Sunday, October 16, 2011

Caroline Glick Declares that Netanyahu's Deal is "A Pact Signed in Jewish Blood"

The title of Caroline Glick's newest Op-Ed piece for the Jerusalem Post--A Pact Signed in Jewish Blood--speaks for itself. Glick rightly declares that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's deal to release over 1000 terrorists to obtain the freedom of illegally abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit speaks volumes about Netanyahu:

At best, Netanyahu comes out of this deal looking like a weak leader who is manipulated by and beholden to Israel’s radical, surrender-crazed media. To their eternal shame, the media have been waging a five-year campaign to force Israel’s leaders to capitulate to Hamas.

At worst, this deal exposes Netanyahu as a morally challenged, strategically irresponsible and foolish, opportunistic politician.

Those are harsh--but quite correct--words from someone who used to work for Netanyahu and who defended Netanyahu publicly long after I came to the conclusion that the smooth-speaking Netanyahu can serve Israel well as a representative to the U.N. but is completely ill-suited for the task of being Prime Minister. Glick concludes:

What Israel needs is a leader with the courage of one writer’s convictions. Back in 1995, that writer wrote: "The release of convicted terrorists before they have served their full sentences seems like an easy and tempting way of defusing blackmail situations in which innocent people may lose their lives, but its utility is momentary at best.

Prisoner releases only embolden terrorists by giving them the feeling that even if they are caught, their punishment will be brief. Worse, by leading terrorists to think such demands are likely to be met, they encourage precisely the terrorist blackmail they are supposed to defuse."

The writer of those lines was then-opposition leader Binyamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu wrote those lines in his book, Fighting Terrorism: How Democracies Can Defeat Domestic and International Terrorists.

Israel needs that Netanyahu to lead it. But in the face of the current Netanyahu’s abject surrender to terrorism, apparently he is gone.


I don't know what happened to the Netanyahu who wrote those words or the Netanyahu who once brilliantly presented Israel's case to the U.N. and to biased media members across the globe but Israel will rue--and might not survive--the day that it elected Netanyahu to the country's highest office.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Only Three Israeli Cabinet Members Dissented from Netanyahu's Prisoner Exchange Deal

Israel's Cabinet voted 26-3 to approve the disastrous, evil deal that will exchange more than 1000 terrorists for Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier illegally abducted by the Hamas terrorist group. The three dissenters were Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Vice Premier Moshe Yaalon and Minister of National Infrastructure Uzi Landau. Lieberman explained his vote by citing "the grave repercussions the deal will have on Israel." Landau declared, "Let there be no doubt--the public and the government are both praying for Gilad's safe return...But this deal is a triumph for terror and it's detrimental to Israel's security and deterrence."

Neville Chamberlain has become infamous for signing the disastrous Munich Agreement with Adolf Hitler and proclaiming that he had assured "peace in our time" when in fact Chamberlain's perfidy had paved the way for World War II and the Holocaust.

The so-called "Oslo II Accords" (also known as the "Taba Agreement" or the "Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip") divided Judea/Samaria and Gaza into three entities: one jurisdiction controlled entirely by Israel, one jurisdiction controlled entirely by the Palestinian Authority and one jurisdiction controlled jointly by Israel and the PA. The PA responded to the Israeli concessions not by building up the infrastructure in the areas under PA control but rather by greatly increasing the frequency and severity of PA-sponsored terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians; that predicable outcome is precisely why most Israelis did not support Oslo II and why the Israelis voted for Knesset members who had publicly indicated that they would never approve such a lopsided deal--but Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin "cleverly" found a way to circumvent the will of the Israeli people: Rabin bribed Knesset members Gonen Segev and Alex Goldfarb with Mitsubishi cars and cabinet posts in exchange for betraying the voters who elected them precisely to halt Rabin's plan to further weaken Israel. Segev and Goldfarb's names should live in infamy, though I doubt that many people outside--or perhaps even inside--Israel know who they are.

Just like Chamberlain's name has become synonymous with appeasement and the names of Segev and Goldfarb should have become synonymous with corruption, when the terrorists Israel is about to release resume killing innocent Jewish men, women and children no one should forget the names of those who approved this deal. Here are the names of the 26 Israeli Cabinet members who supported Prime Minister Netanyahu's disastrous deal with Hamas:
  • Vice Premier, Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Development of the Negev and Galilee and Minister of Regional Cooperation Silvan Shalom
  • Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Ehud Barak
  • Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Eli Yishai
  • Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Intelligence Dan Meridor
  • Agriculture Minister Shalom Simhon
  • Communication Minister Moshe Kahlon
  • Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat
  • Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar
  • Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan
  • Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz
  • Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Atias
  • Immigrant Absorption Minister Sofa Landver
  • Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer
  • Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch
  • Justice Minister Prof. Yaakov Ne'eman
  • Minister of Government Services to the Public Michael Eitan
  • Minister of Public Diplomacy and the Diaspora Yuli Edelstein
  • Minister of Minority Affairs Avishay Braverman
  • Minister of Religious Affairs Yakov Margi
  • Science and Technology Minister Daniel Hershkowitz
  • Social Affairs Minister Isaac Herzog
  • Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov
  • Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz
  • Minister of Social Affairs and Israel’s Heritage Meshulam Nahari
  • Minister Benny Begin
  • Minister Yossi Peled

