Balkans (to relieve him of the necessity of actually governing). And some on the Israeli side are hoping for a US invasion of Iraq, a pro-American Iraqi government, and a US condominium over the entire Middle East which imposed a settlement to Israel's advantage, maybe in conjunction with Jordan, let's say an absorbtion by Israel of the major settlement blocs and aquifers and the rest of the territories going to a Palestinian/Jordanian federation with security provided by Jordanian and other forces with US oversight.

btanne1696 - 09:09pm Sep 11, 2002 EST

1feiner1 :Proposal 1: unilaterally withdraw- How can Israel withdraw when Not being in the West Bank and Gaza meant so many terrorist attacks? AGAIN I ASK YOU WHAT SHOULD ISRAEL DO?

2.Annex the West BAnk-Israel has had to FIGURATIVELY do this to survive and can not do this permanently-too costly and to make the Palestinians citizens would mean they would outnumber the Jews in time=suicide So AGAIN WHAT SHOULD ISRAEL DO?

3.Declare a state with an outside Force like the UN patrolling. The Blue line is being violated daily. Hizbollah is flying flags next to the UN. Arabs own the UN . Israel cannot trust them. AGAIN WHAT SHOULD ISRAEL DO? Check out TRAJAN 14328 His solution is fine with me.(giving them green cards to ELSEWHERE I would appreciate if you would counter my arguments or propose others of your own. In the absense of the ENEMY agreeing Israel has the right to exist, I suggest they deserve none of your sympathy

lfeiner1 - 04:01pm Sep 12, 2002 EST btanne1696 9/11/02 9:09pm

baikonur_ - 04:04pm Sep 12, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 9/12/02 4:01pm

maybe in conjunction with Jordan, let's say an absorbtion by Israel of the major settlement blocs and aquifers and the rest of the territories going to a Palestinian/Jordanian federation with security provided by Jordanian and other forces with US oversight.

Sounds good to me!

perm1 - 04:07pm Sep 12, 2002 EST

Feiner , I sense some change in the tone of your posts . Have you reconsidered your position on the "justified legitimate struggle " of the palestinians. Is it possible that you recognised them for ruthless murderers as they are ? PLease share.

lfeiner1 - 04:19pm Sep 12, 2002 EST

perm1 9/12/02 4:07pm

My position remains what it was. In the absence of outside intervention, the conflict can only devolve into some sort of binational state structure in which the rights of both parties will eventually be recognized by the other, because that is ultimately the only workable arrangement. In the presence of outside intervention, an international mandate, or a US mandate over the region, the outcome will be determined by the the nature of the mandate, its stability and so on, and there is not enough information to make a prediction.

I certainly do not accept calls for ethnic cleansing that have been made on this forum, and I believe that, as long as Israel continues for whatever reason, to occupy the Palestinian area it is responsible, like any occupying power, for the humanitarian needs of the occupied population, just as the US was in Germany after WWII.

I think it would be helpful if Israel halted settlement activity for the duration of the conflict, but they are clearly not going to do it so why waste my breath.

lfeiner1 - 12:16pm Sep 16, 2002 EST

So now that we know what Saddam will do, perhaps we should address the question of what Bush will do. There are several things that are obvious about this administration

· (1) It has a very low tolerance for the enormous financial outlays that would be necessary for post-Saddam "state building" project;

· (2) It has a very low tolerance for expenditure of domestic political capital, especially as regards Israel

· (3) It has a very low tolerance for American casualties

· (4) It has a very low risk tolerance especially as regards a regional or global conflagration precipitated by a botched US action in Iraq

· (5) It is not terribly bright or imaginative

· (6) It doesn't have a trace of humanitarian instinct

(1), (2) and (3) above mean there is no way this administration can get into serious "state building" in a post-Saddam Iraq to any greater extent than it has gotten into "state building" in a post Taliban Afghanistan. (4) would suggest that the adminstration would, on the other hand, be very reluctant simply to go into Iraq, throw out the regime, and leave it in chaos, as it has done in Afghanistan.

(5) and (6) suggest that administration might actually be thinking of ways to implement regime change, without state building, and prevent the chaos of revenge and counter revenge, from spreading to the surrounding areas. Maybe cordon it off and keep the refugees in and the press out? Sabra and Shatila times a thousand, but without the press to cover it? Rwanda in an enormous box, allowed to continue but prevented from spreading to a regional or global upheaval? Yeah, the Bushies just could be thinking along these lines.

bostonaod 12:30pm Sep 16, 2002 EST
bostonaod@hotmail.com

lfeiner1 9/16/02 12:16pm

What an asinine post. You throw out silly "facts" out as gospel, never bothering to back anything, and then preach about what the Bush Administration will do, as if you've got a clue.

What makes you think that post-Saddam Iraq will need the same "serious state building" that a post-Taliban Afghanistan needed? Look at the Kurdish government in Northern Iraq, thriving under the protection of the US-enforced no fly zone. It is not unreasonable to believe that a liberated Iraq could be a democratic state.

(5) and (6) suggest that administration might actually be thinking of ways to implement regime change, without state building, and prevent the chaos of revenge and counter revenge, from spreading to the surrounding areas. Maybe cordon it off and keep the refugees in and the press out?

(5) and (6) are you opinion and not fact. Commenting on them further is a waste of time, as they are just plain silly and not based on reality

lfeiner1 - 05:54pm Sep 16, 2002 EST

bostonaod 9/16/02 12:30pm

The Saddam regime has destroyed much of Iraq's civil society. It rules through deals with the tribal leaders. It also creates new "tribes" with tribal bosses to whom rule is subcontracted. This is very much the way that the African strongmen ruled and why their countries devolved into tribal fratricide after they were overthrown. Observe that many of these African regimes also have great natural wealth. Of course Iraq is at a much higher level of development than the African regimes. But it stands to reason that Saddam would structure his regime in such a way that it would be vulnerable to disintegration without the present of the inner clique. (This is how Arafat ruled the PA) This would be one of his life insurance policies. I have seen nobody in the Bush administration give any assurances that the post Saddam Iraq would be stable, and I have seen no willingness in the United States and the world community to devote the resources to provide the basic order and stability without which a democratic reconstruction would be impossible. The US military asked Bush for 250,000 troops and he said "Nope, you get 90,000"

Of course, you could say that the Bush adminstration has the detailed understanding of Iraq's feudal governmental structures that would be needed to put together a stable security structure that didn't require a massive US military presence for a very long time. But the evidence so far is not promising. When Paul Wolfowitz was chosen as undersecretary of defense, he advocated a regime change strategy which involved no US troops at all. It would involve a CIA-sponsored Shia group that with US air cover would grab a part of Southern Iraq togther with some his large oil fields. This new regime would then be recognized by the US as the legitimate Iraqi government and it would expand to include all of Iraq. Now if you want a plan deliberately designed to bind the Sunni tribal chiefs closer to Saddam and thereby strengthen Saddam, while at the same time making him more paranoid and dangerous, you couldn't find a better one than Wolfowitz's cockamamie idea. Thus, I find it hard to believe that this administration has such a great understanding of how to deal with Iraq short of overwhelming and costly use of manned force. Which of course doesn't square well with Bush's tax cuts and balanced budget pledges if state building is on the agenda.

lfeiner1 - 06:08pm Sep 16, 2002 EST

wharrison2 9/16/02 12:21pm

You know that this morning I called up a Republican Senator making exactly the comments I made above. Only I added "There must be something missing here. There must be something the Bush administration knows and can't tell us, because this doesn't add up". The person who answered the phone said "You are the first person to call us up with that observation (there is something the administration knows that it can't reveal) and you are right"

lfeiner1 - 02:52pm Sep 20, 2002 EST sjlivson 9/20/02 2:41pm Wolfowitz is a lunatic. His announced plan to remove Saddam was a CIA sponsored Shia group in Southern Iraq, which together with US air support would grab Saddam's major oil fields with no involvement of American troops. It's hard to imagine a plan more deliberately designed to bind the Sunni tribal chieftains to Saddam, strengthen Saddam's hold on power, even as it made him more dangerous and paranoid. Indeed, if this plan were actually set into motion in the early days of the Bush adminstration, it could have had a bearing on the disastrous turn of events that followed, both in the Middle East and in the United States.

And it is depressing to live under this administration. Not because life in the US is not good. It is good. And can remain good even in the presence of vast upheavals in the rest of the world aided and abetted by American blunders. Even with the terrorist bugaboo, a steep global economic and political crisis is far more likely to trash the rest of the world before it gets to the US. But it eventually will get here. That life will still be better "here" than "out there" will be cold comfort.

lfeiner1 03:16pm Sep 20, 2002 EST philip160 9/20/02 3:05pm

The US has made so many blunders in the Middle East that it is mind boggling. The peace treaty between Israel and Egypt should have been followed immediately by a permament settlements feeze and negotiations with moderate elements in the PLO brokered by Sadat and the uS. Instead, Israel used the peace treaty with Egypt as a cover to exponentially expand its settlement program, Egypt was isolated in the Arab world. The US chose Saddam as the proxy American policeman against the Iranian revolution and encouraged his invasion of Iraq, expecting that it would be quick. We also encouraged the Israeli invasion of Lebanon expecting that a pro-American Maronite government would emerge. Instead Lebanon was taken over by Syria, Amal and Hezbullah. Iran almost overran Baghdad. We were forced to get closer and closer to Saddam, give him more and more aid, even as we sold weapons to Iran to get the hostages back, earning Saddam's distrust and hatred even as we helped him get stronger and stronger. Yuk.

philip160 - 03:37pm Sep 20, 2002 EST
I DON'T KNOW HOW IT WORKS! - The Wizard of Oz

lfeiner1 9/20/02 3:16pm

Yuk, indeed.

What I fear awaits us in the next few months (and my reasons for stating I dislike Sharon) is that a mere hard line approach towards the Palestinians will be ramped up further, with no avenue of dialogue left open, no place for any moderates to gain a toe hold.

I favor a hard line against terror. It brings me delight to see Arafat's compound leveled. But if this is all the Likud has to offer, they are going to have level a lot more than that.

Does Sharon know it? Yes. Yes, he does. In this regard I think he knows exactly what he wants. He is staying ahead of Netanyhu in the disenfranchisement department. He has to.

In my mind, I see a dual policy of a hard line against terror and an open ear to moderate voices as the best strategy. But neither US foreign policy or, from what I can read (nothing) Israeli policy is paying attention at all to the moderate voices, or trying to offer anything worth risking one's life for. I suspect it is simply because dead bodies get more press than non-violent protest and quiet dialogue. (The "commerce of blood.") But nonetheless it is dismaying.

Why is that neither the Likud Right or the Bush Administration are making real attempts to speak with moderate Palestinians? Could it be that they welcome a Palestinian state as much as they would a plague of frogs? Could it be that, in the eyes of the US and Israeli Right the Arabs are once more simply in the way? Could it be that Arafat serves a purpose more to the liking of Netanyahu than he does the needs of his own people?

It is an almost impossible gordian knot. Somehow the language of hate and violence must be cleansed from the Palestinian community. But there has to be a motivation to do so. Somehow, moderate must engage with moderate -- and survive.

Bye for now.

Phil

lfeiner1 - 03:46pm Sep 20, 2002

philip160 9/20/02 3:37pm

As former CIA offical Anthony Cordesman said as a Congressional hearing "Until state building becomes a bipartisan word, we're not ready to say containment has failed (with Iraq)". The problem the administration faces both with the Arab/Israeli dispute and with Saddam is that it is not willing to get into the massive and costly exertions of state building, something that would be necessary either for a two state solution of the Palestinian issue or for a successful regime change in Iraq. The administration is seeking to shelf the first issue and is looking for a cheap and easy military solution to the second and there ain't no such thing.

ben.77 - 04:18pm Sep 20, 2002 EST

The following was emailed to our moderator.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Dear Olivia,

I believe that the expressions in the following quote, referred to a democratically elected Government, defy the rules of this forum, not to mention the crossing of all red lines of civilized debate and good manners.

This is plain slander, expressed by foul language.

Please make this forum a more reasonable place.

lfeiner1 - 02:18pm Sep 20, 2002 EST (# 16153 of 16158)

"There are two people in the Bush administration with more than a double digit IQ. They are Wolfowitz and Armitage. The rest are either exhausted cynics, hostile morons or raging lunatics."

