Tag Archives: Lebanon

Kosovo’s stark warning

Kosovo’s US-backed declaration of independence is deeply troubling. By setting a precedent of legitimizing the secession of disaffected minorities, it weakens the long-term viability of multi-ethnic states. In so doing, it destabilizes the already stressed state-based international system.

States as diverse as Canada, Morocco, Spain, Georgia, Russia and China currently suffer problems with politicized minorities. They are deeply concerned by the Kosovo precedent. Even the US has latent sovereignty issues with its increasingly politicized Hispanic minority along its border with Mexico. It may one day experience a domestic backlash from its support for Kosovar independence from Serbia.

Setting aside the global implications, it is hard to see how Kosovo constitutes a viable state. Its 40 percent unemployment is a function of the absence of proper economic and governing infrastructures.

In November, a European Commission report detailed the Kosovo Liberation Army’s failure to build functioning governing apparatuses. The report noted that "due to a lack of clear political will to fight corruption, and to insufficient legislative and implementing measures, corruption is still widespread… Civil servants are still vulnerable to political interference, corrupt practices and nepotism." Moreover, "Kosovo’s public administration remains weak and inefficient."

The report continued, "The composition of the government anti-corruption council does not sufficiently guarantee its impartiality," and "little progress can be reported in the area of organized crime and combating of trafficking in human beings."

Additionally, the prosecution of Albanian war criminals is "hampered by the unwillingness of the local population to testify" against them. This is in part due to the fact that "there is still no specific legislation on witness protection in place."

The fledgling failed-state of Kosovo is a great boon for the global jihad. It is true that Kosovar Muslims by and large do not subscribe to radical Islam. But it is also true that they have allowed their territory to be used as bases for al-Qaida operations; that members of the ruling Kosovo Liberation Army have direct links to al-Qaida; and that the Islamic world as a whole perceived Kosovo’s fight for independence from Serbia as a jihad for Islamic domination of the disputed province.

According to a 2002 Wall Street Journal report, al-Qaida began operating actively in Kosovo, and in the rest of the Balkans, in 1992. Osama bin Laden visited Albania in 1996 and 1997. He received a Bosnian passport from the Bosnian Embassy in Austria in 1993. Acting on bin Laden’s orders, in 1994 his deputy, Ayman Zawahiri set up training bases throughout the Balkans including one in Mitrovica, Kosovo. The Taliban and al-Qaida set up drug trafficking operations in Kosovo to finance their operations in Afghanistan and beyond.

In 2006, John Gizzi reported in Human Events that the German intelligence service BND had confirmed that the 2005 terrorist bombings in Britain and the 2004 bombings in Spain were organized in Kosovo. Furthermore, "The man at the center of the provision of the explosives in both instances was an Albanian, operating mostly out of Kosovo… who is the second ranking leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army, Niam Behzloulzi."

Then, too, at its 1998 meeting in Pakistan, the Organization of the Islamic Conference declared that the Albanian separatists in Kosovo were fighting a jihad. The OIC called on the Muslim world to help "this fight for freedom on the occupied Muslim territories."

Supporters of Kosovo claim that as victims of "genocide," Kosovar Muslims deserve independence. But if the Muslims in Kosovo have been targeted for annihilation by the Serbs, then how is it that they have increased from 48% of the population in 1948 to 92% today? Indeed, Muslims comprised only 78% of the population in 1991, the year before Yugoslavia broke apart.

In recent years particularly, it is Kosovo’s Serbian Christians, not its Albanian Muslims, who are targeted for ethnic cleansing. Since 1999, two-thirds of Kosovo’s Serbs – some 250,000 people – have fled the area.

The emergence of a potentially destabilizing state in Kosovo is clearly an instance of political interests trumping law. Under international law, Kosovo has no right to be considered a sovereign state. Even UN Security Council Resolution 1244 from 1999, which the KLA claims provides the legal basis for Kosovar sovereignty, explicitly recognizes Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo.

For Israel, Kosovo’s US-backed declaration of independence should be a source of alarm great enough to require a rethinking of foreign policy. Unfortunately, rather than understand and implement the lessons of Kosovo, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government is working actively to ensure that they are reenacted in the international community’s treatment of Israel and the Palestinians. Today, Israel is enabling the Palestinians to set the political and legal conditions for the establishment of an internationally recognized state of Palestine that will be at war with Israel.

By accepting the "Road Map Plan to a Two-State Solution" in 2004, Israel empowered the US, the EU, Russia and the UN, who comprise the international Quartet, to serve as judges of Palestinian and Israeli actions toward one another. In November 2007, at the Annapolis conference, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government explicitly empowered the US to "monitor and judge the fulfillment of the commitment of both sides of the road map."

That these moves have made Israel dependent on the kindness of strangers was made clear this week when Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni instructed Israel’s ambassadors to launch a campaign to convince the international community that Israel and the Palestinians are making great strides in their negotiations toward the establishment of a Palestinian state. Livni’s move was precipitated by growing European and US dissatisfaction with the pace of those negotiations and by reports from the meeting of Quartet members in Berlin on February 11. There all members voiced anger at the slow pace of negotiations and opposition to Israel’s military actions in Gaza, which are aimed at protecting the western Negev from rocket and mortar attacks.

The US representative at the Quartet’s meeting, Assistant Secretary of State David Welch, reportedly told his colleagues, "First, we must not allow the suicide bombing in Dimona and the shooting on Sderot to affect the negotiations."

Welch reportedly added, "It is also important to us that neither the Palestinians in Gaza nor the Israelis in Sderot are hurt. Also, we must continue to strengthen Mahmoud Abbas and Salaam Fayad."

Moreover, Ran Koriel, Israel’s ambassador to the EU, reportedly warned Livni that the Russians are pushing for the re-establishment of a Fatah-Hamas government. Several EU states, including France, are reconsidering their refusal to recognize Hamas.

If Israel had not empowered the Quartet generally and the US specifically to determine whether the PA and Israel are behaving properly, a European or Russian decision to recognize Hamas would have little impact. But given their role as arbiters, Quartet members can take punitive action against Israel if it fails to comply with their wishes. The Quartet can replace international law in determining who can assert sovereignty over Gaza, Judea and Samaria and how Israel can exercise its own sovereignty. And so, Livni is reduced to begging them not to recognize Hamas.

Once the US decided in 1999 to commit its own forces to NATO’s bombing of Serbia and subsequent occupation of Kosovo, the jig was up for Serbian sovereignty over the area. The fact is, NATO forces in Kosovo were deployed for the express purpose of blocking Serbia from exercising its sovereignty over Kosovo, not to prevent violence between the Kosovars and the Serbs or among the Muslims and Christians in Kosovo. That is, NATO deployed in Kosovo to enable it to gain independence.

And if US or NATO forces are deployed to Gaza or Judea and Samaria, they will not be there to protect Israelis from Palestinian terror or to prevent the areas from acting as global terror bases. They will be there to establish a Palestinian state.

Failing to understand the meaning of Kosovo, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government refuses to understand this point. Indeed, the government is actively lobbying NATO to deploy forces in Gaza. Just as it wrongly hoped that UNIFIL forces in south Lebanon would fight Hizbullah for it, so today, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government insists that NATO forces in Gaza will fight Hamas for it.

If applying the lessons of UNIFIL to Gaza is too abstract for the Olmert-Livni-Barak government, Israel has experience with EU monitors in Gaza itself to learn from. Wrongly assuming that the Europeans shared Israel’s interest in preventing terrorists and weapons from entering Gaza, Israel requested that EU monitors set up shop at the Rafah terminal linking Gaza to Egypt after Israel withdrew from the border in 2005. Yet whenever confronted by Fatah and Hamas terrorists, rather than fight the EU monitors flee to Israel for protection. And its monitors’ experience with Palestinian terrorists taking over the border has never caused the EU to question its support for Palestinian statehood.

Then, too, since the US, EU, UN and Russia all consider Gaza, Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem to be one territorial unit, it is not surprising that Israel’s request for NATO forces in Gaza has been greeted by a US plan to deploy NATO forces in Judea and Samaria. If NATO forces in Gaza would do nothing to secure the border with Egypt or to fight terrorists and would scuttle Israeli operations in the area, NATO forces in Judea and Samaria would not simply prevent Israel from protecting its citizens who live there. They would also prevent Israel from taking action to prevent the Palestinians from attacking central Israel and asserting control over the border with Jordan. And yet, as The Jerusalem Post reported this week, Israel is conducting talks with the US regarding just such a NATO deployment.

What the Serbs made NATO fight its way in to achieve, Israel is offering NATO on a silver platter.

Not surprisingly, Abbas’s adviser and PA propaganda chief Yasser Abd Rabbo reacted to Kosovo’s declaration of independence by recommending that the Palestinians follow the example. Abd Rabbo said, "Kosovo is not better than us. We deserve independence even before Kosovo, and we ask for the backing of the United States and the European Union for our independence."

