Condi Rides Again~~Bush and company

[James and Terry Hamilton]

Condi Rides Again

By P.David Hornik
FrontPageMagazine. com | 5/7/2008

Here in Israel this week for her 16th visit in three years, Secretary of State Rice again attended to urgent business for the United States such as: has Israel been taking down checkpoints and roadblocks in the West Bank that have been a crucial element in its success in stopping suicide bombings for the last couple of years? Do Palestinians have comfort and freedom of movement?

With Defense Minister Ehud Barak, backed by the entire Israeli defense establishment, insisting on the indispensability of the checkpoints, Americans will be relieved to know that the secretary of state met with him Sunday night to try to get him to take down some more of them.

She also met with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Palestinian chief negotiator Ahmed Qurei to talk about a “shelf agreement”—in which, even if a Palestinian state doesn’t get set up this year, Israel commits itself in advance to turn over vital strategic assets to Arab sovereignty.


This time, though, even for Israelis concerned about Israel’s future survivability, Rice’s visit has less of an air of menace and more of an air of unreality, for three glaring reasons.


1. Olmert’s days may be numbered. Last Thursday the Israeli media dramatically trumpeted that the next day, Friday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would be interrogated by the police under caution at his home on charges that, so far, the Israeli media has more or less kept under wraps (though not the U.S. media). Although in a drawn-out, cynicism-inducing process Olmert has already been under investigation on four separate charges of corruption, reportedly this time the charges are especially serious and urgent and, if borne out, would quickly lead to an indictment.


Reportedly, then, Olmert and Livni’s “head is not into [the peace process] now. They have no patience for this now.” Although Livni will temporarily replace Olmert as prime minister if he’s indicted, the Knesset would be thrown into the turmoil of competing attempts to form a new coalition and the talks with the Palestinians would stop.


2. The “moderate Palestinians” could not be less interested in peace with Israel. Hamas marked Sunday, the first day of Rice’s visit, by firing nine rockets at Israel from Gaza—one hit a minimarket and sent five people into shock, another crashed into a home and caused another shock victim, and another hit a cemetery and damaged eight gravestones—and kept up the fire on Monday, the second and last day of her visit. Rice’s apparent dogged belief, though, that the West Bank Fatah establishment is a different species from Hamas, seeking to live in peace beside Israel, seemed to depend more than ever on ignoring facts.


It’s now been reported that on May 14, the secular 60th anniversary of Israel’s independence, 100,000 Palestinians living in Lebanon are planning to march on the Israeli border—and it’s being organized by PA ambassador to Lebanon Zaki Abbas and top Fatah representative in Lebanon Sultan Abu Aynaina.


Those two “have been coordinating their efforts with PA Deputy Minister for Prisoners Affairs, Ziad Abu Ein, who has drawn up a plan calling on Palestinian refugees to ‘invade’ Israel by land, air and sea in protest against Israel’s anniversary celebrations.

”
The plan tells Israelis to “welcome the Palestinians who will be returning to live together with them in the land of peace” and “calls on the refugees to return to Israel with suitcases and tents so that they can settle down in their former villages.” The PA has also announced that it will boycott any world leader who comes to Israel to take part in the festivities.


Would this get Rice and the U.S. administration to start listening to those who have been noting all along that the PA and Palestinian society—not just Hamas—reject Israel in principle and mean it when they talk about the “right of return”? Don’t bet on it.


3. There are much more serious issues at stake than getting Israel to remove checkpoints. Israeli transportation minister (and former defense minister and chief of staff) Shaul Mofaz warned last week at Yale University that Iran is likely to have nuclear-weapons capability before the end of this year and possibly even “within months.” This is even sooner than a recent Israeli Military Intelligence estimate that put the date at 2010.


The Sunday Times reports that M16, for its part, is taking quite seriously an Israeli “breakthrough in intelligence-gathering within Iran,” and that M16 chief Sir John Scarlett is likely to visit Israel later this month to be briefed by Mossad chief Meir Dagan. According to one of the paper’s sources, “the new information [is] on a par with intelligence that led Israel to discover and then destroy a partly constructed nuclear reactor in Syria last September.

”
Israeli intelligence, in other words, has established a good claim to be heeded and is saying the gravest security crisis in world history—Iranian nuclearization—may become imminent in a few months. It’s time for Condi and her boss, George Bush, to stop badgering Israel on dangerous “gestures” to people uninterested in peace and focus on reality while there’s still time.

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P. David Hornik is a freelance writer and translator living in Tel Aviv.
He blogs at http://pdavidhornik. typepad. com/.
He can be reached at [e-mail].

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When do you think ISRAEL should tell Condi and Mr B his stuff stinks???..Opppps
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