Regards,

Ben77

lfeiner1 - 08:26pm Sep 21, 2002 EST

ben.77 9/20/02 4:18pm

If you are a member of the Bush administration I apologize for the hyperbolic language. Obviously, the people in the Bush administration are of higher than average intelligence and competence or they wouldn't be where they are. However, their abilities don't come anywhere near the abilities necessary to run the world's only superpower. The three preceding adminstrations whether or not I agree with their policies or whether or not I approve of their actions, all had people of much higher abilities, such as James Baker, George Bush senior, Caspar Weinburger, Carla Hill, Strobe Talbot, Clinton (he had a character problem), Micky Kantor, James Brady to name a few. This administration consists of a bunch of narrow-minded one dimensional individuals who might make good managers of a small or mid-size business but are simply not up to the complex dangers facing the US. They run the country as though it were a private corporation responding to reasonable criticism whether from at home and abroad with obfuscations or crude bullying. They act like tyrannical corporate bosses ("If you don't like what I'm doing find another job"). A prime example of this attitude is Bush's statement that the world hasn't proved to him that "it can be taken seriously" ("If you don't like what I'm doing find another world"). Another example, is Rumsfeld's statement at Congressional hearing when asked about a post-Saddam Iraq in the event that the regime should be driven from power by the US military, (what the US would do to prevent anarchy and chaos). His answer was "that issue is outside of my administrative scope". In the early phases of the war in Afghanistan, the Northern Alliance was complaining that "the US could bomb like this for a thousand years and we couldn't take Mazari-i-Shariff". Rumsfeld's response was to compare the air war to a game of billiards. The purpose of the limited bombing (which was later replaced by massive bombing) was to break the hold of the "bad Taliban" on the "good Taliban" and drive the "good Taliban" like billiards to the Northern Alliance. Manipulating tribal politics with smart bombs. That's the mindset of this administration. All the poor regions of the world can slide into chaos, but we can manage this chaos with smart bombs, special ops and CIA sponsored tribal leaders. I would describe that mindset as "lunatic and moronic".

philip160 9pm Sep 20, 2002 EST
I DON'T KNOW HOW IT WORKS! - The Wizard of Oz

lfeiner1 9/20/02 3:46pm

I agree with you. The US, in following the "path of least assistance" has boxed itself into a corner with Saddam.

Two things irk me about the present impasse:

1 It was entirely avoidable. (Yes, state building was the answer. And the price tag is cheaper in the long run.)

2 Republican that I am, I dislike Bush, didn't vote for him and hate the expenditure of American blood (or anyone's blood, in fact) to assist the fortunes of the Republican Right.

The timing is just a little too convenient.

However, when even Daschle came out of a secret briefing on Iraq a bit greeen around the gills, stating soberly that it had been "very helpful" or something to that effect, we have to know that something exceedingly wicked this way comes out of Iraq.

It is, in my opinion, the time to close ranks.

Yuk.

Outta here for the day.

Peace to all.

Phil

lfeiner1 08:47pm Sep 21, 2002 EST philip160

Came this way, if my suspicions are correct:

Wolfowitz's...announced plan to remove Saddam was a CIA sponsored Shia group in Southern Iraq, which together with US air support would grab Saddam's major oil fields with no involvement of American troops. It's hard to imagine a plan more deliberately designed to bind the Sunni tribal chieftains to Saddam, strengthen Saddam's hold on power, even as it made him more dangerous and paranoid. Indeed, if this plan were actually set into motion in the early days of the Bush adminstration, it could have had a bearing on the disastrous turn of events that followed, both in the Middle East and in the United States. lfeiner Sept 20

Bush's dilemma is that he can't back out of "hit" which didn't work, without risking Saddam's revenge, and he can't go forward without risking a chaos far more dangerous than Saddam. We are in a very, very dangerous situation now.

lfeiner1 08:54pm Sep 21, 2002 EST

btanne1696 9/21/02 8:47pm NO wecan't.(Trust Saddam not give WMD to terrorists) Nor can we trust Pakistan to keep control of its nuclear arsenal (many of Pakistan's intelligence officals are sympathetic to Al Qaeda). Nor can we know what is going on in all the tribal areas of the world. If the result of a botched regime change in Iraq is global chaos then anyone can acquire anything anywhere anytime

sme49b1 - 08:51pm Sep 21, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 9/21/02 8:50pm

So what alternative do you suggest?

lfeiner1 08:54pm Sep 21, 2002 EST (

Really be prepared to engage in state building

lfeiner1 - 07:55pm Sep 30, 2002 EST (# 18039 of 18039)

sjlivson 9/27/02 10:37am

The purpose of Israel as Jabotinsky saw it was to save the Jews of Europe, not to implement some social experiment as the Labor Zionists saw it. Of all the people in the European Jewish community, Jabontinsky saw most accurately what was in store for the Jews of Europe, although even he didn't imagine the true scope of the catastrophe. The basic goal of the Zionist project as Jabotinsky saw it, was that, with the rise of mutually hostile nationalisms, a nationality such as the Jews which had no land of its own would be regarded as the common enemy of all nations. He saw a Jewish state as the "normalization of the Jewish condition", a state like any other state. He was right, in my opinion, as I said. But, as Rosalind says in Shakespeare's "As You Like It": "'was' is not 'is'. The state came too late to fulfill its intentions. It has not normalized the Jewish condition. Israel is not a self-sufficient state. It is dependent on ever increasing levels of support from the US. It is constantly required by its dilemmas to acquire more and more influence over American foreign policy. It is a satrapy in the American world empire which must constantly bid for support at the imperial court. It has not normalized the Jewish condition. It has only reproduced the condition of Jewish dependence, this time on a world scale, not only to the detriment of the Jews, but, even more importantly, to the detriment of America's ability to stabilize the world.

sme49b1 - 08:08pm Sep 30, 2002 EST (# 18041 of 18042)

lfeiner1 9/30/02 7:55pm

From a political standpoint, I would agree that Israel is dependent to a great degree on Us support. However from an economic standpoint, that is becoming less and less the case. US aid to Israel has been dropping for several years now, even though the Israeli economy has not been performing up to its previous standard.

To call Israel "a satrapy of the US world empire" is way overstating the case. Israel is no more a US "satrapy" today than any NATO member. Based on the conduct of many NATO members these days, your version of a "US world empire" is quite different from any empire that I'm familiar with. Can you imagine Rome letting the governor of Gaul set its own foreign policy?

lfeiner1 - 08:13pm Sep 30, 2002 EST (# 18042 of 18042)

yurysta 9/27/02 10:50am

Yes. And don't forget what happened 27 years ago, when Suharto came to power. Were it not for Israel the Jews of the Arab world would have played a similar role to the overseas Chinese in South East Asia. They would have provided a mercantile class that could have facilitiated the more successful integration of the Arab world into the global economy, especially with their contacts with Jews in the first world diaspora. A great many would have become leftists or secular nationalists as did many Christians the Arab world (from Michel Aflaq to Marwan Barghouti). And yes many could have been slaughtered in anti-leftist coups like the one in Indonesia in 1965. After the fall of the leftist Karim Kassem in Iraq, many Iraqi Jewish communists fled to Israel, (where they became Israeli communists)

But on balance, I reapeat my belief that in 1928 a Jewish state in Palestine was a necessity, in 48 it was "a necessary idea whose time had come and gone"

lfeiner1 05:22pm Oct 2, 2002 EST

President George W. Bush
White House
Washington, DC

Dear President Bush:

Why does your administration seem so oblivious to the effect that its belligerent warmongering is having on global investor confidence? Doesn’t it realize the extent of world economic fragility now that everyone is beginning to see that the US global “engine of growth” is stalling out and that there is no other engine? Does it really want to turn what, at best, will be a prolonged period of global economic stagnation, into a global economic rout, caused by US military adventurism?

It’s almost as though you want to show Saddam that you are not intimidated by the prospect of a global economic collapse, that you are going to invade Iraq even if it precipitates such a collapse.

Don’t you realize that this kind of foreign policy has already been tried and failed?

It was tried by the medieval Scottish warlord Macbeth.

Macbeth got his foreign policy advice from an outside policy think tank known as the “weird sisters”, who were the medieval progenitors of Defense Department Analysts, Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith.

Macbeth’s approach was summed up by Macbeth himself, when he said to Lady Macbeth:

“let the frame of things disjoint and both worlds suffer ‘ere we shed a tear”

Of course, in saying “let both worlds suffer”, Macbeth was referring to the earthly world and the heavenly world of the afterlife, whereas, in saying “let both worlds suffer”, your administration is referring to the underdeveloped world and the developed world. You are hell-bent on fomenting chaos in the underdeveloped world, even if it means economic chaos in the developed world as well.

Sincerely, lfeiner@msn.com

chiefwiley1 - 05:39pm Oct 2, 2002 EST
1feiner1

It's not about you. It's not about Macbeth. Folks in Israel are sleeping with gas masks next to their pillows. What kind of a world do you want to wake up in?

lfeiner1 - 05:56pm Oct 2, 2002 EST

chiefwiley1 10/2/02 5:39pm

If the world economy tanks, large parts of the world will go into chaos and then anyone can acquire any weapon anywhere anytime. Then Russian and Pakistan's nuclear arsenal are called into question. Then the stability of the United States itself can be called into question. I really don't think anyone in this administration has the slightest idea of the fragility of the world political economy at this point.

"Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble <http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/02/business/02JAPA.html>" refers to the unsustainable Western-led growth patterns that were put into place after the long term decline in the rate of return on assets in the late 1960's. First the Carter period inflationary led-growth. Then the Reagan period of debt-led growth. Then the Clinton period of bubble-led growth.

"Eye of Newt" refers to Newt Gingrich's flawed visions that global supply-side economics and free trade would lead to successful global economic growth and stability.

"Liver of blaspheming Jew" refers to the Oslo euphoria among Jewish doves that Israel could farm out its occupation to Palestinian proxies in order to achieve recognition and acceptance in a prosperous, globalized Middle East (This is "blasphemy" to the Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith "weird sisters")

The period of Western-led growth is over. And future sustainable global growth awaits a massive redistribution of resources toward the less developed areas of the world. The instrumentalities for this will take a long time to put into place.

Unless the US is seriously ready to get into massive state building, which it is not, an attack on Iraq could precipitate global chaos, which poses far more dangers than Saddam.

nacl_- 05:57pm Oct 2, 2002 EST

gjames

You wrote:

Much of what I think was well summed up yesterday by the Israeli writer David Grossman gjames9142 10/2/02 10:07am </webin/WebX?14@114.Dzd7aNFWUcU^393892@.f2e3263/11478>

So I went to look at your Grossman post:

it (Grossman's op-ed) states a fundamental truth that those who fume with such savage righteousness from the diaspora are incapable of grasping gjames9142 10/1/02 9:37am </webin/WebX?14@114.Dzd7aNFWUcU^393892@.f2e3263/11315>

Don't kid yourself, don't imagine you are grasping any fundamental truths with Grossman. Rather, you are grasping at a chest beating Jew who supports your position, allowing you to dispense with rational and factual arguments. You don't have an explanation for why Arafat turned down Taba, and why a half hour walk justifies the Intifada and justified children being used as shields by rifleman, and justifies exploding buses etc. Instead you have Grossman's rage and tears to tell you, you are right to blame the Israelis.

And who is Grossman? Actually, that is rather fundamental. Have you read the Old Testament? Have you read the Prophets? Have you noticed, the favorite theme of those old boys? It is sin. Again and again the Jews are unfaithful, they fall into evil ways, they betray their mission, and they are punished. And how they are punished. They suffered invasions, slaughters, pestilence, defeats, exile. They suffer the destruction of the Temple, God does not kid around. He does not let them get away with beans, not for long. The PROPHETS OF ISRAEL are ever on the spot telling everybody why they are being kicked around why they are in agony. It's their own fault. They are unconscionably wicked, they just cannot stay good, not for long. And God is getting even.

Fast forward a few millennia. Don't think anything has changed. We again see a nation of Jews obdurately defying huge, thuggish neighbors. The new Israelis are the same hyperactive bunch with the old temperament, instincts and habits. Which is to say, the Jews are still being pummeled from outside while sermonized from within. They are still being worked over by professional moralists who tell them, as buses explode and crowds are torn to shreds, it's because of their own wicked ways.