For its part, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has responded to Kosovo’s declaration of independence with customary confusion. But the lessons of Kosovo are clear. Not only should Israel join Russia, Canada, China, Spain, Romania and many others in refusing to recognize Kosovo. It should also state that as a consequence of Kosovo’s independence, Israel rejects the deployment of any international forces to Gaza or Judea and Samaria, and refuses to cede its legal right to sovereignty in Judea, Samaria, Gaza and Jerusalem to international arbitration.

Mugniyeh’s true legacy

It is quite possible that terror master Imad Mughniyeh was not killed Tuesday night in Damascus for his past crimes, but to prevent him from carrying out additional attacks in the future.

On January 30, French security services raided a Paris apartment and arrested six Arab men. Three of the men – two Lebanese and one Syrian – were travelling on diplomatic passports. According to the Italian Libero newspaper, the six were members of a Hizbullah cell. Documents seized included tourist maps of Paris, London, Madrid, Berlin and Rome marked up with red highlighter to indicate routes, addresses, parking lots and "truck stopping points." The maps pointed to several routes to Vatican back entrances.

[More]Libero‘s report explained that the "truck stopping points" aligned with information the French had received the week before from Beirut. There, Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah had convened a conference of his senior terror leaders where he ordered them to activate Hizbullah cells throughout Europe to kidnap senior European leaders.

The day of the arrests, French Defense Minister Herve Morin was meeting with his American counterpart, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Washington on a previously unannounced visit. During his public appearances, Morin criticized the US National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear program from November. Morin said, "Coordinated information from a number of intelligence services leads us to believe that Iran has not given up its wish to pursue its [nuclear] program," and is "continuing to develop" it.

Other recent reports relayed French concern that their embassy in Beirut is being targeted for attack by Hizbullah. On January 15 terrorists attacked a US Embassy car in Beirut, killing four and wounding 16. This week, French President Nicholas Sarkozy’s chief of staff told L’Express newsweekly that the threat of terror against France "remains quite high."

All of the feared terror attacks against French and European targets have the classic earmarkings of Hizbullah operations chief and Iranian Revolutionary Guards officer Imad Mughniyeh. Mughniyeh was the pioneer of embassy bombings and high-profile kidnappings.

Most of the reports of his death treated Mughniyeh as a has-been. Coverage was devoted to his attacks against American, Israeli and Jewish targets in the 1980s and early 1990s. Yet at the time of his death, Mughniyeh remained one of the most dangerous and prolific terror operatives in the world.

Mughniyeh’s broad-based leadership role in the global terror nexus was made clear by the reaction of seemingly unrelated terror groups to his death. Representatives of the reputedly nationalist, secularist Fatah terror group expressed their pride in his life’s work. "We’re very proud to have had a Palestinian holding such a high position in Hizbullah," a Fatah official who worked with Mughniyeh in the 1970s and 1980s told The Jerusalem Post. Every Palestinian terror group – from Fatah to Hamas to Islamic Jihad, to the Popular Resistance Committees, the PFLP and DFLP – mourned Mughniyeh as a hero and martyr and called for revenge against Israel and the US.

In Iraq, Shi’ite and Sunni terrorists alike bemoaned his death and called for revenge. Shi’ite militia leader Muqtada al-Sadr, whose forces were trained and organized by Mughniyeh and Iran, condemned Mughniyeh’s killing. Sadr’s supposed arch-foe, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, who leads al-Qaida in Iraq and whose operational commanders are in Iran, responded to his death by calling for attacks against Israel.

And of course, Hizbullah and its state sponsors Iran and Syria all condemned Mughniyeh’s death in the strongest terms and vowed to avenge his killing.

These condemnations were not nostalgic pinings for a has-been. These uniform reactions from across the terror spectrum were the cries of Mughniyeh’s soldiers for their commander. Through Iran, Mughniyeh was in effect the commander or godfather or both of all of these forces. His life’s work embodied the growth, development and modus operandi of the forces of global terror and jihad. And understanding his life’s work is a key to understanding the nature of the jihadist forces arrayed against the Western world and Israel.

Mughniyeh began his terror career in the 1970s in Fatah leader Yasser Arafat’s Force 17 in Lebanon. There, in addition to terrorizing Lebanese Christians, he and Arafat trained Iranian Shi’ite jihadists. These men arrived at PLO camps in Lebanon in the early 1970s to train to overthrow of the Shah of Iran and install their leader Ayatollah Khomeini as the head of a new Islamic state. In 1979 they became the backbone of the newly formed Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps.

When Israel forced Arafat and his Fatah terror army to flee Lebanon in 1982, Arafat gave Fatah’s arsenal to Mughniyeh, who at that time, as an officer in the new Revolutionary Guards Corps, was forming Hizbullah. As Fatah’s terror heir, Mughniyeh and his colleagues set out to throw the Americans, French and Israelis out of Lebanon and to disenfranchise Lebanese Christians and Sunnis. They accomplished their goals through a mix of terror tactics including car bombings, suicide bombings, airline hijackings, kidnappings, assassinations, missile and rocket attacks on civilians, and embassy bombings; and guerrilla warfare tactics like ambushes, RPG attacks on convoys, sniper fire, popular indoctrination and psychological warfare operations. Most of these operations were carried out in Lebanon.

In the 1990s, Mughniyeh and Iran took their show on the road. Not only did they reenact their car bombings in South America, they also expanded their terror nexus to the then nascent Sunni Wahabist al-Qaida organization. As Thomas Joscelyn documents in his short book Iran’s Proxy War Against America, Iran through Mughniyeh has been instrumental in training, arming and sheltering al-Qaida since the early 1990s.

As an Iranian agent, in the early 1990s, Mughniyeh built operational alliances with Osama bin Laden, Ayman Zawahiri and al-Qaida’s military chief Saif al-Adel when al-Qaida was based in Sudan. Adel, along with several hundred other al-Qaida operatives, travelled to Lebanon to undergo training at Hizbullah camps. Hizbullah trainers also worked at al-Qaida camps in Sudan and al-Qaida operatives also trained at Revolutionary Guard camps in Iran. From 1996 through 1998, 10 percent of bin Laden’s satellite phone calls were to Iran.

Operational cooperation between Hizbullah and al-Qaida quickly followed.

In 1996, Iran ordered Hizbullah to blow up the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia that housed US military personnel; 19 US servicemen were killed. Although al-Qaida was never officially tied to the bombing, Zahawiri phoned bin Laden to congratulate him on the attack.

The al-Qaida terror cell in Kenya that carried out the Kenyan arm of the twin US Embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dars el-Salaam in 1998 underwent training in Hizbullah camps in Lebanon. That attack had all the markings of Mughniyeh operations. Like the 1983 attacks on the US Marine barracks and French paratrooper base in Beirut, the 1998 attacks were double car bombings carried out in disparate locations nearly simultaneously.

As Joscelyn recalls, the 9/11 Commission called for further investigation of Iran’s role in the September 11, 2001, attacks on America. Adel, a veteran of Hizbullah camps, was intimately aware of the bombing plans before it took place. Ramzi Binalshibh, the plot’s mastermind, travelled in and out of Iran several times in the months before the bombings. Then, too, eight to ten of the September 11 bombers transited Iran assisted by Hizbullah and Revolutionary Guard officials in late 2000. The Iranians did not stamp their passports. Several of the bombers transited Iran en route to Lebanon. Mughniyeh himself flew to Beirut from Teheran aboard the same flight as September 11 hijacker Ahmad al-Ghamdi.

Although Iran and the Taliban nearly went to war against one another in 2000, in the wake of the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, according to jailed Taliban leaders, Iran pledged to assist the Taliban in their war against the US. Teheran opened its doors to fleeing Taliban leaders and senior al-Qaida commanders – including Adel and bin Laden’s son and heir apparent, Saad and Abu Musab Zarkawi. From Iran, Adel and bin Laden Jr. planned and ordered attacks in Saudi Arabia.

Moreover, from Iran, Adel and bin Laden worked with Zarkawi in planning the group’s insurgency in Iraq. Citing an extensive report from the German Cicero magazine, Joscelyn describes how Zarkawi set up his terror network under the protection of the Revolutionary Guards. Zarkawi had no problem operating in Iran in spite of his avowed hatred of Shi’ites who, after entering Iraq, he massacred at every opportunity.

Then, too, as Al Sharq al Aswat reported Wednesday, Mughniyeh played a central role in organizing and training Shi’ite militias in Iraq. He worked as the head of Iran’s intelligence directorate in southern Iraq, trained Sadr’s Mahdi army fighters in Iran, Iraq and Lebanon and set up shop in Basra to facilitate their entry into Iraq from Iran.

After the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the PLO, Iran abandoned Arafat as a traitor. Mughniyeh was responsible for mending fences. In 1999 he brought Fatah back into Iran’s orbit when he acted as a middle-man in negotiating the Iranian sale of the Karine A weapons ship to the Palestinian Authority; the vessel was intercepted by IDF naval commandos in January 2002.

After Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, Mughniyeh worked as a middle-man bringing Hamas under Iranian control. That control was consolidated in a meeting between Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Syrian President Bashar Assad and Mughniyeh in Damascus in January 2001, after Hamas’s electoral victory in the PA’s legislative ballot.

