CRIE DE GUERRE- CRY FOR WAR
This Blogger happened to be in Egypt, on vacation during the First Gulf War, when the Allied coalition ousted the invading Iraqi forces of Saddam Hussein, from Kuwait.
This Blogger was sitting in a hotel lobby, on the banks of the Nile, nursing a Glubb Pasha gin and tonic, watching an unfolding Coptic Christian wedding reception. It was rumored that this Blogger was the last American in the hotel; that rumor was bolstered when the Egyptian tourist police assigned ten officers as his body guards.
The American lady who had come to Egypt with him, had left him , in a very prudent moment, alone.
As this Blogger was watching the belly dancer do her exotic intoxication; a young, well-groomed Arab came up to him.
He inquired: “ Are you the famous last American in the hotel?”
The Blogger responded: “I think so.”
The Arab smiled: “May I buy you a drink, to salute your courage or honor your foolishness?”
This Blogger responded, in a very friendly manner: “Do you know, by chance, the belly dancer?”
He replied:” I do, she is a Palestinian in exile, as I am.”
The Palestinian was a Christian, so he could drink spirits; and he could and did.
Later, the little party was joined by the belly dancer and two more of the Palestinian’s friends. One of them, an elderly gentleman. They all spoke English.
The odd party drank and chatted, talked and debated about the Israel/Palestine conflict long into the night; until dawn broke over the Nile.
The elderly Palestinian had been in Cairo since, the creation of Israel, in 1948, the NAKBA, the Palestinian Catastrophe.
As the elderly Palestinian drank into his cups; he began to lament about the brief period of Palestinian revanchist hope, the time frame before the Six Day War.
He told a tale of when, he was a young student, and how all the students were enthused that Egyptian President Nasser was planning on going to war with the upstart Israel.
He told about how the Palestinian students would stay up all night, the Christians drinking Scotch, the Muslims coffee to draft a constitution for a free, secular Palestine; which treated all residents equal, a SECULAR state. He remembered the hope, that after Nasser defeated Israel they would go back into the land of Israel, formerly known as Palestine, with their draft Constitution and re-educate the Zionists, in re-education camps.
There would be a Free Palestine, from the river to the sea, the river being the Jordan, the Sea being the Mediterranean; the Nakba reversed. No Israel.
This Blogger told them that though their hopes and desires were pure and well intentioned; the Israelis would never, could never, agree to a non-Jewish state. Before, World War II, they had lived comfortable, productive lives in Germany, Italy, France, Austria, Hungary, Poland, the Baltics, Ukraine….all secular paradises; then, amid all that secularism, they were beaten, rounded up and packed into cattle cars for an effective, mass extermination.
Israel was founded by Jews; who had lived, in real time, the experience that a secular state was not a guarantee of safety for Jews. They, and their progeny, was and are incapable of trusting any state, other than a Jewish state. They believe, with a fierce, unshakeable faith; that only a Jewish state will insure the survival of Jews.
This Blogger told the exiled Palestinians, that what they were offering Israelis in 1967, was a William Golding Peace (we had all read THE INHERITORS). What the hopeful 1967 Palestinians were offering was a Palestinian Cro-Magnon Secularism to a disappearing band of Jewish Neanderthals. A peace which Jews felt would only hasten their extinction from the face of the earth.
That night in Cairo woke up fresh in this Blogger’s memory as he watched the House of Representatives censure Michigan Representation Rashida Tlaib for promulgating the term, FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA. Rep. Tlaib is the only Palestinian American in the House; she defended herself by claiming the term was “aspirational.”
The term is aspirational, if you are seeking ethnic cleansing. The term inyenzi (cockroaches) was aspirational to the Hutu killers of Tutsis; just as Dubul' ibhunu is aspirational for Blacks who want to kill every leftover white Boer in South Africa; just as Manifest Destiny was aspirational for racist Americans to kill off Native Americans.
There is no easy solution to the Israeli/Palestinian Conflict; if there were an easy solution, then it would have been solved by Ralph Bunche, in 1948.
The closet to peace came in 2000, under the aegis of Bill Clinton. Israel was led by a Yom Kippur war hero, Ehud Barak; the Palestinians by Yasser Arafat.
“Israel agreed in principle to give up its sovereignty in parts of Jerusalem’s Old City, including part of the Temple Mount, during peace negotiations with the Palestinians…….
The Israel State Archives on Sunday published Jerusalem’s official response to then-US president Bill Clinton’s Israeli-Palestinian peace proposal in 2000, the Ynet news site reported.
