TRUSTING IN PRINCES
Herbert Zweibon

FROM THE EDITOR: Rael Jean Isaac
A Reverse Domino Effect
The Wrong Dots
Christians in the New Iraq
Thank you Tom De Lay

ARIEL SHARON'S SUICIDAL POLICY
Louis Rene Beres

A HEZBOLLAH PEACE PROCESS?
Lawrence Auster

THE CHIMERICAL MODERATION OF MAHMOUD ABBAS
Roger A. Gerber

ARIEL SHARON ON GAZA
In His Own Words

NUCLEAR IRAN
Rachel Neuwirth

JIHAD AS SPIRITUAL STRUGGLE?
Hugh Fitzgerald

REFLECTIONS ON PASSOVER
Ruth King

OUTPOST IS THE PUBLICATION OF AMERICANS FOR A SAFE ISRAEL

Editor: Rael Jean Isaac
Editorial Board: Herbert Zweibon, Ruth King

Americans For a Safe Israel
1623 Third Ave. (at 92nd St.) - Suite 205
New York, NY 10128
tel (212) 828-2424 / fax (212) 828-1717

Herbert Zweibon

One of the most dispiriting developments in past months has been to find some of Israel’s clearest-thinking supporters, including William Safire, Charles Krauthammer and Norman Podhoretz, publicly professing belief in the strategically absurd and morally infamous "disengagement plan."

Perhaps no one has been so swept away as the normally astute Krauthammer. He is enthusiastic (March 4) about "free Palestinian elections that produced a moderate reform oriented leadership." As to that claim, we refer the reader to Roger A. Gerber's article on Mahmoud Abbas in this Outpost. In a Feb. 25 column Krauthammer says that dismantling Gaza settlements would indeed be a victory for terror -- were this not accompanied by the security fence. Incredibly, Krauthammer calls the fence "the first serious strategic idea Israel has had" since the beginning of the intifada, one "that will change the entire strategic equation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." In fact, the fence is pure strategic folly. Even now Israel's long fenced border with Lebanon has become the most dangerous border in Israel, with Hezbollah and its rockets stationed all along it.

Norman Podhoretz in the April Commentary offers a more thoughtful analysis, providing arguments he encountered in Israel on both sides of the issue. For Podhoretz the bottom line is his enormous respect for President George W. Bush. He writes: "It was because I had come to place so much faith in Bush that I was able to overcome my misgivings about the Road Map. And it was partly because Sharon was also putting his money on Bush that I was ready to bet on Sharon." But what this means is that instead of evaluating the plan, Podhoretz bets on the man. (It is ironic that Podhoretz, who has written an exceptionally fine book on the Hebrew prophets, should ignore the Psalmist’s injunction, "Put not your trust in princes." Indeed, Podhoretz admits his daughter, who finds his embrace of "Oslo II" shocking, reminds him of this.) Yet even if it were correct that Bush can be trusted to stand by Israel, a new President will be elected in three years. Who know what his attitudes will be? Podhoretz’s answer to this is that Bush has set in motion forces of such velocity for the expansion of political and economic freedom in the Middle East that "it will be next to impossible for his successor to change course."

Yet as Carolyn Glick (a reluctant critic because of her great admiration for Podhoretz) points out in The Jerusalem Post, Podhoretz provides no suggestion of how Sharon's plan benefits Israel. He concedes that the goals of Mahmoud Abbas are no different from those of Arafat. But if that is the case, to what purpose is Sharon betraying Jewish residents of Gaza (whom he personally urged to settle there), splitting the country, sending shock waves through the Israel Defense Forces, and destroying his own party?

The President and his admirers (among whom we count ourselves) have unfortunately been swept up in utopian expectations of a New Middle East. There may be more ballots cast in the region, but societies based on what Robert Conquest calls "law and liberty" are not likely to proliferate. As Jonathan Spyer notes in Haaretz of March 11, Middle Eastern elites are old hands at clothing themselves in borrowed array when the political climate demands it. But the new costumes are fitted over the same body of overheated nationalism and chauvinism, hostility to independent institutions and hatred of Israel — the endlessly warmed over centerpiece. The politically convenient language of the moment masks the same fundamental attitudes. Tellingly, as Spyer reminds us, in the same interview with Time Magazine in which Abbas declares his allegiance to democracy, he puts the blame on Israel and "the fence" for the terror bombing in Tel Aviv.

Rael Jean Isaac

A REVERSE DOMINO EFFECT

The "domino theory" is back. In the Vietnam years it referred to the fear that if one country fell to Communism, others in the region would soon keel over. Now the Bush administration uses it in a positive sense: a democratic Iraq is supposedly the domino leading neighboring autocracies to collapse.

In the enthusiasm, it has gone unnoticed that Israel has experienced a domino-in-reverse effect: the government of the only existing democracy in the Middle East has become increasingly autocratic and intolerant of dissent. Implementing a policy of retreat and uprooting of Jewish settlements that splits the public and carries many obvious strategic dangers, Sharon's government rides roughshod over the civil rights of those who oppose its policies. The most draconian punishments are promised for dissenters. Case in point: Attorney General Meni Mazus warned that anti-disengagement protesters who disrupt traffic will face up to 20 years in jail. (At the same time thousands of Arab actual and foiled-murderers of Jews are being released from Israeli prisons in yet another "good-will gesture.")

THE WRONG DOTS

Journalist Arnaud de Borchgrave sounds a badly needed warning note. He begins his article "Connecting the Wrong Dots" (Washington Times, March 21): "Talk of a democratic surge sweeping the Middle East is yet another case of mistaking wishes for reality." De Borchgrave points out that the large counter-demonstrations in Lebanon expose the deep sectarian divide in that country, carrying the seeds of potential revival of civil war. As for Syria, it is more likely to be vulnerable to coups (it experienced 21 between 1945 and 1970 when Hafez Assad seized power) than democracy.