Later in 2006, Mughniyeh returned to Lebanon to plan the kidnapping of IDF soldiers that was carried out on July 12, 2006, and precipitated that summer’s Second Lebanon War. Mughniyeh reportedly commanded Hizbullah forces during the campaign. After the war, he oversaw Hizbullah’s rearmament as well as the training of Hizbullah and Hamas forces in Iran. Saad bin Laden had reportedly travelled to Syria to oversee weapons shipments to Hizbullah during the war.

It is possible that Mughniyeh was irreplaceable. The pivotal role that he played in the nexus of global terror was unique. No one else had such wide-ranging accomplishments. But placing too much stress on Mugniyeh’s uniqueness would serve to obfuscate the basic reality that his life’s work embodied.

Mughniyeh embodied the fact that terrorists of all shapes and colors willingly collaborate with one another against their common enemies in the West. Mughniyeh personally bridged all the divisions within the world of Arab and Islamic terrorism. He showed that when it comes to attacking the West, there is no distinction between secular, nationalist, religious, Islamist, Sunni or Shi’ite terrorists.

His work revealed the inconvenient truth so fervently denied by policy-makers and politicians throughout the Western world. He showed that for the jihadists there is no distinction between terrorists who attack in Israel or against Jewish targets abroad and those who attack non-Israeli and non-Jewish targets. Moreover, his work as an Iranian agent demonstrates Iran’s central role in sponsoring jihad throughout the world.

Mughniyeh’s legacy is not simply a laundry list of massacre and torture. It is the nexus of global terror. While it is a great thing that he is dead, it must be understood that his death is insufficient. Hundreds of thousands converged in Beirut to celebrate his life’s work. The West must understand the significance of that work and unite to destroy it – layer after layer.

Grimmacing to victory, grinning to defeat

 

For leaders in democracies, perhaps the most difficult decision is to change course. Decision-making is hard enough. Revisiting decisions and acknowledging mistakes is simply beyond the capabilities of most leaders. Once they have chosen a strategy, they stick with it for better or for worse.

For a leader to change strategic course, he must first be convinced that his own fortunes are inextricably linked with maintaining failure or moving on towards success. He must believe, in other words, that he has no choice other than to change course.

The current issue of the Weekly Standard contains two articles which lay bare this basic truth. In one, "How Bush decided on the surge," Fred Barnes describes how US President George W. Bush decided to adopt a new strategy for winning the campaign in Iraq. In the other, "Ehud Olmert’s Israel," Peter Berkowitz describes how Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has refused to revisit his own strategies for contending with the burgeoning threats to Israel’s national security.

Barnes’s article depicts a president who at the end of 2006 found himself isolated from the military, Congress and his own Secretary of State as the campaign in Iraq appeared increasingly unwinnable. The going consensus asserted that the reason the war was unwinnable was because US forces themselves were the cause of the fighting. If the US left, or simply hid in big bases outside the population centers and sufficed with training Iraqi forces, then the war would end.

Bush didn’t believe them. And he couldn’t accept the view that victory was unattainable. As he put it to Barnes, "Failure was no option…. I never thought I had to give up the goal of winning." So he didn’t. Instead, working with his National Security Council and relying on the work of people outside the administration and the Pentagon, he embraced the view that the war was the fault of the terrorists – not the US. Bush recognized that far from wishing for the US forces to withdraw from the country, the Iraqis wished for the Americans to stay and protect them. The surge strategy – which involved an increase in forces, and an intimate engagement of the forces in securing the lives and property of Iraqi civilians – has done just that. And the results have been dramatic.

As Max Boot reported in the Weekly Standard, "Iraqi and American deaths fell by approximately 80 percent between December 2006 and December 2007, and life is returning to a semblance of normality in much of Baghdad." Wherever the Americans are operating, al-Qaida is being defeated, the Shi’ite militias are fading away and life is changing for the better as more and more Iraqis come to trust and support the Americans and the Iraqi security forces working with them.

With the presidential race moving into full swing, the sustainability of Bush’s new strategy into the next administration is a key concern. The media’s coverage of the campaign in Iraq has been so negative for so long that in spite of the transformation of the security situation in the country over the past year, the public still considers the war to have been a failed endeavor. More Americans trust the Democrats, who have pledged to withdraw from Iraq, to handle the war than Republicans, who have pledged to see it through to victory.

On the other hand, in spite of the media’s condemnation of the war, Americans today believe they are winning the war in Iraq. According to an NBC News – Wall Street Journal poll, 39 percent of Americans believe that the situation in Iraq has improved over the last six months and only 16 percent believe it has gotten worse. Even if the Democrats win the White House in November, it is hard to see the next president convincing the American people to turn their backs on victory.

Barnes is impressed by Bush’s courage to move forward, almost alone and change the war-fighting strategy in order to enable victory in Iraq. If Bush hadn’t acted as he did when he did, there can be little doubt that the US would have lost in Iraq. The public was willing to accept defeat. Congress was positively demanding defeat. The New York Times might have even granted Bush 15 minutes of sympathetic coverage if he had behaved "pragmatically" and embraced defeat in Iraq.

The fact that a failed leader can expect to find public support for his weakness was manifested in Berkowitz’s portrait of Olmert. Just as the media has manufactured false realities to convince some 60 percent of the American public that the Iraq campaign is not only unwinnable but that the US doesn’t deserve to win, so too, the media has labored for years to convince the majority of Israelis that we cannot win and indeed have no right to victory.

Berkowitz’s opening paragraph attests to the success of their labors. He began his profile of Olmert by noting that some 70 percent of Israelis support the establishment of a Palestinian state. He asserted, as the media does, that the only people in Israel who don’t support the establishment of such a state are right-wing extremists who no one would want to be associated with.

Having established that the only socially and morally acceptable view of Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians is that Israel must feel bad for controlling Judea, Samaria and united Jerusalem, and that Israelis must happy that Israel no longer controls Gaza, Berkowitz goes on to uphold Olmert as a competent and socially acceptable leader.

This is the same Ehud Olmert who led Israel to defeat in the 2006 war in Lebanon. The same Olmert who has exhibited unconscionable incompetence in contending with the Hamas caliphate in Gaza, its rocket and mortar war against southern Israel and its takeover of Gaza’s international border with Egypt. And this is the same Olmert who now fervently advocates surrendering Judea, Samaria and parts of Jerusalem to Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas. Such a land handover would place all of Israel within Palestinian and Lebanese rocket, mortar and missile range. Moreover, Olmert has done nothing to stem the Bush administration’s abandonment of Israel as a strategic ally and has been so feckless in his handling of Iran’s nuclear weapons program that Israel finds itself completely alone to face Iran as the mullahs surge toward nuclear capabilities.

To defend Olmert as a competent leader, Berkowitz turned to political consultant Eyal Arad who served as former prime minister Ariel Sharon’s and Olmert’s public relations guru and strategic counselor. This was a reasonable move. Arad oversaw the infantalization of Israeli politics and the trivialization of the national discourse. It was Arad who together with his fellow public relations consultants convinced Sharon that his political survival was contingent on adopting the radical Left’s strategy of surrender and appeasement. Arad, and his partner Reuven Adler, convinced Sharon to withdraw from Gaza and northern Samaria. They then convinced him to destroy Likud and form the Kadima party. After Sharon was felled by a stroke two years ago, they managed Olmert’s campaign as the head of Kadima in the 2006 elections.

As Yediot Aharonot reported after the elections, Arad and Adler viewed Kadima not as a political party, but as an ad campaign. They viewed its candidates not as leaders of a threatened country, but as products they had to sell like chocolate bars to Israeli consumers at the ballot box. And indeed, like actors in candy commercials, Kadima’s candidates were taught to parrot the Arad and Adler line that if they formed the next government, they would make Israel a country that’s "fun to live in."

Speaking to Berkowitz, Arad kept to his script portraying Israel as an amusement park. He downplayed the significance of the fact that thanks to Sharon and Olmert Israel is threatened as never before. What is really important, he said, is that Israelis – particularly in Tel Aviv – are enjoying the economic benefits of the free market and buying all sorts of fancy gadgets as the Tel Aviv skyline grows taller and shinier. And Berkowitz believed him.

Berkowitz extolled Olmert’s assertion at the Herzliya conference last week that the fact that Hizbullah hasn’t been fighting Israel in 18 months means that Israel restored its deterrent capabilities in 2006 war. The fact that Hizbullah is currently otherwise engaged in taking over Lebanon is apparently of little concern or relevance to either Olmert or Berkowitz.

What the contrasting tales of Bush and Barnes and Olmert and Berkowitz show clearly is that strategic shifts, even when necessary, can never be foregone conclusions. Bush would have had no trouble finding a reporter to extol his prudence in accepting defeat in Iraq if he had decided not to buck the media and indeed his own administration in order to win in Iraq and secure his place in history. There would have been a multitude of reporters like Berkowitz willing to tell the 60 percent of Americans who want to leave Iraq within a year that they are right to believe that you can win a war by losing it.

