Never have the stakes been so high, yet the possibility of no strong, meaningful and united leadership emerging following the upcoming elections could be the catalyst that puts the nation of Israel in peril in the coming years.
How the country will ever deal effectively with external issues without first getting its own house in order is beyond comprehension. A country with a “shambolic” electoral process which produces one divergent coalition after the other where members of the same Government attack each other publicly to score political points is no longer an option. Yet this is what will probably again result in the upcoming elections unless there is a 180 degree turnaround in resolve.
The opinions of Barack Obama is often used as an excuse for Israel’s series of capitulations over recent years but surely the time has come to stand up to the current President of the US and his Secretaries of State.
Let’s face reality. Israel has tried everything with these people, the so called “Palestinians”, yet not one agreement has been honoured. The Oslo Accords have proven to be a disaster, so too land for peace, the two state solution, release (not once but twice) of batches of terrorist murderers with blood on their hands, cessation of building activities for periods of time. Even the act of recognising a people who never existed in all of history, the so called “Palestinians” was not enough to result in a modicum of peace. The facts are that Israel’s supposed negotiating partners for peace were never once held accountable for their actions and whether one likes it or not, the blame for this rests solely with Israeli leadership, or more to the point the lack thereof.
In the last few years we saw an Israeli leadership cowered and berated by none other than the likes of Hillary Clinton the former US Secretary of State who had the audacity to complain in no uncertain terms to Netanyahu about building construction in the western part of Jerusalem. A woman who at the height of the recent war with Hamas told the world that Hamas places its missiles around civilian population centres “because Gaza is a small place and there were not many places they (Hamas) could put them”. All this and yet we witnessed an Israeli leadership that never attempted to set this woman and the world view she represents straight!
I would remind readers that it was Hillary Clinton who along with her boss watched in real time as the American Ambassador and his staff in Libya were butchered by a rampaging Islamic mob, then had the audacity to blame the attack on a video about Mohammed that aired in the US some six weeks prior, in spite of the fact that the Libyan Government stated categorically that the video had nothing to do with the attack. All this while US Special Forces were ready on standby waiting for the “go” to save the Ambassador!
What has happened over the last decade or so can be described as nothing less than catastrophic. We’ve seen the Oslo Accords, where not one violation on the Arab side was deemed sufficient for Israel to declare it null and void. The accords provided that the “Palestinian” security forces were to be issued with side arms but when more sophisticated weapons were introduced, Israel looked the other way. When the indoctrination of Arab children in hate did not stop but in fact accelerated, Israel looked the other way. When Yasser Arafat was caught out preaching jihad in Arabic to his assembled throng, it was that “elder statesman” Shimon Peres who ran to his defence saying that Arafat was referring to a “jihad for peace”.
Lack of a strong resolve was again evident in mid 2014 when Israel went to war to protect itself from thousands of rockets that were fired indiscriminately at its civilian population from Gaza. Israel again ended this war prematurely and inconclusively leaving the Hamas command and control infrastructure relatively intact.
In the history of warfare, no nation on the face of the earth has a “Purity of Arms” doctrine such as Israel. A doctrine which gives advance warnings to the enemy and one that calls off strikes literally at the last second thereby allowing military targets and targeted terrorists (along with supposed “innocent” civilians) to escape unscathed. This doctrine needlessly prolonged the war and thereby invited the inevitable worldwide propaganda campaign against Israel to build up, demanding that Israel and not the terrorists cease hostilities. This doctrine protected people who sympathize with Hamas’ aims, put Israeli soldiers lives at risk and ensured that in all future confrontations, Hamas will always use human shields as a propaganda ploy. There is only one answer to this and that is for an Israeli leadership to arise to announce that in all future confrontations no targets will be aborted and that human shields will henceforth be treated as enemy combatants.
Even during hostilities, Israel continued the supply to the residents of Gaza with electricity, quality drinking water, goods and medical attention all of which aided the “Palestinians” to continue their war making effort. So called humanitarian gestures that again prolonged the war, thereby again putting Israeli lives at risk.
Will a new Government headed by Netanyahu and made up of coalition members whose party platforms rarely agree on anything be able to make substantial headway on issues that matter? Who knows?
Will a new government find the way to remove the leftist court judges appointed by Tzipi Livni? Who knows?
Without Livni’s unsettling presence, will a new government be able to finally indict “Israeli” Arab Hanin Zoabi and her kind for treason and terrorism or will the likes of Zoabi, Ahmad Tibi & Co be allowed to remain in the Knesset, emitting forth their usual treason, day in day out?
It is time for a new government and leaders to formulate a plan of action on what they will do and how they will respond to further challenges, such as:
In the event of any further hostilities, will they finally:
- Uunleash the IAF?Walk away from the so called “peace process.”
- Retake control of the Temple Mount, control Israel foolishly granted to the WAqf after the 1967 war.
- Take unilateral action on borders, handing the welfare of those people outside those borders to the UNHCR, Jordan, Egypt or whomever.
- Expel all foreign and hostile NGOs and UNRWA whose existence only ensures that a refugee problem remains in perpetuity.
At a minimum, it is finally time for Israel to announce publicly that there will be no further capitulations and that the Palestinian Authority’s days of being indulged are over.