Writes de Borchgrave: "It is tempting to connect the dots between the Iraqi elections, Palestinian elections and Lebanon and describe the overall picture as the inexorable march to democracy. But the strengthening of Hamas, another terrorist organization, in the Palestinian municipal elections, a harbinger of how it will do in next July's legislative elections, and Hezbollah's unchallenged position in Lebanon, should remind the White House these two organizations, along with Islamic Jihad, are now part of al Qaeda's support group….Even in Iraq, the elections have produced a less secular country now more influenced by Iran than the United States. In Egypt the winner of a truly democratic election could easily be the Muslim Brotherhood, the founder of all modern-day Islamist extremist organizations."

In conclusion de Borchgrave reminds us that "Turkey elected a democratic government democratically -- and an Islamist party won and now governs. Its first important act was to deny transit rights across Turkey for the U.S. 4th Infantry Division in Operation Iraqi Freedom."

DISTORTED REPORTING FROM NEW YORK'S JEWISH WEEK

Liel Leibovitz has been reporting for the Jewish Week in a manner biased against the Columbia students who have complained about being humiliated and intimidated by anti-Israel faculty members. Given Leibovitz's background, this is no surprise.

Leibovitz is an Israeli leftist who recently obtained a degree from Columbia's School of Journalism. In an article he wrote for Columbia Journalism Review (May/June 2003) he makes no secret of his identification with the pro-Palestinian politically correct denizens of that school. He describes his "double life" as journalism student at Columbia (pursuing "fairness and balance") and press officer for the Consul General of Israel, in which capacity (to his shame) he was forced to defend Israel, experiencing "my own personal blue-and-white Scarlet Letter burning my skin."

Despite his moral sensitivity, Leibovitz seems to have had no qualms about deceiving his superiors. He describes, for example, going with his boss to Columbia where, as his boss spoke, he saw the faces of his classmates, smiling disdainfully. "I wanted so much to be like them," writes Leibovitz. He says it must have shown on his face because his boss, on the way out, asked "What's the matter? Those liberals disgust you too much?"

Defending a government he found indefensible, Leibovitz writes "I became detached, reading the news from Israel as if it were some nation in Asia that I knew nothing of and cared little for."

It all shows in his coverage of the Columbia story -- and it is scandalous that Jewish Week editor Gary Rosenblatt assigned him to cover it.

CHRISTIANS IN THE NEW IRAQ

The large, vibrant, thousands of years old Jewish community of Iraq is gone. And in the euphoria over the Iraqi elections what has gone unnoticed, as English journalist Anthony Browne points out in the Spectator, is that “Iraq may still be occupied by Christian foreign powers, but the Islamist plan to ethnically cleanse Iraq of its nearly 2,000 year old Assyrian and Armenian Christian communities is reaching fruition.”

Similarly, Dr. Nimrod Raphaeli provides a sobering assessment of the plight of Iraq’s Christians, roughly 3% of its 26 million people. Christians have been specially targeted by Islamists, both as "infidels" and for collaborating with the "invading crusading army." The bombing of churches has been widely reported, but less attention has been paid to how many Christians have lost their livelihoods. Islamist groups have driven them out of the liquor business. Barber shops run by Christians have been targeted because Islamists object to haircuts and shaving. Christian students have been harassed to the point that at the University of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest university, 1,500 Christian students decided to suspend their studies. Not surprisingly, large numbers of Christians are emigrating Will Iraq soon be as empty of Christians as it is of Jews?

THANK YOU TOM DE LAY

Carolyn Glick pays a well-deserved tribute to long time stalwart supporter of Israel, Congressman Tom DeLay. Courageously, because he confronts not only the Bush administration but the Israeli embassy and AIPAC, DeLay has forced Washington to hold off, if only temporarily, in transferring $200 million to the PA and to ask: What does the PA do with the money it gets?

Glick points out that the Palestinian Legislative Council just decided its priority is new luxury cars, at $76,000 each, for each PA minister while mere legislators are to get cars costing $45,000 each. Then of course there is the budget for chauffeurs for these cars as well as gas and insurance. Then there are all the senior PA officials, also in line for tens of millions of dollars worth of cars and drivers and gas.

Glick notes that "the cars are just one tiny example of the waste, graft and purloining of PA funds by its politicians, militia commanders and bureaucrats, which have rendered the Palestinians one of the poorest Arab societies in the world today" -- this in a decade when they received more international donor aid per capita than has ever been transferred to any group. And of course there is all the aid money that went directly to terrorists. As Glick notes: "Even today Fatah terrorists are paid salaries from the PA. Abbas now wants to extend the terrorist support program by putting Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists on the PA payroll as part of his much-vaunted 'reform' program."

As Glick sums up, "It is reassuring to know that in this period during which Israeli policy has become near-schizophrenic and the Bush administration appears convinced -- in spite of all evidence -- that Abbas is a man who can be trusted, at least one powerful man in Washington is not buying into the current peace charade. Thank you for your courage.

Louis Rene Beres

In 1784, when the Age of Reason had almost run its course, the philosopher Immanuel Kant defined enlightenment as "man's emergence from self-imposed darkness," and offered as its motto, Sapere aude – "Dare to know." Yet few took this command very seriously, and Diderot, in a moment of rare lucidity, exclaimed to Hume: "Ah, my dear philosopher. Let us weep and wail. ... We preach wisdom to the deaf, and we are still far indeed from the age of reason."

Today, the world – always full of noise – is still largely a desert of understanding, and the vast majority of nations continue to endure as if by accident. A "splendid" example of this unreason, especially in respect to its current prime minister, is the always-imperiled state of Israel.

