Last summer an Iraq veteran stood up in the balcony during John McCain's speech at the Republican convention with a sign "You Can't Win an Occupation." Steve Walt sent me an email that contained the same truth this afternoon, and has let me publish it:
ground offensive and doesn't have a clear sense of the end-game here. If
so, then they may have repeated the key blunder of the 2006 Lebanon War:
assuming that air power could accomplish major strategic objectives (i.e.,
destroying Hamas) and failing to consider what would happen if the adversary
didn't collapse as planned.
At the same time, it presents Hamas with a difficult
decision. They have two main choices:
1. Accept the ceasefire and start rebuilding, while
emphasizing the brutality and ultimate futility of what Israel did. My
guess here is that there will be immediate recriminations in Israel for not
"finishing the job," and Netanyahu will sail to victory. And of
course it leaves the basic question of a political solution completely
unresolved.
2. Reject the ceasefire (or accept it but then let somebody fire off a few more rockets), and force Israel to go in on the ground. The upside for Hamas is that this once again makes Abbas look like a wimp and a stooge and makes Israelis look even more brutal, and it moves the competition into close-quarters urban warfare where Hamas can impose real costs on the IDF. The downside for Hamas is that it makes them look like they are the ones that aren't interested in peace, and will be used to demonize them even more.
What is astonishing to me is the inability of smart people to realize that the Occupation is the taproot of this entire mess, and that these problems are going to keep happening until the Occupation ends. I'm no fan of Hamas, its worldview, or its tactics, but what sort of response does one expect? And don't all the pro-Israel spin-doctors realize that going to these lengths to maintain the occupation–which at the end of the day is what this whole business is about–is very, very bad for Israel itself?
I do wonder what Obama is thinking as he watches this one, knowing that he gets to take charge in three weeks. The coverage in MSM has been typically one-sided, and I keep waiting for just one serious mainstream politician or media commentator to stand up and speak a little truth about the stupidity of it all.
I can't understand how smart people don't understand that the very existence of Israel is occupation to enough people to ensure that there is not going to be peace. Why not just wash our hands of the issue, and severely punish the people who are guilty of subverting U.S. interests? Why not do what would be easiest and best for the U.S.?
Israel typically has placed a US politician on the hotseat: proclaim to the world your unilateral support of our policies, no matter how crazy or counterproductive, or deal w the charges of abandonment, anti-semitism and all-out attack by US jews. Obama must be dying: he didnt want to make it quite so obvious, quite so early in his Administration that he has no real ideas other than continuation of current Republican economic and foreign policies
Todd:
I have to give you credit for honesty. Nothing like a second holocaust to get the juices flowing, right?
Sword,
I don't expect a logical answer, but could you please tell me how I am advocating a holocaust?
protests around the world. one of the pics.
A very small step toward MSM coverage: The Sacramento Bee today published an AP report quoting Daniel Barenboim as saying "The Israeli-Palestinian conflict cannot be resolved militarily," calling recent developments "terrible events," and stating: "There are still . . . far too many people who are still convinced that they can resolve this conflict militarily. That can't be done. That absolutely can't be done." link to sacbee.com
Barenboim, who grew up in Israel, formed an orchestra with Edward Said, made up of Israeli and Arab musicians. This was reported in the names and faces section of the paper, apparently because the article concludes by announcing that Barenboim will conduct the Vienna Philharmonic on New Year's Day. This is a positive step, and came not two weeks after I finally got a response from the editor when I forwarded Phil's post of Mearsheimer analyzing Avrum Burg's Holocaust book, as real news that never saw the light of day. The response was thanks for the article, but why the hostility, to which I replied that it is frustrating not to read about the most important issue of our time in my daily newspaper. No hostility intended, except that articulated by Thomas Jefferson against every form of tyranny over the human mind.
Israel never ever honored the truce with Hamas. It is all completely spin! From day one it maintained the embargo, let alone all the military violations!!
Please let us not fall for more spin. The entire argument is Purile, if not deceitful.
Well the jury is in –Mondoweiss are scared that there might be peace–or that Jews might not get killed.
And by the what BRILLIANT analysis Walt!!! That must be why Chicago pays him 185,000 dollars a year! Any chimpanzee with Internet access could have come up with that one.
What about the count of civilian victims? The Gaza government is the biggest employer there and so almost any victim can be portrayed as a Hamas militant.That whole deceitful spin about Israel not deliberately and indiscriminately targeting civilians in contrast to Hamas should be shown up for what it is however tired we get of this "rhetorical ping pong".
Phil:
Check out the post "Intolerable Museum" by Rabbi Andy Bachman. Andy is a liberal who is deeply pained and torn by what he sees. I've chatted with him and believe him to be a good man. He wants a solution that saves Israel and is fair to the Palestinians.
http://www.brooklynjews.org/weblog/
Somehow this statement from the president of the General Assembly seems to have escaped our media's attention:
The behavior by Israel in bombarding Gaza is simply the commission of wanton aggression by a very powerful state against a territory that illegally occupies.
Time has come to take firm action if the United Nations does not want to be rightly accused of complicity by omission.
The Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip represent severe and massive violations of international humanitarian law as defined in the Geneva Conventions, both in regard to the obligations of an Occupying Power and in the requirements of the laws of war.
Those violations include:
Collective punishment – the entire 1.5 million people who live in the crowded Gaza Strip are being punished for the actions of a few militants.
Targeting civilians – the airstrikes were aimed at civilian areas in one of the most crowded stretches of land in the world, certainly the most densely populated area of the Middle East.
