WarSclerotic

Hamas rally in Gaza takes aim at Egypt, Israel and Abbas, Al Arabiya Net, March 23, 2014

(Assume, contrary to apparent fact and reason, that pressures from the Obama Administration will force Israel to yield to all Palestinian demands and that the “peace process” will then be hailed as a success. Will similar “peace process” results between Israel and Hamas then be demanded? — DM)

Hamas has repeatedly fought Israel, which withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005. The Islamists won a Palestinian legislative election the next year and, after a uneasy power-share with the U.S.-backed rival faction Fatah, seized control of Gaza in 2007.

Supporters listen as Ismail Haniyeh, prime minister of the Hamas Gaza government, speaks during a Hamas rally marking the anniversary of the death of its leaders killed by Israel, in Gaza City March 23, 2014. (Reuters)

Tens of thousands of Palestinians rallied in Gaza on Sunday to show support for their Islamist Hamas government, which has long been at loggerheads with Israel but is now shunned by Egypt as well.

The military-backed government that toppled the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas’s ideological kin, in Cairo last year has blacklisted the Brotherhood and Hamas as terrorist groups and clamped down on people, goods and arms crossing the Sinai-Gaza border.

Hamas tried in vain to mollify Egypt by insisting that its hostility was directed exclusively at Israel, but is now turning up the rhetoric.

“The punishment of the people of Gaza must end,” Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas government, told the rally in a speech interspersed with chants of “Jihad is not Terrorism” over the loudspeakers.

“Why punish Gaza? Was it because it achieved victory against the Occupier? Why punish Gaza? Was it because it took up the rifle against Israel?” Haniyeh said.

“We are living through a difficult stage and harsh challenges, but we are not terrified and we are not defeated. We have become familiar with difficulties and this stage is not the most difficult.”

Hamas has repeatedly fought Israel, which withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005. The Islamists won a Palestinian legislative election the next year and, after a uneasy power-share with the U.S.-backed rival faction Fatah, seized control of Gaza in 2007.

Opposition to peace talks

Sunday’s rally was intended to commemorate three top Hamas leaders, including the group’s founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was assassinated by Israel a decade ago.

The tone of defiance appeared aimed in part at undermining Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah, who holds sway in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and is holding peace talks with Israel under Washington’s auspices.

“We call upon the Palestinian negotiator to quit this pointless track and not to extend negotiation,” said Haniyeh.

Though Hamas has largely held fire since its last war with Israel, in November 2012, the Israelis have been uncovering tunnels dug from Gaza to allow cross-border attacks in the next confrontation. Haniyeh said the tunnels showed his faction’s dedication to fighting Israel until its eventual destruction.

“From below ground and above ground, you, the Occupiers, will be dismissed. You have no place in the land of Palestine.”

Haniyeh described Egypt as “brother, friend and neighbor”, but another Hamas official based in the West Bank, Hassan Youssef, had harsher words.

“We say to the authors of the coup in Egypt, the criminals who support the Occupation (Israel), that the blockade will not work,” he said in a televised speech.

Cairo’s cold shoulder has exacerbated Hamas’s isolation since it quit its headquarters in Damascus in protest at Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s crackdown on opposition groups, a move that led Iran to cut off funding.

Palestinian officials said Hamas was now in fence-mending talks with Tehran, though their outcome remained unclear.

Ya’alon’s words are not void of reality, Israel Hayom, Rabbi Eliezer Schonwald, March 23, 2015

(Accountability for what it does is alien to the Obama Administration. Hence, it needs to claim that fault lies only elsewhere, preferably with an Israeli rather than a Palestinian. — DM)

If people in the State Department think there’s a problem, the problem is not what Ya’alon said but with whoever formed the negligent, out-of-touch foreign policy. . . . Under the pretense of friendship and cooperation, Israel is expected to agree to America’s demands.

There are those in Israel who stress out over the hysterical, enraged comments made by the U.S. State Department in response to Defense Minister Moshe (Bogie) Ya’alon’s remarks. But precisely the outrage tells me that something else is going on and that this isn’t about being offended but a strategic, calculated response.

Whoever looks at Ya’alon’s remarks on U.S. policy in the Middle East and particularly in Iran, does not understand what exactly upset the State Department and what so angered the Americans they demanded an explicit apology from the defense minister. After all, Ya’alon’s comments perfectly reflect the State Department’s policies, one by one.