Yes, Grossman, ever in ashes and sackcloth, is fundamental. His type is an inextinguishable Jewish phenomenon. You see him in the ancient prophets, in Jesus, in Vienna's Jew bashing Jews of the 1930's, in the Lenny Bernstein's singing the virtues of the Black Panthers, in Chomsky and Finkelstein, etc. Christians also display this genotype, only not with the same intensity and frequency.

Those guys are airtight proof, no need to squint into a microscope and poke the DNA, that the archtypical biblical Jews are still around, alive and well.

The only thing that has changed is that today's prophets of God no longer believe in God. But in every other respect they are like those old boys, an articulate bunch who strove for power by wielding a moral cudgel. They kicked the Hebrews in the rear even as they were being speared from outside. Being God's anointed helped the Prophets, but as we can now see, that wasn't indispensable. Crucial was being good at words, and sincere in their plangent hysteria and in their contempt for the hard and nasty facts.

The Talmud understood this and says; the age of prophesy is behind us. Only children and fools can yet be prophets.

But you gjames, don’t want to understand this and fervently grip the knee of Grossman. He is your savior. He enables you to feel virtuous as you support people who openly express genocidal ambition.

lfeiner1 - 06:15pm Oct 2, 2002 EST

_nacl_ 10/2/02 5:57pm

The Talmud understood this and says; the age of prophesy is behind us. Only children and fools can yet be prophets

The MIT economist Rudy Dornbusch once said "anyone who is right on a twenty year time span is either unbearably lucky or completely insane". I would add that anyone who is right on a twenty year time span is both competely unlucky and unbearably sane.

lfeiner1 - 08:22pm Oct 8, 2002 EST

October 3

President George W. Bush
White House
Washington, DC

Dear President Bush:

Why does your administration seem so oblivious to the effect that its belligerent warmongering is having on global investor confidence? Doesn't it realize the extent of world economic fragility now that everyone is beginning to see that the US global engine of growth is stalling out and that there is no other engine? Does it really want to turn what, at best, will be a prolonged period of global economic stagnation, into a global economic rout, caused by US military adventurism? It's almost as though you want to show Saddam that you are not intimidated by the prospect of a global economic collapse, that you are going to invade Iraq even if it precipitates such a collapse. Don't you realize that this kind of foreign policy has already been tried and failed? It was tried and failed in medieval Scotland. Macbeth was a medieval Scottish warlord. who got his foreign policy advice from an outside policy think tank known as the "weird sisters", who were the medieval progenitors of Defense Department Analysts, Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith. Macbeth's approach was summed up by Macbeth himself, when he said to Lady Macbeth:

"let the frame of things disjoint and both worlds suffer 'ere we shed a tear"

Of course, in saying "let both worlds suffer", Macbeth was referring to the earthly world and the heavenly world of the afterlife, whereas, in saying "let both worlds suffer", your administration is referring to the underdeveloped world and the developed world. You are hell-bent on fomenting chaos in the underdeveloped world, even if it means economic chaos in the developed world as well. In fact, you believe, taking the advice of Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith et al,. that the West can devise military means to protect itself from chaos in the developing world by use of smart bombs, special ops and deals with friendly warlords. Indeed your attitude towards problems of global poverty and the global environment is very much like the attitude of Lady Macbeth towards the death of Duncan

"What's without all remedy should be without regard"

But you should realize that Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, Pipes, Ledeen, Krauthammer et al, the brains behind your new national security doctrine, are the same guys who, in 1981, promised that an Israeli invasion of Lebanon would result in a pro-Western, friendly Phalangist government. You should realize that their advice is unreliable and deliberately unreliable

"and be with these juggling fiends no more believed that palter with us in a double sense that keep the word of promise to our ear and break it to our hope"

Because when Macbeth's trouble-making medieval advisors said :

"Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble"

it wasn't just a meaningless chant. It was a very long term prediction which referred to the unsustainable Western-led growth patterns that were put into place after the long term decline in the rate of return on assets in the late 1960's. First the Carter period inflationary led-growth. Then the Reagan period of debt-led growth. Then the Clinton period of bubble-led growth. The period of Western-led growth is over. And future sustainable global growth awaits a massive redistribution of resources toward the less developed areas of the world. The instrumentalities for this will take a long time to put into place. And the more the spreading chaos in the third world, the longer will it take. It is the dawning realization of this in every country but the United States that renders the world economy and world investor sentiment so fragile. It is why an attack on Iraq could drive the world economy into a steep uncontrollable slide.

If the world economy goes into a 1930's style depression (and don't think that this is impossible) large parts of the world will go into chaos and then anyone can acquire any weapon anywhere anytime. Then Russia's and Pakistan's nuclear arsenal are called into question. Then the stability of the United States itself can be called into question. I really don't think anyone in this administration has the slightest idea of the fragility of the world political economy at this point.

Unless the US is seriously ready to get into massive state building, which it is not, an attack on Iraq could precipitate global chaos, which will pose far more dangers than Saddam ever could.

lfeiner1 - 05:24pm Oct 9, 2002 EST

To Sme49b1

As to the actual imminent threat posed by Saddam, I have no idea. I am sure that the administration has info that it won't or can't share with us. When the administration says that the military action against Saddam will be quick and rapidly successful, I have no reason not to believe them.

I question them on the following points:

· They are seriously underestimating the possibility of a steep global economic slide as a consequence of a botched regime change in Iraq. This is because they are seriously overestimating the growth potential in the West in the absence of third world markets and investment outlets.

· They are seriously underestimating the risks posed by the spreading chaos in the less developed world and the enormous increase in this chaos that would be caused by a steep global economic slide.

· They fail to see that total absence of control can be even more dangerous than thuggish and malevalent control. Specifically, they are underestimating the dangers that would be posed by chaos in Iraq itself

I think that the most we can prudently accomplish in Iraq today is to get the strongest possible UN resolution that has broad international support and enforce it by military means if necessary, but by means which stop short of throwing Iraq into chaos in the hope that it can be rebuilt or that the dangers of the chaos can be contained. This won't eliminate the threat posed by Saddam. It will reduce it, and it is the best we can prudently do at this point. And I hope that the administration doesn't get so obsessed with this that it gets blindsided by burgeoning global economic problems.

As to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, it has reached an absolute stalemate. The next phase of it will be determined by what the administration does or does not do in Iraq. If a botched invasion of Iraq destabilizes Jordan then large numbers of Palestinians will flee across the border to escape the stringencies of the occupation and it is likely to be a one way voyage. I'm not going to say that this scenario is just what a lot of Israelis are hoping for because everyone is going to jump on me and my post will travel many pages back at the speed of light.

lfeiner1 - 03:19pm Oct 10, 2002 yehudi_adam 10/10/02 10:39am

This is why Richard Perle advocates a US invasion of Iraq. From this week's Forward:

Iraqi Dissidents Pledge Peace With Israel. Perle boosts exiles as leaders of a a post-Saddam regime...Sources familiar with Bush administration's thinking on the future of Iraq said that the administration is hesitating to anoint a specific group fo dissidents as leaders of Iraq...(there is) a belief among some US officials that a new regime must rely on Iraqis now living in Iraq...That notion was sharply criticized by Richard Perle..Perle accused the adminstration of lacking vision

A post-Saddam Iraq governed by a pro-Israel clique as touted by Richard Perle. A scenario for 'voluntary transfer' perhaps? The new regime is offered inducements to give Palestinians a destination to be pressured to go to? "Transfer with a human face"? A real smoothie that Perle.

Of course, I don't think he'd be completely displeased with a botched US regime change, chaos in the region, and a forcible transfer.

That's why I compared Perle, Wolfowitz and Feith to the "juggling fiends" in Macbeth

that palter with us in a double sense, that keep the promise to our ear and break it to our hope

Perle, Wolfowitz and Feith making prophecies designed to go wrong to serve the agenda of transfer and not American interest.

shimshik - 03:27pm Oct 10, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 10/10/02 3:19pm

And you just can't stand it if a new democratic government in Iraq will make peace with Israel, can you? Well, here's something to think about - what do Iraqis have to gain from war with Israel? What possible reason for war with Israel does Iraq have anyway? On the other hand, Iraqis have alot to gain - economically and politically from peace with Israel. Isn't that just too bad?

paxika. - 03:27pm Oct 10, 2002 EST

I read a declaration, an interesting one, by Scott Ritter, former head of the United Nations weapons inspection team in Iraq. Below is the relative link:

<http://www.iht.com/articles/71077.html>

Among other things Ditter said "...An attack against Iraq would be a disaster for Israel...it would open the door for an Iraqi attack on Israel....undermine regional stability and tilt Arab public opinion even further against the U.S. and it would increase terrorism in Israel.

My assessment in 1998 was that Saddam Hussein did not have the capability either possess non conventional weapons or ability to fire missiles at Israel. And the Israeli government accepted this assessment....Since then, I assume that Israel has continued its excellent intelligence operations... Inspectors should come and be on the ground to assass the situation...."

lfeiner1 - 03:34pm Oct 10, 2002 EST

shimshik 10/10/02 3:27pm

I'm not questioning the desirability of a democratic Iraqi regime that makes peace with Israel. That's what Perle, Wolfie and Feith are offering

that keep word of promise to our ear

But remember these were the same guys that were predicting in 1981 that an Israeli invasion of Lebanon would create a pro-Western, pro-Israel Phalangist government. Well you saw how that turned out. The rise of Hezbullah, the radicalization of the Palestinians on the West Bank, the destruction of the moderate wing of the PLO, the transfer of bomb making technology from Hezbullah to Hamas (when Rabin exile Hamas leaders to Lebanon in 1992)

and break it to our hope

Chaos in Lebanon and then in the West and Gaza, and talk of transfer. Just what these guys wanted in the first place. And what will happen in Iraq if the administration listens to these "juggling fiends"

lfeiner1 >- 03:19pm Oct 10, 2002 EST

yehudi_adam 10/10/02 10:39am This is why Richard Perle advocates a US invasion of Iraq. From this week's Forward:

Of course, I don't think he'd be completely displeased with a botched US regime change, chaos in the region, and a forcible transfer.

That's why I compared Perle, Wolfowitz and Feith to the "juggling fiends" in Macbeth

that palter with us in a double sense, that keep the promise to our ear and break it to our hope

Perle, Wolfowitz and Feith making prophecies designed to go wrong to serve the agenda of transfer and not American interest.

shimshik 03:27pm Oct 10, 2002 EST (# 19310

paxika. 03:27pm Oct 10, 2002 EST I read a declaration, an interesting one, by Scott Ritter, former head of the United Nations weapons inspection team in Iraq. Below is the relative link:

<http://www.iht.com/articles/71077.html>

lfeiner1 - 03:34pm Oct 10, 2002 EST (# 19312 shimshik 10/10/02 3:27pm

I'm not questioning the desirability of a democratic Iraqi regime that makes peace with Israel. That's what Perle, Wolfie and Feith are offering

that keep the promise to our ear

and break it to our hope

ljnelson36 - 11:53am Oct 13, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 - 11:38am Oct 13, 2002 EST (# 19673 of 19674)

Could you cite a source of these statisticis on Palestinian emigration.

Here you go...enjoy

Exodus To Jordan <http://www.arutzsheva.com/news.php3?id=4953>

Over 100,000 Arabs have left Yesha in the past nine months, the large majority of them to Jordan. As a result, it has been reported that Jordan has closed its borders to Palestinians from Judea, Samaria, and Gaza - but Jordan denies this. Some 200 Arabs were delayed on their way into Jordan from Israel yesterday, and in fact aides to King Abdullah say they do not want a repeat of 1948, when 250,000 Arabs from Yesha entered Jordan.

