In Context

This (via IMRA) is a lot like one of those Escher drawings in which down is also up.  And also flat.  It gives me a similar feeling of vertigo.  Without the benefits.

RAMALLAH, May 2, 2012 (WAFA) - Twenty Palestinian unions, including the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (PJS), called Wednesday for a boycott of a reception organized by the US consulate in Jerusalem to be held in Ramallah on Thursday on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day, according to a statement issued by the unions.

They said the call came "to protest US policies toward our national issues, particularly the issue of the prisoners and freedom of the Palestinian press in light of a rise in criminal Israeli belligerence against journalists without hearing one word of condemnation by the US Administration or its representatives."

Escher's magnificent manipulations of space allow the imagination to soar.  And they open the mind to view reality from a different perspective.  Or several.  They don't distort it to serve twisted and narrow political narratives. 

"News" isn't supposed to imitate art.  At least not in that way.

There is NO freedom of the "Palestinian press," as has been extensively and courageously documented by some, but especially by one of their own, Khaled Abu Toameh, who for decades has continuously risked ... well, everything ... to bring this truth to light.

It's true that the current US administration has utterly failed to issue one word of condemnation of the atrocious violations of freedom of the "Palestinian press."  But that, of course, isn't what WAFA, being an enslaved arm of the PA, was referring to.

On Friday, President Obama issued a waiver (thanks to David G for the link) of restrictions passed by Congress and signed into law by Obama last year on providing funds to the Palestinian Authority.  It must be noted that the waiver option was expressly included in the legislation itself.

(b) Waiver- The prohibition included in subsection (a) shall not apply if the President certifies in writing to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the President pro tempore of the Senate, and the Committees on Appropriations that waiving such prohibition is important to the national security interests of the United States

And of course he did so certify.  And his spokesmouth, Tommy Vietor, obligingly prevaricated outright to the press:

"The PA has recognized Israel's right to exist, renounced violence, and accepted previous agreements, including the Roadmap," he said, referring to the peace plan proposed by the so-called Middle East Quartet -- United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations.

The PA has done no such thing.  To the contrary, its official representatives have expressly rejected any intention to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, have consistently honored and rewarded those engaged in violence against Israeli civilians and have imposed their own unilateral conditions upon their alleged "acceptance" of all previous agreements, including but not limited to the Roadmap.

Bottom line: not only is such a waiver not in the national security interest of the United States, it runs directly counter to any such interest.  There is no national security interest in propping up a failed dictator who is now more than three years past the term of his elected office.  There is no national security interest in continuing to feed US taxpayer dollars, even if we had them to spare (which we do not), into an anti-US, anti-Western, antisemitic kleptocracy that knows no bounds. 

This is not that complicated.  And it actually may turn out to be ... a good thing.  Why?  Because the waiver provision has a caveat

(d) Report- Whenever the waiver authority pursuant to subsection (b) is exercised, the President shall submit a report to the Committees on Appropriations detailing the justification for the waiver, the purposes for which the funds will be spent, and the accounting procedures in place to ensure that the funds are properly disbursed: Provided, That the report shall also detail the steps the Palestinian Authority has taken to arrest terrorists, confiscate weapons and dismantle the terrorist infrastructure.

Obama can't submit such a report because the PA has taken no such steps in any meaningful way.  If Congress was indifferent to the president's compliance with this requirement, it would be no big deal.  Obama could submit some made up garbage and it would be accepted.  But Congress does not seem to be indifferent, and if they are, then we, their constituents, need to hold their feet to the fire.  It's an election year.  Public hearings on Obama's "evidence" that the PA has complied with its obligations would provide an interesting venue for the truth to come out. 

I say ... bring it on!

Not even close.

This morning the Supreme Court released its opinion in Zivotofsky v. Clinton. In an 8-1 decision, it reversed the lower courts' dismissal of Menachim Zivotofsky's suit to have "Jerusalem, Israel" listed as his place of birth. The Court held that that the political-question doctrine did not bar Zivotofsky's suit. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion. Justices Sotomayor and Alito each wrote separately to concur, while Justice Breyer dissented, finding that the case presented a nonjusticiable political question.

The case now goes back to the District Court for a hearing on the merits. This isn't over yet by a long shot, but it's a good start.

