The Pianist (Part I)

On its surface, The Pianist is "merely" the true tale of a great Jewish musician (Wladyslaw Szpilman) caught up in the unfathomable depths of Nazi occupation and terror. More profoundly, of course, it is a disturbing visual microcosm of the generic human struggle between good and evil, a titanic struggle that is sometimes utterly clear, but at other times also distressingly "gray." The Nazis in Poland were monsters, to be sure, but what are we to say about the others, including many Jews, who became actual and collaborative perpetrators in every corner of the Holocaust Kingdom? What pertinent lessons can we learn from this 2002 film for Jewish, and especially Israeli, preservation in our own perilous time?

Israel’s Proposed Assassination Of Sheik Yassin: Targeted Killings Of Terrorist Leaders According To International...

According to Zeev Boim, Israeli Deputy Minister of Defense, Israel plans to target Sheik Ahmed Yassin, founder of the deadly Hamas terror group. Boim authoritatively cites numerous acts of barbarism authorized by Yassin, with particular reference to Yassin's recent religious ruling allowing women to become suicide bombers.

Justice And Jewish Slavery: Daimler-Chrysler’s Final And Inevitable Collapse

On its face, it would surely be foolish to blame Daimler-Chrysler's extraordinary woes on the very dark history of Daimler-Benz. On its face, the combined company's deep decline is manifestly a function of bad economic judgments. After all, from the very start, the 1998 decision by Germany's Daimler-Benz to merge with Chrysler simply made no financial sense.

Global Denuclearization And Israel’s Survival (Second of Four Parts)

As only a distinctly last resort, Israel needs nuclear weapons for nuclear war fighting.

Disengaging Reason: Building ‘Palestine’ Upon The Ruins Of Israel (Second Of Two Parts)

Make no mistake, Israel is despised by the Palestinian populations because it is Jewish - not the other way around. In fact, Israel's unceasing pattern of capitulation to Arab terror elicits even greater Palestinian loathing, as such surrender behavior merely confirms the prevailing Islamic view of the Jew as coward.

On The Difference Between Murderers And Freedom Fighters

Moments after the latest bus bombing in Jerusalem this morning (January 29th), the group claiming responsibility, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, identified its action as an expression of "freedom fighting."

Project Daniel: Israel’s Strategic Future (Part One)

Some years ago, in conversations with then Israeli Ambassador Zalman Shoval, I urged the creation of a special "brain trust" to examine Israel's increas­ingly precarious security situation. The main objective, related to Ambassador Shoval, would be to assemble a uniquely capable cadre of strategic thinkers who would be free from the various constraints that normally burden both academic and military planners. The Ambassador agreed fully, but for one reason or another, the idea never got off the ground at that time.

Acknowledging National Mortality: Israel’s Ironic Imperative

Jorge Luis Borges, the very special Argentine writer and philosopher, sometimes quite happily identified himself as a sort of Jew. Although lacking any apparent basis in halacha, he nonetheless felt himself to be a deeply kindred spirit: "Many a time I think of myself as a Jew," he is quoted in Willis Barnstone's Borges at Eighty: Conversations (1982), "but I wonder whether I have the right to think so. It may be wishful thinking."

Five Years After Project Daniel… Our Strategic Recommendations to Israel Remain Valid (Part VI)

Looking back over the original recommendations of Project Daniel, The Group concerned itself with, inter alia, the need for an expanded policy of preemption; an ongoing re-evaluation of "nuclear ambiguity";

Justifying Israeli Preemption Against Iran Under International Law

The following article by Professor Beres and Colonel (Israel Defense Forces) Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto was originally published in the April 18, 2007 issue of The Jewish Press. Its warnings and predictions concerning a nuclear Iran have been proven unassailable.

On Existential Threats And Lethal Remedies A Jurisprudential View (Part II)

Let me return very specifically topreemption, in counter-terrorist operations, and in national self-defense against existential threats from other states. In this regard, there are two basic considerations before us here at the conference: legal and operational. Naturally, our capacity to succeed on both dimensions at the same time will sometimes be problematic. Moreover, there are potentially important trade-offs, and also interactions or synergies between the legal and the operational considerations that should be better understood.

How And Why America’s Christians Must Care For Israel (First Of Two Parts)

The Land and People of Israel are now in great peril. Day after day, hour after hour - almost minute by minute - Jewish men, women and children are fiendishly murdered by Arab terrorists.

A Strategic Imperative: Maintaining Israel’s Pax Atomica In The Islamic Middle East (Part I)

Si vis pacem, para bellum atomicum. "If you want peace, prepare for atomic war." However reluctantly, this must be Israel's overriding strategic mantra in the years ahead. This is not because a nuclear war is especially likely, but rather because Israel's nuclear deterrent will remain indispensable for the prevention of large-scale conventional conflict.

Political Scandal, Public Emptiness And America’s Soul

We have seen this movie before. Already, Herman Cain is off the front pages, but there will remain readily accessible political scandals to enjoy in the wings. Ironically, whatever the particulars of these chronic humiliations, all of them will commonly disclose far more serious shortcomings about their "audience" than about their subjects.

‘The Horror…The Horror’: Facing Nuclear War In The Middle East (Conclusion)

'Faced with imminent and existential attacks, Israel − properly taking its cue from The National Security Strategy of the United States of America − could decide to preempt enemy aggression with conventional forces.