It is particularly sad and disgraceful that Begin and Edelstein did not dissent. Begin, the son of former Prime Minister Menachem Begin, has long been a beacon of reason who was not afraid to criticize suicidal Israeli governmental policies; Edelstein is a former refusenik who should know from personal experience that no good can come from dealing with bloodthirsty extremists. These 26 Israeli Cabinet Ministers have signed death warrants for countless innocent Jewish men, women and children--and when the Hamas murderers execute those death warrants Benjamin Netanyahu and these 26 Ministers should be held accountable for setting terrorists free.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Netanyahu's Shalit Deal Recklessly Endangers Innocent Israelis

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly reached an agreement with the Hamas terrorist group to release over 1000 terrorists from Israeli jails in exchange for Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier who was illegally abducted on June 25, 2006 by Hamas and who has been denied visitation by the International Committee of the Red Cross. The terrorists slated for release by Israel include hundreds who were sentenced to life in prison--in other words, killers who are directly responsible for attacks that killed and maimed thousands of innocent civilians. This is a disastrous, evil decision that will have horrifying--and quite predictable--consequences. Israel has made similarly lopsided exchanges several times and on each such occasion the released terrorists have subsequently killed many innocent men, women and children. Perhaps the most infamous exchange happened in May 1985--the so-called Jibril Deal--when Israel released 1150 prisoners to get back three soldiers; one of those 1150 prisoners--Ahmed Yassin--then founded Hamas. Thus, the Jibril Deal led to the Shalit kidnapping--and many other horrors--and the Netanyahu Deal will inevitably lead to future horrors.

In a December 9, 2009 article, Jeff Jacoby declared:

Few Israeli policies have been as counterproductive or morally questionable as the lopsided prisoner exchanges it has entered into with terrorist organizations like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the PLO. Time and again, Israel has paid for the freedom of a few POWs--sometimes just the remains of a few POWs--by releasing hundreds of violent detainees, many of them complicit in the deaths of civilians. And time and again, the newly freed terrorists have picked up where they left off. Yassin is only the most notorious example. According to Israeli journalist Nadav Shragai, "about 50 percent of the terrorists freed for any reason--including those set free in one-sided 'goodwill gestures'--returned to the path of terror, either as a perpetrator, planner, or accomplice." An analysis by the Almagor Terror Victims Association in 2007 found that at least 30 attacks in the preceding five years had been committed by prisoners freed in deals with terrorist groups. More than 175 men, women, and children died in those attacks; many others were severely injured.

Some of the most infamous, heartrending terrorist attacks against Israel--including the March 27, 2002 Passover attack on the Park Hotel that killed 35 and wounded hundreds more--were perpetrated by prisoners who were released by Israel in exchanges or as "goodwill gestures." Nasser Abu Hameid, who had been imprisoned for five murders, was released by Israel in September 1999 as part of the Sharm el-Sheikh Agreement; he subsequently participated in the mutilation of the corpses of Israeli reserve soldiers Vadim Norzitz and Yossi Avrahami--non-combatants who took a wrong turn into Ramallah on October 12, 2000 and were literally torn apart limb from limb simply because they were Jews--and he murdered several Israelis in various terrorist attacks, including the roadside shooting of Rabbi Binyamin Kahane and Kahane's wife Talia.

Jacoby concluded his article with these prescient words:

But to knowingly risk the lives of civilians in order to protect soldiers is to turn the social contract inside out. The state's first duty to its citizens is to protect their lives and liberties; that is what justifies the creation of a military in the first place. Releasing hundreds of terrorists may mean that Shalit comes home safely, but it almost certainly condemns other Israeli citizens to death. The plight of Shalit and his family is heartbreaking and tragic. Yet it cannot be right to win his freedom by risking the lives of the very civilians he, like every soldier, is sworn to protect.

In 1976, Israeli troops flew 2,000 miles to rescue Jewish hostages being held in Uganda's Entebbe airport, a spectacular feat that electrified the world. Jonathan Netanyahu, the mission commander (and brother of Israel's current prime minister), died in that operation. He made the supreme sacrifice in the service of his nation, as soldiers so often have. Before the Israelis agree to a reckless deal with Hamas, perhaps they should reflect on Entebbe, and pause to ask themselves: What would Jonathan do?

Prime Minister Netanyahu has bodyguards and elite security services to protect him. Who will protect the innocent Jewish children who are going to be slaughtered by the terrorists Netanyahu is releasing? Just as importantly, who will hold Netanyahu responsible for the blood on his hands when such preventable atrocities predictably and inevitably happen? During Netanyahu's earlier term as Prime Minister in the 1990s he agreed to give away 80% of Hebron even though this exposed the city's Jewish residents to sniper attacks from Arab terrorists--and on March 26, 2001 an Arab sniper killed 10 month old Shalhevet Pass by shooting her in the head as she sat in her baby stroller. Netanyahu has yet to be held accountable for recklessly ceding control over most of Hebron and he has no right to set free terrorists who have blood on their hands and who will eagerly seek opportunities to spill even more innocent blood.
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