Israel and the Forever War, by Mike Gold – Brainiac On Banjo #224
May 30, 2011 Mike Gold 10 Comments
If you didn’t see it live, you might have missed the point. This is not your fault. Evidently, Reggie Mantle has been running the media. Our president said a future Palestinian state must be based in territories captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war, with “mutually agreed land swaps” reached through negotiation. That’s what the man said.
Somehow, the media quickly forgot the part about mutually agreed land swaps. I wonder why?
Obama also said the 62-year war “has meant (Israelis) living with the fear that their children could get blown up on a bus or by rockets fired at their homes, as well as the pain of knowing that other children in the region are taught to hate them. For Palestinians, it has meant suffering the humiliation of occupation, and never living in a nation of their own.” Gee whiz, that sounds bad. Maybe we should do something about it.
Obama’s comments mirror policies proposed by people like former Israeli President Shimon Peres, former Israeli foreign minister and Kadima party leader Tzipi Livni, former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft, and virtually every U.S. president since 1967.
Oh, yes. It’s also the position of Binyamin Netanyahu, current president of Israel. When addressing Congress five days after Obama’s comments, Netanyahu said a peace agreement would require Israel to give up some of its settlements in the occupied territories. “The Palestinians share this small land with us. We seek a peace in which they will be neither Israel’s subjects nor its citizens” and that he would make “painful sacrifices” that would involve a partial pullout from the West Bank while maintaining certain settlements around Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
It also reflects the attitude of 57% percent of Israeli citizens.
And then that professional fool, ex-New York mayor Ed Koch, said “if President Obama does not change his position, I cannot vote for his reelection… I can stay home.” If only he would.
“In my opinion,” Koch said, “Palestinians and their Arab allies have no intention of ever accepting a Jewish state in their midst. Many in the Muslim world believe that every square inch of Israel belongs to Islam and will someday be theirs; they have no intention of accepting the existence of a Jewish state.”
Hmmm. The same could be said about a great many Jews, Ed. So, let’s forget about peace. Instead of trying to bring an end to the blowing up of schoolchildren, let’s work hard to maintain perpetual war.
I strongly believe in the concept of religious freedom and, therefore, I am mightily opposed to any nation ruled by religious force. Therefore, I am opposed to the nation of Israel as a Jewish state, as I am equally opposed to a Palestinian nation as a Muslim state and to the United States of America as a Christian state.
But let’s not hide the truth. Let’s quote Obama in context. Editing out those four words is an act of deliberate lying that leads to the perpetuation of death and destruction.
Artwork from Foreign Policy magazine.
Deeply psychotic Mike Gold performs the weekly two-hour Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind ass-kicking bizarro music and blather radio show on The Point, www.getthepointradio.com, every Sunday at 7:00 PM Eastern, replayed three times during the week (check the website above for times). Likewise, his daily Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mind political and cultural rants stupefies the masses at the same venue.
Martha Thomases
May 30, 2011 - 2:59 pm
But, Mike, if there’s no disagreement among Obama, Netanyahu, Scowcroft, et al, then there’s no fight for the media to cover. And if there’s no fight, there’s no news.
Reg
May 30, 2011 - 7:45 pm
Thanks for the breath of clarity, Mike.
Rick Oliver
May 31, 2011 - 2:26 pm
And maybe 62 years from now the two sides will mutually agree on what those land swaps should be…but somehow I doubt it.
Mike Gold
May 31, 2011 - 2:48 pm
American politicians want to score a resolution because it will give whichever party that does it a great political victory. Hallow as dead tree in the desert, but it’ll score points. But without it the Religious Right will get antsy. They don’t think they’ll have access to their religious hoo-hah under Palestinian control (probably something to do with those Crusades; the Arabs seem to be unwilling to accept the concept of “Statute of Limitations”). And there’s also that apocalypse thing, about Israel being around for the end of it all.
And then there’s the map. Look at Israel. Look at where the oil is. Look at where the international terrorism comes from. Look at where you’d build bases and naval seaports.
And then there’s Israel as America’s nuclear surrogate. If their back is pushed to the sea, they will indeed deploy their nukes. If America wants one of the Arab states trashed, all we’ve got to do is turn up the heat.
And then there’s the New Egypt. Not pro-Israel at all. Not even “it’s okay for there to BE an Israel.” Again, look at the map and look at Egypt as a more self-absorbed Syria.
Happy days are here again.
Whitney
June 1, 2011 - 11:31 am
Golden Boy –
From what I understand, the escalation of aggression that launched the 6-Day War started with false information that the Soviet Union gave to Egypt regarding Israel developing an aggressive expansive posture. Because of this, Nasser saw an opportunity and made some moves that Israel had previously warned would incite armed conflict. It had to do with shipping rights through the Suez Canal, which Nasser denied Israel while simultaneously arming up a coalition in the Sinai Peninsula. Did I get this right…?