The Pianist And ‘Palestine’ (Second of Two Parts)

In strategy and law, war, terrorism and genocide are not mutually exclusive. Now, following the “Arab Spring,” even as the usual suspects maintain their explicitly genocidal threats against Israel, certain “progressive” Jews proudly lead various rallies and publications for "peace” and “democracy” in the Middle East. Such “progress,” we might learn from Roman Polanski’s film “The Pianist,” could only be fashioned upon yet another generation of Jewish corpses.

Project Daniel: Why Israel’s Enemies Must Never Be Allowed Nuclear Weapons (Part Two)

Israel holds nuclear weapons for only one purpose: To prevent catastrophic destruction of the Jewish state by enemy state aggression. It is altogether inconceivable that Israel would ever resort to such weapons as an initial move of war

Israel Still Marching Toward Disappearance

Technically, the Lebanon war against Hizbullah is over. In fact, however, Israel remains starkly vulnerable to further rocket attacks, and - even more ominously - to a still-nuclearizing Iran. Making matters worse, Prime Minister Olmert has yet to openly change course from his indisputably catastrophic plan for "realignment" and "convergence."

Project Daniel: The Existential Threat To Israel (Part Seven)

My previous column in the Project Daniel series dealt with Israel's survival problem in a world of increasing chaos and anarchy. Recalling apt images of the Irish poet Yeats, of a world wherein "the blood-dimmed tide is loosed," and where "the ceremony of innocence is drowned," we must now quickly acknowledge that certain current threats to Israel are profoundly existential.

Hammering The Last Nail In Israel’s Coffin: IAEA Chief Still Urging A Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone...

Repeatedly, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Chief Mohammed al-Baradei has urged Israel to accept nuclear disarmament and join a Middle East "nuclear-weapon-free zone." Although this official proposal sounds perfectly reasonable and even-handed in principle, it would, in fact, lead quickly to Israel's final demise. Still surrounded by states and terror groups openly committed to its annihilation, Israel must soon remind the world, that it has an absolutely fundamental right of self-preservation.

Palestine, More Of A Threat To Israel Than The Uprising (Part II)

The following article appears exactly as it was written by Professor Beres 21 years ago. It is especially important to reconsider at this moment when U.S. President Barack Obama, still-embracing the so-called Road Map, pushes Israel to accept a Palestinian state via the five-part Mitchell Plan.

Israel’s Nuclear Ambiguity: Opportunity Or Liability? (Part I)

Worldwide, it is generally assumed that Israel's nuclear policy of deliberate ambiguity makes good sense. Everyone already knows that Israel has "the Bomb." So, why "stir the pot" by retreating from "opacity?"

Living Amid Absurdity: Israel As Tragic Hero (Part One)

True life, it seems, can never be brought purposefully before the judgment seat of Reason. Much as we might wish it were otherwise, absurd narratives now best mirror the deteriorating situation of life on earth. Still living an elaborate pantomime of right and wrong, justice and punishment, we humans desperately want the unfolding world-drama to develop with both fairness and sensibility. Generally, we witness something quite different.

Prosecute Saddam For Crime Of Aggression Against Israel

One of the most elementary principles of law is known as Nullum Crimen Sine Poena: "No crime without a punishment." Stemming from at least three separate passages of the Torah (Exod. 21:22-25; Lev. 24:17-21; Deut. 19:19-21), the Lex Talionis or "law of exact retaliation" was absolutely integral to the Nuremberg Trial and judgment.

On ‘Disengagement’ And Disobedience (Second Of Two Parts)

Can the Sharon government protect Israel's citizens? Clearly, "disengagement" will open the door widely to "Palestine." In consequence, once deprived of its remaining strategic depth, Israel will become an irresistibly tempting object for aggression by certain enemy states.

The Lawfulness Of Israel’s Use Of Force Against Terrorist Bases In Lebanon

International law is not a suicide pact. Israel's distinctly measured use of force against terrorist bases in Lebanon is entirely consistent with international law. Although some would mistakenly contend that Israel's essential actions express "aggression," the incontestable right of individual self-defense is plainly codified in Article 51 of the United Nations Charter. Indeed, by persistently allowing its territory to be used as a base of terrorist operations against Israel, it is Lebanon that is in flagrant violation of the charter.

Bibi And The Iranian Bomb: Reconsidering Israel’s Policy Of Nuclear Ambiguity

Until now, the strategic issue of Israel's nuclear ambiguity - the so-called "bomb in the basement" - has been kept squarely on the back burner. Today, however, time is quickly running out for the Jewish State, and Israel's new/old prime minister absolutely must reconsider this burning issue. From the standpoint of urgency, of course, the immediate problem is Iran.

For America’s Sake, President Barack Obama Should Oppose A Palestinian State

The George W. Bush years are now behind us. But Barack Obama, while still waging an American war on terror, will almost certainly remain committed to a so-called "Two-State Solution" in the Middle East.

Changes Ahead? American Nuclear Policy And Israeli Strategic Doctrine (Part II)

Fourth, the Obama anti-nuclear vision does not provide any useful guidance on how to deal with those refractory states and sub-states that may not be subject to ordinary deterrent threats. This brings to mind the perplexing security problem of prospective enemy irrationality.

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