At the height of the settlement enterprise in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, when thousands of settlers danced before Ariel Sharon and sang songs of praise for him, I used to tell my friends in the settlement movement: Arik, and none other than him, will kick you out of all the settlements one of these days and won’t look back.
My friends in the settlement movement, and there are quiet a few of those, would ridicule my prophecy and point to facts that contradicted my views: Prospering communities, red roofs, backyards, and synagogues were being built everywhere, and who was the great builder? Sharon, of course. And the rest, as any rookie journalist would write these days, is history.
Appealing to Jews
Obama invites close friends, staff to Seder dinner / Associated Press
National Jewish Democratic Council says hosting of traditional Pesach dinner, including reading of Haggadah, 'shows the personal and deep relationship US president has with the Jewish community'
Full story
The view from the Knesset at this time should worry anyone who believes there will be no progress in talks with the Palestinians, even though this appears to be one of the most hawkish parliaments we ever had.
In the near future, we will likely hear speeches that thus far were only delivered at the Knesset’s margins. The words “compromise,” “concessions,” “final-status agreement” and others will be erased. They will offer us to take over Gaza, Baghdad, Khartoum, and Tehran too. We shall bomb, destroy, pulverize, and eliminate. We can expect a fierce competition between the speakers over who goes further.
As in the past year we saw the violation of the honorable custom whereby no applause is allowed at the Knesset, we can assume that some of the speakers will draw loud applause. They will reply by nodding at the podium; thank you very much, really, thank you.
The cheers may sweep many outside the Knesset as well. We like these speeches and these speakers. We took great pleasure in Lieberman’s comments, when he told Mubarak to “go to hell.” That Lieberman is a real man, isn’t he? National pride! We really showed Mubarak who’s the boss. We’re the best.
However, in the 21st Century the world has shrunk as it never did before. Globalization managed, at least when it comes to foreign affairs, to minimize distances and expedite processes. You want an example? President Obama. Last week he crossed continents and states, resolved problems (and created new ones,) and prepared a new agenda for Europe and part of the Middle East. Soon, he will be arriving in Israel.
Intimacy is dissipating
This young man has little time, and he has an odd quality: He tries to deliver what he promised. And another thing: He is indeed a great friend of Israel, and apparently tried some gefilte fish during the Seder held at the White House, yet he has been conveying signals to us en masse: For example, in previous years the American president would travel to Israel, and take the opportunity to also quickly visit Turkey. Now, he travels to Turkey, but doesn’t visit Israel, the close ally, the “aircraft carrier,” “the cradle of democracy.”
That’s it, the intimacy is dissipating. In Obama’s view, we’re not yet “just like other nations,” but we shall get there.
Soon, very soon apparently, someone in our proud national leadership will have to tell Barack Obama to “go to hell,” and perhaps even threaten to bomb the bridges in Washington. Yet experience shows that proud people do not bend; they break.
Just like Menachem Begin, who on the eve of his trip to Camp David said: “If I’ll be asked to return even a grain of send, I will pack my bags and go back home”; just like Sharon (you need examples? It would be a waste of space); and even Yitzhak Rabin (“Withdrawing from the Golan would mean neglecting Israeli security”) and of course Ehud Barak and Bibi Netanyahu.
The bottom line is as follows: There is no reason to be overly excited by the words of some ministers and Knesset members in the near future, who just like many others are excited by our proud national government. State Department officials are filing away their words in dusty binders, and there are plenty of those.
In the room adjacent to Obama’s Oval Office there is a very long table. Those who advise Obama to go to hell would later need to take their national pride and crawl under this table.
Front Page Features