In addition, Jordan is not allowing Hamas spokesman Ibrahim Roshe to enter the country. He was expelled from Jordan almost two years ago, and now his second-choice country, Qatar, also no longer wants him.

lfeiner1 09:16am Oct 14, 2002

ljnelson36 10/13/02 11:53am The web site you gave describing the exodus of 100,000 Palestinians to Jordan in the past nine months had no date on it. But given another headline about the Israeli ceasefire and the talk about the Jordanian seal off of the border as something recent it must have been describing events in the spring of 2001. You can't take the number 100,000 emigrants per nine month interval as the current rate of emigration. The West Bank is under curfew. Until the fence is built Israel cannot simply lift the curfew in order to spur transfer. It would risk infiltration of suicide bombers into Israel itself. Jordan has not unsealed the border. Your demographic projections of only 800,000 Palestinians in the West Bank are based on invalid assumptions. You'd better come with a better source of current West Bank Palestinian population, before we can continue discussion of future West Bank demographics.

ljnelson36 - 09:25am Oct 14, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 10/14/02 9:16am

If you can prove there are more than 800,000 Arabs in the West Bank, be my guest

lfeiner1 09:39am Oct 15, 2002 EST (# 19742

ljnelson36 10/14/02 9:25am I have no idea how many Palestinians there are in the West Bank at this point. It is under Israeli lockup and Jordan has sealed off the border. The CIA yearbook no longer contains demographic information about Palestinians in the Wet Bank and Gaza. In support, however, of your transfer goals, I have received the following Email from Ramallah

October 15, 2002 - 1:36 am Hi, At this very moment the Israeli Occupation Forces are going house to house taking inventory of the people in Ramallah. They are documenting the name and ID number of every Palestinian. We have had dozens of calls from the terrified people .... They fear that the IDF is doing the inventory in preparation for a transfer. At the rate they are moving I suspect they will make it to our house within the next hour. Transfer has been the talk lately and in West Jerusalem there are signs in Hebrew that read "Transfer = Peace". The people in the occupied territories fear that at any time busses will come and they will be forced to leave their homes.

Of course, in order to effect a massive transfer of population in the face of Jordanian opposition to such a move, Israel needs a botched US invasion of Iraq, a destabilization of Jordan, and Jordanian loss of control over who is coming across the Jordan river. Israel cannot just start violating its peace agreement with Jordan by forcing the Jordanians to open the border to a massive influx of Palestinians. As far as the invasion of Iraq is concerned, from today's NY Times

US-France Split on Iraq deepens. DOW up 244.

Hopefully the Palestinians will be spared ethnic cleansing and Americans will be spared economic meltdown precitipated by a botched US invasion of Iraq goaded on by Israel's allies in the US, Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, and their malevalent influence over US foreign policy.

ljnelson36 - 09:53am Oct 15, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 - 09:39am Oct 15, 2002 EST (# 19742 of 19742)

Hopefully the Palestinians will be spared ethnic cleansing..

The only people who have been ethnically cleaned in the last 80 years from Judea and Samaria, twice, have been Jews, by ARABS.

Incredible that Arabs would want to do it again. What is it about Pales that they refuse to have Jewish neighbors ?

The real problem with the population census is evident in the statistics. Arabs have been double dipping for years and finally got caught. Naughty, naughty.

lfeiner1 01:23pm Oct 15, 2002 EST

ljnelson36 10/15/02 9:53am >

After the Nakba of 47-48, the Israelis claimed that there were never any Arabs there to begin with. They were all illegal immigrants who came in during the British mandate. Now you are denying the existence of a large part of the Palestinian population of the West Bank in mental preparation for another Nakba. That is what will happen. If Jordan becomes destabilized and another flight of Palestinians takes place, you can be sure that Israel will destroy any evidence that they were there in the first place, and will strip them of all such evidence before they go. They won't make the same mistake twice. And don't think that this is just a wild speculation. The Bush administration is seriously concerned that Sharon might take advantage of a war with Iraq to start expelling Palestinians as is Jordan (See this week's Forward

ljnelson36 01:28pm Oct 15, 2002 EST (# 19766 If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 - 01:23pm Oct 15, 2002 EST (# 19763 of 19764)

After the Nakba of 47-48, the Israelis claimed that there were never any Arabs there to begin with. They were all illegal immigrants who came in during the British mandate.

Nakba, love that word, can't wait for Nakba II.

No one said there weren't any Arabs, just that there were far fewer than Arabs claimed. Most coming from other Arab countries to forestall Jewish immigration after the Balfour Declaration.

ljnelson36 - 01:31pm Oct 15, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 - 01:27pm Oct 15, 2002 EST (# 19765 of 19766)

It's when the market thinks that the US might not invade Iraq, that the market goes up.

Nope, good earnings reports today.

Try again. And did you see this ?

DEBKAfile

US-UK Aircraft Bomb Air Defense Command Center Tuesday at Al Kut 100 m. Southeast of Baghdad Near Iranian Border

DEBKAfile Military Sources:

This is First Allied Raid from East, Made Possible by Secret US-Iranian Accord for Over-flights from New US Base at Herat, Afghanistan

lfeiner1 - 01:41pm Oct 15, 2002 ljnelson36 10/15/02 1:28pm

The triple A rating given IBM by Lehman brothers on Friday and the increased profit estimates by GE (both Lehman Brothers and GE have good accounting reputations) sent the market up 300 points and punished short sellers and bond holders. This puts an upward bias on the market since people have to cover short positions. It's like a massive currency intervention to punish speculators. And the US and UK have stepped up bombing of Iraq ever since Bush took office. If the US invades Iraq and Israel uses it as a pretext to start massive expulsions of Palestinians, I would advise you not to be in the market. I got out in early 2001 when Sharon won the election, although a market rise benefits me too since I have variable annuities with quaranteed base rates, but whose rates vary with long term quality bond rates. Of course, if Israel's hardline supporters in the US actually get the US into a "clash of cultures" with the entire Muslim world, then my financial precautions won't do me any good either.

lfeiner1 - 01:46pm Oct 15, 2002 EST

ljnelson36 10/15/02 1:28pm

can't wait for Nakba II

Just don't be in the market when it happens

lfeiner1 11:34am Oct 18, 2002 EST

From this week's Forward:

The PA leadership has told the Bush administration it is reconsidering the concept of a two-state solution. Salam Fayad, the PA Finance Minister, last week handed a 10 page memo and five maps - detailing settlement construction around Jerusalem and along the so-called Green Line - to Secretary of Sate Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleeza RIce, according to Diana Buttu, a PA legal adviser. 'He told them that the PA leadership was rethinking its committment to the two-state solution because of the actions of the Israeli government,' Buttu told the Forward. 'Powell and Rice were shocked, they did not realize the situation had worsened so much on the ground'. She added that the PA leadership - 'all of them' - was moving towards a 'South African style solution' that would advocate equal citizenship in one country rather than two countries living side by side.

lfeiner1 - 01:28pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

sjlivson 10/18/02 11:54am

At one point I believe it was you, correct me if am wrong, who said that the Palestinians did not want a binational state when I said that such a state was the only solution. Now it turns out that at leaset some PA members have expressed an interest in it. Barring "transfer", that is the only possible outcome. If Israel doesn't patriate the Palestinians then it will be a binational state with two classes of inhabitants subject to different laws and with different rights. It will certainly not be the end of the dispute, because those with with less rights will press for more rights, just as the blacks did in America and in South Africa.

most_just >- 01:28pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 (# 605)

the single state.

That single state being Jordan, of course.

most_just - 01:32pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

RE lfeiner1 (# 607)

If Israel doesn't patriate the Palestinians then it will be a binational state with two classes of inhabitants subject to different laws and with different rights.

Actually, it will continue to be a democracy that has the burden of administering adjoining territories for well being of the state, as a result of the belligerancy of those in the territories.

It will certainly not be the end of the dispute, because those with with less rights will press for more rights, just as the blacks did in America and in South Africa.

Where on earth did these Palestinians get the ides that they can demand to be citizens of Israel, which they have being doing all in their power to conquer? Cain't beat 'em, join 'em?

lfeiner1 - 01:33pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

most_just 10/18/02 1:28pm

Which means either transfer or merging of Jordan, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza into a single state. Which is it? You want to go on record for transfer?

lfeiner1 - 01:37pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

most_just 10/18/02 1:32pm

Actually, it will continue to be a democracy that has the burden of administering adjoining territories for well being of the state, as a result of the belligerancy of those in the territories

Apartheid in self-defense. Whatever. It will still be a single state

ljnelson36 - 01:37pm Oct 18, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 - 01:33pm Oct 18, 2002 EST (# 611 of 611)

Which means either transfer or merging of Jordan, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza into a single state. Which is it? You want to go on record for transfer?

Call it exchange of population, as was done with Islamic approval between Greece and Turkey

most_just - 01:39pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

RE lfeiner1 (# 612)

Apartheid in self-defense. Whatever. It will still be a single state.

Nonsense. Its self-defense qua self-defence, nothing more. The system is enshrined in 242. Go tell it to the UN

lfeiner1 - 01:47pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

Israel's settlement program has already rendered 242 nonsense. According to a Security Council resolution in 1980, Israel was bound by Geneva IV by 242, which meant that the settlements violated 242. 242 is now meaningless, since it is obvious that UN resolutions don't apply to Israel

most_just - 01:50pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

RE lfeiner1 (# 625)

Israel's settlment program has already rendereed 242 nonsense. According to a Security Council resolution in 1980, Israel was bound by Geneva IV by 242, which meant that the settlements violated 242. 242 is now meanlingness, since it is obvious that UN resolutions don't apply to Israel.

Not so. Settlements can be either disbanded, included iwithin the final borders of Israel, or left to remain, the residents becoming resdidents of any new political entity.

Regarding UN resolutions applying to Israel, each such resolution does apply and Israel is in compliance with each one to the extent that international laws require it to be.

lfeiner1 - 02:09pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

most_just 10/18/02 1:59pm

I think a Palestinian state should allow settlers to remain as citizens. That doesn't mean however that the state would be under any obligation to recognize the actual property which the settlers own or lease. That would be up to the Palestinian government to recognize their ownership or leasehold rights to the actual property on which they reside. Remember that many Israeli Arabs lost their property after 48. And it is hard to imagine any Israeli government forswearing any obligation to to enforce whatever grievances the settlers had in the new Palestinian statee. The more settlers move in, the more difficulties an impoverished, potentially unstable Palestinian state would have in governing the settlers in the style to which they are accustomed. The question of "land reform" would be an endless source of friction between Jews and Arabs within the fledgling state and an endless source of conflict between Israel and the new state. Such a state would only be source of new violent conflict. It's one state or transfer. And if it forcible transfer, then I hope the US washes its hands of Israel, cuts off aid, and treats as a pariah state.

lfeiner1 - 02:16pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

tedriii 10/18/02 12:43pm

A letter from a relative of mine to Hilary Clinton about Iraq

Dear Senator Clinton:

As one of your constituents, I strongly urge you to vote against S.J. Resolution 46 authorizing the president to use force against Iraq at any time that he alone determines that further diplomatic or other peaceful means are “not likely to lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions.” Because the Senate intends to authorize the president to wage war against Iraq only after “all diplomatic or other peaceful means have been exhausted,” why is the Senate voting on this resolution now? Can the Senate really trust the Bush administration to determine whether that condition has been met? If the Senate gives the president the power to determine whether the Senate’s condition precedent to war has been met -- the exhaustion of all diplomatic and peaceful means to disarm Iraq - hasn’t it abdicated its constitutional war making power to the executive? In addition, S.J.Res. 46 does not define which U.N. Security resolutions regarding Iraq are “relevant” in this context. For example, the introduction to S.J. Res. 46 refers to Iraq’s failure to comply with the UN resolution requiring it “to return property wrongfully seized by Iraq from Kuwait.” There is nothing in S.J. Res. 46 that would prevent the president from waging war against Iraq to enforce its property obligations to Kuwait. If the president has no intention of using force for this purpose, he should have no objection if the Senate refuses to authorize him to do so. It is not enough for members of the administration to testify that force will only be used to enforce the UN resolutions relating to weapons of mass destruction and disarmament. This limitation must be included in any Senate action authorizing force. This resolution also appears to be a first step in the Senate’s approval of the Bush administration’s new doctrine of “preventive war” - a doctrine that almost certainly will be used to justify aggressive wars to enforce our ideological or economic dominance. Shouldn’t the Senate debate the profoundly negative geopolitical consequences that may result from such a radical shift in our national security policy before voting for S.J. Res. 46. Further, the connection between Saddam Hussein and terrorist acts against the United States has not been made. Shouldn’t the Senate heed the CIA’s warning that Iraqi aggression against the U.S. is now a very remote possibility that will be made more likely by aggressive action against Hussein? How could it possibly aid the United State’s efforts to undermine support for terrorist actions to unilaterally engage in a war that many in the Muslim world will interpret as a U.S. war against Islam? You may have heard support for S.J. Res.46 from members of New York State’s Jewish community who believe that a war with Iraq will somehow enhance Israel’s security. Even though I am a member of that community, I do not believe that our security interests are always congruent with Israel’s. I believe that a war with Iraq will gravely harm our national security and therefore should be avoided even if Israel’s interests will be advanced. But I also cannot understand how Israel’s security will be enhanced by a U.S. war with Iraq. There is a grave risk that Hussein will retaliate against Israel. If Israel then massively retaliates against Iraq, as Prime Minister Sharon has promised, the entire region could collapse into a chaos that will make Israel substantially less secure.

lfeiner1 - 02:25pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

Forget it. Try to understand the very simple thing. Israel will not accept the Palestinian Arabs the very same way the US is not going to accept the Mexicans, the Cubans or the Bolivians.

