The Aftermath of Gaza Withdrawal?
Ralph Kostant weighs in on this one:
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Daniel Pipes, Director of the Middle East Forum, writing in The Jerusalem Post,
The answer is coming soon. Starting on August 15 the Israeli government will evict some 8,000 Israelis from Gaza and turn their land over to the Palestinian Authority. In addition to being a unique event in modern history (no other democracy has forcibly uprooted thousands of its own citizens of one religion from their lawful homes), it also offers a rare, live, social-science experiment.In one sense, however, the experiment proposed by Pipes is unfair. When Israel’s enemies argue that Palestinian terror is the result of Israeli occupation, they do not mean solely the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, the areas conquered by Israel in the June 1967 Six Day War. To them, the mere existence of Israel represents Zionist occupation. As George Will has written, with his incomparable gift for turning a phrase, “The problem [for Israel’s enemies] is not that Israel is being provocative; the problem is that Israel’s being is provocative.”
We stand at an interpretive divide. If Israel's critics are right, the Gaza withdrawal will improve Palestinian attitudes toward Israel, leading to an end of incitement and a steep drop in attempted violence, followed by a renewal of negotiations and a full settlement. Logic requires, after all, that if "occupation" is the problem, ending it, even partially, will lead to a solution.
Pipes, however, predicts a very different result. The reader should read his entire column, comparing Pipe’s predictions, and the evidence he offers for them, with the predictions that would seem to follow from the point of view of Israel’s critics, and consider which sound more plausible.
Ralph B. Kostant
posted by Lowell Brown at 9:28 AM
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1 Comments:
I believe there's something much bigger than and end to terrorism behind Sharon's policy in Gaza. Something no one is talking about. I suspect it has to do with the threat of a US arms embargo against Israel.Probably the only thing that would set jew against jew is the fear of being unarmed.
But the pull-out is right. It's so right that it cannot be coming from the Jewish state.
It's simply beyond belief, beyond the pale that any people claim a land by God's gift. If that were the case, we would have to give the US back to the Indians, and they would give it back to the Mongols, and they would give it back to the apes.
Posted by Dixon Berry
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