On September 28, 2000, Ariel Sharon took a walk up to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.  It was most assuredly a political statement, meant to communicate to the Israeli public his credentials as a strong leader who would protect and defend the sites holiest to the Jewish People.  It was surely meant to signal that he would do a better job of that than Ehud Barak who had arguably offered to give away the store at Camp David and than Benyamin Netanyahu who was challenging Sharon for leadership of the Likud party.

It was also most assuredly a jurisdictional statement, meant to remind the world that, notwithstanding Israel's numerous and generous attempts to accommodate Muslim sensitivities there, as the singularly holy hill toward which Jews had yearned and prayed for millennia, it was and would remain under the sovereignty of the Jewish State.

Yassir Arafat and much of the world blamed Sharon's walk for igniting the terror war that is commonly (but inaccurately) referred to as the "second intifada."  But the evidence is to the contrary.  A survey of events from Camp David through September of that year indicate that Arafat had been preparing for war and was seeking a trigger, any trigger, to set it off.  In that respect, Sharon may have given him a gift and it may be that better judgment could have prevailed.  Another view is that it was time to call the other half of the bluff that Arafat had brought to Camp David.  He had already proved there that he wasn't ready for peace.  Was he actually ready, willing, even anxious for war?  Did he actually, as he subsequently claimed, try to prevent Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount (for the sake of preserving the peace, of course)?

DG's Mideast Media Sampler recently offered important insights into the flaws of an article (since expanded) by Neil Lewis in the Columbia Journalism Review in which Lewis attempts (unsuccessfully, IMO) to defend the New York Times against claims of anti-Israel bias.  One such insight explores a piece of "analysis" by Deborah Sontag, other parts of which are mentioned by Lewis, in which Sontag recites a story about a party in late September, 2000, at the home of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, a few days before Sharon's walk.

But Palestinians drove away from that dinner with something else on their minds -- Mr. Sharon's coming visit to what Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary and Jews know as the Temple Mount. Mr. Arafat said in an interview that he huddled on the balcony with Mr. Barak and implored him to block Mr. Sharon's plans.

Though Sontag doesn't identify the interview, it would appear to have been this one by Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes (first aired November 5, 2000).  It's cited, along with Sontag's op-ed, in this recent book by Greg Myre and Jennifer Griffin, in which they uncritically repeat Sontag's (and Arafat's) version of the story.  If a full transcript or video of the interview is available, I've been unable to find it.  Here's a partial annotated excerpt:

Arafat blames all the recent violence on Ariel Sharon - Israel's hardline opposition leader - who five weeks ago made a point of visiting a key Muslim holy place in Jerusalem, the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Arafat said he knew about Sharon's visit three days in advance, and tried to head it off because he knew it would trigger clashes.

"I had asked (Israeli Prime Minister) Ehud Barak and asked others why Sharon is insistent to come in this delicate time," Arafat said.

"(Barak) kept silent. I raised this question to President Clinton to try with me to convince Barak not to give him the permission to go to visit," Arafat said.

Arafat said he also told the European Union, the Vatican and Arab leaders about the planned visit.

No mention of a huddle on the balcony or any direct warning of violence is apparent here, at least according to this report.  And did Arafat really prevail upon President Clinton to prevent the walk (something Clinton clearly needed no prodding to attempt for obvious reasons)?  Or did Arafat merely repeat to Clinton his claim that had made the request of Barak?  Clinton addresses the issue in his autobiography right after mentioning the dinner at Barak's but, notwithstanding the embellishments and hyperbole in this Ha'aretz report, actually seems to suggest the latter.  Says Clinton (at p. 924):

Arafat said he had asked Barak to prevent Sharon's stroll, which was clearly intended to affirm Israel's sovereignty over the site and to strengthen his hand against a challenge to his leadership of the Likud Party from former prime minister Netanyahu, who was now sounding more hawkish than Sharon.  I had also hoped Barak would prevent Sharon's inflamatory escapade, but Barak told me he couldn't.