Any child of an illegal immigrant in the US becomes a US citizen. This is a very wise policy. If the US did not have such a policy and if the ratio of multigeneration illegal Latin immigrants in the US were ever to become the same as the ratio of Palestinans to Israelis then I think that the US had better patriate them or it would ultimately face endless conflict with a disenfranchised population, an indefinite occupation and a deep economic slide. And, of course, the US would have no US to bail it out. It is its ability to absorb immigrants of all religion and ethnic groups from all over the world into its society that makes the US the strongest country in the world. Thank God, the US doesn't make "ethnic purity" a national policy.

lfeiner1 >- 02:29pm Oct 18, 2002 EST

sjlivson 10/18/02 2:18pm

(transfer) is an impossible outcome. Israel will never allow it. If ahd when the Palestinians will stop terrorism they'll be given an opportunity to have an independent state of form a federation with some other Arab state of their choice.

I would agree with that if I believed that all Israelis were like you. But I think far too many of them and their supporters in the US are more like ljnelson or yahudi-adam.

sjlivson 04:30pm Oct 18, 2002 EST
False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

lfeiner1 10/18/02 3:05pm

Well do you agree with ljnelson that there are only 800000 Palestinians in the West Bank and that they are leaving at the rate of 100,000 every nine months and that in six years the whole thing will be over, Palestinians gone, Israel annexing the West Bank free of them?

I believe that the numbers are correct. I'm not sure that this process will continue at this rate for the next six years. If it will and if there will be no Arabs in West Bank and Gaza and if Jordan (the only country that may have concerns about it) will not object to it than, probably, this what will happen.

lfeiner1 - 04:40pm Oct 20, 2002 EST

sjlivson 10/18/02 4:30pm

lfeiner1: Well do you agree with ljnelson that there are only 800000 Palestinians in the West Bank and that they are leaving at the rate of 100,000 every nine months and that in six years the whole thing will be over, Palestinians gone, Israel annexing the West Bank free of them?

slivson: I believe that the numbers are correct. I'm not sure that this process will continue at this rate for the next six years. If it will and if there will be no Arabs in West Bank and Gaza and if Jordan (the only country that may have concerns about it) will not object to it than, probably, this what will happen

And now you have just described exactly what Sharon's policies are designed to achieve and what the politics of his hardline supporters in the US are designed to achieve. Transfer, pure and simple. All this talk about territorial compromise if the Palestinians can make bricks without straw, is just pious nonsense. If the numbers quoted above are accurate and all the Palestinians leave voluntarily then that is what will happen. If not, then Sharon and his supporters in the United States will use all their influence to promote US policies designed to throw the region and the world into chaos, designed to facilitate "transfer". This is what Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith are all about. And why they are so dangerous. I don't believe they share your and nelson's "optimism" about the demographics in the West Bank. And they want to force the issue by leading the US into a botched "regime change" in Iraq. And BTW I am not quoting Noam Chomsky, but Republican Senator Chuck Hagel.

lfeiner1 - 04:12pm Oct 20, 2002 EST

sjlivson 10/18/02 4:20pm

And nor did it send massive numbers of American civilian settlers into American only settlements,and nor was it contiguous with Germany and Japan. Put Mexico into the hypothetical example I gave. Mexican citizens in areas conquered by America in the war of 1848 were given American citizenship.

themarlin0 - 04:20pm Oct 20, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 10/20/02 4:12pm

Yes but the Mexicans did not constitute 50% or so of the combined population and present the danger of swamping out the "American" population. (Yes I know, it is very difficult to define "American" population.)

baikonur- 05:00pm Oct 20, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 10/20/02 4:53pm

If I may interject, any discussion that accepts in its premise that it is allright to move people off their land is obscene.

To even justify such a point of view as a legitimate point of discussion would mean we are all willing to debate whether the earth is flat

lfeiner1 - 05:08pm Oct 20, 2002 EST

Baikonur_ 10/20/02 5:00pm

I completely agree. But, unfortunately, the goals of many on the Israeli right, including Sharon and his supporters in the US is "transfer". Not necessarily putting the Palestinians on trucks and dumping them across the Jordanian border, but of finding whatever opportunities present themselves to change the demographic balance of the West Bank. I have no idea what that balance is now, and I tend to doubt the figures that have been given on this board for the Palestinian population. But chaos in Jordan and loss of control over the border if it can be arranged can present a very useful opportunity to tighten the stringency of the occupation and to arrange conditions to motivate a "voluntary flight" as happened in 48, even though the Arabs are hardly likely now to be accommodating enough to ask the Palestinians to leave.

security5 - 09:37pm Oct 29, 2002 EST
"For God will save Zion, and will build the cities of Judah: that they may dwell there, and have it in possession." Psalms 69, 35

Secretary Rumsfeld: "-- those problems have been going on since the country was established in the late '40s. It is a complicated set of issues. And it has been -- it has tended over time to have been dominated by a couple of facts. Several. One is periodic warfare. Second is the fact that the surrounding areas from Israel have preferred that Israel not be there.

And third is that the people that Israel has been trying to interact with and find as an interlocutor have, for whatever reason, not been an effective interlocutor. That is to say, they have not had a structure and an accountability that would enable them to make a deal or keep a deal. And Barak made a proposal that was as forthcoming as anyone in the world could ever imagine, and Arafat turned it down.

If you have a country that's a sliver and you can see three sides of it from a high hotel building, you've got to be careful what you give away and to whom you give it. If you're giving it to an entity that has some track record, that has a degree of accountability, that has the ability to enforce security that's promised in whatever arrangements are made, it seems to me that's one thing. If you're making a deal and yielding territory to an entity that cannot or will not do that -- and there is no question but that the Palestinian Authority have been involved with terrorist activities, so that makes it a difficult interlocutor.

My feeling about the so-called occupied territories are that there was a war, Israel urged neighboring countries not to get involved in it once it started, they all jumped in, and they lost a lot of real estate to Israel because Israel prevailed in that conflict. In the intervening period, they've made some settlements in various parts of the so-called occupied area, which was the result of a war, which they won.

They have offered up -- successive prime ministers have offered up various portions of that so-called occupied territory, the West Bank, and at no point has it been agreed upon by the other side. I suspect it will be, even in my lifetime, that there will be some sort of an entity that will be established. Maybe it will take some Palestinian expatriates coming back into the region and providing the kind of responsible government that would give confidence that you could make an arrangement with them that would stick. It may be that the neighboring countries, Egypt and Jordan and Saudi Arabia and others, will have to assist in providing a degree of accountability.

But certainly everyone has to hope and pray that there will be something that could be an effective interlocutor so that they could make a deal.

The settlement issues -- it's hard to know whether they're settlements in portions of the real estate that will end up with the entity that you make an arrangement with or Israel. So it seems to me focusing on settlements at the present time misses the point. The real point is to get an effective interlocutor. The real point is to get a condition so that you can have a peace agreement."

lfeiner1 - 05:18pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

security5 10/29/02 9:37pm

Thanks for the fascinating bit of Rumsfeld bafflegab. He could be talking about implementing the right of return (the bold part) or he could be talking about "transfer" (the italicized part). I would guess that he is talking about putting the conflict on the backburner indefinitely, while the US tries to establish a military mandate over the entire Middle East to prevent the conflict from spreading.

innatyso 05:20pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

lfeiner,

lfeiner1 10/30/02 5:18pm

I don't know.. I read that as asking the neighboring Arab states to please stop supplying terrorists with $$$$ and guns.

BTW, what provisions are being made to acomodate Jewish refugees in that proposal? Any?

If none, why not?

lfeiner1 - 05:55pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

innatyso 10/30/02 5:20pm

I took Rumsfeld's statement about the accountabiity of the surrounding Arab regimes, as a call for an Arab security force in the West Bank, of pro-American Arab regimes, particularly Egypt and Jordan, to help the new Palestinian "interlocutor" provide control. But hey the meaning of Rumsfeldese, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

lfeiner1- 08:42pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

cmarind 10/30/02 6:35pm

Zeev Schiff writing in today's Haaretz

It would be a mistake to regard the settlers' robberies of Palestinian villagers' olive harvests as merely another serious crime. This collective theft signifies a change in the current military conflict between Israel and the Palestinians and is a revolution in the history of the settlements in general. For the first time in the current conflict, Israelis are stealing and confiscating Palestinian food. Even if they won't admit it, it can be seen as laying the groundwork for Transfer, not by the state but by a group of settlers. In Yanun, south of Nablus, most of the residents have already been forced to leave their homes.

Israel has occupied the West Bank, will not allow the Palestinians to provide civil services, and will not do so itself, in violation of international law. And now it is allowing settlers to steal the livelihood of Palestinian farmers. If Jordan goes into chaos, after a botched US invasion of Iraq, and widespread and upheaval in the Middle East, and loses control of its borders. All Israel has to do is tighten the siege on Palestinians, push them further to the brink of starvation, let the settlers go hog wild, and there will be a flight of Palestinians into Jordan. And it will be a one way voyage. Viola transfer! What's needed is chaos in Jordan, or Jordanian loss of control over its border with the West Bank. This is the real agenda of Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith, just as the real agenda of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon was the radicalization of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza to ward off any peace agreement in which Israel would have to give up land. This radicalization was accomplished, and Oslo became a doomed project, while the stable, pro-American Lebanon promised by the double-dealing Wolfowitz gang, never materialized as indeed it was never intended to.

lfeiner1 - 09:00pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

msjane 10/30/02 8:39pm

In 1981, I was the coauthor of a newsletter about global economic and political trends. One of the subscribers was the NSC under Richard Allen. After the June 1981 peace agreement between Israel and the PLO, the CIA was advocating that the US begin a dialogue with moderate factions in the PLO. At that point Feith and Richard Pipes countered with a report recommending that Israel invade Lebanon to destroy the PLO. I know this by word of mouth (in a fit of hysteria after the CIA recommendation, Feith blurted it out to a business associate of mine), and I guess it's a security breach to say it, but it is really common knowledge now. The fight between the Rumsfeld, Perle group and the CIA began a long time ago. Now Feith is the head of a Defense Department intelligence agency designed to counter the CIA. His former business partner was a big contributor to right wing settlers groups. Believe me, these people are nothing but trouble

msjane - 09:04pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

I looked it up and learned who Feith is.

I knew that 'Rummy' was just a nickname for Rumsfeld and not derogatory.

But I AM greatly disturbed at the antisemitic postings here attributing all sorts of malicious schemes to 'Wolfowitz and his 'double-dealing gang' and listing every Jews that can be mentioned in one post.

There is a well-known poster BANNED from this forum for recognizing that antisemitism from same poster and calling it for what it is. Yet, it goes on in full flower ad nauseum here according to the double standard

msjane - 09:07pm Oct 30, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 10/30/02 9:00pm

Your posts are all antisemitic and should be deleted by the moderator.

I am sending off a bunch of emails in protest.

Talk to yourself.

egalon1 - 05:14am Oct 31, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 10/30/02 5:02pm

"Israeli cantons and Palestinian cantons, where the Israeli cantons can exercise security control over the whole federation, but where the Palestinian cantons have representation in a parliament governing all cantons."

I went to the web site and read it all. Allow me to state that the idea is a "consummation devoutly to be wished" but totally impossible and impractical. This for several reasons:

1.You can't combine an authoritarian theocracy (PA) with a liberal democracy - Israel.

2.Nor can you combine an economy with a per capita National Income of $15,000 with one with something like $3-4000. That is, unless you want the latter to maintain an undeveloped economy.

