Defenseless under the night,
Our world in stupor lies.
W. H. Auden
Part Four
Incontestably the PA/PLO − and now especially Hamas − are guilty of multiple material breaches of the basic Oslo Accords.
(Continued from last week)
There are other PA/PLO/Hamas violations of Oslo, any one of which could comprise an entire magazine article. They include unilaterally halting security cooperation with Israel, in contradiction to Art. II [2] of Annex I to the Oslo Accords; failing to coordinate movement of Palestinian police (under Art. V [6] of Annex I to Oslo 2; the movement of Palestinian policemen between Area A and Area B, or in Area C, must be coordinated in advance with Israeli security officials; detaining Israeli citizens (according to Art. XI [4d] of Annex I to the Oslo Accord: “Israelis shall under no circumstances be apprehended or placed in custody or prison by Palestinian authorities.”); failing to enforce restrictions on Visitor’s Permits (under Art. 28 [13b] of Annex III to the Oslo 2 Accords, “The Palestinian side will notify Israel of any extension”.); and constructing, without authorization, a Gaza strip seaport and the Dahaniye airport (the first − in violation of Art. XIV [4] of Annex I to the Oslo 2 Accords; the second − in violation of Art XIII [3] of Annex I to the Oslo 2 Accords).
Generally, Israeli and Arab proponents of “peace” feel that, for Israel, the Oslo agreements and Road Map represent a pretty good bargain. Ignoring the entire history of genocide against Jews that led to Israel’s statehood in the first place, they neglect to consider that this “bargain” involves nothing less than another Jewish diaspora. But there is no more indefensible component of the pro-Peace Process argument than the one that goes like this: The accommodation with the Palestinians opens the way to peace treaties with Syria and Lebanon, which, along with peace treaties already signed with Egypt and Jordan, will leave Israel in a state of peace with all its immediate neighbors for the first time. Looking at (1) the aforementioned map of Palestine (which incorporates the current State of Israel), (2) at the aforelisted PA/PLO/Hamas violations of Oslo – especially the refusal even to abrogate a codification of genocidal intent, and (3) at the unending Arab and Islamic calls for Jihad − is there any reason to believe that Israel’s enemies will now yield their overriding doctrinal and religious expectations to the diametrically opposite expectations of international law? In view of the most recent explosive events in Lebanon, shall Israel now expect a manageable “peace” with Hizbullah?
Regarding doctrinal and religious expectations, it will be instructive to consider the following hadith, an Arabic term which refers to the oral tradition by means of which sayings or deeds attributed to the Prophet Mohammed have been handed down to Muslim believers: “Verily, the word of Allah teaches us, and we implicitly believe it, that for a Muslim to kill a Jew, or for him to be killed by a Jew, ensures him an immediate entry into Heaven and into the august presence of Allah Almighty.” Indeed, have Israeli supporters of the current Road Map/Peace Process forgotten that Anwar Sadat defended his 1979 Treaty with Israel in the Arab world by identifying it as no more than a needed tactical expedient? President Sadat claimed that the Treaty was “founded upon Islamic rules, because it arises from a position of strength, after the holy war and victory Egypt achieved on 10th Ramadan 1393” (October 1973). The Treaty itself provides a legally permissible rationale for pertinent abrogation by Egypt. A minute to Article VI, paragraph 5, of the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty stipulates: “It is agreed to by the Parties that there is no assertion that this Treaty prevails over other Treaties or agreements or that other Treaties or agreements prevail over this Treaty.”
Al Da’wa (The Mission), a prominent Islamic publication, has identified the status of Israel with the status of the individual Jew. Here, as we have noted earlier about authoritative Arab/Islamic views in general, Israel is merely the Jew in macrocosm: “The race (sic) is corrupt at the root, full of duplicity, and the Muslims have everything to lose in seeking to deal with them; they must be exterminated.” Following are some earlier statements by senior PA officials, all of which were flagrantly anti-Jewish and several of which incorporated sordid anti-Jewish stereotype. They complement the earlier cited Arab/Islamic quotations about Jews and Judaism: (1) “Five Zionist Jews are running the policy of the United States in the Middle East: Madeleine Albright, William Cohen, Dennis Ross, Miller and Martin Indyk. It is not possible that the American nation, which consists of 250 million people (sic), can not find anyone other than five Zionist Jews to conduct the peace process with the Palestinians” [PA Justice Minister Freih Abu Middein, Yediot Ahronot, April 13, 1997]; (2) “We are fighting and struggling with an enemy who is Shylock. We must know that he is Shylock” [Othman Abu Gharbiya, PA Chairman Arafat’s Adviser on National Political Guidance, in a radio interview, Voice of Palestine, March 15, 1997]; (3) “The Jewish lobby is working very hard to jeopardize the process” [Former PA Chairman Yasir Arafat, in an interview, Beirut Daily Star, March 25, 1997, Agence France Presse, March 26, 1997]; (4) “Israeli authorities…infected by injection 300 Palestinian children with the HIV virus during the years of the intifada” [Palestinian representative Nabil Ramlawi at a session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva, Jerusalem Post, March 17 1997].
The theme of Palestine as the grave of Israel and of the Jews in general is a persistent motif in Arab/Islamic orientations toward Israel. Here the following claim, made by Dr. Yahya al-Rakhawi in Al-Akhbar, the organ of Egypt’s Liberal Party, as far back as July 19, 1982, is still typical: “When the State of Israel was established and was recognized by many, in both East and West, one of the reasons for this recognition was the desire of the people in the East and West to get rid of as many as possible of the representatives of that human error known as the Jews. Behind this motive was another, secret purpose: to concentrate them in one place, so that it would be easier to strike at the right moment.”
Certain of Israel’s Islamic enemies are now making preparations for just such a strike. Principal among these is the Islamic Republic of Iran. To assist in these genocidal preparations, an ongoing war of terror and attrition against the Jewish State is laying the foundations for the planned war of annihilation. Although it may no longer be possible for Israel to prevent such a war entirely, a war that would involve various unconventional weapons, the government of Israel may still diminish expected harms by recalling the true history of Arab-Israeli conflict and by extricating the beleaguered country from the inevitably lethal consequences of Oslo, the Road Map, disengagement, realignment and convergence.
The poet Auden understood many things. In ordering the recent IDF operations in Gaza and Lebanon, Prime Minister Olmert has understood the need to act correctly and heroically. Let him now understand that the so-called Peace Process was never anything more than an Arab/Islamic Trojan Horse, and that Israel’s survival will never be delivered as a gift.
Copyright The Jewish Press, September 29, 2006. All rights reserved.
LOUIS RENE BERES (Ph.D., Princeton, 1971) is Strategic and Military Affairs columnist for The Jewish Press.