The Great Land
Theft in the Negev
Ze`ev Wolfson
The
Bedouin problem in the Negev has become a part of the wider Arab
demographic, security and political threat to Israel.
The
Bedouin population in the Negev, which was estimated to be 15-17,000
in the mid-1950s has grown to over 170,000 in 2005. Today a huge area,
sparsely covered with clusters of houses and sheds covers the area.
These clusters are not suburbs, not a metropolis, certainly not
agricultural areas, and only a few percent of Bedouin families
today engage in herding flocks.
No doubt
the Bedouins deserve to enjoy the same living conditions as the rest
of the Israelis. However, with such dispersal inherent to their style
of life and at the current rate of their population growth, no budget
can provide a modern physical and social infrastructure for such a
vast territory. It has become a source of poverty, unemployment and
crime. Illegal Palestinian residents in large numbers find refuge
there. The Hamas movement has been enforcing its position there.
Following
the expulsion of the Jews from Gaza, the US supports the Palestinians’
demand for a corridor of free passage from Gaza to Hebron. This is
just another catalyst to the merging of all the Muslim masses in one:
Gaza-Negev-Hebron.
Still
there are ways to improve the situation:
-
Completely prevent the infiltration of illegal aliens from Judea,
Samaria and Gaza to the Negev.
-
Stop
the practice of polygamy;
-
Enforce
payment of Social Security dues and the rightfulness of its claims.
-
Encourage the participation of Bedouins in extensive programs for
family planning.
back to
top
What is the Problem with the Israeli Ruling Elite?
Is it Stupidity?
Or is it Something Else?
Francesco Gil-White
This
article argues that the policies of the Israeli government with
respect to the Arab-Israeli conflict have severely weakened the
ability of the Israelis to defend themselves and have put the Jewish
people in great peril. It examines evidence relevant to helping the
reader decide between two hypotheses. The first says that Israeli
leaders have energetically carried out these entirely
disadvantageous policies because they are radically incompetent. The
second says that Israeli leaders are committing treason. I argue
that an examination of the most relevant evidence forces us to
reject the hypothesis that Israeli leaders are incompetent.
back to
top
The
Cost of the Ethnic Cleansing in Gaza and Northern Shomron
Nachum Gutentag
According to Israeli Government
policy, the “disengagement” included the displacement of
approximately 10,000 residents in the Gaza Strip and Northern
Samaria and their expulsions from their homes, in which they had
resided for 38 years. The policy was determined by one person – the
Prime Minister. This policy was not preceded by the type of
preparation and planning required in a democratic country. That
explains the difficulty in examining its financial cost.
The law referred to as
“evacuation-compensation” deals exclusively with the economic
aspects of the reparations that will be paid to the displaced
persons for their personal belongings and the personal damages
caused to them and compensation for the economic enterprises that
existed in those settlements. The law contains no compensation for
the damages caused by the communal aspect of the displacement. This
cost was allocated by creating a deficit in the present annual
government budget and the budget of the coming years. The deficit
also includes other expenditures like security and the cost of
training the expulsion forces.
What is the total cost? In order to
answer the question in the absence of official documents, it is
necessary to gather information from various publications. This
information is inconsistent and lacks a common denominator. Some of
the expenditures are from open (unlimited) accounts so that at the
end of the process it will turn out that the final outlay will be
much larger; more than twice as high as the original estimate.
It is possible to calculate the
components of the cost of the expulsion according to the objective
of the allocated funds (the estimates are generally based on
calculations of the Treasury Ministry’s Budget Branch).
Civilian Compensation: For
assets, personal compensation, economic compensation, intangible
damages – 4.5 billion NIS.
Civilian Expenditures:
Training the expulsion force, government actions and the Sela
Authority, the transfer and evacuation of all personal
belongings, evacuation camps, hotels and rent for temporary housing,
permanent solutions and communal agreements – 1.74 billion NIS.
Civilian Security Expenditures:
Establishing new passageways, fences and protection – 1.2 billion
NIS.
Security Expenditures:
Training the army for the mission, transferring existing army camps
from the Gaza strip to a new location, purchase of new equipment to
maintain the area’s security – 5.5 billion NIS.
Total Budgetary Cost:
Approximately 12.9 billion NIS. However it is clear that including
the additions to that sum the total cost will be approximately 27.4
billion NIS.
According to this precedent, one can
conclude that the next ethnic cleansing plan, in whose context all
of the Jews residing beyond the cease fire line that was in effect
until June 5, 1967, in other words, 512,000 people, will reach the
fantastic cost of close to three-hundred billion dollars.
This sum – almost three times the
entire annual product of the State of Israel – if it were to be
paid, would bring the Israeli economy crashing down.
back to
top
The Settlers: A
Presentation of Anti-Semitic Abuse
Shmuel Fischer
This article is a collection of anti-Semitic
slanderous publications, the minority of which appeared in the
Israeli media over the past 20 years; however most of them appeared
in the period preceding the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Gaza
Strip and northern Samaria, in the course of its implementation and
thereafter (January-August 2005).