Recently codifying its newest policy of surrender – Sharon's policy of "disengagement" – Israel now desperately needs enlightenment. Despite its extraordinary technical and industrial successes, the Jewish state must either "dare to know" about its enemies' relentless commitment to another Jewish genocide, or it must make ready to disappear. Exeunt omnes. Of what use to Israel is the light of reason if there are not enough eyes to see the light, or if those leaders with eyes resolutely keep them shut? The French philosophers liked to speak of a siecle des lumieres, a century of light, but Israel in the early 21st century already remains mired in the bruising darkness. Manipulated shamelessly from official Washington, Prime Minister Sharon now does not dare to know what looming catastrophes are in the making.

What should the prime minister now dare to know? First, he must learn to recognize that Israel can disappear. Such learning, in turn, will require that he begin to feel, as palpably as possible, the unendurable pain of Israel's plausible removal. Today, even after the obvious failure of Oslo and in the midst of the successor crime now quaintly called a "Road Map," Sharon is unaware that he does not have time on his side. For Israel, the consequences of an unreciprocated "peace process," however named, are apt to be quick and apt to be fatal.

Second, Prime Minister Sharon must now recognize that things are as they are. The Arab world will always despise Israel, at least for the foreseeable decades. It follows that Israel must now reconcile itself to the persistent absence of peace and to the corollary persistence of war. It must prepare to conduct operations against shifting coalitions of Arab and certain other Islamic states, and to defeat such coalitions. Strategically and tactically, this means an obligation to fight offensively, to structure its Order of Battle accordingly, and to strictly resist all policies founded upon the principle of "Land For Nothing." It also means having: a) the political courage and operational tools to carry out, as needed, appropriate preemptions against certain developing WMD assets in particular enemy states b) the will to resume immediately an essential defensive policy of "targeted killing" of terrorist leaders and c) the legal awareness that such pre-emptions and assassinations can be entirely permissible expressions of anticipatory self-defense under international law. An enlightened Israel must understand that international law is not a suicide pact.

Third, the prime minister must decide, soon, if he wishes Israel to become a genuinely Jewish state, or whether he wishes it to become nothing more than a state of the Jews. Now, after Oslo and during the convoluted cartography of the Road Map, the Jewish character of the state of Israel is withering daily. Readily observable and difficult to deny, this is an especially ironic debility, one that should call into question the very reason for maintaining such a painful statehood.

Too often in its brief modern history, Israel has abandoned itself to bland conformance, to manifestly ordinary imitations that would make it the same as all other states. But Israel is not the same. Not surprisingly, whenever it has rejected the lifeblood of its own Jewish particularity, Israel has exuded a kaleidoscope of contradictions that drive it to misfortune. In the end, such a determinably characterless presence in the world may even create a condition of absolute indefensibility for which no military capability could ever compensate. And with "disengagement," Prime Minister Sharon positively ensures such a presence.

To be a faithfully Jewish state may, in world-historical terms, be altogether insignificant. Indeed, it may be absolutely nothing. And yet, this is the only true and ultimate significance of Israel. Israel is the state in which there still dawns the possibility of a thoroughly unique and redemptive consciousness. Before Israel can experience enlightenment, it must first understand that its never-ending struggles for existence are never merely a matter of ordinary politics and strategy, but rather an absolutely special and sacred task.

Tragic drama instructs us to recall that the spheres of reason, order and justice are painfully limited, and that no progress in science or technology can
ever really compensate for the "otherness" of the world. For Israel, the time has now come to escape knowingly from the primeval forest of diplomatic evasion and to acknowledge, fully, that its enlightenment has intellectual, military and spiritual dimensions. Only when the Jewish state is fully committed to progress along each of these interdependent dimensions can it reasonably hope to survive and prosper. To begin this indispensable commitment, it must quickly reject Prime Minister Sharon's suicidal policy of "disengagement" and proceed to finally recognize the still openly genocidal intentions of its still multiple and unapologetic enemies.

Louis Rene Beres is a professor of international law at Purdue University. This article appeared in WorldNetDaily on March 22.

Lawrence Auster

To understand the essence of the Hezbollah peace process, let us begin by recalling the insanity of the Oslo peace process from which President Bush's June 2002 speech (remember that?) supposedly delivered us. The idea of Oslo (never formally stated as such but tacitly acknowledged by the Rabin government) was that the Israelis did not even expect the Palestinians to comply with their commitments under the agreement, such as ending terror and ending hate-Israel indoctrination in their schools. Rather, the Israelis hoped that the process of negotiations itself would lead the Palestinians to the point where they saw that they had more to gain by accepting Israel's existence than by continuing their campaign to destroy it, at which point they would be willing to make a final deal exchanging their acceptance of Israel's existence for Israel's recognition of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Up to that magical moment when the terrorists would convert to peaceful democrats, nothing would be expected of them, they would be free to carry on their terrorist incitement and activities and still get all the benefits of the peace process including control over their own territory, international recognition, and vast financial subsidies. This was the fatuous fantasy, the criminally stupid policy, of Rabin, Peres, and Barak, backed and pushed by Clinton. We know the disaster it led to, how coddling unreformed terrorists only inflamed their intent to kill Israelis and destroy Israel. Bush, supposedly having learned this lesson, reversed the Oslo logic and said in 2002 that the U.S. would not help the Palestinians move toward a peace settlement unless they clearly gave up terror.

But look at what the Bush team is saying now about democracy, in relation to the question of whether Hezbollah ought to be a part of Lebanese democratic politics: “I like the idea of people running for office. There's a positive effect when you run for office. Maybe some will run for office and say, vote for me, I look forward to blowing up America. I don't know, I don't know if that will be their platform or not. But I don't think so. I think people who generally run for office say, vote for me, I'm looking forward to fixing your potholes, or making sure you got bread on the table. “

And look at what Bush's twin brain Condoleezza Rice is saying: “When people start getting elected and have to start worrying about constituencies and have to start worrying not about whether their fire-breathing rhetoric against Israel is being heard, but about whether or not that person's child down the street is able to go to a good school or that road has been fixed or life is getting better, then things start to change.”

