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5763: Articles posted from September 2002-September 2003
Get the real situation in Israel every day.
Yesh T'Guva:
NO MOMENT - NO MAN
by Paul Usiskin
January 1, 2003
Troubled times. New leaders sought. Never in the history of the
Israel-Palestine conflict has the need for the synergy of the moment and the
man been more desperately needed, and never less likely are the fates to
conspire to bring either the moment and the man together.
With all the machinations of Israeli politics - which in pre-state days
established a proud tradition of robust democracy - a further and much
uglier conspiracy has emerged - in which the primaries of the party in the
ascendant, the Likud, have been revealed as the scene of a money-for-votes
scandal. At the very least the electorate should deprive Likud of many more
than 5 of its predicted 35 seats for harbouring such vipers and betraying
the nation's trust at this most testing of times. At best the Prime
Minister, also Likud party leader, ought to declare the Likud unfit to
participate in the elections, until a root and branch investigation has been
completed and the vote mongers, amongst them underworld personalities, and
purchasers have been turfed out. Firing a Cabinet Minister for her silence
in the whole affair isn't sufficient.
On the other side of the unfinished security fence the Palestinians have
announced that they cannot and will not hold their elections - planned for
almost the same time as Israel's - whilst they are under occupation. A
ballot held "without let or hindrance" is impossible next month as long as
the IDF is in continued stranglehold - not mere occupation. And for those
who've forgotten why the IDF is where it is, it is there to stop terror
attacks which keep happening nonetheless.
Hebrew has a graphic phrase for something that was supposed to be there and
wasn't - "lo dubim ve lo ya'ar" - "no bears and no forest." And he who
maintains that ultimately there will be a Palestinian state and that to
reach it he is ready for "painful concessions" has produced neither the
"bears" nor "the forest" but a lot of pain. And yet to woo the centre whose
votes are always the main prize in any election, Arik has become "Koba" the
bear, the way Stalin was to Soviet Russia - the big warm cuddly teddy, the
nation's grandfather. He's projecting this image to win enough votes to
soften the hard right who dominate the Likud list. So he announces he's
ready for political initiatives after the election, though what these will
be, Saba Sharon isn't saying.
The last person I heard use "Stalinist" as an epithet for an Israeli Prime
Minister was Baruch Marzel talking about Yitzhak Rabin. Marzel was large and
grizzley, sitting in his cramped caravan in Tel Rumeida above Hebron in
1995. He'd been under prolonged house arrest on suspicion of masterminding a
series of Jewish terror attacks against Palestinians. He was, with Baruch
Goldstein, a member of Kach the extremist party and a protégé of its founder
Meir Kahane. A slimmed down Marzel is number two on the Herut party list and
likely to get elected on January 28th despite protests. No one is convinced
that though Kach is outlawed, it doesn't exist today and that Marzel heads
it. Those who lead the protesters include Israel's Attorney General and the
chair of the Central Elections Committee (CEC). But those on the CEC who
think Marzel is either a reformed character or are prepared to close blind
eyes to his past record include the Likud, Yisrael B'Aliyah and the National
Religious Party amongst whom are a goodly number who support "transfer" as
an option for solving the "Palestinian problem".
And just when you thought things couldn't get worse along come reports of
al-Qaeda connections to Gazan based terror operations. However flimsy the
link may be, it blurs the line between Palestinian and international terror
and makes "our terrorists" and "your terrorists" identical. It also creates
a greater justification for using the military option against the
Palestinians. Those "painful concessions" will just have to wait again.
"Let there be Light! Said God, and there was light. Let there be Blood! said
man, and there's a sea!" wrote Byron. It is hard to predict what will happen
in the months after this Israeli general election. For those clinging to
hopes of peace, the key isn't a Mitzna lead Labour victory so much as a
Sharon-lead right of centre slim majority government that won't last. It is
the party list that counts. Like Sharon, Mitzna too has a right of centre
dominated list which he needs to out-manoeuvre so he can leap frog those who
want to go back to Saba Sharon's warm embrace in another coalition
government. Mitzna must break the contradiction that pervades Israel -
majority support for Sharon and for the peace camp's twin planks : giving up
most or all of the settlements and a negotiated two state solution And he
needs help from the Palestinians to keep Labour away from Sharon's clutches
and that Labour hechsher - kosher tag - for more of the same in the
territories.
That elusive Palestinian unilateral cease fire is vital especially if it can
then be linked to a new political/peace process. And not only for Israelis
who still maintain they've no partner for peace. Whoever forges the cease
fire - even with Arafat's tacit approval - earns himself a big slab of
support in nascent Palestine - another much sought-after man working towards
that precious moment.
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