Prof. Paul Eidelberg, President
Israel-America Renaissance Institute
Part I. Netanyahu’s Self-Incrimination
Near the outset of his speech, PM Netanyahu emphasized that, for the sake of peace, “Israel did more than just make sweeping offers [to her adversaries]. We actually left territory. We withdrew from Lebanon in 2000 and from every square inch of Gaza in 2005. That didn’t calm the Islamic storm, the militant Islamic storm that threatens us. It only brought the storm closer and made it stronger.”
This factual statement of Netanyahu unwittingly reveals that Israel’s political leaders are ignorant concerning the implacable nature of Islam and are therefore incapable of making strategic decisions conducive to the security of their country.
Netanyahu goes on to say: “Hezbollah and Hamas fired thousands of rockets against our cities from the very territories we vacated.” To this I ask, “What morally responsible and self-respecting government would allow Israel’s enemies to fire so many rockets against Israel’s cities without retaliating after only a few rockets were fired?”
Oblivious of his incriminating Israel’s government, Mr. Netanyahu went on to say that leaving Gaza did not stop Muslims from attacking Israel. Now ponder his further admissions regarding Gaza:
We didn’t freeze the settlements in Gaza, we uprooted them. We did exactly what the theory [of land for peace] says: Get out, go back to the 1967 borders, dismantle the settlements. And I don’t think people remember how far we went to achieve this. We uprooted thousands of people from their homes. We pulled children out of — out of their schools and their kindergartens. We bulldozed synagogues. We even — we even moved loved ones from their graves.
What a monumental display of self-incrimination! This forced expulsion of Jews from their homes was an unspeakable crime. Perhaps Mr. Netanyahu is too callous or self-righteous to see this uprooting of innocent men, women, and children from their homes and bulldozing their synagogues as a crime. His own father Benzion Netanyahu denounced the projected expulsion as a crime! I would only add it was a desecration of God’s Name.
Nor is this all. Listening to PM Netanyahu’s speech to the UN, the intelligent observer will ask: “Didn’t it occur to you that expelling the Jews from Gaza had grave military consequences, namely, that all of Gaza would become a launching pad for rocket attacks against your country?” Were you deaf to the warnings of your military and intelligence experts?”
Indeed, Israel’s highest defense and intelligence officials, Moshe Ya’alon (IDF Chief of Staff), Maj. Gen. Aharon Ze’evi-Farkash (head of IDF Intelligence), and Avi Dichter (Director of the Shin Bet—General Security Service), all warned against the Gaza withdrawal.
On January 5, 2005, in testimony before the Knesset Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee, Dichter described the threats inherent in pulling the IDF from the Gaza Strip: “In a situation where Israel is not in control of the Philadelphi corridor [which separates Gaza from the Sinai Peninsula], terrorists arriving from Lebanon are liable to infiltrate through it into the Gaza Strip and there is the distinct possibility that in a short while the Gaza Strip will turn into south Lebanon.” Dichter also cautioned that the current “trickle” of arms smuggling through the corridor is liable to turn into a “river.”
On September 28, 2005, Farkash warned that Al-Qaida members are in the Palestinian-controlled Gaza Strip after infiltrating while the border with Egypt was opened two weeks ago.
Ya’alon warned, in interview published in Ha’aretz on June 3, 2005, that disengagement will lead to a renewal of the terrorist war in the West Bank.
On July 23, 2005, Maj. Gen, Yaacov Amidror (who served as commander of Israel’s School of National Security until 2002) warned: “There is no military advantage to leaving Gaza. You lose control on the ground, the ability to conduct intelligence operations and to stage ground efforts into Gaza City and Khan Yunis. You let Hamas and Islamic Jihad have a safe haven to launch terrorist actions from and in which to grow their terror apparatus.”
Despite all this, Netanyahu had the audacity to remind the UN how the entire world applauded Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza as “an act of great statesmanship … bold act of peace.” “But ladies and gentlemen,” he added, “we didn’t get peace. We got war. We got Iran, which through its proxy Hamas promptly kicked out the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority collapsed in a day—in one day.”
That’s right, Mr. Netanyahu, but I ask you: On what empirical grounds, on what historical grounds, on what logical grounds, on what psychological grounds, on what theological grounds, had you any reason to expect peace after this display of defeatism and this unconscionable crime against the Jews of Gaza?
(To be continued)