Follow Rice's logic. She's saying that once terrorists are elected to office, and once they become responsible for running a country, then the force of their circumstances will make them stop being terrorists. Under Oslo, it was assumed that the process of negotiations would lead the terrorists to abandon their terrorism, at which point they would be willing to make a final deal with Israel and so acquire a state. Under Oslo, the reformed terrorists only get their state after they've ceased being terrorists. But under Bush's and Rice's Hezbollah peace process, unreformed terrorists get their own state, and then the experience of running their own state makes them stop being terrorists!

The Hezbollah peace process, may well prove worse than the Oslo peace process.

This article first appeared on View from the Right, "the right blog for the right"

Roger A. Gerber

As a young man in his twenties working in Qatar, Mahmoud Abbas (now also known as Abu Mazen) joined Yasser Arafat and the small group of men who founded Fatah in 1959 with the stated aim of destroying Israel. Abbas, who was born in Safed in 1935, remained at Arafat's side thereafter as a trusted key aide in Jordan, Lebanon, Tunis and, of course, the Palestinian Authority. He has held the most senior posts under Arafat including Secretary of the PLO Executive Committee, member of Fatah's Central Committee, head of the PLO Department of International Relations, and in March 2003 was Arafat's choice as the first "Prime Minister" of the Palestinian Authority. Along the way, Abbas was the recipient of a doctorate from Oriental College in Moscow. His doctoral thesis was subsequently published as a book entitled The Other Face: The Secret Connection Between the Nazis and The Zionist Movement which contained statements such as: "Regarding the gas chambers, which were supposedly designed for murdering living Jews: A scientific study ... denies that the gas chambers were for murdering people, and claims that they were only for incinerating bodies, out of concern for the spread of disease and infection in the region."

With this background, why is Abbas widely regarded as a "moderate" who engenders hopes for peace? It is due in part to the marked contrast in his appearance and style to his predecessor, Yasser Arafat. Abbas does not visibly carry a gun; he generally appears in a well tailored suit and tie; and is clean shaven (except for the obligatory moustache). In addition, Abbas was the chief PLO negotiator of the [Oslo] Declaration of Principles, which he signed on behalf of the PLO on the White House Lawn on September 13, 1993. Perhaps the chief reason for his reputation as a moderate is his stated opposition to the use of violence against Israel at this stage; however, he does not reject violence because he deems it immoral or wrong, but because it does not currently serve the interests of the Palestinian cause. When asked by New York Times reporter Steven Erlanger whether the armed intifada was a mistake Abbas responded "We cannot say it was a mistake" (Feb. 14, 2005). Moreover Abbas said (see Memri Special Report, April 29, 2003): "We did not say that we would stop the armed struggle - but that we would stop the military nature of the Intifada...[T]here is no alternative but to stop [the military operations] for one year. This does not imply any concession on our part."

David Horovitz, the dovish former editor of The Jerusalem Report and currently editor of the Jerusalem Post, writing in the Post of Feb. 9, asks "Is Israel to take at face value Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's pledge to cease all acts of violence, to usher in a new era of peace and hope?" He responds to his rhetorical question by observing that "the precedents are discouraging," citing the Arafat era when “a malevolent Palestinian leadership...strategically incited terrorism and persuaded much of a gullible world of its legitimacy."

At the summit with Prime Minister Sharon held at Sharm El-Sheikh on February 8th, 2005, Abbas spoke in moderate tones, but a close analysis of the content of his speech reveals cause for concern. Abbas asserted that the meeting was "the beginning of peace and hope … in addition to being the implementation of the first article of the road map that was established by the quartet". This completely distorts the provisions of "the first article of the road map" which specifically requires the dismantling of terrorist infrastructures and confiscation of weapons -- and which Abbas has studiously avoided. Abbas now claims that merely declaring a period of "calm", while leaving the terrorists armed and their infrastructures intact, constitutes implementation of the P.A. obligations.

In an effort to sound candid, Abbas went on to say: "We differ on several issues. And this may include settlement, the release of prisoners, the wall, closing institutions in Jerusalem." However, he once again purposefully avoided addressing the security issues pertaining to disarming of terrorists and dismantling their infrastructure, as well as confiscation of weapons and ending incitement in Palestinian Authority media and school textbooks.

Most ominously, Abbas, in moderate tones to be sure, skillfully reiterated every position previously enunciated by Arafat and the PLO by stating: "Here in the city of Sharm el-Sheikh, the city of peace, we renew on behalf of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, and the Palestinian Authority, our adherence to the terms of reference of the peace process and to the resolutions of international legitimacy and all the resolutions endorsed by the PLO, the Palestinian government, and the government of Israel, and the road map as well." (emphasis added) His well crafted reference to "the resolutions of international legitimacy and all the resolutions endorsed by the PLO" and the Palestinian government incorporates the entirety of the PLO positions including, among others, the so-called "right of return", the code words for the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state.

In his recent election campaign Abbas repeatedly extolled terrorists, calling them "the heroes that are fighting for freedom…Israel calls them murderers, we call them strugglers. . At one campaign stop he was literally carried on the shoulders of the notorious terrorist, Zacharia Zubeida, wanted by Israel for murder. Arlene Kushner reports in Front Page Magazine of February 25 that Abu Daoud, the terrorist responsible for the murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972, claims that it was Abbas who provided the financing for that terrorist attack. Abbas supported Arafat's rejection of Barak's generous, some would say reckless, offer at Camp David saying "I do not feel any regret". She writes that "Yossi Beilin, the left wing Israeli politician who worked with Abbas, believes that his positions during the Oslo negotiations were actually more extreme than Arafat's. Beilin says Abbas “was among Arafat’s 'restrictors' during the Camp David summit."

