By Alan Caruba
New Jersey –-(Ammoland.com)- The Israelis are ready to go to war even if the United States is not.
The news out of the Middle East reflects how President Obama’s policies have led to an Islamic terrorist takeover of huge swaths of Syria and Iraq.
No nation watches these events more closely than Israel. On June 6 2014 the chief of the Israeli Defense Forces, Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz cryptically remarked that the IDF is gearing up to address the growing numbers of terrorist forces on its border with Syria. He noted Iraq as well for good measure.
When Israel is in the news, it is usually because it is under attack or responding to one. The only other times have been news of “peace talks” between it and the Palestinian Authority (PA), but none of those talks over decades has ever achieved peace because, as the diplomatic community knows, the Palestinians do not want it.
Most recently, the PA announced “unity” with Hamas, a Palestinian organization that all nations identify as terrorist. As Efraim Inbar, the director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies and a fellow of the Middle East Forum, recently noted, “As long as the military branch of Hamas remains independent, there is no Palestinian unity.”
Why the PA would engage in this charade is known only to them. There are no advantages in it because they do not gain any presence in the Gaza Strip, the home to Hamas. As far as the U.S. and Europe are concerned, says Inbar, “the establishment of a real, stable Palestinian state (is) more unlikely than ever.” Hamas has already asserted itself by kidnapping three teenagers, one of whom is an American
Though most U.S. taxpayers are likely unaware of it, the U.S. gives an estimated $440 million in aid to the PA every year. They are not likely to be pleased now that the PA has entered into some form of unity with Hamas. Official State Department statements referred to something they called “an interim technocratic government…that does not include members affiliated with Hamas” and made it known the U.S. expects the PA “to do everything in its power to prevent attacks from Gaza.” A European Union spokesman said it would insist that the new government recognize Israel’s right to exist. That will not happen.
Israel’s initial response was to announce plans to build 1,500 new housing units in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, making it clear the decision was its retaliation for the creation of the Palestinian unity government with Hamas. Israel made it known it might withhold the taxes it collects on behalf of the PA. This is well short of a shooting war and, of course, the U.S. ambassador to Israel repeated the Obama administration’s longtime opposition to new settlement construction.
What exists at this point—and has for a long time—is an Israel that is an oasis of sanity in the Middle East in contrast to the conflicts occurring in the region’s other nations.
Syria is now entering its fourth year of civil war and Israel took notice that a small Hezbollah force took up position on June 5 on the Syrian side of the Quneitra crossing directly opposite the Israeli Defense Force Golan deployment. It was the first known instance of such an occurrence and will likely precede a larger force because the al Assad regime attaches a high strategic importance to the town.
Lebanon, also to the north, has not been a source of conflict for many years and is controlled these days by Hezbollah. The U.S. designates it as a terrorist organization. Jordan to its east has felt the brunt of the Syrian civil war, having to absorb thousands of refugees as has Lebanon and as the fanatical forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) continues its takeover of Iraq, Jordan has to know it is in its sights for takeover. Israel is not likely to allow that to occur. It would put ISIS on its doorstep.
To the West, Egypt has been working its way through the “Arab Spring”, having just elected a new president, a former general, but one waging war against Hamas terrorists in its Sinai region while continuing to crack down on the Muslim Brotherhood domestically.
Israel has long since abandoned any notion that the Obama administration is to be trusted. As Anne Bayefsky, director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, recently noted, the administration’s foreign policy decisions have “deliberately driven a wedge between Obama and Israel. President Obama’s priority is, and always has been, the Muslim world.”
The recent exchange of five high ranked Taliban leaders, set free from Guantanamo, for a single American soldier who is identified as a deserter suggests that Obama’s attitude and actions pose as great a problem for the U.S. as it does for Afghanistan and the entire Middle East.
Israel’s primary “existential” threat is a nuclear-armed Iran and, should the day arrive that Israel wants to stop that from occurring, it will take action just as it did in Iraq and Syria in past times.
Meanwhile, Mideast nations such as Saudi Arabia no longer trust the Obama administration any more than does Israel and some have been engaging in outreach to Iran, knowing that the current U.S. negotiations were doomed to failure from the start.
Israel is the only stable nation amidst the pandemonium that is the Middle East and it will defend itself.
c Alan Caruba
About:
Alan Caruba’s commentaries are posted daily at “Warning Signs” his popular blog and thereafter on dozens of other websites and blogs. If you love to read, visit his monthly report on new books at Bookviews.
Keepin’ em honest. Thanks for the post/link.
Why isn’t Ammoland.com posting Caruba’s June 19th article “The EPA is America’s Other Enemy.” Afraid to make Global Warming alarmist, land-grabber TRCP upset? Hmmmmm…?
@BillyBob Check yourself before you wreck yourself: https://www.ammoland.com/2014/06/the-epa-is-americas-other-enemy/
Well, I do have a full knowledge of Israel and have no problem with their history or existence. The formation of the country goes–back to WWII when one of the researchers of the A-Bomb,Leo Szilard made a deal with the Bits for his further help with the first bomb for establishment of Israel. BUT, Israel is NOT our friend, we are theirs. We send them a ton of money every year, and make special commerce for their products above even our own products when coming into the U.S. They have militarily attacked us before and have NEVER supported us in… Read more »
@TSgt B amazingly well said. I agree with you there is so much land that IF the other middle eastern countries really wanted to create a PA they could easily donate land like Great Britain did for Israel but the truth is they don’t WANT to and as long as Israel is around it will have the support of the US and besides it has one of the finest defense forces on the planet man for man far better then even ours here in the USA. Every person in Israel must serve in the military when they become of age… Read more »
It is quite obvious that many of the previous posters have very little, if any, knowledge of the Plight of the Jewish people. They have been on the bullseye for most of recorded history. The State of Israel was commissioned by the U.N., back when the U. N. had at least some valid, limited reason to exist. As Israel was formed through a concensus of the majority of Earth’s nations, it has EVERY RIGHT TO EXIST, and to take whatever action(s) is/are necessary for its survival. If the entire Arab world were in fact seriously concerned about the humanitarian situation… Read more »
“Kill them all, let God sort it out!”
–Pope Innocent III. GOOD IDEA!
Go to war??? Israel is THE ONLY NUCLEAR POWER IN THE ENTIRE MIDDLE EAST. They have a larger nuclear arsenal than some of the permanent members of the U.N. And, they have intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear submarines capable of launching thermo-nuclear weapons that can hit any place on the planet and God only knows what else.
If they want a war, let them have a war—-without us!
Israel wants our approval to keep the substantial number of nations who wish Israel gone and most jews killed at bay.
Someone needs to put forth a bill proposing that Israel become the 51st state of the union—thereby subjecting them to the rulers in Washington DC on the one side, and the restraints of the Constitution on the other. Think they’d go for that?
btw, to answer your question—it’s because they aren’t ACTUALLY being threatened the way they claim (and have been claiming for the last 20 years, w/ regard to Iranian nuclear program). Because they’re not under threat, they can just continue to whine and see if they can get yet another freebie from their western “ally.” Parasites…
One thing about Israel I’ve never understood is this ! Why do they always have to have the US stamp of approval when they feel threatened or want to go to war. It’s like they want it to be a joint US/Israeli effort against their enemies ! Israel does absolutely nothing for the United States at all except take billions of dollars annually in aid. If they have a “perceived” threat take care of it and send us a bill !