The articles though also show something else. They show the difference between leaders who believe in using their power to advance ideas and leaders who use their power to advance themselves. While Bush recognizes that historians will judge him not by whether he was liked, but by whether he left America safer than he received it, Olmert couldn’t care less how history judges him. He just wants to be prime minister, and to maintain power he finds it more convenient to tell Israelis to have a good time than to ask us to join him in defending the country from those who seek our destruction. It is easier to tell us that defending our country is socially unacceptable and that good Israelis choose to empower terrorists instead in the name of peace.

Or maybe Olmert has it right and Bush is a fool. After all, if he could convince Berkowitz to trust him, perhaps future historians will truly believe that the best way to secure one’s country is to accept defeat with a grin.

Breaching conventions in statesmanship

Winston Churchill once said, " When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home. "

An amusing sentiment but at the same time a serious one, and it used to govern the behavior of statesmen overseas, Americans included.  No longer. This past October Bill Clinton — on a visit to London promoting his recent book "Giving" — sat down with BBC Radio host John Humphreys for an interview and, after disposing of book chat in a few minutes, breezily proceeded to harshly criticize President Bush and recent American policy in Iraq, as well as our positions on Kyoto, the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty and the International Criminal Court.

[More]The old rules no longer apply, having in large measure been overborne by Democrats who feel no compunction about violating them because of what they view as the mean-spirited, selfish nature of contemporary conservatism; not simply that it’s wrong but that it’s evil, which allows them to defy what had heretofore been important conventions in managing foreign policy, not to mention simple decency.

Witness the spectacle of Nancy Pelosi visiting Syrian Dictator, Bashar Assad and making irresponsible pronouncements on policy while at the same time giving legitimacy to a nasty dictator involved in killing our troops in Iraq, undermining the relatively democratic government of Lebanon and continuing support for terrorists.

And then there’s Harry Reid, joined by a number of his colleagues, denigrating our war effort.  Reid believed that the War in Iraq was lost a few years ago.  Fine, but in an action that would have shocked previous generations of American statesmen, he went so far as to publicly and emphatically say so, giving what amounts to aid and comfort to our enemies.  

But the real political sin has been the effort by a majority of Democrats in both Houses of Congress to attempt to restrict funding for the War or otherwise impede its prosecution and stultify the President’s constitutionally-mandated responsibility as Commander-in-Chief and master of American foreign policy.

At the same time, a number of Democratic politicians have felt free to either freely lie about or obscure their record of support for the War or their beliefs about WMD or about the necessity of removing Saddam Hussein.

To return to former President Clinton for a moment, he recently stated that he was opposed to the Iraq War from its beginning.  A Google search reveals no statements to that effect before the War; not even a hint of his claimed opposition.  And, indeed, it would have been widely reported at the time given his status as a former president and his wife’s vote to authorize President Bush to take military action against Saddam.

And throughout, scarcely a peep from the mainstream press about how the Democrats have debased our politics and simple common decency, about their dishonesty or about the threat this kind of   behavior presents to pursuing crucial foreign policy goals confirmed by repeated elections.  If the Democrats do it, ipso facto, it’s fine.

The Democrats have never reconciled themselves to President Reagan’s popularity or their loss of Congressional majorities, particularly in the House of Representatives, which they had held since the beginning of Eisenhower’s Administration.  As long as a figure like Bob Michel was Minority Leader and the Republicans were tame, malleable creatures — content with a little pork and to accept dhimmitude under the Democrats — the Majority party had no problem with them.  

But with the loss of power in the House in 1994 when New Gingrich took over from the soft, fuzzy Republicans of old and sharpened differences with the Democrats, the former seeming hereditary rulers have declared war on the Republicans and have used every means at their disposal, fair or foul, to regain power, beginning with delegitimizing their opponents and extending to dishonesty, obstructionism and unprecedented parliamentary and political maneuvers.

Of course, the Republicans are not entirely without blame, and the Democrats’ antics have been part and parcel of a more general "coarsening of the culture" as the expression goes.  But the sense of entitlement and righteousness that seems intrinsic to contemporary liberalism has been endorsed by the press and allows Democrats to play outside the rules.  After all, their opponents are evil, not simply wrong.

It’s a scandal, unprecedented in our history, where it used to be said that partisan differences over foreign policy stop at the water’s edge.  No longer.

Claiming that a war is lost or foreign policy freelancing only encourages our enemies to hold on until there is a change of Administration or the country is paralyzed by dissension.  Denigrating the United States from a foreign land adds nothing to the domestic debate, and it only serves to demean us in the eyes of those without familiarity with some of the nuances of American policy and politics. Refusing to fund a lawful war is not only undemocratic, but it undermines our military and compromises the President’s authority.

Traditional rules, as frustrating and imperfect as they may have been, as inscrutable as they may have appeared, grew up organically over many years and more often than not have a solid, logical pedigree.  Their destruction is undermining U.S. foreign policy, as the Democrats — and all of us — will discover to our detriment when the loyal opposition again gains the Oval Office.

George in jihadland

US President George W. Bush arrived in Israel at the start of an eight-day tour of the Middle East at an interesting moment. In the lead-up to his trip, enemy forces, of both the terrorist and state variety, clarified their strategic outlook and the scope of their ambitions. Unfortunately, the president seems not to have noticed.

For the past several weeks, the leaders of the global jihad and their state sponsors in Syria and Iran have escalated their rhetorical and military attacks against Israel and the US. Osama bin Laden, his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri and his American lackey Adam Gadahn all issued video and audio appeals on the eve of Bush’s trip. Their messages were devoted mainly to the campaigns against US forces in Iraq and against Israel. Bin Laden labeled Iraqi opponents of al-Qaida in Iraq apostates and called for Iraqis to rally around his allied forces. Gadahn called for Bush’s assassination. All three men called for Israel’s annihilation and for the unification of the forces of global jihad.

Then there is the al-Qaida affiliate Fatah al-Islam. Fatah al-Islam is considered a creation of Syrian intelligence. It is led by Shaker al-Absi, a Palestinian and a former member of the Syrian military. Syrian intelligence dispatched Absi to Lebanon last year to launch a campaign against the Lebanese military. Under his command, Fatah al-Islam took over the Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp where it pinned down the Lebanese Army for four months before being overrun.

Despite assertions by the Lebanese military that Absi had been killed, his body was never found. This week, ahead of Bush’s trip, Absi surfaced alive with a videotape attacking the Lebanese army, calling for a jihadist takeover of the Levant and announcing his allegiance to Osama bin Laden.

Western intelligence agencies have claimed that he is currently operating from Syria. Jihadist Web sites claim that Absi has based himself in northern Iraq. There, they reported that he is combining forces with al-Qaida in Iraq.

Whether he is in Iraq or Syria, allegations that he is collaborating with al-Qaida terrorists in Iraq make sense given that Absi was formerly allied with Abu Musab Zarkawi, who led al-Qaida forces in Iraq until he was killed by US forces in June 2006.

Absi’s Syrian-supported operations have also extended to Gaza. Over the past several months, Gazan terror cadres claiming membership in Fatah al-Islam have been actively involved in recruitment and propaganda activities. Last month, the organization in Gaza claimed it fired missiles at southern Israel.

Absi’s videotaped message was followed by Monday night’s Katyusha attack on the Galilee and Tuesday’s roadside bombing of UNIFIL forces near Sidon. When seen as component parts of a larger whole, it is clear that Fatah al-Islam’s various groupings are acting to unify al-Qaida forces in Iraq, Gaza and Lebanon under one banner.

Like al-Qaida, Hamas too spent the period leading up to Bush’s visit escalating both its missile offensive against southern Israel and its anti-Israel and anti-American rhetoric. The massive anti-American protests in Gaza on Wednesday were followed by an RPG attack against an American school in northern Gaza early Thursday morning. Moreover, Bush’s visit was greeted by a ferocious shelling of southern Israel with rockets and mortars.

For its part, the Palestinian Authority government led by Mahmoud Abbas stepped up its own anti-Israel propaganda drive in December. According to a Palestinian Media Watch report, Abbas’s television station intensified its rhetoric calling for the destruction of Israel by advocating the "liberation" of Haifa, Tiberias, Acre and Tel Aviv. Then too, in his press conference with Bush, Abbas restated his hope of renewing negotiations with Hamas over control of Gaza.

Noting that his government spends 59 percent of its Israeli- and internationally-funded budget in Gaza, Abbas stated that if Hamas were to agree to roll back its control over Gaza, "recognize international legitimacy, all international legitimacy, and… recognize the Arab Initiative, as well… we will have another talk."

Then too, Fatah’s own terrorist forces in Judea and Samaria have not ceased their efforts to join their Gazan and Lebanese counterparts in their missile war against Israel. Last week’s major IDF operation in Nablus was directed against Fatah terror squads which had begun producing rockets to attack central Israel.

With Bush’s arrival in Israel on Wednesday, the Sunni terrorist groups’ Shi’ite counterparts launched their own rhetorical attacks against the US and Israel. Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah gave a televised speech excoriating Bush for his support and recognition of Israel. Against the backdrop of "Death to America and Israel" chants from the crowd, Nasrallah intoned, "Bush is a faker, who fails to protect the Arabs from the real murderer and instead argues that he wishes to defend them from a fictitious enemy. He is attempting to convince our Arab and Muslim people of a bogus danger. It’s a deception."