The ultimate question is whether Abbas has relinquished his lifelong goal of Israel's destruction. In a Feb. 9 interview on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Daniel Pipes sums up the evidence that Abbas' strategic goal of Israel's demise has not changed as follows: "He has celebrated the elements in, for example, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade who have clearly called for the destruction of Israel and he has associated with them. He has used terms like "the Zionist enemy". He has notably been unwilling to say that the war is over; he has simply said violence has to cease. His record as an aide to Yasser Arafat for 40 years… everything, I think, points to his still holding onto this goal." Similarly, an editorial in the New York Sun that same day noted that “Under Mr. Abbas, the Palestinian state information service on its web site calls Israel the '1948 Occupied Territories', sells posters of Hamas terrorist leaders, and glorifies pictures of masked, armed men in Islamic extremist garb as 'occupation resistance'."

His record of inaction following recent terrorist outrages is likewise not encouraging. In the aftermath of the February 25 bombing in Tel Aviv that murdered five Israelis, Abbas' first reaction was to blame Israel, saying that "The bombers came from the suburb of Tul Karem to Tel Aviv, crossing the wall. So who is responsible? The wall and the Israelis." (Ha'aretz, March 6). After Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack, Abbas stated: "We will not hesitate for one moment to follow them and to bring them to justice. We will not allow anybody, whoever he is, to sabotage our aims." Abbas' principal concern was that the murders might interfere with his strategic aims; he has not taken any steps to bring the perpetrators "to justice" nor has he confiscated a single weapon from Islamic Jihad or any other terror group. In fact Nabil Amr, a close ally of Abbas, reports (Scotsman-U.K., January 11) that Abbas will ask Sharon to drop the demand specified in the road map that the PA dismantle "terrorist capabilities and infrastructure" and instead accept a ceasefire by the armed groups. "If Abu Mazen succeeds in reaching a ceasefire and containing all these groups, the Israelis must be satisfied. We will not punish any group, we will contain them by our own way, not Sharon's way."

Under Abbas, as Palestinian Media Watch has documented, the Palestinian Authority media have continued to glorify martyrdom by children and have continued to broadcast incendiary sermons, including at least one that was delivered in the presence of Mahmoud Abbas on March 11, 2005 and extolled as the ideal Palestinian woman Al Khansah, an Islamic heroine who celebrated the death of her four sons in battle by thanking Allah for the honor. In addition, under Abbas the Palestinian Authority has not taken steps to revise its school textbooks that foster hatred of Israel and Jews and that are inconsistent with preparing a populace for peaceful co-existence with a Jewish state.

At the recent Cairo conference, Abbas was unable to obtain even a truce (hudna) from the terror groups with whom he conferred; the best he could do was a conditional "period of calm" (tahdiah). The Jerusalem Post of March 22 commented that " A cease-fire would not be enough because it leaves the terrorists intact and fully armed. A "calming" is even worse, because it is explicitly no more than a pause to rearm, train and reload — which, security officials report, is already happening." No less a dove than Shlomo Ben-Ami, Ehud Barak's foreign minister, wrote in Haaretz of March 17: "Abbas is moderate in his strategy, not his goals, which are no different from Arafat's goals. Abbas' PA will also have to return to revolutionary and violent patterns of behavior once it feels that the minimum goals of the Palestinian national movement are being denied."

Israel's security chiefs well understand the terrible price that Israel may pay for acquiescing in the charade of Abbas' putative moderation. According to a poll conducted by Khalil Shikaki of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in September 2004, the perception of 74% of the Palestinian Arabs is that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza constitutes a victory for violence. Virtually every major Palestinian figure has spoken of the Sharon plan as a victory for violence; Haaretz of Oct. 27, 2004 quotes Hamas spokesman Mushir Al-Masri describing it as "a big achievement of the Palestinian people and the resistance, which alone has pushed the Zionist enemy to think of leaving Gaza." Ahmed al-Bahar, senior Hamas leader, called the plan “a sign of the moral and psychological decline of the Jewish state” saying that “Israel has never been in such a state of retreat and weakness as it is today” and that the plan is a major and strategic victory for the Palestinians. (Jerusalem Post, September 23, 2004)

The assessment of Gen.Yaakov Amidror (res), the former head of the IDF's National Defense College, and former head of the IDF's research and assessment division, published by the Jaffee Center, is that the results of the Sharon plan "will be disastrous". Chief of Staff Gen. Moshe Ya'alon recently reported that the terror groups "are utilizing the calm to further arm themselves as well as produce explosives and build up their depleted ranks." For those who believe that Abbas' accession to political power has opened the door to peace, Ya'alon warned: "Do not get intoxicated by the current calm in the region. As long as Abbas fails to collect the arms from the terror groups, the conflict will not end". (Jerusalem Post, March 16, 2005)

Mahmoud Abbas has made quite clear that he has no intention of collecting those arms and dismantling the terrorist infrastructure. Abbas’ vaunted moderation has proven to be a chimera.

Roger A. Gerber is an attorney and real estate consultant in New York City.

The Prime Minister's Own Words

"Israel did not return all the territories taken from Egypt in the Six Day War; the most important of these, the Gaza Strip, was not handed back. Moreover, the essentiality of retaining the strip in Israeli hands was so self-evident that even the Egyptians did not try -- certainly not seriously -- to demand its return.

"One reason for not raising the Gaza issue, and of course for not returning the area, was historical-political: all parties, including the Arabs and the Americans, understood that no sane Jewish government could conceive of handing over parts of the Land of Israel, even in return for peace.

"A second reason, in itself sufficient to reject out of hand any notion of discussing the transfer of the Gaza Strip, was what everyone accepted as the most elementary requirements of Israeli security, even in conditions of peace. The strip is -- and was -- a hostile zone, thrusting out of the Sinai area towards Israel's very heart.

"It enables any potential enemy to deploy forces or station artillery and rocket launchers of the sort long owned by all terrorist organizations, and certainly by all armies, only 13 km. from Ashkelon, 30 km. from Ashdod port and 55 km. from Gush Dan.