3. A unified nation is impossible until the PA textbooks teaching hate of Israel are totally revised and at least several decades will pass, until maybe the hatred dies down.

lfeiner1 - 03:25pm Oct 31, 2002 EST

egalon1 10/31/02 5:14am

I'm not backing that specific proposal, I just offered it for informational purposes, and also that site <http://www.ap-agenda.org> has a forum where you can raise all these objections.

But look at the situation facing Israel and the Palestinians. Can Israel every really have security with a sovereign Palestinian state in such close proximity? Being a sovereign state it would have free flow of goods, people and services to the outside world. Israel would always have to be worrying about what was being brought in by a truck or a shipping container. And if each truck or shipping container that came in to the sovereign state, had to be thoroughly examined by Israel, then where's the sovereignty and where are any prospects for economic growth and betterment?

So Israel has to have a considerable amount of control over what goes on in a Palestinian region in order to provide security. And control means governance and governance is very difficult without the consent of the governed. The only way to get that consent in the long term is to provide representation to the people being governed.

Whether it is a cantonal arrangement or a confessional arrangement, a sngle state arrangement of some sort or another is what is in the offing, barring "transfer"

As to the economic disparities between the Israelis and Palestinians, well that is the dilemma that has been facing Israelis ever since it took control of the West Bank and Gaza. Israel is a first world society interleaved with a third world society. Those tensions and contradictions have been present since 1967 and will persist in any conceivable solution.

But in that sense, Israel is a microcosm of the entire developed world. That is what the global economy is; the merging of a rich, developed sector with a poor, underdeveloped sector. This is what is causing many of the upheavals and dangers in the world today.

Of course, in Israel, these power relations, which on a global scale are obscured by distance, are seen up close.

lfeiner1 - 10:24am Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3339 of 3339)

Sharon's real strategy.

80,000 Palestinians emigrated from territories (August 26, 2002) Jerusalem By KHALED ABU TOAMEH Approximately 80,000 Palestinians have left the West Bank and Gaza Strip since the beginning of the year, a rise of 50 percent compared to last year, a senior Palestinian Authority official said Monday. The official, who asked not to be named, told The Jerusalem Post another 50,000 Palestinians are now trying to leave through the Jordan River bridges and the Rafah border crossing. "We are seriously talking about transfer," the official added. "We are holding urgent deliberations with the brothers in Jordan and Egypt to try to stop the influx." He estimated that at least half of those who have already left would eventually decide to settle in another country. The figures, which do not include Palestinian residents of Jerusalem who have Israeli-issued ID cards, are based on data provided by several PA ministries, which issue various travel documents for Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Last week Bethlehem Mayor Hanna Nasser revealed in an interview with the Post that about 1,000 Palestinians from his town had left the country over the past few months. Thousands of Palestinians have been camping in the open air outside Jericho, waiting for their turn to cross the Allenby and Adam bridges into Jordan. Hundreds others are waiting near the Rafah border crossing. According to the PA official, at one stage more than 40,000 would-be entrants were gathered near Jericho. Many of them have been waiting for weeks after Jordan decided to limit the number of West Bank Palestinians entering the Hashemite Kingdom. The Jordanian authorities say they do not want to help Palestinians leave their homes for fear Israel will not allow them back. But Palestinians say they believe the Jordanians are afraid a large number of Palestinians want to live permanently in Jordan. Under pressure from the PA and humanitarian organizations, some of which have supplied the stranded Palestinian travelers with tents and food, the Jordanian government earlier this month agreed to allow 1,000 people a day to enter Jordan. The move came after the Palestinians complained that Israel was preventing them from returning to their homes in the West Bank. A PA cabinet minister, who visited Jordan last month for talks with Jordanian officials on the restrictions, said he could understand the Jordanians' fears. "They fear that [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon wants to expel the Palestinians to Jordan, where they would be able to establish a substitute state," he told the Post yesterday. "This is understandable." The minister added that top Jordanian government officials told him Israel could seize the opportunity during an American military strike on Iraq "to try and get rid of as many Palestinians as possible."

The Israeli/Palestinian conflict has turned into a shoving contest between an Israeli government intent on starving the Palestinians across the border and a Jordanian "Jordan first" policy trying to stem the flow. The Israeli right and its supporters are looking for a botched US invasion of Iraq to loosen Jordan's control of its western border, and to facilitate "transfer". The time window for the US invasion is right before the Israeli election.

Even if regime change is not on the agenda of the Bush administration, then one can understand American desire to get as big a military presence in the Middle East as possible in order to try to stem regional instability while this "shoving match" between Israel and Jordan takes place. The time window for a US imposed regime change in Iraq is this winter, right before the Israeli elections in February. If it goes badly, Sharon gets the chance to implement his real strategy.

philip160 - 10:57am Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3358 of 3495)

lfeiner1 11/5/02 10:47am

I am slowly beginning to come to the conclusion that you are right about Sharon, and that his goal is transfer, if not now, then soon. I have never doubted that Netanyahu wished this, and know that in his fondest dreams Sharon surely desires it. But it begins to appear that he is putting his dreams into action.

In this the Right must not prevail. If transfer should occur -- even in a "boil the toad" fashion -- there will be no moderate stance possible on either side and once again the conflagration will begin in earnest.

But we all know what the end result of that will be.

yehudi_adam - 10:58am Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3359 of 3495)

Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.

lfeiner1 11/5/02 10:53am

Oh, I know what you think Sharon's goals are - but you cannot offer any proof other than anonymous reports from Palestinian sources to buttress your suspicions.

I would be very surprised if the Arab population in Israel (all parts) has gone down in the last two years.

lfeiner1 - 07:10pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3498 of 3498)

yehudi_adam 11/5/02 10:58am

Oh, I know what you think Sharon's goals are - but you cannot offer any proof other than anonymous reports from Palestinian sources to buttress your suspicions.

I don't think that there is any reliable information on the current demography of the West Bank at this point. The 2001 CIA World Fact Yearbook has 3 million Palestinians about equally divided between Gaza and the West Bank. The 2002 Country Fact Yearbook has no demographic information whatsoever on the Palestinians. I fail to see why the Palestinian Authority should announce that tens of thousands of Palestinians had fled to Jordan, that thousands were camped outside of Jericho waiting for permission to cross the Allenby Bridge, and why the PA should publicly beseech Jordan to allow them in. It's hard to imagine a statement more prejudicial to the Palestinian cause. It is a public announcement to Israel and the world that the Palestinians have lost the conflict, and all Israel has to do is stay the course and it wins the West Bank minus the Palestinians. It is a public admission that the PA has failed to negotiate a treaty, failed to run a state, failed to wage a war, failed to protect its citizens and is looking for a place to run to. I can't see an ulterior motive there.

When Sharon came in to office in Feb of 2001, he promised the Israelis security, an interim peace agreement and a solution to the economic crisis. Now, practically two years later, the Israeli economy is contracting, investor capital is fleeing, unemployment is at an all time high, there is no diplomacy in sight, Israel is embroiled in a costly endless occupation with the entire standing army and 20,000 reserves, and there are still suicide bombings. So what has Sharon achieved? Is he an idiot? No he is anything but an idiot. He has achieved a continued increase in new settlements in defiance of the unity agreement, he has destroyed the Palestinian physical, civil and political infrastructures, he has precipitated a flight of Palestinians into Jordan, he has warded off all possibility of diplomacy and he has pushed the Palestinians in the West Bank to the brink of starvation. In short, he achievements have been settlers in, Palestinians out, no diplomacy, Palestinians at the brink of starvation.

Since, he is, in my opinion, one of the most effective, tenacious political leaders in the world today, I assume that is what he wanted.

lfeiner1 - 07:31pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3506 of 3506)

yehudi_adam 11/5/02 10:58am

Several months ago, I said that ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians into Jordan was outside the realm of possibility. I felt that the US, while it would permit and even welcome an Israeli occupation of the West Bank, would never permit a humanitarian catastrophe among the Palestinians and I felt that Jordan would never be able to absorb a massive flight of Palestinians.

As much as I pride myself on getting it right, I have to admit that I could have been very wrong about this prediction. I was very, very surprised by the extent to which the United States allowed Israel, the occupying power, to shirk its responsibility for the humanitarian needs of the Palestinians. That Israel would be allowed to prevent the Palestinians from carrying out civil functions, while not providing those functions itself, was something I thought the US would never tolerate. It's obvious that the Palestinians are dispensible as far as Bush is concerned. If the "Arab street" objects, Bush is going to respond with threats and possibly force to the "Arab street" by putting a US military mandate over the Middle East.

That leaves the absorbtive capacity of Jordan, and its ability to secure its western border, as the only remaining obstacle to "transfer". I don't think Jordan can absorb enough Palestinians at this point to allow "transfer" and I don't the US wants hundreds of thousand more Palestinians in Jordan, while the US is in a tense confrontation with Iraq.

The next phase of the conflict, transfer or prolonged low level conflict and then peace, will be determined by what the US does in Iraq. The US has been pushed to the brink of a disastrous misadventure in Iraq, by the Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle clique, although the US seems to be backing off now. If it steps over the brink, then there will be a massive transfer of Palestinians into Jordan, and a massive transfer of Americans to the unemployments lines and bankruptcy courts.

accredited - 07:30pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3505 of 3506)

"A national suicide is not an international obligation." Abba Eban

lfeiner

What do you say to this?

KING SEEKS TO CUT JORDAN'S LINKS TO PAN-ARABISM

AMMAN [MENL] -- Jordan has launched a campaign to end its dependence on Iraq and the Palestinian Authority.

Jordan's King Abdullah has announced a "Jordan First" campaign meant to increase loyalty to the Hashemite kingdom. An estimated 70 percent of the kingdom is composed of Palestinians, including Abdullah's wife, Queen Rania.

"The call for 'Jordan First' will not be a call for isolationism," Abdullah said in a letter to Prime Minister Ali Abu Ragheb. "But it springs from the conviction that Jordan's socio-economic strength and its social security are essentials that should be fulfilled if the country wants to fortify its Arab environment and support its Arab brethren."

The campaign was launched as Jordan has restricted the entry of Iraqis and Palestinians into the kingdom. Palestinians from the West Bank must deposit thousands of dollars to demonstrate that they will leave the kingdom after two weeks. Iraqis under age 35 are being stopped at the Jordanian border with its eastern neighbor.

lfeiner1 - 07:45pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3513 of 3513)

canoerib 11/5/02 7:22pm

Exactly my point, the Israeli stock market went up after Sharon announced he was standing for election and that his government was over. Even though Netanyahu is portrayed as more hawkish than Sharon, his greater economic sophistication and his greater concern for economy has to make him more wary of regional instability and global instability. He also has closer ties to America and American politicians. Sharon used his alliance with labor and his proclaimed support for a Palestinian state, as a cover to advance his real agenda, settlers in, Palestinians out. The markets would react favorably to a Netanyahu victory and a pragmatic Likud cabinet not dependent on extreme rightists like Landu or Lieberman. But as I have said, the next phase will be determined by what the US does or does not do in Iraq.

canoerib - 07:18pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3501 of 3513)

http://www.hasbara.us/

Markets react positively to elections decision

The shekel representative rate was set at 4.737/$, a 0.21% appreciation.

Zeev Klein and Yaron Friedman 5 Nov 02 17:52

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon announced today that was unable to form a coalition, and therefore had no choice but to disperse the 15th Knesset and hold early elections. Elections will be held in early February. Financial markets reacted apathetically to the announcement. The shekel-dollar representative rate was set at NIS 4.737/$, a 0.21% appreciation, although dollar trading was volatile earlier in the day, with the exchange reaching NIS 4.777/$.

The bond market reacted positively to the elections announcement. Market players said the shortening of the period of uncertainty was behind the reaction. The same reaction was behind the rise in bond prices.

Shahar shekel instruments rose 1.5% today, and traded at a yield of 12% for long-term bonds and 11.5% for medium-term bonds. CPI-linked bonds rose a slight 0.3%, due to the shekel appreciation.

The stock market also rose today, after volatility in the morning before the prime minister's announcement. The Tel Aviv 25 index rose 1.8% by closing.

Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on November

http://www.globes.co.il/serveen/

canoerib - 07:37pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3510 of 3516)

http://www.hasbara.us/

"and a massive transfer of Americans to the unemployments lines and bankruptcy courts. "

Leftist fantasyland projecting. Fact is, American employment and bankruptcy rates do BETTER during times of conflict.

lfeiner1 - 07:56pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3515 of 3515)

canoerib 11/5/02 7:37pm

What kind of conflict, are you referring to? The Arab/Israeli war in 73? Good for the economy? The Iranian upheaval in 79? Good for the economy? The Gulf war in 1990? Good for the economy? Chaos in the Middle East, Turks fighting Kurds, Shia fighting Sunni, Jordan fighting Iraqi refugees? Good for the economy?