If people in the State Department think there’s a problem, the problem is not what Ya’alon said but with whoever formed the negligent, out-of-touch foreign policy. It seems the U.S. State Department truly believes their competent, calculated foreign policy succeeded in preventing the chaos in Egypt in recent years, succeeded in thwarting the ongoing slaughter in Syria, stopped Iran’s nuclear arms race, and deterred Russia from annexing the Crimean peninsula. According to the Americans, only Ya’alon is unaware of their great success and sees it as a failure.

Even if the State Department (whether under the current or previous administrations) wanted to bring peace and prosperity in the spirit of the American democratic vision — they prove, time and again, that they cannot form policies or lead global reforms. Yet this does [not?] diminish the department’s confidence in its abilities. It is confidant it has the key to solving the Israeli-Arab conflict. Here and now. Even if that means one side is forced to conform to their plans (its [sic] no secret that usually that means Israel). After all, these are the rules of the game. Under the pretense of friendship and cooperation, Israel is expected to agree to America’s demands.

Ya’alon is one of the most significant and successful professionals that has risen in the field of security. His professional analysis on security issues field have been proven to be free of an agenda, and therefore not slanted. That is why he has accurately predicted events and warned against them.

However, the State Department seems to view Ya’alon as an obstacle to forming the framework peace agreement. They fear he might reveal the flaws and dangers, hidden within the document. Perhaps the hysterical response to his comments was meant to deter him from saying what he really thinks, a kind of way to put him in line.

If that’s the case, we must stand behind him and encourage him to express his professional opinion, without fear. For us, this is a life or death situation, so it is crucial we allow him to reveal the true meaning of every plan regarding our future, secretly brewing behind closed doors

The State Department should know that Israeli society stands behind its defense minister and from that perspective, we are all Bogie Ya’alon.

The Palestinians want to buy time, Israel Hayom, Dr. Ronen Yitzhak, March 23, 2014

(They apparently want to buy time at Israel’s expense for their own purposes, a strategy reflecting the Obama Administration’s own strategy. “Peace in our time” would help President Obama politically; since the Palestinians won’t make concessions, Israel has to be forced to do so. — DM)

[I]t seems as though the Palestinian purpose for extending negotiations is none other than releasing prisoners, and that’s it.

At the beginning of March 2014, during one of his interviews with the Israeli press, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat admitted to having suggested to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to abandon the negotiations.

“I won’t do it,” Abbas replied, “until Israel completes the fourth round of prisoner releases.” The fourth round is due to be executed at the end of this month. Israel is supposed to release the 26 prisoners left on the list of 104.

The negotiations were designed to continue for nine months. They were meant to finish with a ratified agreement declaring the end of the bilateral conflict. But even though envoys to the talks have maintained total secrecy, it’s pretty clear that no significant breakthrough has been achieved, despite U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s ample and vigorous efforts. The core issues have not been resolved and it seems as though there is no willingness to show flexibility. At the same time, the U.S. has failed to show creativity or the powers of persuasion.

Given the circumstances, the negotiations are probably going to be extended beyond their allotted time. Abbas’ trip to Washington was meant to get his consent for that. It doesn’t seem as though Abbas would protest prolonging the talks with Israel — even if progress is not predetermined — because he already declared that he would agree to it in exchange for releasing additional prisoners serving sentences in Israeli prisons.

And indeed, it seems as though the Palestinian purpose for extending negotiations is none other than releasing prisoners, and that’s it. Their insistence against progress and compromise on core issues, such as the issue of recognizing Israel as the state of the Jewish people, reinforces the belief that their interests have nothing to do with resolving the conflict, rather drawing it out while getting Israeli concessions.

Because of internal Arab political considerations, the Palestinians cannot declare an end to the conflict, such as Israel has been demanding, or relinquish the right of return, an Israeli demand to which the Arabs have never acceded. There are probably other considerations, however, hiding in the Palestinian refusal either to make progress or achieve the coveted peace. The reality in the territories is comfortable for the Palestinians and serves them well. Israel has been working day and night to uphold Abbas’ authority at the helm of the Palestinian Authority, resolutely battling Hamas’ attempts to overtake the Authority in the West Bank as it did in the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007.

Making diplomatic progress and providing the Palestinian Authority — under Abbas and Fatah — with full control of security in the West Bank means the Palestinians will have to take responsibility for their own fate. Given that various people’s uprisings have determined the fates of Arab leaders much stronger and more impressive than Abbas, such as Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak or Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi, it’s hard to believe that Abbas could continue to survive alone without any of Israel’s help — especially given the surrounding, complicating challenges of a growing Islamist opposition in the territories.