In this book, S. Daniel Abraham (who helped arrange that dinner meeting at Barak's home and was actually there) provides a different account (at pp.154-55):

Barak stood up, thanked me for arranging the meeting, and said that he believed peace could be achieved by the people gathered in this room.  Even as he was speaking, Gilead Sher and Saeb Erekat were whispering among themselves, trying to set an agenda for the evening.  No one seemed to know exactly what topics should be discussed.  Arafat followed Barak with a similar sort of vague, but positive, speech.  But there remains to this day a very important difference of recollections regarding exactly what Arafat said.  News had broken earlier that day that Sharon was planning to visit the Temple Mount (what the Muslims call Haram al Sharif), in order to demonstrate Israel's sovereignty over the holy site.  Erekat insists that during his remarks, Arafat turned to Barak, and said, "Your Excellency, it is to no good end that Sharon will go to the Haram.  Please don't allow him to go.  Don't allow him to go because in a few months time, he will be the only one smiling.  He will destroy us.  Please don't give him permission to go."  According to Erekat, Barak never responded to Arafat's request.  The Israeli team claims they never heard such a request.  But I do know that the issue of Sharon's visit was discussed.  I remember Barak saying to me toward the end of the evening that Israeli law would not permit him to prevent the visit of a private Israeli citizen, which Sharon then was, to the Temple Mount.

Very peculiar.  Abraham was obviously in the room for these two speeches and yet he suddenly pivots from a first person on-the-spot account to an "objective" discussion of this "difference of recollections."  What was his recollection??  Like Sontag, he cites no reference references for the claims.  Nevertheless ...

The BBC propaganda documentary film "Elusive Peace" (see CAMERA's critique here), includes a report remarkably similar to Abraham's -- unsurprisingly narrated by Saeb Erekat himself (the relevant part starts at 34:25), with helpful commentary from the narrator.  Here's an excerpt:

NARRATOR: To make his point that Temple Mount belonged to the Jews, Ariel Sharon said he would take a public walk on Haram al Sharif, around two of Islam's holiest mosques...

EREKAT: [Arafat said to Barak] "Please, please, please, your excellency, don't allow Sharon to come to Haram."

NARRATOR: Hanging over the whole room was the threat of Ariel Sharon's visit to the mosques on Haram, Temple Mount, scheduled to occur in three days.

EREKAT: I remember President Arafat telling Mr. Barak, "He wants to destroy everything. Your excellency, if he goes to Haram he'll be the only person laughing in the next months to come.

NARRATOR: Barak took no action. ...

(There's more and I recommend watching that segment of the video for the full context.)  Abraham's book came out the year after "Elusive Peace" was aired on PBS and may well have used it as his source, diplomatically suggesting that while he heard no such conversation, "Erekat insists" in that clip that it happened. 

So what did happen?  Did Arafat ever make a serious attempt to prevent Sharon's walk?  Did he, as he and Erekat claimed, try their best to avoid the eruption of violence?  If so, why is the evidence so thin, inaccessible and vague?  And why are the few uncorroborated accounts of his efforts all after the fact?  Where are the contemporaneous reports of warnings and alarms being sounded in the days preceding the walk?

I was, in fact, able to find ... one.

On September 27, 2000, the day before Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount, IMRA reported:

Col. Jibril Rajoub, the head of Palestinian Authority Preventive Security in the West Bank, warned Israel Radio this morning that there would be bloodshed if Arik Sharon visits the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on Thursday and that the PA would do nothing to prevent bloodshed in areas under their control.

But contrast that report with this one from just a week later:

Israel Radio reported this morning that Minister of Internal Security and Acting Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben Ami was promised by Jibril Rajoub, head of PA Preventive Security, that there would be no reaction to Likud MK Arik Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount as long as Sharon did not attempt to enter the mosque itself.

Numerous Israeli officials and American peace processers have related similar accounts of such assurances having been made by Rajoub in the days immediately prior to the event.  So the evidence, such as it is, is that the threat of violence was both telegraphed (threatened) once and and played down repeatedly ... by the same person.  With that exception, the warnings seem largely to have been projections backward after the event, an excuse swallowed whole by many in the media (see here, for a particularly egregious example) and in international diplomatic circles as well.

On this page, there's an impressive collection of quotes attributed to palestinian and Arab sources that demonstrate the terror war had been planned since at least the conclusion of the Camp David summit in July.  (See also, Palestinian Media Watch.)  Perhaps the best known of these is this excerpt from a speech reportedly made by PA Communications Minister, 'Imad Al-Faluji during a visit to the 'Ein Al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon in March, 2001 (subsequently disavowed).