It's when Bush tempered his position on Iraq, that the US markets went up.

bohemianbill - 07:57pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3516 of 3518)

"There is a Providence that protects idiots, drunkards, children and the United States of America." - Otto von Bismarck

canoerib 11/5/02 7:37pm

Leftist fantasyland projecting. Fact is, American employment and bankruptcy rates do BETTER during times of conflict.

No, middle of the road projections from the likes of Business Week and Fortune magazines. These conflicts won't be of the WW2 variety, which placed a lot of resources back into production. Instead, they'll roil the financial and energy markets, spiking the interest rates. The resulting hits on the economy will prompt Corporate America to shed employees, whose unemployment will lead to those higher bankruptcy rates. Sorry it doesn't fit your reich-wing cloud cuckoo land imagination.

lfeiner1 - 08:28pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3524 of 3524)

accredited 11/5/02 8:09pm

If a botched invasion of Iraq precipitates global chaos, you are going to have to worry about Musharraf's ability to protect his nuclear weapons. You are going to have to worry about who gets their hands on whatever biological and chemical weapons Saddam has spread around.

The basic flaw in the Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith reasoning is that chaos would be less dangerous than a hostile but cohesive government, because they believe chaos can be controlled by smart bombs, special ops and deals with friendly warlords. This philosophy is derived from the military doctrine of Israeli military theorist Martin Van Creveldt, who devised ways of protecting the rich world from widespead development failures in the poor world. The approach, which I will call Wolfowitzism, is perfectly compatible with "democratization". "Democratization" means, in the Wolfowitzian world-view, a puppet pro-US parliamentary government in the capital and chaos everywhere else, the Afghan model. Democracy without development.

As in the ancient empires, today too "order,culture and civilization" accrue to those who live under the protection of the (American) empire, while those outside are at the mercy of "barbarians, chaos and disorder". In relations with these "others".."double standards" will have to be applied. "Among ourselves we operate on the basis of laws and open cooperative security..But when dealing with the 'others' we need to revert to rougher methods of an earlier era....force, preemptive attack, deception" Israeli foreign policy is now riding enthusiastically on the back of the American tiger...the trumpets of war being sounded in Jerusalem and Washington will soon become the euphoric herals of victory over the Iraqis and Palestinians. Yeshayahu Ben-Aharon Haaretz 10/4/2

lfeiner1 - 08:48pm Nov 5, 2002 EST (# 3529 of 3531)

sme49b1 11/5/02 8:36pm

As I said, I did not think transfer was Sharon's goal, and I was not sure exactly what his goal was, because I couldn't make sense of it. Now I believe that it was to grab as much land as possible, (as it was as Housing Minister under Shamir), destroy as much Palestinian physical and civil infrastructure as possible and get as many Palestinian out as possible. He did this as long as possible. Sharon is not stupid. He realized that the neither the Israeli markets nor the Israeli public would tolerate an unstable, narrowly based government at this time. But he is going to be Prime Minister until February, which is after the time window for a US invasion of Iraq. So what happens next, is going to be determined by what the US does or does not do in Iraq. If the US settles for harsh inspections, puts in a large military force into surrounding states, and Saddam agrees, and a long standoff results, then there will be no transfer. If regional chaos begins, Sharon is ready. He's in power during the critical time window. Sharon is a brilliant opportunist with greater Israel goals.

philip160 - 09:14pm Nov 5, 2002 EST

lfeiner

Sharon is a brilliant opportunist with greater Israel goals.

That is beginning to become apparent. Like one of those dotty pictures that becomes visible after you look at it long enough

lfeiner1 - 03:59pm Nov 7, 2002

sme49b1 11/5/02 9:08pm

(if)we don't invade this winter (and I do hope we don't have to), then what happens to Sharon's window of opportunity?

So do I and it's gone. Unless some other crisis supervenes. According to the latest issue of Haaretz, if Sharon wins the primary and election, he intends to bring back Labor into the coalition. He wants a unity government, good relations with the US, he wants to make the diplomatically "political correct" noises, and to do what he can within those constraints, until some external crisis supervenes to allow him greater scope. I cannot at this point, see any other motive for Sharon's actions and positions other than to build more settlements, immiserate the Palestinians, try to get as many out as possible, and wait for opportunities, as the world heads into what will be a prolonged economic and political crisis. This was a crisis which actually began in the late 60's with the long term decline in the rate of return on assets in the developed world and the need for expanded markets in the underdeveloped world. This crisis was managed in the 70's by inflationary growth, in the 80's by debt-led growth, and in the 90's by bubble led growth. The age of gimmicks is over. The need now arises for real reforms in the economic relations between rich countries and poor countries, which is the only solution to the crises of global development. (And also internal reforms within Third World societies) Until then the world, and the Middle East, are vulnerable to crises (and opportunities for Sharon)

philip160 04:14pm Nov 7, 2002 EST

lfeiner1

The need now arises for real reforms in the economic relations between rich countries and poor countries, which is the only solution to the crises of global development. (And also internal reforms within Third World societies) Until then the world, and the Middle East, are vulnerable to crises (and opportunities for Sharon)

Behold! I hear a voice in the wilderness, a still, small voice of reason in the desert, that leadeth me to the knowledge that not all have bowed their knee to Baal.

Thanks,

Phil

ljnelson36 - 04:11pm Nov 7, 2002 EST
If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem

lfeiner1 11/7/02 3:59pm

Prior to Israel liberating the territories, there was no reliable potable water, telephones or electric. Add to that the billions in aid from the EU and the US and where is it all ?

Arafraud has manipulated the media and maintained a closed fist on finances that insure a continuance of terrorism in lieu of economic growth.

The world has grown tired of all the hackneyed cliches coming from Arabs without taking responsibility for their ineptitude.

lfeiner1 - 04:33pm Nov 7, 2002 ljnelson36 11/7/02 4:11pm

There are two things that do not interest me, especially about the Middle East. (1) Assigning blame, (2) Expressing my personal dislike or approval for a particular leader.

I was describing what is happening.

A Palestinian state? That gets into state building in the 21 century in a prolonged global economic crisis of stagnation. Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank and Gaza? That means a binational state of some sort or another which is anathema to most Israelis. Is some country about to come along and welcome the Palestinians? Not likely.

What's the alternative? Transfer by economic or other forms of coercion.

The only question is can Israel pull it off without compromising its relations with the US? And, if it can, in my opinion, that would severely compromise America's ability to solve global problems.

Blame it on whoever you want.

cmarind >- 07:03pm Nov 7, 2002 EST )
"El hombre es esclavo de sus palabras, pero amo de su silencio."

sjlivson 11/7/02 4:11pm

In other words, you would like Sharon not to bring back Labor...

Feiner's post does not express any wishes or desires.

He is describing what he believes Sharon's intentions and motivations are.

He states that there is a long term economic crisis that results from bad relations between rich and poor countries.

This crisis has been temporarily averted,in his opinion, by the use of various "gimmicks".

He believes such "gimmicks" can no longer be effective, and unless relations between rich and poor countries are significantly modified, a serious economic crisis will ensue.

The Israeli/Palestinian conflict is an example, and probably an important component, if these bad relations that need to be repaired.

I disagree completely with this analysis (which is an economic analysis , not a political one).

It is clear that good relations between rich and poor countries (in fact between any countries) contribute to economic prosperity.

But I don't see any evidence for this long brewing crisis.

The economic cycle (like the poor) has always been with us.

Proponents of the "new economy" claimed that it had been made obsolete by technology.

They have been shown to be (dramatically) wrong.

cmarind >- 07:05pm Nov 7, 2002 EST
"El hombre es esclavo de sus palabras, pero amo de su silencio."

sjlivson 11/7/02 7:02pm

...thank you for pointing out htat I was right (as it happens most of the time...:-)

False.

Philip almost never points out you are right (although you occasionally are).

sjlivson - 07:07pm Nov 7, 2002 EST
False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

cmarind 11/7/02 7:03pm

I thought that I've pointed out pretty well just how hilarious Feiner's arguments were. I'm sorry you did not understand it.

lfeiner1 - 10:05am Nov 9, 2002 EST

cmarind 11/7/02 7:03pm

I am saying that future, long-term global economic growth requires the creation of expanded markets within the developing world, that the era of "Western-led", the growth pattern where poor countries grow simply by exporting to rich countries or attracting private capital from rich countries, is over. Growth depends on two factors, (1) technological innovation, (2) more participants in the economy, more markets. The "new economy" paradigm said that technology alone was sufficient. In fact, the US economy has performed better than other first world economies because of its ability to absorb new immigrants who then moved into the middle class (new markets). From 1970 to the present the US population grew by 100 million much of this growth coming from the Third World. The US cannot absorb the whole world however. At some point, this method of growth has to end. Therefore, sustainable global economic growth, including growth in the West, depends on new global institutional arrangments, to facilitate flow of investment from rich to poor countries to provide new markets for growth. The current economic situation is not simply a cycle. It is a symptom of long-term structural problems in North-South economic relations. Until these are resolved, the world political economy is vulnerable to regional and global crises.

Sharon is aware of the inherent problems in creating a stable, truly sovereign, Palestinian state in today's global economy, where a state's economy has to be globally competitive from day one. After two years of intifada, he is beginning to doubt that even a viable Palestinian Bantustan, dependent on the Israeli economy could be practicable. He certainly doesn't want a binatonal state or permanent military occupation. The only remaining option? Transfer. The current long term global economic situation makes a two state solution extremely difficult but might provide opportunities as cover for transfer

pevers - 10:33am Nov 9, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 11/9/02 10:05am

There is another potential solution: confederation of the West Bank (and Gaza) to Jordan.

This would be the most viable, from an economic prospective; however, questionable from a political

lfeiner1 - 01:49pm Nov 9, 2002 EST

pevers 11/9/02 10:33am

My suspicion is that one of Cheney's motives for wanting to invade Iraq is to establish an American mandate over the Middle East which can impose a "Jordanian" option to the conflict. An economic alliance with a pro-American Iraq and Jordan which could form a federation with the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, with part of the West Bank (the major settlement blocs) being annexed to Israel. Here, again, "transfer" (Palestinians leaving for jobs in Jordan and Iraq) is at least part of the envisioned solution. But, again, the problem with this is the whole question of "state building" in a Third World region in the 21 century in a globalized economy which lacks the global financial and monetary architectures that it needs.

One neglected element in analyses of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, in my opinion, is an analysis of how the regional and global economy bears on the conflict and visa versa. For example, in the late 70's and early 80's, the height of the "greater Israel"movement among the settlers, the idea of the Palestinians leaving for better opportunities elsewhere was not so far fetched. Oil prices were predicted to remain sky high for decades and decades and the Gulf economies were expected to need labor.

With the collapse of the Arab economies in the late 80's, this vision of economic transfer receded and the "demographic problem" (somewhat of a racist term, but that it was the way it was phrased in Israeli discourse) came to the fore, with the desire for a separate Palestinian state.

Now that the economic stringencies of the prolonged military occupation are sending the Palestinians to the brink of famine, many Palestinians are desperately trying to get into Jordan, and talk of "transfer" is again in the air.

lfeiner1 - 05:39pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

canoerib 11/10/02 8:50am

(1) Hunger Among the Palestinians. See State Department Report <http://usinfo.state.gov/regional/nea/summit/text/0809study.htm> (2) Corruption in the Palestinian Authority. See CPAP report <http://www.cesr.org/PROGRAMS/palestine/rogercpap2.htm>

lfeiner1 - 05:53pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

ljkamm 11/10/02 9:55am

American conquest of the middle east, starting with Iraq, is the only route to Arab democracy

If Afghanistan is any example it will be democracy in the vicinity of the capital and chaos everywhere else. If Haiti is any example, it will be chaos everywhere in the country. And if Iraq becomes another example, it will be chaos everywhere in the world.

lfeiner1 - 05:58pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

pevers 11/10/02 5:16pm

I said I doubted the viability of a future Palestinian state, even with the best of intentions among the Palestinians, and that is the crux of the story. Everything else is (1) a single state for Israelis and Palestinians, (2) transfer.

