The name “Philadelphi corridor” has been bandied about so often recently there may be a few residents in the City of Brotherly Love who may be wondering why its name was changed and why did no one tell them about it.
The NY Times’ conservative pundit Bret Stephens, the former editor-in-chief of SAPIR: A Journal of Jewish Conversations, offered a fair and balanced explanation of the entire Philadelphi conundrum, which is rare for the newspaper that employs Tom Friedman. We’ll get to that later.
On Monday night, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered one of his more Churchillian speeches, asserting in no uncertain terms that the IDF will never leave the Philadelphi corridor. For a detailed review, kindly click to, “Biden Negotiating Gaza Deal Not with Netanyahu but with Qatar & Egypt.”
On Tuesday, State Dept. Spokesman Matthew Miller said this:
“Number one, we absolutely believe that it is in the interest of Israel, and it’s in the interest of Palestinians in Gaza as well, that Hamas not be able to smuggle arms in across the Philadelphi corridor. That is absolutely in the interests of both parties. But we are opposed to the long-term presence of IDF troops in Gaza. We’ve made clear that we are opposed to the reoccupation of Gaza.”
In other words, the US agrees that as long as Hamas is not annihilated, Israel should control its oxygen supply from Egypt by maintaining control over Philadelphi, but only in the short term.
Fair enough. Israel can take a year or two to clean up the Gaza Strip from the vestiges of the terrorist regime there, but then it must withdraw to allow the residents to create a Western democracy where everybody thrives with a chicken in every pot.
But then Miller dropped this bomb:
“I will also say that in the bridging proposal that we put forward, that the Government of Israel agreed to, it did include the removal of the IDF from densely populated areas. That includes the Philadelphi Corridor.”
Two key ideas there: one, the IDF must withdraw from Philadelphi now, not after the cleansing of Hamas, and, two, despite the hour that PM Netanyahu spent on Monday insisting Israel is staying in Philadelphi, Miller says Netanyahu’s government has agreed to this withdrawal.
The Washington Post on Tuesday offered this observation:
“Netanyahu says remaining in the corridor is essential to prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons, a stance that is fueling tensions with Egypt — another key US ally in the region — and increasingly vocal dissent from figures within Israel’s political and security establishment, who say the country must prioritize the return of its hostages. They downplay the significance of an Israeli presence in Philadelphi, describing the embattled prime minister’s demands as an effort to derail an agreement that could weaken him politically.”
Which stands to show you that a sleep-deprived prime minister can spend an hour explaining, with maps and everything, why staying in Philadelphi is critical to Israel’s security – in the end it’s all about his struggle for political survival. Oh, and the tensions with Egypt thing – we’ve covered here extensively how the entire Egyptian political system has been benefiting from the smuggling of people out of Gaza, and weapons and tunnel-building resources into Gaza. Bibi is killing their thriving business, and said as much on television.
REASON, ANYONE?
Enter Bret Stephens (A Hostage Deal Is a Poison Pill for Israel), probably channeling the immortal conservative pundit William Safire, who wrote on Tuesday:
“Netanyahu is right, and it’s important for his usual critics, including me, to acknowledge it.
“He’s right, first because the highest justification for fighting a war, besides survival, is to prevent its repetition. Israel has lost hundreds of soldiers to defeat Hamas. Thousands of innocent Palestinians have died and hundreds of thousands have suffered, because Hamas has held every Gazan hostage to its fanatical aims. Hamas was able to initiate and fight this war only because of a secure line of logistical supply under its border with Egypt.”
“Israel’s control of the Philadelphi Corridor largely stops this. To relinquish it now, for any reason, forsakes what Israel has been fighting for, consigns Palestinians to further misery under Hamas and all but guarantees that a similar war will eventually be fought again. Why do that?”
Stephens concluded:
“Also elementary: Whatever one thinks of Netanyahu, the weight of outrage should fall not on him but on Hamas. It released a video of a hostage it later murdered — 24-year-old Eden Yerushalmi, telling her family how much she loved them — on Monday, the day after her funeral. It’s another act of cynical, grotesque and unadulterated sadism by the group that pretends to speak in the name of all Palestinians. It does not deserve a cease-fire so that it can regain its strength. It deserves the same ash heap of history on which, in our better moments, we deposited the Nazis, Al Qaeda and the Islamic State.
“There are bright people who say that what Israel ought to do now is cut a deal, recover its hostages, take a breather and start preparing for the next war, probably in Lebanon. Israelis should remember that wars will be worse, and come more often, to those who fail to win them.”
EVERY VILLAGE MUST HAVE AN IDIOT
Thomas L. Friedman, who lost a whole lot of caché once it became clear that his major sponsor, President Joe Biden, has only a few months of political life left to live, has reverted to his former post as the Gray Lady’s moron. On Tuesday Friedman offered an op-ed with a headline that belonged in The Onion: “How Netanyahu Is Trying to Save Himself, Elect Trump and Defeat Harris.”
He announced, “Based on my reporting and all my years watching Netanyahu,” that “I would not be surprised if he actually escalates in Gaza between now and Election Day to make life difficult for the Democrats running for office.”
Here’s the full conspiracy theory:
“Netanyahu may do this because, I believe, he wants Trump to win and he wants to be able to tell Trump that he helped him win. Netanyahu knows that many in the rising generation of Democrats are hostile to Israel — or at least to the Israel he is creating.
“Then, if Trump wins, I would not be shocked if Bibi declares that his ‘total victory’ in Gaza has been achieved, agrees to some cease-fire to get back any hostages still alive, mumbles a few words about Palestinian statehood in the far-off, distant future to get the Saudi-Israel normalization deal and tells his craziest far-right partners to get lost while he runs for re-election without them. His likely platform: I brought total victory in Gaza and, with Trump, forged a historic opening between Israel and Saudi Arabia.”
Makes perfect sense. Bibi, whom Friedman has painted numerous times as a satanic figure, will sacrifice countless Israeli lives to be able to get rid of Smotrich and Ben Gvir and win re-election. And he will rely on the reelected President Trump, because, you know, Trump is reliable and predictable. And grateful, don’t forget grateful.