"In the crisis which enveloped the General Staff on the eve of the Six Day War, the Gaza Strip was designated as the exclusive target of the IDF in war. So long as Gaza was in Arab hands, it was the most dangerous security element along our frontiers and the chief base for terrorist activity." ("A Highly Deceptive Precedent," Jerusalem Post International Edition, Oct. 3, 1992)

"Those who suggest that the solution is to flee from Gaza are, in effect, proposing that we abandon it when stricken and defeated by terrorism. If we run from terror, it will pursue us, and the Gaza Strip will turn into a terrorists' base, paralyzing the settlements in the northern and western Negev and even beyond." ("Its Possible to Stop Terror," The Jerusalem Post International Edition, Dec. 26, 1992.

"Let's take Europe. France keeps its forces in Germany: Britain, this BAR, the British Army of the Rhine. They keep their forces in the places where they believe they can defend their homes. What is Gaza? Gaza is the southern security belt." ("Israel: The Soliloquy of Ariel Sharon, Part One," Wall Street Journal, Feb. 22, 1989)

"Not coincidentally, the Gaza Strip was the last area the Ben Gurion government evacuated in 1956-57, with great reluctance. Again, it was no coincidence that conquering the Gaza Strip was the IDF's primary objective in June 1967." ("The Security Sellout, Jerusalem Post, Feb. 8, 1994)

"The national-historical argument is basic and eternal -- even when detached and in its own right -- while the security-objective consideration, needed to ensure elementary defense of the main population centers within the Green Line, requires that the areas of Judea, Samaria and Gaza, and the Golan Heights in the north, must stay in their entirely under our control." ("Jordan is the Palestinian state" Jerusalem Post, April 13, 1991)

"Then there are those, even among Likud members, who say 'Gaza first.' Who needs Gaza? They say let us fence Gaza in, let's mine it, dig trenches, put up road blocks. The main thing is to get out.

"First, there is no way to hermetically seal any district. In the past, terrorist units from Gaza reached Tel Aviv suburbs. But to hit Negev towns, no Arab need leave Gaza. A Katyusha in the center of Palestine Square in Gaza will easily hit Mohammed the Fifth Square in Ashkelon. Likewise, it can reach Kiryat Gat, Sederot, Netivot and scores of kibbutzim and moshavim." ("Autonomy Means Statehood," Jerusalem Post International Edition., Week ending Aug. 14, 1992)

"Israel is signaling the world that it is ready even to evacuate settlements by force; the smaller and more wretched this government is perceived to be abroad, the more cunning it exercises at home.

"One more point: do not try to evacuate Jewish settlements!" ("Then and Now: Startling Contrasts, Jerusalem Post International Edition, Week ending March 19, 1994)

Rachel Neuwirth

The Iranian mullahs are intractable in their all-out push to achieve nuclear weapons as soon as possible. They cunningly toy with the West, while cynically insisting that their nuclear program is intended to only produce peaceful nuclear energy. Meanwhile, they prevent full inspection, and disperse and hide their facilities in underground sites protected by ground-to-air missiles. They are repeatedly caught lying about their nuclear preparations and respond with more lies. They openly acquire offensive missiles with increasing capability to deliver nuclear payloads ever further and more accurately. They vow to exterminate Israel as soon as they achieve nuclear capability. The brazenness of the mullahs suggests a deep contempt for the West, and especially America, as they confidently flaunt their hatred and provocation and then dare us to do something about it.

The Bush Administration faces a grim dilemma while the mullahs pour out their invective and contempt towards us. Our so-called European 'allies' are insisting on a diplomatic solution, which means that we cannot count on them for much more than talk. Our government says that we are prepared to bring the matter before the Security Council, as if that is supposed to impress Iran. Such empty talk actually makes us look foolish and weak, because China, France and Russia will likely veto any UN sanctions, and even Britain is edging away from support for the US.

China just signed a seventy-billion-dollar deal to buy Iranian oil and Russia is proceeding to supply Iran with nuclear fuel to start up their 'peaceful reactor', despite urgings by the Bush administration to refrain from doing so. There are also reports that Iran was having difficulty processing uranium to weapons-grade concentration and may be opting to simply purchase it from cash-strapped North Korea. Yet, even suggesting a serious economic embargo at this time might be asking too much of our so-called allies, because it could raise the high price of oil still further and damage Western economies. Ultimately, they may even be prepared to live with a nuclear-armed Iran while retreating into their own world of denial and engaging in business-as-usual with Iran's mullahs, offering endless rationalizations.

Having stated repeatedly that a nuclear Iran is unacceptable, President George Bush, who heads the world's presumed superpower, has raised the stakes and he must now deliver soon. If he doesn't, he will lose credibility, which would then further embolden our enemies. Iran and the world will smell fear and hesitation coming from the Bush administration.

The United States faces daunting choices. Unilateral military action to disarm Iran would entail great difficulty and high risk. We would be limited to air strikes against many dispersed and highly protected sites. A ground invasion is unlikely because our all-volunteer army is already deployed in Iraq, and Iran is strong on the ground. Iran's military has substantial firepower and could react fiercely if attacked, including missile strikes on US bases in the region. They could also attack Israel, which by now has no reason to heed any more US urgings about 'showing restraint' while their people are being blown up. An Israeli response could be massive, which could generate widespread Muslim rage against America. Having waited far too long to confront Iran, we are now virtually without allies while facing a powerful enemy who cannot be knocked out in a quick air strike, and who is totally ruthless.

Another daunting scenario is that Israel might be compelled to preempt to avoid facing nuclear annihilation. That would embarrass us with the Muslims, who would naturally blame America for anything done by Israel. George Bush and Bill Clinton both ignored long-standing and repeated Israeli warnings about Iran's nuclear weapons program and its public threats to exterminate Israel. But our government did express concern over Israel's possible preemptive action to neutralize the Iranian threat and how that would complicate our relations with the Arabs.