All this talk about "intentions", "corruption", "terrorism", etc, is ex ante justification for (2)

innatyso - 06:00pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

lfeiner,

You realise of course that the children in the Territories are, according to aramedia (which can hardly be accused of pro-Israel bias) are actually better of than children elsewhere in the Middle East.

Go here:

<http://www.sunship.com/mideast/maps.html>

and then click on the Map showing the national percentages for the Stunting of Children under age five

lfeiner1 - 06:09pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

innatyso 11/10/02 6:00pm

The same map will tell you that stunting occurs over time. The Israeli occupation started in late spring of this year. And the Palestinians don't have to be worse off than people in parts of the Third World or worse off than people in other parts of the Middle East, in order to facilitate transfer. All they have to be is worse off than they would be in Jordan, or believe that they are worse off than they would be in Jordan, and Jordan has to lose control of its borders. And one can imagine scenarios in which that would be the case, especially if Israelis give the Palestinians money to leave, as the Israeli Tourism Minister Elon advocates, and if Jordan becomes destabilized or loosens control of its Western border in order to protect its eastern one from a flood of Iraqi refugees

pevers- 06:07pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

lfeiner1 11/10/02 5:58pm

Fiener

I love your solution. But let me rephrase

"Israel must commit national suicide!"

Give me one example in history were this occured.

sjlivson- 06:06pm Nov 10, 2002 EST
False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

lfeiner1 11/10/02 5:58pm

Everything else is (1) a single state for Israelis and Palestinians, (2) transfer.

Mr. Feiner,

would you please explain why is the (3) a single state for Jordanians and Palestinians is not included in your list? If it is included in the "everything else" is it included in the (1) or (2)?

All this talk about "intentions", "corruption", "terrorism", etc, is ex ante justification for (2)

So, in your opinion, "intentions", "corruption", "terrorism", etc do not exist but are just talk to justify (2)? What about all these reports of Palestinian terrorism and corruption? Are these only figments of our imagination

lfeiner1 - 06:22pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

sjlivson 11/10/02 6:06pm

Good point. A Jordanian absorbtion of parts of the West Bank. That was the Reagan plan. Jordan dropped out of it in 1987. This, in my opinion, would require an American mandate over the region, in order to aid Jordan in doing this. Which is one of the reasons that the US wants a regime change and a pro-American government in Iraq. Or at the very least a large US military presence in the area. Options (1) and (2) were based on the Israeli/Palestinian dynamics assuming no external intervention. When and if an American political and military mandate materializes over a stable Middle East, we can discuss this option. I see this as a more viable economically than a separate Palestinian state. A separate Palestinian state is making something out of nothing. A Jordanian mandate over the West Bank Palestinians is making something out of very weak material, the Jordan economy. A binational state is making something out of strong material (the Israel political economy). So the Jordanian option would require a large amount of American intervention, that I don't think the country is politically ready for. (The Americans love smart bombs, but state building, and massive aid, not yet)

innatyso - 06:10pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

pevers,

pevers 11/10/02 6:02pm

The problem with Sharon's plan is that not many people have listened to it.

According to Sharon's plan, the Palestinians would get control over everything between the two security zones -- albeit with severe restrictions on their sovereignty. Israel would control Palestine's borders with Jordan and Egypt, as well as its airspace and two or three "lateral roads" connecting the two zones. The new state would be demilitarized, banned from joining military pacts, and committed to cooperating with Israel against terrorism. To ensure the contiguity of their state, Sharon would give the Palestinians some additional land and build a system of tunnels and bridges. He would also support rapid economic development in Gaza and the West Bank, which he believes is necessary to reduce Palestinian militancy and national ambitions. Development projects, including a joint Israeli-Palestinian water desalination plant, would be underwritten by international investment. Finally, Sharon's plan calls for "education for peace" in both societies.

<http://www.foreignaffairs.org/Search/document_briefings.asp?nb=10&i=20020501FAEssay8058.xml>

Sharon has obviously revised this plan a bit since this was written but the crux of it has remained the same. A non-terrorist contiguous state with massive economic development and education for peace.

lfeiner1- 06:29pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

innatyso 11/10/02 6:10pm

That would be single state, since the Palestinian state would not have sovereignty. It would be a semi-autonomous region of a single state, a sort of pale of settlement.

lfeiner1 - 06:36pm Nov 10, 2002 EST

pevers 11/10/02 6:25pm

I believe that Sharon's plan as outlined by innatyso is in effect a binational state. If it works then as the conflict subsides and becomes a political discourse, the Israeli and Palestinian regions will merge into a federation. However, as Sharon pressures the Palestinians into accepting these discontiquous, Spaghetti-like livings arrangements, the dynamics of transfer arise from the pressure.

sjlivson - 06:49pm Nov 10, 2002 EST
False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

lfeiner1 11/10/02 6:46pm

I mean like a flat Earth or a binational state for Israelis and Palestinians.

lfeiner1 06:16pm Nov 13, 2002 EST

sjlivson 11/10/02 6:49pm

I mean like a flat Earth or a binational state for Israelis and Palestinians.

Since Israel took the West Bank and Gaza, how many sovereignties have there been in Israel/the West Bank/Gaza? One. One national sovereignty, Israel. Even during the Oslo period the PA areas were a local government not a separate state. They have been negotiating the formation of a separate Palestinian state. If such a state fails to materialize or its creation becomes an impossibility, then one sovereignty will remain, for Israelis and Palestinians. If you want to say that the Palestinians do not constitute a nationality, then it will not be a binational state. I don't want to quibble about terminology. It will be a single state for Jews and Arabs and the issue will be how the Jews and Arabs are to be governed within this single national sovereignty.

Sharon's offer was an interim agreement, not an end of conflict agreement. Each side could agree to disagree about borders, refugees, Jerusalem, etc., but within the context of a non-belligerency agreement. Several weeks ago, the PA Finance Minister and the PA legal adviser Diana Buttu met with Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell, showed them a map of Israeli settlements, and said that Israeli settlement activity had been so extensive no two state solution was possible. They maintained that if Sharon's plan were to be the interim agreement, then the Palestinians would press not for a separate Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza with 67 borders, but for citizenship within a single state as an end of conflict resolution.

The situation would be parallel to the situation between whites and blacks in South Africa, and the Palestinian cause would be seen worldwide as a struggle against apartheid. Sharon and others on the Israeli right realize very well the political and diplomatic problems this would cause for Israel.

Your word play about "statehood" would be about as convincing to the world as the South African claims that the Bantu regions were really a separate nation.

A claim that "Israel wouldn't be safe with those scum as citizens" would be the identical arguments given by South African whites during apartheid and by American southern whites during the ante bellum period. They might sound good to you, but Sharon and others on the Israeli right knows how they would sound to the rest of the world, and they would know what the solution is: circumvent the whole issue by transfer.

And they would look for opportunities to bring it about

sjlivson - 01:21pm Nov 17, 2002 EST (# 5437 of 6037)

False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

rogerdacosta 11/17/02 1:14pm

As long as the vast majority of Palestinians are willing the conflict to continue it will continue. If this vast majority was willing violence to stop they would prevent any "forces behind the Pals lines" from launching murderous attacks from their homes.

lfeiner1 - 07:31pm Nov 19, 2002 EST (# 6045 of 6045)

sjlivson 11/17/02 1:25pm

Yes. The mass expulsions and displacements carried out by the National Socialists and Communists were crimes against humanity. Not as bad as the Holocaust, the Gulag or the collectivization in the Ukraine, but crimes nonetheless. The expulsion of over a million ethnic Persians by the Iraqi government was a crime, for which the current government is to blame, not the people but the government. As far as Israel is concerned, there is no evidence of a plan in 47 to 48 to expel the Palestinians. It depended on the local commander. Rabin expelled the Arabs at Lod and Ramle, but the local commander who took Nazareth allowed the Arabs to stay. The Nakba was precipitated by Ben Gurion's Plan Dalet in 47, the decision to attack the Arab population centers in response to the Arab attacks on the roads between Jewish settlements. (The Arabs were not strong enough to attack the Jewish population centers head on). Israel was certainly less than cooperative in 1949 in allowing the refugees the right to return to their homes once hostilities had died down and the Stern gang assasinated Count Bernadotte when he came to negotiate the refugee issue.

Constant Zionist territorial expansion, met by chaotic Arab resistance, followed by displacement of the Arabs is, however, the basic dynamic of the Jewish/Arab conflict from the beginning of the Zionist project to this day. Even now Sharon is going to respond to the Palestinian attack in Hebron by building a corridor from the Kiryat Arba settlement to the Hebron settlement, which would involve the displacement of hundreds of Palestinians.See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2485877.stm

This is why I say the there are two outcomes to this conflict, (1) a single state for Arabs and Jews, or (2) transfer. It is to create the chaotic regional conditions that would facilitate the latter option, that Sharon's allies, Wolfowitz, Perle and Feith are peddling their deadly, two-faced, duplicitous "advice" to the Bush administration.

lfeiner1 - 07:42pm Nov 19, 2002 EST (# 6050 of 6050)

sjlivson 11/17/02 1:21pm

If this vast majority (of Palestinians)was willing violence to stop they would prevent any "forces behind the Pals lines" from launching murderous attacks from their homes.

Not true. Once conditions have become as chaotic and anarchic as they have become in the Palestinian territories, the "vast majority" have no power to stop the violence even if they want to. The "vast majority" of Germans had no power to stop the 30 years war, which only stopped when there were not enough Germans left to fight eachother. The "vast majority" of Columbians are not able to stop the fighting between the rebels, the drug lords and the paramilitary groups. In all areas of the world, there are wars which grind on forever, because the social cohesion necessary to stop them has disintegrated.

You're setting the Palestinians up for collective blame for whatever happens to them.

sjlivson - 07:49pm Nov 19, 2002 EST (# 6052 of 6059)

False assumptions inevitably lead to false conclusions.

lfeiner1 11/19/02 7:42pm

Once conditions have become as chaotic and anarchic as they have become in the Palestinian territories, the "vast majority" have no power to stop the violence even if they want to. The "vast majority" of Germans had no power to stop the 30 years war, which only stopped when there were not enough Germans left to fight eachother.

Well, if you insist in your interpretation of the current situation the war will only stop then there will be not enough Palestinians left to continue fighting... Pretty bleak prediction, I must say.

lfeiner1 - 08:12pm Nov 19, 2002 EST (# 6063 of 6063)

sjlivson 11/19/02 7:49pm

Well, if you insist in your interpretation of the current situation the war will only stop then there will be not enough Palestinians left to continue fighting... Pretty bleak prediction, I must say.

But it is one possible outcome, if there is regional chaos and if Jordan loses control of the border. Another outcome is that the two sides find a way to live together in a single polity which provides security and rights for all.

Of course, the world as a whole is in for some pretty bleak times before things get better. And the situation in the Middle East is no different. If and when there is a peace, Israel and the Palestinians are still going to have a lot of problems and tensions. Political violence might end, but criminal violence and ethnic violence will continue as they do in South Africa. Israel will never have first world levels of security, simply because it is located in the third world. And if the the third world as a whole fails to develop, then the first world is not going to have first world levels of security

lfeiner1 - 08:31pm Nov 19, 2002 EST (# 6077 of 6077)

sjlivson 11/19/02 8:16pm

I admire your desire for order and I share it, but time flows in only one direction. Once things get to a certain point, you can't just rewind the tape whether it's with guns or the intifada. And if the US ever gets into another 1929 type depression with all the guns and heavy weapons around, there will be a level of chaotic violence unseen on our shores since the Civil War, and we will see just how impotent "the vast majority" will be to bring the violence to a halt.

Which is why I think it is so important for the US to avoid policies which would increase regional and global chaos and obstruct global development. And these are precisely the kind of policies that are being advocated by some of Israel's partisans in the White House.

For example, at a speech on a Fortune world forum, an Indian journalist asked Rumsfeld about global poverty. Rumsfeld said that poverty was the natural state of the human race, and that the job of the West was to defend itself against the violence caused by poverty.

This kind of Malthusian, Hobbesian, Wolfowitzian, Neocon, Likudnik view of the world is very dangerous. There is no military defense against global poverty. If global poverty is not alleviated, the western economies will be dragged down and we will have chaos and anarchy right here in the US.