The slanderous publications appeared in the
framework of news surveys and reports, in articles and commentary
pieces and as quotes from politicians, artists and intellectuals,
academics, senior officers, journalists and others. The article also
documents the testimonies of opponents of the “disengagement”
regarding manifestations of violence, humiliation, arbitrary
detention, false arrests, abuse and blatant violations of human and
civil rights. These actions performed by the governmental
authorities in Israel (police, army, justice system) vis-à-vis
citizens seeking to democratically and legitimately express opinions
contrary to the official policy of their government would have fit
in very well in the harshest dictatorships in Third World countries.
The article proves that these actions are the
result of a deliberate policy, supported by the media, whose
objective was to bring about the de-legitimization of the entire
settler community in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip and of their
supporters within the “Green Line”.
The government seeks to achieve this objective
by means of mobilizing the media to a campaign of provocation,
hatred and incitement against an entire community of citizens of the
State of Israel who maintain and fulfill in practice the values of
genuine Zionism. Most even “add insult to injury” and are
national-religious Zionists who maintain and fulfill a Jewish way of
life and believe that the land of Israel belongs to the Jewish
people.
To demonstrate the hatred and incitement, below
are several quotes:
“Only one who is willing to attack Ofra with
tanks, will be able to stem the tide of fascism threatening to
drown Israeli democracy”.
Professor Zev
Sternhal, Davar, April 5, 1988
“A gang of armed gangsters, criminals against
humanity, sadists, perpetrators of pogroms and murderers.”
Amos Oz, “In the Name
of Life and Peace”, Yediot Aharonot, June 8, 1989
“The knitted skullcaps for me are like the
swastika on the sleeves of the Nazi soldiers.”
General (res.) Shlomo
Gazit, Yediot Aharonot, March 8, 1998
“We will break the settlers’ bones.
Clearly, we are on the brink of an insurrection”, Sharon's
confidants said to Maariv commentator Ben Caspit. “There is
no alternative...we will have to implement force...Yes, break
their bones.”
Confidants of the
Prime Minister, Maariv, January 7, 2005
“Give them a beating, let them burn...You
know that I am an expert regarding these
ultra-orthodox...Therefore I tell you, arrests...I will screw
their mother, now tell your people...don't just beat them...I said
these things to save you the trouble of getting permits!”
Deputy Commissioner
Niso Shaham, Yediot Aharonot, July 22, 2005
back to
top
Behind the Scenes of Arab Politics
During the War of Independence
Yitzhak Ronen
On November 24, 1947, the
UN Security Council adopted the Partition Resolution calling for the
establishment of two independent states in the Land of Israel: One
Arab and one Jewish. King Abdullah of Jordan, more than any of the
other Arab leaders, wanted to go to war in the Land of Israel,
because he viewed the Partition Resolution as his first opportunity
to realize the “Greater Syria” plan, in other words, annexation of
the Land of Israel, Lebanon and Syria to Jordan under his rule. Out
of concern lest the plan be realized, the Arab League decided in
1947 to establish an irregular Arab army known as the Arab
Liberation Army for Palestine under the command of Fawzi al-Qawuqji.
The Arab leaders hoped that the irregular army would defeat the Jews
and they would thereby avoid the necessity of sending their own
regular armies to war. They knew that if the Arab Legion – known as
the best Arab army – was to take part in the war, Abdullah would be
able to actualize his plan quite easily.
However, the Liberation
Army failed in its attacks against Jewish settlements, and in its
terrorist attacks against Jews. And the pressure from the Arab
public on the Arab leaders to invade the Land of Israel increased.
The only matter upon which they agreed in early May 1948, was to
concentrate their troops on the border of the Land of Israel. That
step seemed more designed as a threat to the Jews and the UN than an
expression of their serious intentions to go to war in the Land of
Israel. King Abdullah was the only Arab leader who continued to
declare his intention to fight and also make preparations to do so.
Abdullah’s declarations and actions frightened the Arab leaders
until ultimately, it led them to make the decision to invade the
Land of Israel. It appears that the leaders’ intention was more to
prevent Abdullah from realizing his plan than to assist the Arabs in
the Land of Israel in their war against the Jews.
back to
top
The Crusaders Kingdom of Jerusalem and Israel
Moshe Yegar
One of the most
often used lines of Arab anti-Israel propaganda is the comparison
they like to make between the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem and the
modern State of Israel. The Crusader Kingdom existed less than 200
years before it was destroyed by the Muslims; so, too, will be the
end of Israel, claim Arab spokesmen.
Official
Israeli spokesmen, as well as historians and Zionist academicians,
used to dismiss the Arab claims as irrelevant and devoid of any
historical substance. “There is no room to compare,” so they said,
between
the Crusaders, who were a religious-Christian movement, whose main
purpose was the claiming of the “Holy Sepulcher” from the heretic
Muslims, and Zionism, which is the national liberation movement of
the Jews who returned to their original and natural homeland.
Zionism is a completely different historical phenomenon.
Yet, 100 years
after the beginning of modern Zionist resettlement of the Land of
Israel, one might distinguish a few disturbing points of comparison.