Nasrallah’s Iraqi counterpart Muqtada el-Sadr made a call on Wednesday for Arab leaders to boycott Bush. Sadr condemned Bush and the US stating, "You brought the wars and you can’t bring peace. . . . Get out of our land and you will be safe from us." Addressing Arab leaders, Sadr said, "Don’t be partners responsible for the blood of your own people. If you will accept his visit, then you are collaborating with him on the blood of your brothers in Palestine, Iraq and others."

The jihadists’ state sponsors – Syria and Iran – also took pains to demonstrate their anti-American and anti-Israel animus. As Bush landed in Israel, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s representative Ali Larijani was rounding off a week-long official visit to Syria. There he met with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad and reasserted Iran’s strategic alliance with Syria. He also met with representatives of Iran’s terrorist and political proxies headquartered in Syria and Lebanon. Larijani held talks with the heads of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian groups as well as representatives of Hizbullah and the Lebanese Shiite Amal militia and political party.

Finally, a week after US military spokesmen in Iraq released contradictory statements about Iran’s continued support for the insurgency in the country, Iranian forces directly challenged US naval forces in the Straits of Hormuz. Although US leaders angrily referred to the Iranian operation as a dangerous provocation, a more constructive way to view the Iranian attack on US naval ships is as a probe.

The Iranians probed both the US’s defenses and its willingness to take action against Iranian aggression. Whereas the ships apparently demonstrated their readiness to engage, in their decision not to open fire on the Iranian boats, they signaled clearly that the US is unwilling to actually fight Iran.

Today in Iraq US forces are concentrating their efforts not on Iranian proxies but on Syrian-supported al-Qaida in Iraq units and cells. After flushing al-Qaida forces out of their former sanctuaries and operating bases in Anbar Province and Baghdad, Tuesday US forces mounted a major offensive against al-Qaida in its current operational hub in Diyala province. Apparently tipped off in advance of the attack, most of the terror operatives reportedly fled the area ahead of the US offensive after laying roadside bombs and booby traps in the towns they abandoned.

Rather than contend with the destructive power and influence of Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias in southern Iraq to US strategic interests, US military commanders and US diplomatic chiefs in Iraq brush them off as an internal Iraqi affair. US diplomats maintain open relations with Sadr’s representatives in Baghdad in spite of his overt incitement against the US and its efforts in Iraq.

And after the confrontation between the US navy and Iranian forces in the Straits of Hormuz, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari announced that the US would soon begin a fourth round of talks with Iran about the situation in Iraq. Zebari announced that these talks – the most intensive to date – will include discussions of how to control militias, how to cooperate in fighting militant networks and monitor the border and how to prevent the flow of weapons, money and fighters through Iraq’s borders. Given Iran’s bellicosity in threatening US naval ships in one of the most vital waterways in the world, it is hard to see why the US would believe that Iranian cooperation in policing and defeating its own proxy forces in Iraq would advance US interests in the country or in the larger war.

Bush stated that he has come to the Middle East to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians and to ensure US allies that the US is committed to preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Yet on both scores US actions do not accord with the president’s message.

On the Palestinian front, his calls for Israeli concessions to the Palestinians and for Palestinian statehood make little sense given the central role that Palestinians play in the global jihad. Bush repeatedly stated that he will not support a Palestinian state that will serve as a base for terror operations against Israel. And yet, under the current circumstances when all Palestinian forces – from Fatah to Hamas to al-Qaida – are committed to Israel’s violent destruction, there is no chance that a Palestinian state will be anything other than a base for terrorist attacks and not only against Israel.

Even if Israel were to conclude an agreement with Abbas that sets out the contours of a Palestinian state in the next year, such an agreement would not engender peace. Given the current jihadist state of Palestinian society as a whole, such an agreement would simply serve to empower jihadists still more.

As to Iran, Bush’s decision to visit the Middle East was made immediately after the National Intelligence Estimate effectively removed his most potent threat against Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The thought was that by visiting the region, Bush would be able to convince US Middle East allies that America is still serious about thwarting Iran’s nuclear and regional ambitions despite the NIE. Unfortunately, the US navy’s refusal to open fire on the Iranian boats in the Straits of Hormuz and America’s continued refusal to combat Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias in Iraq send the opposite message.

In their statements and actions in the run-up to Bush’s visit, jihadist groups and state sponsors made clear that they are serious about fighting their war for regional and indeed global domination. Had Bush acknowledged their plans and expressed a strategic plan for countering their actions and intentions, his visit here could have gone a long way towards cementing alliances to combat and defeat them. Unfortunately, both Bush’s statements and US actions on the ground give the jihadists every reason to believe that they will be able to continue their war without fear of America.

Gang-rape in Annapolis, Saudi-style







The Annapolis meeting: “peace in our time,” at Israel’s expense, of course.
It is fitting that Condoleezza Rice chose the U.S. Naval Academy for the venue of tomorrow’s so-called Mideast peace conference.  The reputation of that extraordinary institution in Annapolis has been sullied in recent years by a succession of rapes of young women.  Despite official efforts to low-ball its significance, Ms. Rice’s conclave is shaping up to be a gang-rape of a nation on a scale not seen since Munich in 1938, when the British and French allowed Hitler and Mussolini to have their violent way with Czechoslovakia.  

This time, the intended victim is Israel.  As with the effort to appease the Nazis and Fascists nearly sixty years ago, however, the damage will not be confined to the rapee.  The interests of the Free World in general and the United States in particular will suffer from what the Saudis and most of the other attendees have in mind for the Jewish State namely, its dismemberment and ultimate destruction.


[More]As it happens, millions Americans have lately been introduced to the Saudis’ attitude towards gang-rape, pursuant to the theocratic code known as Shari’a that they seek to impose on us all.  We learned that a 19-year-old Saudi woman identified only as the Girl of Qatif had been kidnapped and raped by seven men.  The rapists were to receive prison sentences and whippings.  The woman, though, was sentenced to receive 90 lashes for the crime of sitting in a car with a male who was not a relative.  When she had the temerity to appeal her barbaric sentence, it was increased to six months in prison and 200 lashes. 


There will, of course, be no punishments for the perpetrators of the coming gang-rape of Israel at Annapolis.  To the contrary, the Bush Administration feels deeply indebted to the Saudi foreign minister for his participation and that of a representative of a country Ms. Rice’s department lists as a state-sponsor of terror: Syria.


In fact, as an inducement for attending, a host of nations who have never formally and concretely abandoned their historic determination to bring about Israel’s liquidation have been assured by their U.S. hosts that they will be able to use this event to promote their agendas.  As one American official blithely put it: “No one’s microphone will be turned off.”


Consequently, it seems likely that Annapolis will feature an outpouring of sentiment in fact, near unanimity on the following points:  Israel must relinquish to its Palestinian and Syrian enemies territory essential to the defense and security of the Jewish State.  Hard experience in southern Lebanon and Gaza leaves no doubt that the vacuum thus created will be used by terrorists to attack Israel, and perhaps America.


The gang assembled at the Naval Academy Europeans, Russians, non-governmental organizations as well as Arabs will largely insist that the Israelis allow the capital of a new Palestinian state to be established in the section of Jerusalem most holy to Jews (and Christians).  Never mind that from East Jerusalem, the Israeli-controlled remainder of the city can be shelled at will with Kassam rockets or even mortars.   


At Annapolis, virtually everyone will also agree that Israel must accept some arrangement affording rights to millions of Arabs who have been, as the esteemed historian Bernard Lewis points out in today’s Wall Street Journal, deliberately condemned to refugee status (in some cases, for as many as five generations) by their regional “brothers” and UN enablers.  Everyone understands this demand will translate demographically into the end of the Jewish State.


By virtue of its sponsorship of the event and its actions, both there and subsequently, the United States will once again assume the role of “honest broker.”  This mutation of Israel’s one ally makes it still less likely that America will block such international demands. 


Even before Annapolis, Condi Rice has found it inexpedient to do more than mouth platitudes of the kind that once governed George Bush’s policies vis a vis the Jewish State and its enemies.  Today, Palestinians can remain in the terror business they can even officially and explicitly refuse to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish homeland and still enjoy the Administration’s political support and access to U.S. military equipment, training and vast amounts of taxpayers’ funds.


The bigger problem is that the government of Ehud Olmert seems disposed to go along with the emerging “international consensus.”  Indeed, Olmert has already signaled a willingness to compromise his country’s future security and integrity as a Jewish state in the hope of rescuing his failed premiership and avoiding prosecution for corruption.  For their part, his people seem to be sleep-walking, unable to believe that every one of their longstanding national requirements (for example, a unified Jerusalem, secure borders, no “right of return” for “refugees,” etc.) is being abandoned in the pursuit of a “peace” no one can seriously believe is in prospect from the Saudis and their friends.