The document also showed that Israel under left-wing prime minister Ehud Barak demanded eight percent of the West Bank — home to 80% of Israeli settlers and some Palestinians — without any land swap in that territory, while a land swap in the Gaza — which at that point included some 20 Israeli settlements, home to some 7,000 Israelis — would be no more than 2%...the Guardian.”
Arafat agreed to terms; then reneged, because he did not want to meet the fate of Michael Collins, killed by his own people for signing a peace treaty.
Arafat enjoyed corruption too much to be killed for the betterment of his people.
Abba Eban, one of the geniuses behind the creation of the state of Israel once said: “the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”
Palestinians have been unable to come up with pragmatic, creative leadership; but one can fairly blame that on Israel; for Israel has been too clever by half, in dealing with the Palestinians. How so? They assassinated all the pragmatic, creative Palestinian leadership, leaving the dolt Arafat in command.
Now, when Israel most needs a towering Palestinian figure, to strike a deal with; the most towering are dead, by Israeli hands.
On January 30, 2018, this Blogger published the following: ”The respected Israeli journalist, Ronen Bergman has written a brilliant new book, RISE AND KILL FIRST, about the Israeli state sponsored assassination bureau.
“Since World War II, Bergman calculates, the Jewish state and its pre-state paramilitary organizations have assassinated more people than any other country in the Western world — some 2,300 “targeted killing operations,” most of them against Palestinians, but also aimed at Egyptians, Syrians, Iranians and others …WASHINGTON POST.”
Israel’s security apparatus had two philosophical pillars to support its justification for extrajudicial killings.
a) Cicero- “In times of war, the laws fall.”
b) The Talmud- “ If someone comes to kill you, rise up and kill him first.”
One of the leitmotif’s of Mr. Bergman’s book (which has been excerpted in the NEW YORK TIMES SUNDAY MAGAZINE) is Israel’s inability to kill the head of the Palestinian Liberation Organization(PLO), Yasser Arafat.
Seemingly Arafat was extraordinarily lucky.
The book describes the moral anguish Israeli Security went through over whether to kill Arafat with civilians present.
All the villains, those who wanted Arafat dead at any cost, are conveniently dead....
....The Israeli and he were discussing ....This was after the Israeli assassination of Khalil al-Wazir, (his nom de guerre was Abu Jihad); he was Arafat’s brilliant, charismatic second in command.
A team of Israeli commandos landed outside of Tunis, the capital of Tunisia ( the PLO was headquartered there at the time). The commandos went to Abu Jihad’s home, broke into his bedroom and pumped 52 bullets into him, in front of his wife.
The Israeli was speaking, in English, “….Gerry, .we killed Abu Jihad, but we will never kill Arafat,because he is the most inept, dumbest, most corrupt, incompetent Arab in the world….if we kill him he will be replaced by a smart Arab…..so we only kill the smart, charismatic, competent Arabs…..all those assassination attempts Arafat are staged to make him look good…..”
So there you have it; Arafat was not lucky; he was a beneficiary of astute Israeli cleverness.. So there you have it….THE MAXEY CHRONICLES.”
It is never wise to assassinate the best, most generous of the enemy; which is why the Boers never assassinated Nelson Mandela.
HAMAS wants to ethnically cleanse Israel of all Jews from the Jordan to the Sea. Ms. Tlaib supports that.
It is not a well thought out plan.
Suppose the Palestinians borrow enough money from the Arab Gulf states to hire a Kurdish military genius, such as the Kurd, Saladin.
And the victorious Palestinians push the Israelis to the shores of the sea....before they allow themselves to be exterminated; what would the Israeli Jews do?
Well, they have the atomic bomb; faced with extinction would the Israeli Jews use the atomic bomb?
Would the Aztecs have used it to defend themselves against the Conquistadores? Would the Imperial Japanese have used it to defend their homeland; if they had had it, rather than suicide pilots?
Would the Gauls, under Vercingetorix, not used the atomic bomb against the all conquering Caesar, as he mastered them into extinction?
Would the Carthaginians, as they faced extinction in the Third Punic War, not used the atomic bomb against the Roman exterminators?
Would any people, facing extinction, not use the atomic Bomb?
Of course, they would; terror will not gain Palestinians what they want, an end to the occupation and dignified lives.
Palestinians must use this moment of empathy to gain leverage for a two state solution.
On May 16, 2021, this Blogger published: “This month of May marks the 73rd anniversary of the state of Israel.
And to quote the ETHAN EDWARDS character in THE SEARCHERS: “Just as sure as the turnin' of the earth”, Israelis and Palestinians are killing each other. As sure as the cicadas come back, Israel bombs Gaza as the mad terrorists who run Gaza, HAMAS, send a murder of rockets into Israel. But this time, there is a new and explosive element, Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs are lynching each other.