The first, is the failure of the Crusaders to establish their rule
on the mountainous regions of Judea and Samaria. Their territorial
conquests were concentrated, with some exceptions, mainly along the
coastal region. Israel is facing a similar situation which is the
result of her own doing. Israel handed over the Sinai, abandoned
South Lebanon and Gaza and refused to incorporate Judea and Samaria.
The Muslims
never accepted the presence of the Christians in the Holy Land;
neither do they recognize Israel’s existence today. Many Israeli
politicians, especially those of the left, prefer to ignore it.
The Muslims
maintained a constant war against the Crusaders, in spite of
sporadic periods of ceasefire or peace. So do the Arabs against
Israel.
There are
historians who believe that the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem
collapsed more because of internal malaise: ideological weakness,
corruption and lack of integrity among the ruling elite, political
intrigues, disloyalty, absence of unity, and defeatism. Israel must
stand guard not to suffer from the same inflictions.
back to
top
Understanding the “Official Mind” of Whitehall
and the State Department
on the Necessity for Israel
Christopher Barder
For the complete text of this article
(in English), click
here.
So-called
intellectual history is often perceived to be a discipline somewhat
isolated from the realities behind diplomacy. However, very
frequently, it provides essential keys by which to interpret and
explain the prevalent thought-worlds of diplomatic and intelligence
personnel. The mind-set of officials creates the advice given to
governments. It is these ways of thinking which I would seek to
fathom and expose. The intrinsic purpose is to show and demonstrate
how Israel’s experts are truly up against a wall of incomprehension
with deep roots and whose foundations they must understand in order
to be effective. They will otherwise never quite comprehend the
degree of inculcated antipathy towards Israel’s case and right to
defend itself – and so, ultimately, its right to exist.
The mood that
stalks the corridors of power, Lord Chalfont’s “Laurentian Arabism”
for example, needs effective and serious think-tank and university
level argument against it, a shattering of the monopoly of Middle
East Studies by Muslims and, very sadly, rational and determined
assertion from Israeli and similarly understanding academics,
explaining the centrality of Islamic attitudes and the core issues
of the conflict the Muslim world has with Israel and with the West.
It is clear that for Israel to have interlocutors, there must be a
grasp of why a dialogue of the deaf prevails and has been so
pronounced. Israel and its supporters need a very sophisticated
grasp of what training and intellectual baggage informs the advisers
in Whitehall and the State Department, if they are to engage with
these people successfully.
What creates
the thinking in the corridors of Whitehall and behind State
Department power and their collective history of ideas? What the
forces are matters and in spite of past failures, Israel and its
friends now have to undo the prejudice and antipathy by
understanding afresh their deep roots and educational causes.
back to
top
Machiavelli and
the Decay of Western Civilization
Paul Eidelberg
For the complete text of this article
(in English), click
here.
Machiavelli is the father
of Modernity and Democracy and the creator of Secular Man par
excellence. His deceptively simple book, The Prince, so often
trivialized, marks the Copernican revolution in politics. In that
sibylline work, Machiavelli undertook the world-historical task of
destroying nothing less than the two pillars of Western
civilization, classical Greek philosophy and Christianity, whose
ethics, whether derived from Nature or nature’s God, derogate from
the complete autonomy of human will and desire.
The key to modernity will
be found in Chapter 15 of The Prince. There Machiavelli lists
ten pairs of qualities for which men, especially rulers, are praised
or blamed – qualities which a ruler, “if he wishes to maintain
himself”, must be able to “use” and “not use” “according to
necessity.” Some rulers, he declares, “are held liberal, some
miserly … [and/or] rapacious; some cruel, others full of pity; the
one faithless, the other faithful; the one effeminate and
pusillanimous, the other fierce and spirited; the one human, the
other proud; the one lascivious, the other chaste; the one open, the
other cunning; the one hard, the other easy; the one grave, the
other light; the one religious, the other skeptical, and the like.”
Conspicuous by their
absence are the four cardinal virtues of Greek philosophy: wisdom,
justice, moderation, and courage. Further, to complete his
Copernican revolution, Machiavelli reverses the Decalogue by placing
religion last in the list of qualities for which rulers are praised.
In developing his new
political science, Machiavelli, in direct opposition to the biblical
tradition, which exalts truth and truthfulness, teaches would-be
rulers to practice deceit and dissimulation constantly: “A prince
ought to take great care...that he appears to be, when one sees and
hears him, all pity, all faith, all integrity, all humanity, and all
religion... For men, universally, judge more by the eyes than by the
hands... Everyone sees what you seem to be, but few touch what you
are.”
We have here a politics
keyed to the sense of touch, the most dynamic and erotic of the
senses. For unlike sight and hearing – passive receptors of the
written and spoken word – the sense of touch, especially in the
hands, connects to the will – the will to power.
Finally, in opposition to
all previous philosophers, Machiavelli posits democracy as the best
regime. As Machiavelli well knew, however, the idea that democracy
is the best regime is simply a manifestation of his own will to
power, his creating a new dispensation for mankind. The great
Florentine well understood that democracy, the seedbed of Secular
Man, would dissolve the moral foundations of Christianity and
classical Greek philosophy and thereby fulfill his world-historical
project.
back to
top
|