Sadly, like the Girl of Qatif, the people of Israel stand to be punished for putting themselves in such a compromising position.  Unfortunately for them and for others who will be victimized in the future by Israel’s emboldened Islamist enemies, the penalty for the “process” resuscitated at the Naval Academy and the concessions that will flow from it will not be the lash.  It may well prove to be a death sentence.

Staticidal zealotry







A Palestinian terror-state: Condi’s hope for a “legacy?”
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice behaves like a zealot. In her ever-rasher pursuit of a Palestinian state, she exhibits the syndrome defined by the philosopher George Santayana as one who redoubles her efforts upon losing sight of the objective.

Let’s recall: The objective laid out by President Bush, when he decided in June 2002 to support the creation of a homeland for the Palestinian people, was to provide a stable, secure neighbor for Israel, committed to leaving peaceably with the Jewish State.

Mr. Bush explicitly preconditioned such support on: an end to Palestinian terror; a Palestinian leadership untainted by ties to terrorism; and eliminating the infrastructure in Palestinian areas that enables such behavior. After the September 11, 2001, attacks, the United States was in the business of eliminating terrorist-sponsoring regimes, not creating them.

[More]Now, however, it is crystal-clear that the only outcome from Condi Rice’s idee fixe namely that she will convene a Middle East peace conference at the U.S. Naval Academy for the purpose of extracting from Israel the territorial concessions needed rapidly to establish a Palestinian state has nothing to do with the original Bush vision. Under present and foreseeable circumstances, the best that can be hoped from such a meeting for is failure. For success will result in a new safe haven for terror that is a mortal threat not only for Israel, but for the United States, as well.

Unfortunately, even the failure of Condi’s Folly at Annapolis is likely to be a very bad outcome. To the extent her actions are raising unwarranted expectations on the part of Palestinians and their Arab friends, past practice suggests it will translate into a pretext for new violence against Israel.

That will be especially true if, as is also predictable, the Israelis are blamed for the outcome for not being willing enough in the face of Palestinian intractability to make what are euphemistically called “painful” moves for peace. Another way to describe such moves are as reckless concessions certain to jeopardize Israel’s security, and quite possibly ours.

After all, it is only reasonable to expect the West Bank to follow the trajectory of the Gaza Strip and, before it, southern Lebanon both of which Israel abandoned to her foes, only to have those territories become staging grounds for attacks on Israel and secure incubators for terror against us. Among those operating from such areas are Islamofascist terrorist organizations like Hamas, Hezbollah, al Qaeda and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, the newest addition to the State Department’s list of such entities.

Condi Rice nonetheless demands that Israel now relinquish the West Bank and East Jerusalem to yet another terrorist organization: Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah. To be sure, the secretary of state would have us believe Fatah is no such thing. In fact, the entire Annapolis house of cards is built on the fraudulent foundation that the Palestinian faction established by Mr. Abbas’ mentor, Yasser Arafat, is a reliable partner for peace and effective counterweight to Hamas, which now controls the Gaza Strip.

Only a zealot who has altogether lost any sense of reality could make such an assertion. Treating Fatah as the cornerstone of American diplomacy and demands on Israel is nothing less than perilous and irresponsible. Consider the following sampler of recent counter-indicators:



  • Last August, five Fatah operatives assigned to Mr. Abbas’ security detail conspired to assassinate Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during a visit by the latter to meet the Palestinian “president” in the West Bank city of Jericho. After their arrest on information from Israel’s internal intelligence agency, Shin Bet, several of these individuals were released by the Palestinian Authority.



  • This is in keeping with past practice. By some estimates, Fatah and its Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade have claimed responsibility for murdering roughly as many Israelis as has Hamas. In those rare cases when the perpetrators are actually arrested by Palestinian police, they are generally set free in short order. How could Israel possibly entrust physical control of the West Bank from which virtually the entire Jewish State’s population can be subjected to rocket or even mortar fire to people with such a record?



  • Speaking of the Jewish State, in the run-up to the Annapolis meeting, Mr. Abbas and his subordinates have lately become quite brazen in denouncing Israel’s right to exist as such. Their statements not only speak volumes about the degree to which Condi Rice’s desperate bid for a “legacy” is now being clearly read as bullies always do: as evidence of contemptible and exploitable weakness. They also make a mockery of the premise that Abbas and Company are preferable to Hamas because, unlike the latter, they are truly willing to live in peace with their Israeli neighbors.



  • In fact, only the most willfully blind could maintain such a pretense in light of the incessant propagandizing and indoctrination about killing Jews and destroying Israel that passes for official or at least officially sanctioned broadcasts, sermons and speeches emanating from Mr. Abbas’ rump Palestinian Authority.

The only Palestinian state that can possibly come from Condoleezza Rice’s zealotry will be a dagger pointed at the heart of Israel and a new safe-haven for terror aimed at the United States and other Western nations. Even if a corrupt and politically unrepresentative Olmert government in Israel is prepared to play along, Americans who understand the stakes for the Jewish State as well as our own, must reject her desperate and unacceptable bid to launch a Palestinian one at Annapolis.

Bush Doctrine 2.0?

The first term of the George W. Bush presidency and what has come to be known as the "Bush Doctrine" were marked by a profound and forceful reaction to September 11, 2001.  Determined to prevent further, murderous attacks on the United States, Mr. Bush and his national security team were determined to "drain the swamps" from whence terrorists received safe havens and other forms of support.  Out went the sort of "stability" born of accommodations with totalitarians and favored by the foreign policy establishment’s so-called "realists."  In came a U.S. commitment to bringing down the "axis of evil," in favor of a world ordered by liberty and democracy. 

Today, we are seeing the emergence of what might be described as "Bush Doctrine 2.0."  It bears no similarity to the first edition.  In fact, it pretty much repudiates everything Mr. Bush stood for during his first four years in office.  Worse yet, it threatens to render his legacy not simply one of unrealized goals but of betrayed principles, abandoned friends and unscrupulous deals with tyrants sure to perpetuate their odious regimes.

A Bill of Particulars

Herewith a sampling of the unraveling of Mr. Bush’s policies:

  • Appeasing North Korea:  Early in the first Bush administration, the President to his credit candidly revealed to Bob Woodward that he loathed Kim Jong Il’s brutally repressive police state.  After the North Koreans acknowledged lying about their nuclear weapons program, he strove to intensify Kim’s isolation in the hope of neutralizing the threat thus posed and, with luck, to bring him down.

Mr. Bush was subsequently induced to believe that this goal could be advanced best by enlisting the North’s regional neighbors – including its enablers, China, Russia and South Korea – in so-called "six-party talks."  Even as it became ever more apparent that Pyongyang’s allies were using those negotiations to thwart the original Bush Doctrine, not advanced it, the President clung to this approach and eschewed bilateral talks with, to say nothing of appeasement of, the North.

Now, however, the U.S. envoy to those talks, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, has eviscerated the original Bush policy.  In the name of obtaining still more vacuous promises of nuclear disarmament from Kim Jong-Il, Hill is not only negotiating directly and bilaterally with Pyongyang.  He has promised to remove North Korea from the list of state-sponsors of terrorism, despite mounting evidence that the North is actively engaged in the ultimate support for terrorism: proliferating nuclear weapons technology to the likes of two others on that infamous list: Syria and Iran.

  • A Palestinian state, no matter what: In June 2002, Mr. Bush declared that he would be willing to work towards a homeland for the Palestinian people only if certain conditions were satisfied.  These included their rejection of terrorism, the elimination of its infrastructure and the emergence of a new generation of leaders unsullied by ties to terror.

Now, Mr. Bush’s Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice is frantically pursuing the creation of a Palestinian state she hopes will be run by a man with lifelong ties to terror – Yasir Arafat’s crony and right-hand man, Mahmood Abbas.   In the process, she is: whitewashing his record and current conduct; euchring Israel into surrendering more territory to its enemies; and ignoring the virtual certainty that any land thus yielded will become yet another safe-haven for terror (as with South Lebanon and Gaza before it).

  • Closing ‘Gitmo’:  For years, President Bush has recognized the need for a U.S.-controlled facility outside the United States capable of securely incarcerating international terrorists.  He refused to capitulate to the often-hysterical calls, both at home and abroad, for the closure of the irreplaceable prison complex used for this purpose and located Guantanamo Bay.

Now, according to the New York Times, Mr. Bush’s administration is poised to shut down Gitmo, transfer its remaining occupants to U.S. territory and extend to them expanded rights to counsel and consideration of their cases in civilian courts.  It is unlikely that this action will earn "W." any kudos from his critics.  It will, however, make it more difficult and vastly more expensive to keep such detainees off the actual or propaganda battlefields of this war.

  • Farewells to sovereignty: During his first term, Mr. Bush recognized the threat to U.S. sovereignty posed by unaccountable and generally hostile multinational organizations like the International Criminal Court.  He went so far as to "unsign" the treaty that established that tribunal, rather than allow Americans to be subject to its prosecutions.

Now, President Bush is arguing in a case pending before the Supreme Court that the dictates of such tribunals must trump domestic law.  He is also pressing the Senate to allow the U.S. to be subjected to a host of new tribunals authorized by yet another sovereignty-sapping multinational accord, the UN Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST).