Another unspoken consideration may also be guiding US thinking. In 1981, US intelligence had to know that Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor at Osiraq was nearing completion and intended to provide nuclear weapons to attack Israel. And yet, the US allowed France to build that reactor, perhaps assuming that if Israel were the only target then 'we could live with that'. Also note the very harsh response of the US administration against Israel following its air strike on the Osiraq reactor. Instead of deserved congratulations, there was a suspension of American support as punishment and Vice President Bush was reported to have demanded that we bomb the Israeli air base that launched the strike. Yet, even Iraq's neighboring Arab countries felt relieved and safer after the Israeli action.

Today, the US and even the Europeans rightly fear a nuclear Iran under the extremist mullahs. But given the Jewish experience of World War II and of seeing the West allow Saddam Hussein to seek nuclear weapons -- not once, but twice -- we can now pose an 'ugly' question, however hypothetical. If the West could be assured that only Israel, and not the US or Europe, would be threatened by a nuclear Iran, would that then be acceptable? History suggests that the 'ugly' answer is probably "yes". But the problem now is that, unlike during World War II, those 'troublesome' Jews may refuse to die quietly. Israel may decide to preempt. In a worst case scenario it can deliver a massive nuclear punch with huge consequences. It may come to seem that our problem is more to hold Israel back than to disarm Iran.

In all of this, our government seems reluctant to openly discuss other ramifications of a nuclear Iran. Iran's launching nuclear missiles directly at the West is not likely because that would obviously reveal their origin and bring immediate and awesome retaliation. The Iranians could easily intimidate the Europeans by merely issuing credible threats to ‘play ball or else'. With Europe neutralized, they could then distribute easily smuggled small-size nuclear weapons and dirty bomb devices to Al-Qaeda for use inside the US while claiming plausible deniability. We cannot retaliate against an unknown enemy and Al-Qaeda has long sought, and may now have acquired, such weapons on their own. It would be very difficult to strike Iran without proof of culpability, which may prove difficult to obtain.

A further problem for the Bush administration is that we have failed to prevent North Korea from going nuclear, and our earlier bribe under the Clinton Administration with Jimmy Carter as negotiator was a total failure. Those opposed to military measures will argue that after our having 'allowed' North Korea and Pakistan to go nuclear, we cannot now make an 'exception' for Iran, which would then insult and enrage the entire Muslim world.

Will the Bush administration act in time to use necessary military force to disarm Iran? Only a revolution against the mullahs would derail the apocalyptic scenario we now face. It may not take long to find out.

Rachel Neuwirth is a California-based writer.

Hugh Fitzgerald

There is a reason why Islamic “reformers,” who had a brief run early in the twentieth century (circa 1900-1920), insisted on promoting the idea of “jihad” as “a spiritual struggle.” By so doing, they accomplished two things. First, the “reformers” attempted to supply a new authority for their novel interpretations and analyses. Second, at a time when Europe was overwhelmingly powerful, it was important to assuage any worries Infidels might have, to gain their support.

After all, in 1900, there were many educated Orientalists who knew perfectly well what the doctrines of Islam were all about. William St. Clair Tisdall, for example, engaged in a fierce polemic with a Muslim apologist over Tisdall’s Original Sources of Islam. From Ignaz Goldziher, the Hungarian who was the first Westerner to subject the Hadith to rigorous study, to Emile Fagnan, a French scholar who lived in Algeria, to Samuel Zwemer, the American missionary, to Henri Lammens, a Jesuit and Professor of Arabic at St. Joseph’s University in Beirut, to the Dutchman C. Snouck Hurgronje, to the Italian Leone Caetani, to David Margoliouth, Laudian Professor of Arabic at Oxford, to Arthur Jeffery, who taught at Columbia University when that school’s Islamic scholars were a matter of pride, the period 1900-1940 represented the highest point in the Western study of Islam – a point not reached since.

It is only in the West, and by non-Muslims, that Islam has been subject to real study. What is now occurring is simply a picking-up where Orientalists left off a few decades ago. Much of this work is done by lone scholars, for the situation in academic departments in the West has been grimly declining for some time. Muslims and non-Muslim apologists for Islam have taken over many of the major departments. At Columbia University’s Middle Eastern and Asian Languages program, there is not a chance that today, either Arthur Jeffery or Joseph Schacht would be hired by the likes of Rashid Khalidi, George Saliba, and Hamid Dabashi. Rather, these promoters of the Arab and Muslim worldview insist on offering every conceivable subject, real or imaginary, that they can connect to the Middle East -- the “construction of Israeli identity” (bad), the “construction of Palestinian identity” (good), colonialism, the West’s need for “the Other,” studies in narrativising the construction of identity on the basis of the alterity inherent in post-colonial hegemonic discourse – in short, every modish kind of gobbledygook one can imagine.

If Islam is taught at all, it is in courses on World Religions, where there may be a “unit” on Islam, taught by some enthusiast who insists that All Religions Want the Same Thing, and who is enamored of the “three Abrahamic faiths” idea, mistaking the appropriation, and distortion, of Christian and Jewish figures and stories, by Islam, for a splendid “sharing” of a common monotheistic tradition. If the Qur’an is read at all, it will most likely be offered in carefully-select excerpts, such as the “lyrical” suras collected by Michael Sells in his utterly misleading and treacly Approaching the Qur’an.

Islam exhibits a peculiar brittleness. There is no incipient sign, within Islam, of any attempt to seriously study the origins of the religion in a manner similar to what both Christianity and Judaism have undergone. Instead, the work of Western scholars is ignored or denounced.

Muslims, and not only on NPR, have preferred that Infidels take the word Jihad to mean what they want those Infidels to think it means: “a spiritual struggle.” But the evidence, textual and historical, is overwhelmingly the other way. We are told: Forget what people chant at rallies in Cairo, or Karachi, or Gaza, or what imams in Jiddah and Baghdad and Teheran preach. Forget what the boys in the madrassas learn, or what the Qur’anic commentators have written. Just remember – What the World Needs Now Is Love, Sweet Love, and not a “clash” but a “dialogue” of “civilizations,” and if that means pretending that people do not mean what they mean, surely it is worth it.

