Jul 12

As a Jew-loving liberal I must say that David Greenberg’s recent piece in Slate on Yale’s center for the study of anti-Semitism struck me as abstract, and one-sided–yet I took it personally. When I quit my kvetching, I decided that Greenberg’s usually capacious historical vision had failed to capture the reality of anti-Semitism in the city where I live, Washington DC.

The piece evokes anti-Semitism as a threat to the Jewish community worldwide, particularly as articulated by Islamic fundamentalists, including the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Some liberals, he says, are faint of heart when it comes to talking about this. Greenberg (a former colleague at the New Republic in the mid-1980s) asks:  “How did liberalism—historically the philosophy of toleration and equal rights—come to be so squeamish about confronting Jew-hatred in its contemporary forms?

Here’s how:

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Jun 29

Is hope losing out to fear in the Middle East?

The phrase “the Arab Spring” self-consciously echoes of the Prague Spring  which referred to the rapid flowering of the political culture of Czechoslovakia in early 1968 from orthodox communism to inchoate dreams of “socialism with a human face.” The Prague Spring was then crushed by the Soviet invasion of August 1968. The revolutionary emergence of humanistic hope lead directly to militaristic retaliation of reactionary fear.

And right now, the Middle East’s two most militaristic and ideologically aggressive governments–Iran and Israel–have more to fear than they did six months ago. Neither is an Arab country, which gives them even more reason to worry.

Israel has lost its best friend in the neighbhorhood, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who was willing served as the warden of the jail known as Gaza.  Israel’s strongest enemy, Iran, will soon restore diplomatic relations with Egypt. And Israel’s suffocation of Arab political rights seems no more attractive or tenable or inevitable than Mubarak’s.

Iranian missile test

Nervous Iran tests its missiles

Meanwhile, Iran has to worry too. The Islamic Republic crushed the abortive Green revolution of 2009, only to see the popular demands for accountable, participatory government spread across the region two years later. Not coincidentally, the Iranian government itself is wracked by another power struggle, this one between  President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and Spiritual Leader Ayatollah Khameni, suggesting that dissatisfaction with the country’s theocracy has spread from liberal reformists to conservative populists. And Iran’s closest Arab ally, Syria, is trying to stave off a popular uprising that might turn into an armed rebellion.

Iran and Israel have long waged a war on words, and perhaps now is no different. Israel talks loudly about stopping the next international humanitarian flotilla to Gaza and fears Iran’s nuclear ambitions while Iran denounces another Western intervention in the region and  flaunts the big stick of its new ballistic missiles that is boasts can hit Israel.

But with two militarized governments feeling defensive and fearing emboldened democratic populations whose very existence is unprecedented and threatening,  the prospects for miscalculation, if not war, seem barely concealed.

“Our message in this drill is that our strategy is defensive, but our tactics are aggressive,” said an Iranian general on Monday.

“Iran’s tentacles extend to all those who are working against Israel,” said a top former Israeli intelligence official on Tuesday.  “In the next confrontation there is a likelihood that more than one front may erupt, and Tel Aviv will be turned into the front lines.”

It doesn’t sound good.

Jun 28

The Daily Star in Beirut on how Hezbollah and Israel are preparing for their next war.

Given the difficulties of recruiting agents within the party, Israel relies heavily on technology to peer beneath Hezbollah’s veil. These technologies vary from the ubiquitous reconnaissance flights of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, or drones, to wire taps and surveillance devices incorporating long-range cameras which can transmit data via short-burst transmissions.

Hezbollah also relies not only on its ever-watchful cadres for its security, but upon the extraordinarily sophisticated signals intelligence and electronic warfare assets it currently possesses.

Its a matter of when, not if.

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Mar 28

Like President Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s Barack Obama leads passively, says Ron Brownstein in National Journal. He seems to believe words cannot speak louder than actions.