Given the same scenario, it’s hard to fault Israel because they won. But the Palestinians need a place to live. Nothing makes an individual or a tribe more bitter than not having a home. And while everyone always looks to Israel to give up territory that was won fair-and-square to accomplish this end, it seems like (WITHIN REASON) it is the best solution. I have noticed that ZERO Arab countries are willing to welcome the Palestinians across their borders. If I remember right, there is even an idiomatic expression for the Palestinians that is common is Arab countries that roughly translates “stay dogs”.
I have a soft spot for Israel. Always have / always will. If they are willing to relinguish some territory in order to provide a home for Palestinians, I think it is a graceful act of statesmanship that I wish would have been emulated by the Arab brethren sooner.
Mike Gold
June 1, 2011 - 12:53 pm
Whitney, my love, you’ve got it absolutely right: the whole damn thing is totally fucked, and (as Rick thunderously implied) it’s really hard to imagine how it could get any better. It would help if both Israel and Palestine offered true religious freedom, but if you think that’s gonna happen I’ve got a some pieces of the cross to sell you. You’re right: nobody wants the Palestinians, nobody’s wanted them for 62 years and Israel is a problem because the other Arab nations would like to drop the guilt. When the whole thing was worked out after WW2, there WAS a Palestinian land. It was called Jordan. Or Trans-Jordan. Well, that sure didn’t work out.
Yes, it’s hard to fault Israel because they were attacked and they won. So there. That makes it legal. I mean, have we given Washington State back to the British? Michigan back to the French? The Florida Cubans back to Cuba? I don’t think so. But there’s that pesky Palestinian problem. It’s real easy for the other Arab nations to think it’s not their problem.
But let’s keep in mind that the Israeli “solution” was reached by Great Britain and France and backed by the United States, which has had a Zionist lobby since before WW1. Quite simply, none of those nations wanted all of those European Jews to migrate to their nations. Shuffle them off to Israel. That’ll make the Zionists sort of happy, and spare a lot of neighborhoods from spooky people who dress like they’re bomb-throwing anarchists.
Harry Truman, that cocksucking Ku Klux Klan bastard, thought that the Jews wouldn’t last a year in “Israel.” So he backed the play to pacify the Zionists as his own private little “final solution.”
So we’ve got all these highly anti-American Palestinians wandering around bitching about land that they never really had in the first place. The Jews who lived there for the previous thousand years were highly repressed and abused. Is turnabout fairplay? No, but it’s hard to make that argument to two Semitic Diasporic peoples who are fired by the fuels of religious hatred.
Your bit about the Soviets and the Egyptians stokes an old memory. I don’t know if its true, although it certainly could be. The Suez was a problem several years before, but then again nothing ever goes away in the middle east.
Just wait until the new regime takes over in Egypt. That’s gonna be a whole lot of fun.
Rick Oliver
June 1, 2011 - 1:25 pm
The British made conflicting promises to the Jews and the Palestinians, then took their gin and tonic and went home.
Israel is not likely to retreat to pre-1967 borders because they believe (with some reason) that would make them far more vulnerable to invasion.
Mike Gold
June 1, 2011 - 1:41 pm
I don’t think anybody’s REALLY asking them to, Rick. I mean, Obama said first Hamas has to recognize Israel’s right to exist, a deal killer if there ever was one. And Hamas doesn’t have the sense of humor to just say “Oh, yeah, well sure, we’re always cool with that.” Then Obama said something about negotiated land swaps. Awesome. So, what would Israel take for Jerusalem? What would the Palestinians want for Israel to keep Jerusalem? And how comfortable will Israel be with those reduced borders? For that matter, how comfortable will Palestine be with all those Israeli nukes? And what are the Christians going to say when their holy stuff gets divvied up between the Muslims and the Jews?
You know, if so many people weren’t getting blowed up real good, this one would actually be funny. As a Chicagoan, I would think there was a deal made to keep this one perpetually fucked up for sundry peoples’ financial benefit.
That’s the longer version of what you said five responses back.
Whitney
June 1, 2011 - 2:38 pm
Golden Boy –
Or…all you whitish-boys can give back all of America back to me and my tribe(s)…
Not going to happen. So, it is a powerful solution for the victims to be the peacemakers to the conquerors. Sometimes the first one to hold out the olive branch is the winner.
Mike Gold
June 1, 2011 - 3:31 pm
Whitney, that sounds oddly logical. Conquerors don’t have to sue for peace.