The Al-Aqsa Intifada emphasizes these principles and axioms. Whoever thinks that the Intifada broke out because of the despised Sharon's visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, is wrong, even if this visit was the straw that broke the back of the Palestinian people. This Intifada was planned in advance, ever since President Arafat's return from the Camp David negotiations, where he turned the table upside down on President Clinton. [Arafat] remained steadfast and challenged [Clinton]. He rejected the American terms and he did it in the heart of the US.

President Clinton claims that he and others on his team had urged Arafat to prevent the violence, to "refuse to be provoked."  Arafat was having none of it.  IMRA reported:

Sept 29, 2000

Prime Minister Ehud Barak told Israel Radio this afternoon that Palestinian incitement AFTER Likud MK Arik Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount rather than Sharon's visit was to blame for the violence today in Jerusalem.

When Sharon visited the Temple Mount on Thursday morning very few Palestinians responded to calls to come to the Temple Mount to protest. Palestinian youth also steered clear of the Temple Mount even though local schools were closed to allow them join in "the defense of Jerusalem".

Israel Radio reports that Palestinian Authority Radio devoted the morning broadcasts to calls for people to come to the Temple Mount in the defense of Jerusalem and inciting talk against Israel. Israel Radio also reports that the Palestinian papers featured similar calls.

The palestinian media was under the absolute control of Yassir Arafat, as were the schools.  This was, in fact, exactly what he had wanted all along. 

From Foreign Policy (via DG's Mideast Media Sampler):

On Saturday, SCAF chief Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi pardoned Nabil, along with 1,959 other prisoners subjected to military trials. Adel al-Mursi, the head of the military prosecution, said that the decision to pardon the detainees was taken to commemorate the revolution's anniversary. He was released on Jan. 24, flashing the "V" for victory signs to photographers as he marched out of prison.

This is very good news, no question.  But here's another headline that puts the prisoner release in a broader context:

Egypt pardons nearly 2,000 prisoners; Islamists take three quarters of parliament

Sanad, a secularist, an atheist, an advocate for gender and affectional preference equality and a supporter of Israel, has consistently called for the Egyptian army to get out of the way and let the voice of the people be heard.  And yet, those whom the people have now given political power ruthlessly oppose all of those stands and the people who take them.  The only force standing in the way of Egypt's Islamists today is the army.  How does he square that circle?

David Keyes writes at the Huff Post about "Why the World Should Care about Freeing Maikel Nabil Sanad." 

Sanad's freedom is a litmus test for Egypt's future. So far it is failing miserably.

Sanad, as you may recall, is the Egyptian blogger who was arrested last March for "insulting the military."  He's still in jail and, since August, has been on a hunger strike.  Keyes reminds us why it's important to keep the spotlight on him.  Thoughts and prayers may also help.

More here.

Emerging from my most recent ... pause ... to convey warm congratulations to David Gerstman for having yet another excellent essay published at PJ Media last week.  Tom Friedman vs. Israel neatly encapsulates the high (or rather low) points of Friedman's inconsistency, hypocrisy and (perhaps inadvertent?) malice in his columns on and about the Jewish state.  Don't miss.

Meanwhile, speaking of low, I must also convey my utter disgust with the miserable excuse for a journalist that Aussie Dave (editor of the terrific blog Israelly Cool) appropriately refers to as Doucheblogger^TM Richard Silverstein, who has proven conclusively (as if there was previously any doubt) that not only is he a sloppy and rabid anti-Israel extremist but also a totally unethical one.  The details are here, and here and here.

If you've never heard of Richard Silverstein, consider yourself lucky.  If you've never been to Israelly Cool, go now.

Flashback:  William F. Buckley, National Review, 2/15/2006, speculating on the Western response to the victory of Hamas in the January 25 elections:

. . .

We are dealing with a movement that decades ago was illegalized by the Egyptian government. But the Muslim Brotherhood persisted and in the parliamentary election last fall showed their gathering strength. Accordingly, on the same weekend in which Hamas faced economic ostracism, Mubarak announced a postponement by two years of scheduled local elections. This was a visible sign of fright, that democracy was on the move, and that a religious organization which has engaged in violent activities, and is banned, threatens the plans of Mubarak, which were to hand Egypt over to his son. Observers with minimal liberal sensibilities welcome most moves against Mubarak, but not any move against him, because he has stayed outside the clutches of the Islamic totalists and because his country was the first Mideast power to acknowledge and to respect Israeli independence. The prospect of the Muslim Brotherhood overwhelming Egypt and collaborating with the mullahs' Iran reminds us of the risks that democracy can bring.