A common thread throughout Obama’s responses has been his belief that the U.S. image across the region is so toxic that it could undermine the change it seeks by embracing it too closely.

Prudence means deference to actors close to the scene.

“In Egypt, Obama deferred to local protesters; in Libya, he allowed France and England to drive the international debate toward military intervention—and only publicly joined them once the Arab League had signed on. By stepping back, Obama has effectively denied the region’s autocrats the opportunity to discredit indigenous demands for change as a U.S. plot.”

The downside of caution: “Delay, mixed messages, and his unilateral renunciation of the weapon of ringing rhetorical inspiration,” says Brownstein. “There’s been no Kennedyesque ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’ moment for Obama.”

Which may also be a good thing. Brownstein is referring to a famous speech JFK made in Germany in June 1963 –in which he proclaimed in German, “I am a Berliner too.” As the Western half of the city resisted the Soviet Union’s efforts to impose a blockade, JFK expressed his simple human solidarity. Words worked because they spoke to a stalemate in the world’s thinking and defined an alternative, as only words could.

The democratization of the Arab world is the antithesis of mental stasis, an almost physical transformation in popular thinking about political participation whose ultimate political forms are just beginning to take shape. Eloquence from Washington at this moment might be formative. It was equally likely to be received as empty or arrogant. To the extent, Obama could wax idealistic, he would be called hypocritical. Words might be inspiring. They might be premature. They might be meaningless. Obama’s reticence is a sign of respect.

Which is not to say that presidential eloquence might not help some time soon

If and when Egypt holds elections this August, the reality of the country’s transition to democracy and its implications for peace in Israel/Palestine, will require U.S. response. Obama will have to confront the stalemate of the Israeli occupation and Palestinian resistance,  the irrelevance of  the two-state diplomatic dance, and the ugly reality of a wall of Occupation built to enforce racial and religious differences.

The opportunity for eloquence is obvious. Obama could go back to Cairo next fall or next year and say to the Israelis, a la Reagan to Soviets in 1987, “Tear this wall down.” But the White House staff will worry about the losing the Jewish base, while the National Security Council will counsel against setting expectations too high. Behind the scenes, AIPAC will sponsor Congressional resolutions to condemn the idea, duly approved by large congressional majorities, and the Obama’ 2012 reelection campaign’s fundraising goals will suffer. The Sunday morning experts will caution against pandering to the liberal base and the Arab Street. The birthers and loonier neoconservatives will say the very idea is proof the man is a closet Muslim.In short, Obama could pull a JFK or Reagan but only at the price of crossing the combined forces of the  Israel lobby and the right-wing noise machine, just in time for Election Day 2012. There seems slight chance of that.

Our chief executive seems most  likely to do like Ike: manage the status quo with mostly muted commentary.  Is that such a bad example? Eisenhower authored one of the most effective public rebukes of Israel ever to emanate from the White House. During the Suez Crisis of 1956, Eisenhower declined to participate in the Anglo-French-Israeli effort to snatch the Suez Canal from Egypt’s nationalist president Gamal Nasser. Such a nakedly colonialist venture did not deserve U.S. support, and it failed. Eisenhower did not make a speech. He waited for everybody to exhaust themselves and then he made a decision–and made it stick. Sometimes that’s better.

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Feb 07

The fact is, BDS is an integral part of Palestinian non-violent tactics. Quite simply, BDS is the globalization of Palestinian non-violent action against Israel’s occupation. So why do certain Jewish organizations from the United States and Israeli liberal Zionists lend rhetorical support to the joint nonviolent struggle in Sheikh Jarrah and elsewhere, while demonizing the call for BDS as borderline anti-Semitic and beyond the pale of reasonable people?

via Max Blumenthal.

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Feb 03

Should we fear the Muslim Brotherhood asks Slate?  Nah, says Shadi Hamid. The United States “can work with the country’s largest opposition group,” he writes–which is true. Even centrist Washington policy wonks agree.