US said worried at imminent collapse of Israel-Palestinian talks, Ynet News, March 23, 2014

(How many U.S. citizens did Mr. Pollard murder or otherwise terrorize? Zero. Nevertheless, if the radio report is accurate perhaps Israel should adopt a Palestinian tactic and agree to (maybe) think about the possibility of releasing one non-terrorist prisoner jailed for as long as Mr. Pollard has been (if one meeting both criteria can be found) after the U.S. releases Mr. Pollard and he is safely wherever he wants to be. — DM)

Sources tell Israel Radio that Americans may even consider possibility of freeing Jonathan Pollard.

The US government is very worried that the talks between Israel and the Palestinians are on the verge of collapse and are seeking a solution that would allow for a way forward, Israel Radio reported Sunday.

According to the report, Western political sources said that the US administration is searching for a proposal favorable enough for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which would persuade his government to free Israeli Arab prisoners.

US sources would not rule out the possibility of agreeing to Netanyahu’s request for the release of convicted spy Jonathan Pollard in order to keep the talks going, the radio said. The former US civilian defense worker is currently serving a life term in the US for spying for Israel.

The report said that Pollard’s release would come in return for the Israeli adoption of Secretary of State John Kerry’s framework agreement and the release of Israeli Arab prisoners. But, the radio said, the sources stressed that US President Barack Obama would not necessarily agree to Pollard’s release.

The talks between Israel and the Palestinians, which began in July, are due to end on April 29. Israeli officials have warned that a Palestinian failure to extend the talks would exempt Jerusalem from releasing a fourth and final batch of Palestinian prisoners, while President Mahmoud Abbas said Saturday that an Israeli failure to free the final group of 26 would allow the Palestinians to act as they saw fit in the international arena.

“We are awaiting the release of the fourth batch of prisoners, as agreed upon with the Israelis through the United States,” he told members of the central committee of his Fatah movement.

“We are saying, if they are not released, this is a violation of the agreement and allows us to act however we see fit within the norms of international agreements.”

J Street Backs Refusals to Recognize Jewish State – Middle East – News – Israel National News.

( “J Street” is the way by which lefty Jews can maintain their positions in their lefty communities while claiming to still be “pro” Israel.  Not sure they will survive being against it as  Jewish state. – JW )

John Kerry and Mahmoud Abbas meet in Paris, February 2014

Reuters

US lobbying group J Street has once again thrown its weight behind the Obama administration and the Palestinian Authority, urging Israel to drop demands for the PA to recognize the country as a Jewish state.

Israeli leaders have been adamant on the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, saying that far from being a mere symbolic gesture, the recognition would signal an end to future claims against Israel by the PA and a genuine end to the conflict. Some PA officials have openly declared that from their perspective, any concessions gained by the current talks would be merely a “first stage” in the destruction of the Jewish state.

In a statement on the group’s blog, J Street CEO Jeremy Ben-Ami reiterated his group’s commitment to diplomatic efforts by US Secretary of State John Kerry, including a partition of Israel as part of a “Two-State Solution” to the Arab-Israeli conflict, but noted that talks between Israel and the PA were stalling.

“To keep moving forward, both men now need to give a little, while keeping their eyes on the prize and recognizing that the benefits of resolving the conflict outweigh any short-term political considerations and that the penalties for failure for both peoples are immense,” Ben-Ami wrote of Israeli Prime Minster Binyamin Netanyahu and PA Chairman Abbas.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, however, Ben-Ami did not explain what concessions would be expected from the PA, instead branding Israeli demands for recognition as a Jewish state as “unrealistic” and calling on Israel to drop those demands – echoing recent statements by the US State Department and Secretary of State Kerry himself.

J Street – which claims to be “pro-Israel and pro-peace” – has come under fire by pro-Israel groups for its links to radical anti-Israel organizations, including some which call for a boycott of the Jewish state. J Street’s critics say it is simply hiding an anti-Israel agenda behind a friendly face.

But peace activist Yehuda Hakohen says the problem runs far deeper, and that J Street undermines both Israeli and Palestinian Arab interests on the ground.

“J Street is essentially the Jewish mouthpiece for American empire in the Middle East,” said Hakohen, who directs the grassroots Alternative Action organization. “They promote Washington’s foreign policy agenda for the region and work hard to present that agenda as somehow being in the interests of Jews and Palestinians on the ground.