This Blogger happened to be in Cairo during the first Gulf War……..The common dream of the Palestinians was the establishment of a secular state on the land of Israel, in which Jew, Christian, Druze and Muslim could live as brothers. Alas, the Palestinian Dream meant and means that Israelis, as a Jewish state, as a Jewish homeland, would be extirpated.
That idea will not go over well in Israel, since Israeli Jews do not trust the benevolence of History, from the Babylonian Captivity, to Romans destroying the temple, to Masada, to the Catholic majesties kicking them out of Spain, to Russians slaughtering them, to Nazis making a close run to annihilating all of them.
The Palestinians made a point of returning again and again to the righteousness of their cause; they continually referred to the Nakba, the catastrophe; the Nakba, the mass exodus of Palestinians from the new state of Israel in 1948.
The Palestinians desired to bet the righteousness of their NAKBA pain against the righteousness of the pain of the Holocaust.
The Palestinian exercise in righteousness is useless.
It has no merit.
For the sake of their people, Palestinians must reach the obvious conclusion, that they cannot defeat the Israelis militarily, by war or intifada, in the lifetime of any living Palestinian.
The Palestinians must accept who the Israelis really are in the arc of History; the Israelis are Macedonians, Romans during the Punic Wars, Normans, and Conquistadors.
For their people to survive, in dignity, Palestinians must retire all their wartime consiglieres and find, in their population, a Mahatma Gandhi.
It is one of the great sins of 20th Century History that an Israeli/Palestinian accord could not be forged when other great Israeli lions were alive: Moshe Dayan, David Ben-Gurion, Yitzhak Rabin, and Abba Eban. Alas, the great Arab lion of that age was Gamal Abdel Nasser; who was delusional.
He threatened Israel with annihilation; then,rather than plan for an armed Israeli reaction to his threats, a preemptive strike, he spent hours discussing the future of Jews in a post Israel, Palestinian state. With lions like Dayan, one does not plan post victory parties before winning the victory.
Bibi Netanyahu is a very shrewd politician, who wants a powerful Israel, even at the cost of a SAFE Israel. Historically he is direct descendant of Guy of Lusignan, the last King of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem; Guy wanted a powerful Crusader Kingdom at the cost of a safe Crusader Kingdom. Guy wound up with no Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem.
It is now quite obvious that Bibi of Lusignan wants to dismantle the concept of a two state solution, Israel living side by side with a West Bank Palestinian state, hopefully in peace. Bibi wants to replace the two-state solution with a one state solution, a greater Israel from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea to the banks of the Jordan River, the mythic Eretz Israel(Greater Israel).
...Palestinians should not waste their lives in resisting the declaration of the mythic Eretz Israel; instead Palestinians should renounce a state of their own, renounce the two state solution, renounce violence, and begin the epic voyage of asking for Israeli citizenship, with voting rights. Palestinians renouncing a two state solution, for citizenship in a one state, will insure a two state solution.
The first step in seeking Israeli citizenship for all West Bank Arabs, Palestinians, is to dissolve the quasi-state, the Palestinian Authority.
Faced with Palestinian Arabs seeking full Israeli citizenship, Israel will just LEAVE the West Bank. (The Gandhi input to the Peace Solution)……THE MAXEY CHRONCILES.”
This Blogger humbly suggests that the Palestinian people give considerations to suggestions, he published on January 1, 2009.
“ New Year, 2009, and Israelis and Palestinians are still killing each other, as has happened every year since Jehovah knows when. This conflict is something out of Gabriel Garcia Marquez; so it will take a solution out of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.…..the Palestinian Arab-Israeli Conflict, must be based on a Two State solution, using methods out of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Step One-The Palestinians pull a Chief Joseph and stop fighting, period.
” From where the sun stands, I will fight no more.”
Step Two-The Palestinians execute some of their own die hards as proof of life examples to the Israelis.
Step Three-The Palestinians disarm, and give up all their claims to a State of the own.
Step Four-The Palestinians ask for Israeli citizenship, and the right to vote in Israeli elections.
Step Five-The Palestinians start peacefully marching for the Israeli vote and start singing, “WE SHALL OVERCOME.”
Step Six-The Palestinians calmly wait for the Israelis to open discussions on a two state solution; the alternative not being war but the REAL threat of Palestinians becoming Israeli citizens.”
The future of Israel is quite stark, if it does not accept a two state solution; the Palestinians will force a one state solution, and overwhelm the Jewish state by demographics…….Gerry Maxey in THE DAILY GRAND and SUNDRY."
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