It is a bitter pill to swallow, to see the United States and Israel forthrightly attempting to subvert democracy in Palestine. But the first law in this sermon is that democracy's fruits sometimes need either to be stillborn or else to be resisted.

In yesterday's PJ Media column promoting his (and LInda Bridges') recently published anthology of Buckley's writings, Roger Kimball wrote:

Literature, said Ezra Pound, is news that stays news. I have met few people better informed about public affairs than Bill Buckley. But his mastery of the day's ephemera was only a prelude to his embrace of the principles that underlay the controversies.

So it would seem.

What happens if there is a peace accord tomorrow, and Israel gives up any claim to sovereignty over Jerusalem? Is the President free to stop listing Israel on the passport?

Thus Justice Sonia Sotomayor yesterday, when the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of Zivotofsky v. Clinton. 

The case has its origin in the attempt of U.S. citizens Ari and Naomi Zivotofsky to have the birthplace of their son Menachem shown on his U.S. passport as "Israel."  Menachem was born in 2002 at Shaare Zedek hospital, which is located in western Jerusalem, near Har Herzl, which is well within the "1967 borders." 

But the State Department, in its wisdom [sic], has had an official policy since at least 1970 to designate the birthplace of those born anywhere in Jerusalem as "Jerusalem," with no reference to a country.  This is ostensibly because U.S. foreign policy regards sovereignty over Jerusalem to be an issue for resolution between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and wishes to remain "neutral" in the meantime.  Right.

There are many twists, turns and legal aspects to this case, but I want to focus for the moment on this exchange that took place yesterday between Justice Sotomayor and Nathan Lewin, the attorney representing the Zivotofskys. 

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: Mr. Lewin, you were cut off earlier when you were saying this reading doesn't hobble the President in the future.

It says anybody born in -- in Jerusalem can have Israel listed, correct? What happens if there is a peace accord tomorrow, and Israel gives up any claim to sovereignty over Jerusalem? Is the President free to stop listing Israel on the passport?

MR. LEWIN: If -

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: Or does he have to wait for Congress to change the law?

MR. LEWIN: I think he does have to wait for Congress to change the law.

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: So you are hobbling the President with respect to situations that occur frequently -

MR. LEWIN: Well -

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: -- as happened in Egypt, sometimes overnight.

MR. LEWIN: No, but it may in some way, in a very remote possible way -- I mean, I think under those circumstances, if there were a peace treaty and if Jerusalem were handed over to a Palestinian state, I think Congress would repeal the statute.

That's the point. Congress has the power, has the authority under the Constitution to enact laws, and it is Congress that makes the decision even with regard to foreign policy issues.

I do understand that during oral argument a justice can propose any far fetched hypothetical scenario he or she believes may clarify a point or better define an argument.  But one of the disturbing things about this whole issue of birthplace designation, which I've raised many times before, is that the official position of the State Department, which appears to be echoed here (perhaps inadvertently) by Justice Sotomayor, is a return in negotiations not to Israel's 1967 borders (a/k/a the 1949 armistice lines) but to the completely untenable 1947 borders as drawn in the UN Partition Plan, under which Jerusalem was an "international" city under UN control.  Why else would "Jerusalem" (as opposed to "East Jerusalem") be included with the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights and the West Bank as areas in which the State Department prohibits a passport to show "Israel" as the birthplace?  And why would a Supreme Court justice posit the utterly absurd hypothetical that Israel would ever "give up any claim to sovereignty over Jerusalem" as part of any accord or negotiation?

Again, the question:

What happens if there is a peace accord tomorrow, and Israel gives up any claim to sovereignty over Jerusalem? Is the President free to stop listing Israel on the passport?

Couldn't the same question be asked of Haifa or Jaffa or Beersheva?

People rarely like to hear bad news, so when it comes to the "Arab Spring," they can be perhaps be forgiven for preferring to luxuriate in feeble fluff like Tunisia's example: Successful elections followed the Arab Spring rather then face the hard cold facts cited by Barry Rubin in Tunisia: The 'Moderate' Islamists Make a Radical Revolution.

They do so, however, at their own peril.  From Tunisia to Egypt to Libya, the "Arab Spring" is looking and sounding more and more like a fever swamp.  Best to pay attention.