The reaction of the New York Times to the report authored by former Israeli Supreme Court Justice Edward Levy about the legality of Jewish settlements in the West Bank was predictable. It fulminated about the way the Levy commission differed from the consensus in the international community that holds, as the Times editorial put it, that “all Israeli construction there as a violation of international law.” But the Times is not just exercised about the legal dispute that it dismisses in a couple of sentences without even looking seriously at the arguments. As far as the paper is concerned, any measure or idea that does not contribute to the push to get Israel to leave the West Bank is an obstacle to peace and a threat to the Jewish state. Even worse, it went so far as to speciously claim that the ongoing dispute about settlements is diverting attention from the attempt to stop Iran’s drive for nuclear weapons.
This is a red herring that should and will be ignored by both the Israel and American governments. Iran is a threat to Israel but it is also a danger to the surrounding Arab countries as well as to the West. Israeli concessions won’t dampen Iran’s resolve to go nuclear because Tehran doesn’t care about a two-state solution for the Palestinians. Their hatred of Israel and the Jews and desire for hegemony over the Arabs can’t be bought off in this manner. But the mention of Iran should remind observers that what Israel’s foes oppose is not Israel’s presence in the West Bank but it’s existence.
What Levy’s critics are doing is, as I wrote earlier this week, conflating the issue of legality with that of the wisdom of the settlement enterprise. But what the Times editorial, as well as most of the comment about this issue ignores is that the question of the continued Israeli presence in the territories is not one that is controlled by Levy or even Prime Minister Netanyahu. Rather, it is the Palestinians and their refusal to make peace even when offered most of the West Bank and a share of Jerusalem for an independent state. So long as Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas and his Hamas allies refuse to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn, the settlements will remain since withdrawal would remain of the 2005 Gaza withdrawal disaster. Should they ever truly choose peace, there is no question that many will be dismantled. That’s why the obsessive desire to brand the settlements as illegal and to depict the Jews as foreign colonizers in areas in places where Jewish civilization was born and thrived does nothing to advance the cause of peace. So long as the Palestinians think that they don’t have to negotiate over the territories, the status quo will remain in place.
There is a connection between the question of the settlements and Iran but it is not the one the Times thinks it is. In the minds of those Islamists who wish to destroy Israel— be they in Tehran, Gaza or here in the United States agitating against Israel — the West Bank settlers are no different from the cosmopolitan urban dwellers of Tel Aviv. To them, every Jew in the country, whether in the coastal cities or hilltop settlements is an illegal settler. From their point of view the whole idea of Israel, be it within the 1949 armistice lines or one that would incorporate some of the settlements in the sort of territorial swap that even President Obama has recognized as the only possible formula for a two-state solution is anathema.
Far from discouraging Israel’s foes, the push to brand the settlements as not just unwise but illegal gives encouragement to those Arabs and Muslims who still nurture the fantasy that Israel is on the brink of collapse. While the majority of Israelis do not wish to rule over Arabs in the West Bank any more than they did to control those of Gaza, from which Israel completely withdrew in 2005, until the Palestinians give up the dream of the end of the Jewish state, there will be no peace. Those who decry Levy’s report upholding Jewish rights while not saying that they must be exercised are only feeding this delusion rather than promoting peace. Nor are they doing anything to give Western leaders the guts to stand up to Iran.
It is not enough to defned the legality of the settlements. Like any good argument, there also needs to be an offsensive dimension. The Palestinians were invented solely to torment and destory Israel. That is their raison d'etre. When Tobin says the Pals won't accept any version of Israel, he is really saying the same thing but in an overly diplomatic way. n nEven if you disagree, it is crazy from a negotiating standpoint to accept the legimiacy of someone who denies yours, when yours is stronger than theirs. At a bare minimum, if it does not want to deny the Pals legitimacy (which it would be within its rights to do), Israel at least should say: We only accept the legitimacy of the Palestinian national movement to the same they accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish homeland just like Italy is the homeland of the Italians and England the homeland of the English. If they don't grant Israel this IN ADVANCE, there is no reason to confer unearned legitimacy on such an invented people.
Iranians have a long history of anti-Arab bias. They are not interested in a Palestinian state. nPalestinians, who ARE interested in such a state, understand that its existence might possibly legitimize Israel. First things first. Destroying Israel takes precedence over all other issues. nWhenever Israel makes a concession, anti-Israel hatred zooms up all over the world. Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza raised anti-Israel sentiment–already extremely high–to new heights.
How is Iran a threat to the west? As far as it's neighbors, the only ones they are a threat to are the bribed and coerced tyrants who have somehow managed to avoid the arab spring. You think the people who were in the streets of Libya and Egypt are on Israels side re: Iran??
"Their hatred of Israel and the Jews…" You were referring to the Iranians but you just as well could have been referring to the NYT, the paper that buried all news of the Shoah, that favored the British over an independent Israel, that counseled Israeli restraint as the Arabs moved in for the kill in June, 1967, and that consistently argued for moral equivalence between dead Arab suicide bombers and their Israeli victims blown to bits in supermarkets, buses and discotheques. And this is a paper written in English not Arabic, published in NY not Beirut, and purchased daily by hundreds of thousands of American Jews.
Mr. Tobin please stop using the Arab term "West Bank". If you investigate the term's origin, it was developed by the Arabs as a means to conceal the Jewish basis of Judea and Samaria, the correct term for the area. Furthermore, by using "West Bank" it helps legitimate the idea that Israel doesn't exist, since all of Israel (whether you believe in the "Green Line" or not) lies on the west bank of the Jordan River. Those who adopt their enemy's language cannot win the argument.
I remember on Face The Nation or another similar program, PM Begin corrected a questioner’s use of the term, “west bank”, stating, “…the west bank is the entire territory from the Jordan River to the Mediteranean…” If necessary, one can include “west bank” in parentheses,when referring to the incorrect term. One can comfortably use “disputed territories” or better; “Judea and Samaria”.
However, the one part of Mr. Tobin’s work here which I would seriously question is as follows:
“…Should they ever truly choose peace, there is no question that many will be dismantled.”
Wrong, yes there is a question. It depends upon what occurs in the intervening years. It could be 100 years. No one knows what the dynamics will be in ten years. No one can or should make such an assurance. All of the land may be crucial to hold in x years.
Therefore, the statement is false. [It must be a typo.]
Mr. Tobin, it is the Levy commissions effort to supersede the issue of whether unfettered settlement growth by delving into legalities that is the real story. Yes, the Times is ridiculously anti-Israel, yes the international community uses "illegality" without deliberation for age-old and ugly reasons, and yes the settlements are not the principal reason for Palestinian intransigence, but please don't pretend that the Levy commission was commissioned for any reason other than to justify continued settlement growth. It is the long-term wisdom of unfettered settlement growth in Judea and Samaria that is and remains the principal issue, regardless of legalities or anything else.
"Mr. Tobin please stop using the Arab term "West Bank"." n nyou wouldn't allow my comment but you allow this stuff? What's going on here?