The Bottom Line

With the notable exception of Iraq – where George W. Bush has largely held firm in the face of relentless criticism, with ever-more-promising results – virtually every aspect, principle and objective of his security policy is being eviscerated on his watch.  The problem is not merely that those adulterating his original Bush Doctrine by supplanting it with a 2.0 version will obliterate the principled and common-sense approach made necessary in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.  He will bequeath to his successor and his people a world made vastly more dangerous, not more stable, for his administration’s embrace of appeasement dressed up as "realism."

How not to help “moderates”

According to the commander of Military Intelligence, Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin, Israel’s raid in Syria on September 6 against what was reportedly a North Korean-supplied nuclear installation in eastern Syria restored Israel’s deterrent posture which was so weakened in last summer’s war in Lebanon.

Yet as the execution of anti-Syrian Lebanese parliamentarian Antoine Ghanem in a Christian suburb of Beirut on Wednesday indicated, Israel’s successful raid did not derail Syria’s and Iran’s pursuit of their strategic goals. Those goals involve achieving regional domination through their proxies in Lebanon as well as in Iraq and the Palestinian Authority.

In Iraq, the Americans pursue a policy of military confrontation against Shi’ite and Sunni forces that are supported and directed by Iran and Syria. In contrast, in Lebanon and the PA, the Americans and the Israelis have avoided decisive confrontations, opting instead to advance a diplomatic course aimed at bringing about the political defeat of Iranian and Syrian proxies. In Lebanon this involves supporting Prime Minister Fuad Siniora’s government against Hizbullah. In the PA it involves supporting Fatah against Hamas.

It is still too early to know how the American strategy of military confrontation against Iranian and Syrian proxies in Iraq will pan out. But it is already clear that the American-Israeli strategy for contending with Lebanon and the PA has failed.

Ghanem was a member of the Christian-Phalange party. He had announced his intention to run in the presidential elections that will take place next week in the Lebanese Parliament. With his assassination, the Syrians and Iranians effectively completed their campaign of murder and intimidation aimed at anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians.

With Ghanem out of the picture, the anti-Syrian forces lost the parliamentary majority of 72 out of 128 seats that they won in the 2005 general elections. Today, the anti-Syrian coalition has only 64 sure votes. A presidential candidate needs a 65 vote majority to be elected. Now the pro-Syrian forces have the ability to force their presidential candidate on the country.

Led by Hizbullah, the pro-Syrian parliamentary bloc demands that a "compromise" candidate who will bring "national unity" be elected to the presidency next week. Their demand is openly supported by France, the UN and Saudi Arabia. The Americans have not weighed in on the issue and so it can be assumed that they, too, support it.

Although the demand for "compromise" and "unity" sounds like a call for fairness and even stability, just the opposite is the case. In the Lebanese context, "compromise" and "unity" can only serve to bring about the election of yet another Syrian and Iranian puppet to the presidency. Like outgoing President Emile Lahoud, such a leader will work to prevent Lebanon from extricating itself from Iranian and Syrian influence and control.

That the inclusion of pro-Syrian and Iranian elements in the Lebanese government renders the government, regardless of its members’ actual desires, an effective tool of Syria and Iran was made clear in last summer’s war. During the war, Hizbullah’s membership in the Siniora government worked to transform the Siniora government into a mouthpiece of Hizbullah and, through it, of Iran and Syria.

Many had hoped that Hizbullah’s entry into Lebanese politics would signal its integration into Lebanese society and force its leaders to dismantle Hizbullah’s military force. But the opposite occurred. Hizbullah’s entry into Lebanese politics – and into the Siniora government – consolidated its position as a Syrian-Iranian state within the state in Lebanon. Rather than distance itself from Hizbullah after Hizbullah launched its war against Israel, the Siniora government actively assisted it both diplomatically and militarily. With Hizbullah in the government, the Lebanese military openly assisted its forces in attacking Israel and IDF troops.

Hizbullah used its governmental power to increase its influence over the Lebanese military. With Shi’ites comprising 40 percent of the Lebanese army and with army commander Gen. Michel Suleiman being touted by pro-Syrian forces as a "compromise" candidate for the presidency, it is impossible to trust the Lebanese army’s loyalty to the elected government. Indeed, since the war, the Lebanese army has enabled Hizbullah to reassert its control over southern Lebanon and has turned a blind eye to massive arms shipments to Hizbullah coming across the Syrian border.

During last summer’s war, in a bid to protect the ostensibly pro-Western Siniora government, the US, France and the UN pressured Israel not to attack Lebanese infrastructures. By so acting, the US, France and the UN ignored the actual status of the government. While it talked the anti-Syria talk, it walked the Hizbullah walk.

Siniora’s inability or unwillingness to confront Hizbullah and to end its status as an independent political and military force in Lebanon engendered a situation where, through their support for Lebanon’s "unity" government, the US, France and the UN effectively protected Hizbullah and preserved its ability to maintain its independent position in Lebanon as a Syrian and Iranian proxy against Israel. Since the cease-fire went into effect last August, that protection has been maintained by UNIFIL forces stationed along the border with Israel.

Last October, Iran and Syria determined that Hizbullah had nothing more to gain from remaining in the government and so they ordered it to resign. Ever since, they have worked steadily to overthrow the government by politically paralyzing it in Parliament and, of course, by assassinating its supporters. At the same time, they have poured arms and cash on Hizbullah and ordered it to expand its territorial control north of the Litani River, while enacting an ethnic cleansing of southern Lebanon by preventing Christians who fled their villages during the war from returning home.

Commentators warn that if the Lebanese Parliament does not elect a pro-Syrian presidential candidate next week, then Lahoud is liable to call general elections. Those elections, in turn, are liable to give rise to a situation where two separate governments operate in competition. That, we are warned, will almost certainly foment a new civil war.

But given the fact that Hizbullah together with Iran and Syria already wield enormous power over the Lebanese army, it could be reasonably argued that a renewed civil war is the least bad option. The more likely option – that Iran and Syria will consolidate their domination of Lebanon – would be far more destabilizing for the region and for Lebanon itself.

The fact of the matter is that the West’s unconditional support for the anti-Syrian forces in Lebanon has always been problematic. Even if Hizbullah had not entered the government, Siniora and his colleagues never had sufficient political or military will or power to fight Iran, Hizbullah and Syria effectively. Indeed, many members of the anti-Syrian coalition are anything but pro-Western.

Aside from the Siniora government’s inherent inability to assert its control over the entire country by defeating Hizbullah and its sponsors, the government’s regional supporters have never been interested in a confrontation with Hizbullah or Iran and Syria. Specifically, the Saudi government, which acts as the Siniora government’s primary supporter in the Arab world, has consistently encouraged it to reach an accommodation with Hizbullah rather than fight it. When the Saudi view is contrasted with the consistent Iranian and Syrian goal of dominating Lebanon through Hizbullah, it is clear that the political victory of the anti-Syrian and Iranian forces in 2005 was insufficient to defeat Hizbullah or free Lebanon from the influence of Syria and Iran. It is, after all, impossible to accommodate an opponent charged with destroying you.

The situation in the PA is strikingly similar to that in Lebanon. But it is also far more problematic. As in the case of the contest between Hizbullah and the Siniora government in Lebanon, so in the PA, the US, Israel and the West in general have decided to support Fatah in its contest against the Iranian and Syrian proxy Hamas.

Militarily, the desire to "strengthen" Fatah has led to a situation where Israel has almost completely stopped its operations against Fatah terror cells. Furthermore, it has abstained from taking action against Hamas’s new army in Gaza, lest an Israeli offensive somehow weaken Fatah.

Politically, Israel and the US are bending over backwards to appease Fatah in the hope that doing so will strengthen it against Hamas. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Israel on Wednesday to advance the peace process with Fatah. En route to Israel, Rice told reporters, "We can’t simply continue to say we want a two-state solution. We’ve got to start to move toward one."

For its part, the Olmert-Barak-Livni government already made clear through official statements and leaks that it is ready to withdraw from Judea and Samaria and to partition Jerusalem and surrender the Temple Mount.

The reason that the situation in the PA is worse than the situation in Lebanon is because Fatah is not analogous to the Siniora government. For all its weaknesses, the Siniora government truly seeks Syrian and Iranian disengagement from the country. The same cannot be said of Fatah. As the fighting this week between Fatah terrorists and the IDF in Nablus indicates, far from objecting to terrorism and the war against Israel, Fatah fights side by side with Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

Consequently, the massive concessions that the Olmert-Barak-Livni government is now offering Fatah will redound directly to Hamas’s (and Iranian and Syrian) benefit. This will be the case both if Israel actually implements those concessions and if they are merely offered formally at Rice’s summit in November.

Since Hizbullah quit the Siniora government in October, the Lebanese leadership has rejected all of Hizbullah’s demands for "unity." In contrast, both before and since Hamas took over Gaza in June, Fatah has sought to join a Hamas-dominated "unity" government. And while in Lebanon, Iran and Syria actively undermine Siniora and his colleagues, in the PA, they assist both Hamas and Fatah. Both serve Iran’s and Syria’s purpose of expanding and consolidating their control over Gaza, Judea and Samaria.

