'Israel As The Battered Woman'

(Graphic courtesy of Chabad)

I just came across this prescient article below, penned by American-born therapist Dr. Miriam Adahan, not long after the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the then nascent Palestinian Authority. Around the same period, I worked as a producer and program host at a "micro-broadcast" radio station in Jerusalem, called "RadioWest."

One evening as I was working the control board during the hourly newscast, Dr. Adahan was sitting in the studio alongside the news reader, waiting to begin her call-in show. As I watched the reader tersely recite a day's litany of terrorism and other mayhem, Adahan hid her eyes in her hands, and rocked back and forth in her seat as in grieved shock and mourning. How true her words ring today:

"In years to come, historians will be shocked at how Israeli leaders happily encouraged a gang of Arab murderers to create a country within our tiny borders -- a country which never existed before -- and gave them arms knowing that those arms could be used to kill and maim us, and then continued to try to appease the murderers. Why are we fulfilling Hitler's dream? Why did we ignore Arafat's rhetoric calling for our destruction, ignore the fact that they were flooding their cities with arms, and ignore the warnings that they are preparing for all-out war?"

(...)Want to understand what happened here in Israel? Listen to the battered woman:

1. "It takes two to make a fight. So I must deserve this abuse -- after all, I'm not perfect either. I left dishes in the sink, was talking on the phone when he came home and didn't have dinner ready on time. Sometimes, I was a little confused after he beat me up and didn't function so well. These sins of mine are so enormous that whatever he does is justified. I should have done better, should have known, should have anticipated...." (Israel: "As penance for not being perfect, we must allow them to continue murdering us.")

2. "If he's so angry, it means that I'm to blame. People don't get angry about nothing. It must be that I haven't done enough to please him. If I just try harder, I'm sure I'll eventually win his love." (Israel: "We must keep making more concessions. We're the more enlightened country, so we have to keep trying harder to get them to become more democratic, more humane, more civilized.")

3. "No matter how badly he acts at times, I truly believe that he doesn't really mean to hurt me and that he really does love me underneath it all. He just has to act like this to prove his masculinity. It doesn't really mean anything, because underneath it all, there's a good man." (Israel: "No matter how many of us he kills, Arafat is our partner. The fact that he keeps wanting to talk is proof of his love, isn't it? Otherwise, why would he take the time to talk to us?")

4. "I'm proud of myself for being loyal and determined! I stand by my man through thick and thin. You don't leave during the bad times. When you're willing to forgive after getting beaten up, that's when you prove how strong your love is." (Israel: "We take pride in the fact that we are the ones who care more about peace, and keep negotiating even when we're under attack. Hey world! Look at how much we're willing to suffer and not fight back! Now will you love the Jews?")

Read the rest, and weep.

What now for the Palestinian Authority?

Click image for a candid video interview with Toameh,
on media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Highly-respected journalist Khaled Abu Toameh offers a clear-eyed, close-up assessment of methods Israel and the world community should consider in dealing with the Palestinian Authority. His analysis comes in light of the power-struggle and chaos in Gaza and the West Bank, and the violent ideological chasm between Fatah and Hamas:

• The January 2006 election that brought Hamas to power was mostly about: "Let's punish these Fatah thieves." Hamas was building schools and kindergartens and clinics, while the PLO was building a casino and villas for its leaders. I believe some 30-35 percent of the Palestinians who voted for Hamas did so as a vote of protest because they were unhappy with the way the Palestinian Authority was running the show.
• Let Mahmoud Abbas and the PLO and Fatah start rebuilding their institutions, reform themselves, get rid of the corruption, and come up with a new list of candidates. Then run in another free and democratic election and offer the Palestinians a better alternative to Hamas.
• The Palestinians do not need more guns and military training. If the U.S. has $86 million and wants to help the Palestinians, then help them build civil institutions, help them build freedom, educate them about good things. What's the point in taking 200 Presidential Guards to Jericho to train them? Who are they going to fight at the end of the day? In Gaza they were defeated.
• What should Israel do at this stage? Nothing. There is no one to deal with on a serious basis on the Palestinian side. Abbas doesn't even have control over his own Fatah militias. Israel should just sit and wait. Don't repeat the mistake of unilateralism, when Israel left Gaza to Hamas and Islamic Jihad and al-Qaeda-affiliated groups.
• It is ironic that the West is supporting the guys who are suppressing the moderates and people who want democracy. The West is actually undermining its own goals. Worth reading.
  

Here's a candid video interview with Toameh, on media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

(Full disclosure: I worked with Toameh at The Jerusalem Post, both as an interviewer/producer for their internet radio operation, and as a night-desk editor on the print edition)

Iran & the Winds of War

Joshua Muravchik, in a powerfully written Wall Street Journal op-ed, believes that "Iran is making a mistake that may lead the Middle East into a broader conflict."

"Consider the pell-mell events of recent weeks. Iran imprisons four Americans on absurd charges only weeks after seizing 15 British sailors on the high seas. Iran's Revolutionary Guard is caught delivering weapons to the Taliban and explosives to Iraqi terrorists. A car bomb in Lebanon is used to assassinate parliament member Walid Eido, killing nine others and wounding 11 more.

"At the same time, Fatah al-Islam, a shady group linked to Syria, launches an attack on the Lebanese army from within a Palestinian refugee area, beheading several soldiers. Tehran trumpets further progress on nuclear enrichment as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad repeats his call for annihilating Israel, crowing that "the countdown to the destruction of this regime has begun." Hamas seizes control militarily in Gaza. Katyusha rockets are launched from Lebanon into northern Israel for the first time since the end of last summer's Israel-Hezbollah war."

"The apparent meaning of all of this pointless provocation and bullying is that the axis of radicals--Iran, Syria, Hamas and Hezbollah--is feeling its oats. In part its aim is to intimidate the rest of us, in part it is merely enjoying flexing its muscles. It believes that its side has defeated America in Iraq, and Israel in Gaza and Lebanon. Mr. Ahmadinejad recently claimed that the West has already begun to "surrender," and he gloated that " final victory . . . is near." It is this bravado that bodes war."

Important reading.

Fatah prisoner release: signing a death warrant? (editorial cartoon)

From Haaretz:

"[Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert announced the plan on Monday at the close of a four-way summit with Abbas, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah II, saying that Israel would only release prisoners not held for deaths of its citizens.

"As a gesture of goodwill toward the Palestinians, I will bring before the Israeli cabinet at its next meeting a proposal to free 250 Fatah prisoners who do not have blood on their hands, after they sign a commitment not to return to violence," Olmert said."

---

"This is a wrong, harmful message that will not strengthen the Palestinian Authority. It will only weaken it," Likud Chairman Binyamin Netanyahu said Tuesday in response to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's decision to release Palestinian prisoners.

"[Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, also known as] Abu Mazen will be hurt by such a decision," continued Netanyahu. "Giving them guns and releasing their prisoners is a big mistake."

More on Bibi & Co. here.