But Hamid implies the U.S. can work with the banned opposition group  because Egypt’s  revolution won’t really change the country’s foreign policy–which is almost certainly not true. The sound idea that the Jewish state has little to fear from a democratic Egypt does not mean that it has nothing to lose. Israel has already lost plenty.

The real concern, Hamid writes, “is whether the Brotherhood, known for its inflammatory rhetoric against Israel and the United States, would work against U.S. regional interests.” Hamid understandable wants to quell fears of another Iran circa 1979. Egypt is not the scene of a runaway religious counterrevolution, nor is it likely to become one.

But we can be sure  the Muslim Brotherhood, as a participant in a new h will work against U.S. regional interests, as they are now defined. The Brotherhood ‘s leaders and followers have never shared Washington’s Israeli-centric vision of the region, and they’re not going to start now. The Brotherhood is not, as Glen Beck believes, a band of bloodthirsty anti-Semites aching for the chance to colonize North America. Nor are they are not going to collaborate with Washington’s defense of the Zionist state in its current expansionist mode. Both the fear and the hope are American projections.

Hamid says it is “unlikely” that the Brotherhood will attempt to cancel Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, also  true. But there’s a lot more to Egypt’s role in the Middle East than a 30-year old treaty. What Hamid’s reassuring argument glosses over is that the mainstreaming of the Brotherhood into Egyptian politics is a big setback for Israel in three ways.

The Brotherhood will not support the U.S.-Israeli-Mubarak policy of collective punishment in Gaza.  Nor will any democratic government in it participates. That is going to affect Israel’s ability to maintain its siege of Gaza, a linchpin of its strategy of keeping the Palestinian population out of Israeli territory.

A democratic Egypt will demand something more productive than the dysfunctional “peace process” between the unyielding Netanhayu regime and a discredited Palestinian Authority. We can be sure the new Egyptian dispensation, whatever it is, will support Palestinians who want to shrug off an unelected government and unwanted occupation.

And the Egyptian revolution is dissolving the U.S.-Israeli-Mubarak triangle of hostility against Iran. The Brotherhood’s alliance of convenience with secularist Muhamed ElBaradei, former U.N. nuclear inspections chief who says military strikes against Iran would be “insane,” is a leading indicator of Egyptian public opinion.  The U.S.-Israeli policy toward Iran based on the implied threats will no longer enjoy Cairo’s support.

The reality is that the Eygptian revolution undermines Israel’s policy of strategic deterrence and will continue to do so.

But wishful thinking dies hard. Another thing that will not change in the new Egypt, says Hamid, is the government’s clientelist mentality.

Any new, transitional government—which will be tasked with rebuilding a battered country—will not want to harm its relationship with Washington and risk losing billions of dollars in much-needed assistance.

The democratic Egypt, in this view, will tailor its policies toward Israel for the sake of Washington’s money, just as Mubarak did. This is may be true. But it may not be. Egypt, after all, has changed.

Feb 02

Says Israeli diplomat. Which roughly means ‘Occupation of Palestine is at risk.’

Jan 29

As U.S. steps up pressure on Egypt– Don’t ‘stand pat’ we need ‘real reform
–Israel sees the political dominoes falling into a pattern on encirclement.

Any new Egyptian government is unlikely to maintain Mubarak’s alliance with Tel Aviv in controlling Gaza. As Israeli analyst Yoni Ben-Menachem told VOA:

“This can create the domino effect, and this fall of the regime in Egypt can also continue to Jordan, and also with Jordan we have another peace treaty…. And if this will happen, if there will be a strategic change in the Middle East, that will not be for the benefit of the State of Israel.”

Note how Israeli’s much-vaunted doctrine of “deterrence,”  the attendant war crimes, and Washington’s longstanding alliances with Arab dicatatorships have finally served to isolate the Jewish state. Enormous military strength has turned profound political weakness.