“But the reality is that the policies they advocate only further oppress both peoples and further divide us, making the attainment of genuine peace increasingly more difficult.”

“The two state paradigm is doomed to failure because it fails to address the aspirations and grievances of either people. It simply creates more injustice and oppression for both of us while advancing the agendas of foreign powers in our region,” he continued.

“Forcibly expelling Jews from their homes in the cradle of Jewish civilization and forcing Palestinians to live under an American-backed police state is not the way forward towards peace or justice and I honestly have trouble believing the leadership of J Street to be so naive as to genuinely think otherwise.”

Iran is building a mock-up of the USS Nimitz-class nuclear carrier near Bandar Abbas.

DEBKAfile Special Report March 23, 2014, 1:48 PM (IST)

Iranian mock-up of aircraft carrier.

At the same time as President Barack Obama was sending New Year greetings to the Iranian people Thursday, March 20, US satellites snapped shots of a mockup of Iran’s first aircraft carrier under construction at the Revolutionary Guards naval base of Bandar Abbas. After decoding the images, US intelligence experts were astonished to find it was a replica of a US Nimitz-class super-carrier. debkafile reports that the construction work was first picked up by drones from the US Navy’s 5th Fleet, which operates in the Persian Gulf, Red Sea and Arabian Sea.

In his message, the US president challenged Iran’s leaders to “take meaningful and verifiable steps to assure the world that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only” for the sake of “a new beginning,” including “a better relationship with the United States and the American people, rooted in mutual interest and mutual respect.”

Of the US Navy’s 10 operational Nimitz-class carriers, two – the USS George H.W. Bush and the USS Harry S. Truman — are currently deployed in the Middle East. Each is 330 meters long and carries on is decks up to 3,000 naval and air crew and 85-90 fighter craft and helicopters.

The Pentagon’s first response to the discovery was uncertain: “We are aware that Iran has constructed a floating barge that resembles a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier near Bandar Abbas,” spokesman Lt. Col. Tom Crosson said Saturday. “Commercially available imagery shows its construction. We are not sure what tactical value Iran hopes to gain by building a mock-up of a US aircraft carrier.”

Since the disclosure, Iran experts have been speculating on that question. Some have suggested that it was a crude model which the Iranians were planning to destroy as a propaganda stunt during a naval training exercise.

However some military experts are taking it more seriously and warn that the mock-up carrier signaled a new level of sophistication in the use of unconventional doctrine and capabilities for confronting superior US naval power.”
Obama’s message of friendship for Nowraz was not exactly reciprocated: At a speech in Mashhad the next day, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the US the “enemy” and a “dictatorial and arrogant” power. Khamenei said the Americans “used rhetoric and language that was less courteous and more aggressive… and insulting to the people.”

debkafile’s military experts offer six points of interest about Iran’s attempt to replicate a US carrier:

1. The discovery of this project was not random. Its construction has been going on for more than two years, but the Obama administration preferred to keep it dark so as not to spoil the climate of détente it was striving to build with Tehran. And indeed, the first response to the disclosure from the senior Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee Rep. Eliot Engel was that the mock-up “demonstrates Iran’s continued lack of good faith.”

2.  The Iranians deliberately exposed the project by placing air force fighter jets on the deck of the fake Nimitz to make sure they were detected by US surveillance.
3.  Its purpose is neither for propaganda nor for show in a training exercise. Iran’s method for its most ambitious military projects is to start from scratch and advance step by step until their goal is reached, our Iran experts sources report. Their UAV program began with primitive models, which were perfected stage by stage over a period of years, with the help of Chinese, Russian and North Korean experts. The drone project has by now advanced enough for Iran to hand the Lebanese Hizballah a fleet of drones with high-grade technological and surveillance capabilities.
4.  The mockup vessel program is adjusted to the long-term prospects of nuclear diplomacy – in Iran’s estimation. Tehran is certain that negotiations with the six powers are going nowhere, fated to be dragged out to bar any diplomatic or military solution of their nuclear controversy forthcoming before the end of Barack Obama’s presidency. By 2017, when his successor takes office, Iran’s policy-makers calculate that their mockup will have been developed into a full-scale operational aircraft carrier ready to go from Bandar Abbas.

