Why is the world so sympathetic to the American tragedy, and supportive of military retribution, yet critical of every aspect of Israeli policy with regard to defense and retaliation toward terrorists? Certainly hasn’t Israel suffered even more than America at the hands of terrorists?
Are we prepared to take a second look at their situation?
Do you think we should be firing away with rubber bullets in Afghanistan?
One serious factor that will separate the current situation in the U.S. from perceptions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the result of the 1967 war.
If Israel was to survive, it genuinely needed to do something to neutralize the Golan Heights, the West Bank (of what had been the country of Trans-Jordan) and the Gaza Strip.
I have no idea what should have been done to reduce future friction, but the choice Israel made was to take and hold the land. Once it was under Israeli control, Israel then permitted emigration to and settlement of that land. However, much of that land was still occupied by the original Palestinian inhabitants. While Arabs in Israel are full citizens, Palestinian Arabs are not treated as citizens. In addition, relocation camps were set up that effectively became new Palestinian cities–without the normal infrastructure of cities. 34 years later, there are people who have grown up as aliens in “their own” country and they are genuinely not happy about it.
It is possible to refrain from condemning Israel and still note that serious mistakes were made. As to whether the terrorism is a result of Palestinian intransigence or Israeli oppression, there will be any number of people along, shortly, to argue both sides of that equation. Suffice it to say, that no Arab or Palestinian terrorist has destroyed 5,000 Israeli lives in a single day. (Some would even claim that killing Israelis by the twos and tens to provoke Israeli vengeance is a specific tactic to win the approval of world opinion by making the Israelis appear to be the heavy-handed thugs.) This assault on the U.S. was not only out of “proportion” to any previous violence, it is a clear sign to every nation with an established infrastructure that no nation is safe–a very strong practical (as opposed to ideological) argument to encourage Pakistan and others to support our battle while continuing to oppose Israel.
There may be a subtle difference between the US’s situation and Israel’s. The US has not plunked itself down in the middle of the Middle East and has not been trying to extend its territory into land that has been worked and occupied by local Arabs since the Islamic conquest in, I think, the 600s. We pose no territorial threat to any Middle Eastern people. Israel does. All we want to do is buy their oil at the price they set. We are not occupiers. We are customers.
Well, to Bin Laden, we are occupiers, because American troops are in Saudi Arabia, defiling Muslim territory, and propping up (what he sees as)an unjust illegitimate king.
Not exactly. The US really did plunk down in the Middle East. When we discovered oil there we developed it and paid the nations we were drilling in a pittance for royalties. It was exploitative to the extreme… back before autonomous nations comprised most of the world, England and us had our paws all over the Middle East. We were like OPEC in those days.
More recently, we armed and backed Israel and all sorts of folk in the Middle East against each other, to counteract the Soviet Bloc. The fact that they’re all running around with guns and tanks and missiles is in greater part our fault.
Tomndebb cites the '67 War and Israel’s position in it as a mitigating factor… you’ve got to look at before 1967…
Israel consistently expressed a desire to negotiate with its neighbors. In an address to the UN General Assembly on October 10, 1960, Foreign Minister Golda Meir challenged Arab leaders to meet with Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion to negotiate a peace settlement. Nasser answered on October 15, saying that Israel was trying to deceive world opinion, and reiterating that his country would never recognize the Jewish State.
The Arabs were equally adamant in their refusal to negotiate a separate settlement for the refugees. As Nasser told the United Arab Republic National Assembly March 26, 1964:
“Israel and the imperialism around us, which confront us, are two separate things. There have been attempts to separate them, in order to break up the problems and present them in an imaginary light as if the problem of Israel is the problem of the refugees, by the solution of which the problem of Palestine will also be solved and no residue of the problem will remain. The danger of Israel lies in the very existence of Israel as it is in the present and in what she represents.”
Meanwhile, Syria used the Golan Heights, which tower 3,000 feet above the Galilee, to shell Israeli farms and villages. Syria’s attacks grew more frequent in 1965 and 1966, while Nasser’s rhetoric became increasingly bellicose: “We shall not enter Palestine with its soil covered in sand,” he said on March 8, 1965. “We shall enter it with its soil saturated in blood.”
While Nasser continued to make speeches threatening war, Arab terrorist attacks grew more frequent. In 1965, 35 raids were conducted against Israel. In 1966, the number increased to 41. In just the first four months of 1967, 37 attacks were launched.
Meanwhile, Syria’s attacks on Israeli kibbutzim from the Golan Heights provoked a retaliatory strike on April 7, 1967, during which Israeli planes shot down six Syrian MiGs. Shortly thereafter, the Soviet Union-which had been providing military and economic aid to both Syria and Egypt-gave Damascus information alleging a massive Israeli military buildup in preparation for an attack. Despite Israeli denials, Syria decided to invoke its defense treaty with Egypt.
Meanwhile, Syria’s attacks on Israeli kibbutzim from the Golan Heights provoked a retaliatory strike on April 7, 1967, during which Israeli planes shot down six Syrian MiGs. Shortly thereafter, the Soviet Union-which had been providing military and economic aid to both Syria and Egypt-gave Damascus information alleging a massive Israeli military buildup in preparation for an attack. Despite Israeli denials, Syria decided to invoke its defense treaty with Egypt.
On May 15, Israel’s Independence Day, Egyptian troops began moving into the Sinai and massing near the Israeli border. By May 18, Syrian troops were prepared for battle along the Golan Heights.
Nasser ordered the UN Emergency Force, stationed in the Sinai since 1956, to withdraw on May 16. Without bringing the matter to the attention of the General Assembly, as his predecessor had promised, Secretary-General U Thant complied with the demand. After the withdrawal of the UNEF, the Voice of the Arabs proclaimed (May 18, 1967):
As of today, there no longer exists an international emergency force to protect Israel. We shall exercise patience no more. We shall not complain any more to the UN about Israel. The sole method we shall apply against Israel is total war, which will result in the extermination of Zionist existence.(6)
An enthusiastic echo was heard May 20 from Syrian Defense Minister Hafez Assad:
Our forces are now entirely ready not only to repulse the aggression, but to initiate the act of liberation itself, and to explode the Zionist presence in the Arab homeland. The Syrian army, with its finger on the trigger, is united…I, as a military man, believe that the time has come to enter into a battle of annihilation.
Nasser challenged Israel to fight almost daily. “Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight,” he said on May 27.(11) The following day, he added: “We will not accept any…coexistence with Israel…Today the issue is not the establishment of peace between the Arab states and Israel…The war with Israel is in effect since 1948.”
Oh boy. Hope you like the sound bites.
All nations are less than nothing to God compared to Israel. All Israel will be saved.