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Jan 27

First Wikileaks, now the Palestine Papers. When the veil of secrecy around U.S. foreign policy is lifted, unnoticed (at least in Washington) American vulnerabilities are clarified for the reading public. That’s the message from Tunis to Cairo to Foggy Bottom.

Feeling queasy: Egyptian President for Life Hosni Mubarak: Feeling Queasy (Photo courtesy AllVoices)

Feeling queasy: Egyptian President for Life Hosni Mubarak (Photo courtesy AllVoices)

For example, U.S. diplomats have long known that Gamil Mubarak, son and heir-apparent of President for Life Hosni Mubarak, is “deeply unpopular.” But to say so publicly was considered a threat to the credibility of Cairo-Tel Aviv alliance on which U.S. Middle East diplomacy has depended since 1979. The American taxpayers were not supposed to get the memo about Gamil Mubarak. Now, thanks to Julian Assange, it sits in the inbox.

The Palestine Papers may prove even more influential on U.S. Middle East policy, at least in the short term. The reaction to the  1,700 documents, posted on Al-Jazeera, about the U.S.-Israeli-Palestinian peace talks may well depose unpopular Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and formally end the U.S.-backed “peace process” that began on the White House lawn in 1994.  The implosion of U.S. policy is just one aspect of the U.S. loss of credibility in the region. JCS chairman Mike Mullen says a Palestinian state is a “cardinal interest” of the United States. Yet the United States has never had a less credible  proposal for how to achieve one. U.S. policy is somewhere between disarray and disappeared.

As Ali Abunimah notes in the Christian Science Monitor, the Palestine Papers show that “the United States is, to put it mildly, actually rather incompetent at evaluating its own credibility among those it seeks to influence” and “completely out of touch with the grim realities it has helped create in the region and unprepared to deal with the consequences.”

As Arab civil society turns on U.S.-backed dictatorships, President Obama faces a fundamental test: Can he align the U.S. policy with Arab civil society while still preserving the special relationship with Israel? Many Israelis are assuring themselves that Egypt is not Tunisia. But  what if it is? The Angry Arab predicts the Obama administration will back President Mubarak in launching a Tianamen Square-style crackdown to disperse the burgeoning demonstrations in the street.

Feeling bolder: Egyptian reformist leader Mohamed ElBaradei (Photo courtesy of Palestinian Pundit)

Feeling bolder: Egyptian reformist leader Mohamed ElBaradei (Photo courtesy of Palestinian Pundit)

More likely, U.S. policymakers are already calculating how to cut their losses and head off the presidential candidacy of M0hamed ElBaradei, the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who so irked the Bush administration for his accurate observation that Saddam Hussein did not have nuclear weapons.

ElBaradei is a rather dour technocrat who chose a career in the global civil service rather than toil in Mubarak’s satrapy. He has shallow roots in Egyptian civil society but is the most plausible presidential possibility internationally, which makes pro-Israeli policymakers in Washington just a little bit nervous.

For what’s at stake in the streets of Cairo is not just the future of Egyptian democracy but also the future of Israeli influence on U.S. foreign policy.

Would a democratic post-Mubarak Egypt align itself with Israel to perpetuate the Gaza blockade? Mubarak did not hesitate. ElBaradei probably would, if only because of the need to bring the politically conservative, non-violent Muslim Brotherhood into a post-dictatorship government. (Hamas, the governing party of Gaza, is an offshoot of the Brotherhood. Unlike its parent organization, Hamas has not renounced violence.)

Would Egypt certainly countenance a U.S. or Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities? Mubarak probably would have. As chief of the IAEA, El Baradei made clear in 2008 that he would resign if Iran was attacked and that he thought such an attack would be unmitigated folly.

The conundrum that Washington faces is that as Mubarak gets weaker, so does Israel. That’s the new reality facing President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton, and its no longer secret.

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Jan 27

U.S. foreign policy in action: Israel creates a new refugee camp inside Israel.

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