5. On various occasions in the past year, officials associated with Iran’s nuclear program and senior commanders of its Navy and Revolutionary Guards have said that high-grade nuclear fuel will be needed for their nuclear-powered naval vessels and submarines – which they don’t possess.  Iranian negotiators will for the first time be able to present a complete aircraft carrier to support their claim when they are confronted by skeptical world powers.
6. Iran obviously lacks the capacity to build an aircraft carrier to US standards. Nor does it possess advanced fighter jets comparable to US or Israeli air force aircraft; or the technology for constructing and operating the sophisticated military electronic devices installed in American warplanes and carriers.

At the same time, Tehran has surprised the world by its strides in drone and cyber technologies, while at the same time demonstrating the military and tactical mastery for turning the tide of the Syrian civil war from Bashar Assad’s almost certain defeat to success. Iran’s aggressive ambition to outperform its enemies should therefore not be underestimated.

Ben Shapiro at UCLA: “BDS is just another form of anti-semitism” – YouTube.

(Ben Shapiro delivers the knockout punch to the BDS crowd. – Artaxes)

The Vienna lesson | JPost | Israel News.

By JPOST EDITORIAL

03/22/2014 22:44

Ultimately, Israel must look after its own interests, chief among which is preventing uranium enrichment by its arch-enemy.

Just about the only semi-newsworthy report to have emerged out of the latest round of negotiations in Vienna on Tehran’s nuclear project is that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Zarif canceled a dinner with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

The cancellation was apparently Ashton’s punishment for, according to the Iranians, breached protocol by hobnobbing with opposition representatives on her recent trip to Tehran.

Viewed against the supposed big picture this is a negligible item. Yet, as such, it is highly significant. It almost goes to show that there is really no big picture.

Supposed talks with Iran continue sporadically and constitute the pretext for relaxing sanctions on the rogue regime’s nuclear ambitions. But in truth, nothing is actually happening.

To make things worse, the strategy of employing stringent sanctions to force Iran to give up the program that would enable it to develop nuclear weaponry is a thing of the past. As European firms rush to close deals with the Islamic Republic, the residue of the pressure on it becomes a derisive reminder of unkept promises and hollow declarations.

Although we certainly hope the talks achieve what the US and the EU have proclaimed as their goal of stemming the nuclear program, Iranian representatives, newly confident and insolent, show no inhibitions in thumbing their noses at their pro forma interlocutors.

They have ample reason to be cocky. They know the show of negotiating at Vienna will draw out the process and in the interim Tehran will regain legitimacy.

In all likelihood, its nuclear threat will be increasingly pooh-poohed while its centrifuges keep on turning and enriching uranium.

Easing fears about Iranian intentions while failing to abrogate the atomic-bomb scheme is, however, only the preliminary sham.

Iran’s standing has been radically enhanced via the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Moscow has throughout been Tehran’s main backer in the international arena.

Now that Russia is at loggerheads with America and Europe over Crimea, there is even less incentive for Russia to cooperate with the Western effort to curb its leading protégé in the Middle East, to put it mildly.

Since the bark of the Obama administration and its European sidekicks appears to be considerably worse than their bite, the Russians are hardly deterred by the ludicrous punitive measures adopted against them.

Moscow’s fundamental geopolitical interests far outweigh denial of entry visas to its VIPs. The hectoring from Western capitals is as an irritating mosquito sting.

It does no real harm but the agitation it provokes is nothing to scoff at.

A vexed Kremlin means even less accommodating Russian negotiators at Vienna, and they were hardly obliging partners to begin with.

There is little incentive for them to keep up previous pretenses. The Americans’ shortsighted 2009 unilateral retreat from establishing a missile shield over Poland and the Czech Republic had already cast US President Barack Obama in President Vladimir Putin’s eyes as a paper tiger, and Putin has not spared Obama recurrent humiliations.

The upshot is that the apparent diplomatic offensive against Iran’s nukes is fast evaporating. Even top American experts concede there is no chance for real success.

Cementing Iran’s status as a nuclear-threshold state has evolved into the best-case scenario. How nightmarish things have become.

The ostensible pressure on the ayatollahs was to start with spurred by Israeli threats to deal with Iran by itself and by military means. As Israel’s warnings lost volume, so they lost effectiveness.

The international community’s prime motivation to lean on Iran was gone. Reviving it is, perhaps, the logic behind Defense Minister’s Moshe Ya’alon’s assertion last week that Israel cannot rely on Washington to thwart Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.

Ultimately, Israel must look after its own interests, chief among which is preventing uranium enrichment by its arch-enemy. We can only hope that our primary ally, the United States, together with the EU, will ultimately lead the international community in stopping Iran.