It is prudent for Muslims in the West not to attack Infidels head on (though little can be done about hotheads such as Abu Hamza, late of the Finsbury Mosque) , but rather to treat Infidels in Europe as a bunch of frogs in pots full of water. The flame beneath is being turned up, slowly and steadily, but so slowly that those amphibians go quietly, as if falling asleep in a warm bath. And many non-Muslims have begun to despair, as if their own culture of “tolerance” is a permanent bar to taking action that, in order to preserve a modicum of that culture, they will have to consider.

Lacking the wit and imagination to figure out what can be done about creeping Islamization, Europeans have convinced themselves that there is no point in getting excited. An extraordinary defeatism needs to be identified and attacked, wherever it is. It is not “too late;” Muslim strength, and Islamization, depends entirely on the continued misperception, by Infidels, both of Islam, and of the measures that they are amply justified in taking.

Or perhaps another analogy is more fitting. Remember Abbott and Costello? Thin Abbott and fat Costello were always getting into verbal misunderstandings (as in “Who’s On First”). In one skit, they are in the jungle, accompanied by a native interpreter. Suddenly they are surrounded by menacing men with bones in their noses, wearing grass skirts. The sound of tom-toms can be heard. The chief head-hunter approaches. He looks at Costello, points to his head, then licks his lips. And Costello, sweating and stuttering with fright, asks the interpreter what was just said, and the interpreter explains: “Oh, he was just admiring the way you look. And he asked me ‘Who does his hair?’” Costello is greatly relieved.

But we Infidels are not so many Lou Costellos. And when Asina Mehdi, or John Esposito, or Karen Armstrong, or Richard Bulliet, a professor of history at Columbia and author of The Case for IslamoChristian Civilization, all tell us, in the same misleading spirit as that native-interpreter, that Jihad does not mean Jihad or, still worse, that the word should not be used by Infidels, we are entitled to our doubts.

Suppose we were all to pledge to use Jihad only with the clear understanding that it be taken to mean “a spiritual struggle,” a way to establish internal mental harmony. Then, to be consistent, we should endow every well-known phrase in which the word Jihad occurs with new meaning. Take, for example, the group Tawhid and Jihad (Monotheism and Jihad). As is well-known, the mild-mannered Dr. A. M. Al- Zarqawi has taken a leadership role in Tawhid & Jihad, that organization of social workers dedicated to meeting the psychic needs of the troubled Sunni community of Iraq, and to address their feelings of inadequacy and loss of status. Perhaps the title “Mental Health Through Monotheism” would help to win friends and influence Infidels.

And many more words and phrases will need to be redefined to protect Islam from prying eyes. Certain words that could prove too hot to mishandle may have to be eliminated altogether. One word that seems to be getting much disturbing attention lately, is dhimmi. If Infidels were to visit the website www.dhimmitude.org, or read the books of Bat Ye’or, they might develop a negative view of Islam. And that would never do. Muslims are keenly aware of the problem – hence all the talk of “protected peoples” and the Compact of Omar.. No less a personage than Dr. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, a Turkish historian of Ottoman science, who is now the Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Countries, explained in a recent address to an audience of American Infidels, that the “privilege of becoming a protected minority via an act of dhimmiship was given only to the followers of a prophet to whom a sacred book was revealed.”

In defining dhimmiship as the “privilege of becoming a protected minority” Dr. Ihsanoglu did his best. But those who are so solicitious of the public image of Islam realize that it should not be left up just to NPR, or the BBC, or Le Monde; we all have to pitch in. It might be better if dhimmi were to be jettisoned altogether. The word upsets Infidels.

Instead of dhimmis why not call them “Friends With Benefits”?

(This is excerpted from an article that appeared on Jihad Watch of Feb. 14. Mr. Fitzgerald is a frequent contributor to Outpost.)

Ruth King

On April 24th Jewish families and friends throughout the world will celebrate the feast of Passover commemorating the exodus of Jewish slaves from Egypt during the reign of the Pharaoh Ramses 11. Moses led them to freedom to the land of Israel.

As we read the Haggadah which tells of this remarkable epic, here are four more questions to add to the traditional ones.

How many remember that biblical Israel encompasses the area of present-day Israel?

How many reflect that Israel was the cradle of a great faith that sustained its adherents in spite of millennia of dispersion and persecution?

How many recall that Israel’s sages and prophets wrote the words that have inspired the founding fathers of our great nation and that are inscribed in Hebrew letters on the gates and walls and in the symbols of universities, courts, hospitals, and major institutions?

And, finally, how dare anyone rule that Jews be outlawed from any part of their biblical home?

We must also remember the martyrs of the Warsaw Ghetto rebellion which also occurred during Passover, on April 24th, 1943. Approximately eight hundred Jewish fighters armed with knives, handguns and gasoline fought well-armed and well-trained Germans who called for reinforcements. They held them off until May 16th, 1943 when the revolt ended. Of the 56,000 Jews captured, seven thousand were shot and the rest sent to the killing centers.

The words on the martyrs’ lips as they faced their inevitable death were: “Hear oh Israel.”

On May 15th, 1948, only five years later, their dying prayers were answered when Israel declared itself an independent Jewish state. Again, the seas parted for ships that carried Jews home from every corner of the Diaspora. Hebrew became the language of scientists, performers, entrepreneurs, social workers, professionals and laborers, farmers and yuppies, policemen and generals. In spite of implacable enemies, wars, terrorism, a resolute people created a model nation in their ancient homeland and a thriving and lively democracy. Israel, more than any museum or institute, is a living commemoration of Jewish martyrs from the time of Moses to the Warsaw ghetto.

What went wrong will be the subject of much future prayer and study, but this Passover, with Israel in retreat, there are bitter herbs to eat in the midst of our celebration.