U.S. wrecking ball crushed Israel leaders' aspirations

Last update - 06:26 10/06/2009

Yossi Sucary / U.S. wrecking ball crushed Israel leaders' aspirations

By Yossi Sucary

It seems as if the term "spirit" has never contradicted itself as it did in Jerusalem on Tuesday night: Instead of remaining an abstract concept detached from the material world, it took on a form more tangible than cast lead.

It was not the American spirit that was present in the corridors of the Foreign Ministry during U.S. envoy George Mitchell's visit, but a massive iron wrecking ball manufactured by the new U.S. administration.

Whenever it headed in his direction, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman managed to dodge the ball - some might even say skillfully. Yet to do so, he had to leave his political beliefs behind. The wrecking ball did not spare them. It crushed them time and again.

But in one respect, the American wrecking ball was merciful toward Lieberman's views: It did not leave them lying there alone. It laid them to rest in a mass grave together with the rest of Israel's traditional policies and its leaders' aspirations.

Anyone could tell from one look at Mitchell's face that the old game was up. We are at the start of a new game, in which Israel can no longer bend the rules at will; it can no longer let its players pass the ball among themselves and run out the clock indefinitely.

Rather, this is a game where the man in black now acts as a true referee, instead of as if he were a player of one of the teams.

But something else was also apparent last night: The Arabs will not be able to lounge at ease due to the new U.S. attitude toward Israel. A person who stares for too long becomes passive, and passivity is one of the new U.S. administration's biggest enemies. Arabs will therefore have to act.

They will have to get rid of the anti-Israel incitement in their schools, the Jewish stereotypes, the political passivity, the variants of anti-Semitism, the various shapes and forms of Holocaust denial.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1091708.html

referee! I like it! Now both Israelis and Palestinians have to decide how much peace is worth to them.



But in one respect, the American wrecking ball was merciful toward Lieberman's views: It did not leave them lying there alone. It laid them to rest in a mass grave together with the rest of Israel's traditional policies and its leaders' aspirations.

Anyone could tell from one look at Mitchell's face that the old game was up. We are at the start of a new game, in which Israel can no longer bend the rules at will; it can no longer let its players pass the ball among themselves and run out the clock indefinitely.

Rather, this is a game where the man in black now acts as a true referee, instead of as if he were a player of one of the teams.

Netanyahu wants the Palestinians to acknowledge that Israel is a “Jewish state.” I don’t understand this demand. Israel is not a Jewish state, it is a multi-cultural state, with about half a million non-Jewish Russians and Ukrainians and 20% of its population is Arab. If “Jewish” is meant religiously, then observant Jews are actually a minority of the population in Israel. If “Jewish” is meant racially, then it is a particularly shameful demand. It is like demanding either that the US be recognized as a “Christian” country or as a “white” country. Obama was ill-advised to use the diction, himself. - Juan Cole –

official designation you really despise.

There are a number of multicultural "Islamic republics" that deserve to be derecognized, or at least publicly castigated by the State Department as "particularly shameful." Iran, Pakistan, Yemen. Granted, none of these are stellar examples of progressivism. Or, many would say, "Islam".

And yet places like Britain and the US recognize these as "Islamic republics" and many here want to have better relations with some of them than we now have. Odd.

Then there are those with official state religions--where "state religion" is taken much more aggressively than it has been in the West for a century or three. Malaysia, Jordan, Egypt come to mind. Having a state religion aggressively enforced, of course, helps to swell the ranks of the "observant"; it actually renders the term pointless.

Of course, minorities, religious and ethnic, are often or usually treated far worse in those countries--even if you're "Muslim" by your own reckoning, in many instances.

I guess we should start small. First, get Israel to do what we want to, in the interest and name of respecting differences and respecting sovereignty. Then we can work up to Sa'udi Arabia, eventually to Malaysia, and then to the US.