Disproportionate military response – the airstrikes have not only destroyed every police and security office of Gaza’s elected government, but have killed and injured hundreds of civilians; at least one strike reportedly hit groups of students attempting to find transportation home from the university.
I remind all member states of the United Nations that the UN continues to be bound to an independent obligation to protect any civilian population facing massive violations of international humanitarian law – regardless of what country may be responsible for those violations. I call on all Member States, as well as officials and every relevant organ of the United Nations system, to move expeditiously not only to condemn Israel’s serious violations, but to develop new approaches to providing real protection for the Palestinian people.
Search and search, but you won't find it mentioned in an American newspaper. The statement was however reported in China (World Leaders Condemn Escalation of Violence in Gaza) which probably explains the photo Pat posted above.
incriminating evidence Phil doesn't want you to see
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=7f0_1230584566
those are Grad missiles, and that's a residential neighborhood. The payoff is at 2:10, for those anxious to see live martydrom
The IDF said it would blow up any house in Gaza in which there were guns. I wonder what the Israelis would say if the Palestinians announced they would blow up any house in Israel containing guns? Why is it one side is supposed to not so much as have a handgun while the other side deploys Merkava tanks, Apache helicopters and F-16s?
Steve Walt wrote:
"If so, then they may have repeated the key blunder of the 2006 Lebanon War…."
Maybe, if indeed merely trying to stop the rocketry they've been subject to is their true goal. But if that was its mere goal why now? Why not two months ago? Or one month ago. Or why not a mere month from now?
I.e., maybe the goal is to present Obama with a fait accompli by essentially putting the "roadmap" peace process back to square one and preventing Obama from using it to press Israel to do more in furtherance of it. After all Abbas has already announced that he will not continue speaking to the Israelis so long as this Gaza business is going on, and even after it stops his moderate position is going to be so weakened (if indeed he can survive politically at all) that there will essentially be no-one other than Hamas and militants to speak to.
Objectively speaking, time has always worked in Israel's favor in terms of it using same to consolidate and expand its occupation and settlements. And even despite the "roadmap's" supposed prohibition on same it was just revealed not long ago that there has been a quiet continuation of settlement expansion going on all along.
So from the perspective of those Israelis who want to hang onto the occupied territories and feel that the longer they exist and the more they expand the more "facts on the ground" are being established on their side, how exactly does this Gaza thing constitute a blunder?
Or, in other words, why not give Hamas a whack right now before Obama might tell the Israelis not to, maybe even agree to a quick cease-fire so as to be reasonable, set the whole situation back to square one, and let Obama know that they and not him will set the terms of the situation over there?
Doesn't sound dumb to me.
Here's where "Jim Haygood" is getting his news videos from–
Israeli Defense Force Gets YouTube Channel
Actually I got in on Liveleak. Youtube has been that video (although it never bans Islamist crap). Must be the Jewish controlled media, eh?
Bill, can you at least admit that your childish impersonations are a rearguard measure against a foe you know is winning? You wouldn't bother otherwise, right? The idea being that most normal people would slide right over anything tagged with 'Bill Pearlman', but they might stop and consider with the Haygood imprimatur.
The tactic must be in the approved hasbara playbook. It's not original – I used to argue years ago with monikers like 'voice of sanity' and various Arab-sounding handles, obvious fronts for humble little downstream sayanim like yourself, who used to infest Aust blogs every time Israel soiled itself in public. An oldie but a goodie, eh?
Not me Glenn, but I doubt that a mentally deficient scumbag like yourself is going to believe that. Perhaps you should take a break from whacking off to your Arafat poster. Just for a little while.
Well,
Its nice that Walt is no fan of Hamas or its methods.
No word from Phil on that yet.
There is word from objective sources that the majority of targets at least on the first day, were explicitly NOT civilian targets.
If Israel's hesitancy to undertake ground action is accurate (which sounds plausible), I assume that that is because of a combination of intent to avoid harm to Israeli soldiers, intent to avoid harm to Palestinian civilians in neighborhood to neighborhood crossfire, and recognition that they are unlikely to succeed at their objective.
Anger is NOT peace. Israeli anger is not peace. Hamas' anger is not peace. Dissenters anger is not peace.
If a pig can't fly (and personally I don't think it can), then that's probably because 1.) it doesn't want to make the cows envious, 2.) it doesn't want to scare the birds, and 3.) it doesn't have any wings.
"I wonder what Obama is thinking".
Me too.
Phil is the link between Walt and the far left.
He would make a MUCH LARGER contribution, if he instead sought to serve as a link between Walt and those that rationally retain a balanced analysis that includes support for civil Israel, and prospectively civil Palestine.
I forgot which individual stated that they appreciated the reasoned but assertive analysis of Rashid Khalidi, and even Walt himself, FAR more than that of the loudly and grossly stated proponents of Walt and Mearsheimer.
What is civil about Israel's actions over the past 50 plus years?
Like the way you retain a balanced analysis of supporting the theft of Palestinian land – Witty thinks Israel should keep all of Jerusalem – and the murder of Palestinians? Witty thinks it's rational that Israel is bombing civilians in Gaza.
At this point, Richard I'd be very surprised if your friend Phil cares for your completely hypocritical and false views of the conflict…
"Perhaps you should take a break from whacking off to your Arafat poster."
LOL, that's funny stuff, Bill. You may be emotionally retarded, but you do have a sense of humor, so there's hope for you yet. :)