In their handling of the situations in Lebanon and the PA, the US and Israeli governments are implementing a strategy predicated on their refusal to acknowledge the nature and significance of regional power struggles in these theaters both for the West and for the Syrians and Iranians. As is the case in Iraq, so in the cases of Lebanon and the PA, the possibility of forming a "moderate" government will only materialize after the Lebanese and Palestinian Iranian and Syrian proxies – Hizbullah, Hamas, Fatah and Islamic Jihad – are defeated.

Moreover, in spite of the IDF’s bravado, as long as these proxy forces continue to exist and augment their powers, and as long as the Syrian and Iranian regimes remain in power, no single military operation – no matter how successful – can rebuild Israel’s deterrent strength or ensure its security.

Recognizing the Axis of Evil

North Korea might be hiding or building nukes in Syria. (National Geographic Photo)

If media reports of last week’s IAF raid in Syria pan out, the attack against a North-Korean-supplied Syrian nuclear facility in eastern Syria should serve as a pivotal event in the free world’s understanding of the enemy it faces in the current global war. The central question now is whether this clarity will be followed by a strategic shift in the US and Israeli governments’ conceptualizations of the challenges facing them in the various theaters of war and diplomacy in which they are now engaged.

What the raid exposed is that the free world faces a cohesive alliance of enemy forces that collaborate closely in their joint and separate offensives against their common foes. Whether or not it is called the axis of evil, after the IAF raid it is undeniable that its members – North Korea, Iran and Syria – collaborate closely in their joint war.

Contrary to the prevailing wisdom, this is not a temporary alliance of convenience among three otherwise unrelated states. It is a strategic alignment of three regimes that have been acting in tandem on multiple levels for decades. Their collaborative operations have served two primary functions. First they cooperate in perpetuating their holds on power. This they do primarily through criminal enterprises. Second, they work together to wage war against their common foes. The second objective is advanced primarily through the proliferation of ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction.

Furthermore, all three regimes view diplomatic exchanges with their enemies not as a means to solve their disagreements with them, but as a means to gain advantage by forcing US, Israeli and international concessions that legitimize their regimes and enable them to continue to conduct their war.

TIES BETWEEN the countries have been developing since the 1980s. That cooperation blossomed into a full-scale alliance during the 1990s. This is notable because the 1990s marked the period when both US and Israeli foreign policies centered on repeated attempts to appease all three governments.

In 1994, the US embraced appeasement of North Korea when it signed the Agreed Framework that maintained the economic viability of the North Korean regime in exchange for Pyongyang’s pledge to end its nuclear weapons program. The US appeased Teheran by embracing the supposedly moderate government of president Muhammad Khatami, and downplayed Iran’s role in terrorist bombings of US targets like the 1996 Iranian-ordered bombing of the US Air Force barracks in Saudi Arabia.

Israel pursued appeasement through the Oslo peace process with the PLO, its refusal to contend effectively with the Iranian- and Syrian-sponsored Hizbullah forces in Lebanon, and through its conduct of intense negotiations with the Syrians toward an Israeli surrender of the strategically vital Golan Heights.

It was during the 1990s that North Korean-Iranian-Syrian criminal cooperation reached its apex. It was also during this decade that they made the greatest headway in their ballistic missile and weapons of mass destruction programs. These advances were made while all three regimes pocketed concessions made by the US and Israel, and systematically breached all their commitments to both countries and to international treaties of which they are signatories.

ONE OF the inheritances the mullahs received from the Shah of Iran after they overthrew him in 1979 was a US-supplied Intaglio currency printing press. Since at least 1989 this printing press has been used to produce so-called "super-notes."

Super-notes are highly sophisticated counterfeit US bills that are nearly undetectable. The advent of the super-notes forced the US Treasury to print new currency twice in a decade. In 1992 a Congressional Task Force concluded that the bills which proliferated in Lebanon’s Hizbullah and Syrian-controlled Beka’a Valley were of Iranian and Syrian origin. In 2005, the first super-notes were intercepted in the US. They were sourced to North Korea.

According to a report Sunday in Yediot Aharonot, Iran has financed its purchase of nuclear and other materiel from North Korea through the provision of super-notes to Pyongyang. The US believes that Pyongyang itself procured a Swiss-made Intaglio press sometime in the 1990s. Intelligence services agree that Iran, Syria and North Korea collaborate closely in their currency-counterfeiting operations.

In 2003, the State Department concluded that the North Korean regime had sustained its economic viability principally through counterfeit currency operations.

IN SEPTEMBER 2005, the US launched a financial offensive against North Korea which could potentially have led to the eventual financial collapse of the regime when it labeled the Banco Delta Asia, a Macau-based bank, an agent of North Korean money-laundering. The move followed a US investigation showing that BDA was North Korea’s primary conduit for laundering counterfeit currency. The move effectively cut Pyongyang out of international financial markets, making it far more difficult for the North Koreans to sustain the regime financially.

North Korea’s response to the move was to expand its nuclear and missile collaboration with Iran and Syria still further. Throughout the 1990s, the North Koreans provided Iran and Syria with ballistic missiles, and then missile technologies and assembly plants. After the BDA affair, in July and October 2006 North Korea conducted intermediate and long-range missile tests and then a nuclear test. Iranian scientists were reportedly present at all tests.

THE US responded to the North Korean provocations by intensifying its diplomatic efforts. Those efforts led to the signing of the February 13, 2007 bilateral deal between the US and North Korea, in which Pyongyang pledged to end its nuclear programs within 60 days in exchange for diplomatic acceptance by the US and economic assistance from the US and the international community. In exchange for the North Korean pledge, the US secretly agreed to unfreeze North Korean accounts at BDA and so paved the way for North Korean reentry to international financial markets.

While the deal was hailed as a diplomatic triumph, it suffered from several fatal flaws. The first flaw was that it failed to account for North Korea’s pattern of breaching its agreements with the US. As former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton has pointed out, the US had no reason to believe that North Korea would honor its commitments; and, indeed, when 60 days after the deal was signed, Pyongyang had yet to shut down its nuclear installation at Yongbyon, it was clear that North Korea had maintained its practice of diplomatic perfidy.

The agreement also made no allowance for North Korea’s existing nuclear arsenal or materials, and said nothing about restricting North Korea’s proliferation of nuclear materials and technologies. As last week’s IAF raid on the reportedly North Korean-supplied Syrian nuclear installation made clear, this oversight is full of geopolitical consequences.

IT WOULD seem that the main reason the US signed such an ill-advised deal with the North Koreans is that the State Department wished to neutralize North Korea in order to concentrate its efforts on Iran and Iraq. By so acting, the US failed to recognize the fundamental truth that last week’s IAF raid exposed. Specifically, North Korea is allied with Iran and to Syria, and as a result cannot be set aside or isolated. It is impossible to confront Iran or Syria or North Korea without confronting the entire alliance. And it is impossible to appease one without strengthening all of them.

This truth has been ignored by both the US and by Israel for decades. The Israeli government continues to view Syria as an independent actor and so hopes that eventually it can be sufficiently appeased to accept the Golan Heights from Israel in exchange for a cold peace.

Israel and the US fail to understand the proxy role the Palestinians play for members of this enemy axis, and so view the establishment of a Palestinian state as a means of neutralizing the Palestinian theater rather than recognizing that such a state will serve at best as a safe haven for global terrorists, and at worst as North Korea’s new nuclear client.

The US views Syria only in relation to its nefarious role in Iraq, and so misses the connection between Syrian and Iranian sponsorship of Palestinian terrorists in Fatah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah, and the war the US fights in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Israel and the US view North Korea as an isolated Asian nuisance that has little connection to the war in the Middle East. As a result, Israel for decades has been indifferent to North Korean provocations and the US has ignored the global implications of Pyongyang’s nuclear program. So too, the US fails to understand how its diplomatic weakness toward North Korea enhances Iran’s position at the bargaining table and advances its nuclear weapons program.

ON THE positive side, the muted, even supportive international response to the Israeli raid makes clear that the diplomatic standing of the members of the axis is far weaker than one would have expected. If, as some have claimed, the IAF raid was a rehearsal for an Israeli or US attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, then the international reaction to the IAF raid shows that such a mission will likely be met with minimal, if any, retrospective diplomatic opposition.

Yet it is far from clear that either Israel or the US understand the significance of Israel’s operation in Syria. A week after the attack, the US announced its intention to give Pyongyang $25 million worth of heavy fuel oil in return for Pynogyang’s good faith in their nuclear activities. Members of the IDF General Staff have recommended renewing negotiations with Syria regarding an Israeli surrender of the Golan Heights. The US is permitting Iranian President Ahmadinejad to attend the UN’s General Assembly meeting in New York next week even as Ahmadinejad has escalated his nuclear and anti-American and anti-Israel rhetoric in recent weeks.

One can only hope that these Israeli and American moves represent simply the death throes of their clearly discredited view of their enemies as distinct and independent actors. Otherwise, the lessons exposed and the advantages gained from the IAF strike will be squandered, and the free world will be weakened as new life is given to the axis of evil.