donderdag 22 april 2010

Iran 327

Why Iran Won’t Attack Israel

The Jewish state’s substantial Palestinian population — which Israel once sought to expel — serves as a deterrent.

By Yousef Munayyer

April 21, 2010 "
Los Angeles Times" -- Palestinians are in Israel today because they managed to survive the depopulation of 1948, the year the Jewish state was founded (Arabs constitute about 20% of Israel's population). Ironically, while Benny Morris' scholarship suggests that the mere existence of these Palestinians in Israel -- and millions more in the occupied territories -- irks him, Israel's substantial Arab population also blows a hole in his argument about the need to deal with the supposed Iranian nuclear threat.

Morris is part of an increasingly vociferous chorus warning of an impending apocalypse for Israel at the hands of a nuclear Iran eager to rid the Middle East of its Jews. Yet Iran's religious leaders have repeatedly stated that such weapons are "un-Islamic" or "forbidden under Islam."

Morris' role in our understanding of the region's history is confounding. Arguably, no one played a more central role in exposing Israel's role in the depopulation of Palestinians from their homeland than Morris. In his seminal work, "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem," Morris, using declassified military documents, exposes the calculated effort by early Israeli leaders to impose a Jewish majority through ethnic cleansing.

Long considered a champion of modern Israeli historians who sought to shed light on the ugly side of Israel's birth, Morris shocked many Israelis and Palestinians alike when he later changed course. To Morris, the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians was no longer the problem at the heart of the conflict; in fact, he suggested that the problem was that Israel didn't finish the job in 1948.

Morris said in a
2004 interview "Under some circumstances expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. You have to dirty your hands."

Morris added later in the interview that if Israel's first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, "was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. ... If he had carried out a full expulsion — rather than a partial one — he would have stabilized the state of Israel for generations."

Yet the pesky Palestinian minority Morris wishes had been expelled decades ago serves as a deterrent from a nuclear-armed Iran, should the Islamic Republic ever build nuclear weapons and consider using them on Israel. The fact that Arab Israelis were among the casualties of the 2006 war with Hezbollah speaks to the reality that no nuclear attack on Israel could happen without the deaths of countless Palestinians and Israelis, not to mention the likely destruction of Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam.

The reality of Palestinian casualties, the destruction of Jerusalem, the onset of regional war and the immediate destruction of Iran's regime as a result of a multilateral conventional or even nuclear counterattack all serve as a credible deterrent to a nuclear Iran. The Iranian leadership has shown a demonstrable interest in self-preservation

The alarmism espoused Morris and company isn't grounded in reality. Rather — just as with Iraq, Syria and now Iran — Israel constantly needs an enemy that it says threatens its existence. Otherwise the Jewish state would have a harder time maintaining its overwhelming military supremacy in the region and continuously changing the subject from resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to practically anything else.

The ideology at the foundation of the state of Israel and the very justification for its existence requires the existence of apocalyptic anti-Semitic forces with the intent and capability to annihilate. Without these boogeymen, whether it is Saddam Hussein, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Arabs who "want to push Israel into the sea," the state of Israel ceases to have any justification for the maintenance of a Jewish majority by force or for its ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands.

The fact that Benjamin Netanyahu, the pro-colonization Israeli prime minister, has made every effort to connect the idea of a nuclear Iran to the Holocaust is evidence of this scare-mongering. Iran, like Iraq in 2003, is an inflated but necessary fear for Israel. No credible analysis of the situation envisions a scenario in which Iran would use nuclear weapons against the Jewish state. But proponents of Israel's colonial enterprise, who support maintaining a Jewish majority by the force of walls and soldiers in occupied territory, want everyone to believe that the focus should be on Iran, not on the occupation, and that Israel's security policies are justifiable against "existential threats."

The need for these inflated threats has increased in the years since Israel signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. Despite these agreements, Israel still maintains and furthers its occupation of Palestinian lands through blockade and settlement expansion.

The emperor may be naked in Tel Aviv, but he can continue avoiding attention and shame if he persuades the world to look in Tehran's direction instead.

Yousef Munayyer is executive director of the Palestine Center.

5 opmerkingen:

Sonja zei

AEL vrijgesproken van belediging van Joden

Paul zei

First deportation from West Bank to Gaza under new apartheid-style IDF pass law

http://desertpeace.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/one-down-over-three-million-more-to-go/

Anoniem zei

Geweldig, de uitspraak van de rechtbank w.b. de cartoon van de AEL. Hierbij ging het om de context waarin de cartoon geplaatst werd, wat ik Naftaniel niet heb horen zeggen. Hij kan fluiten naar de 2500 euro. Ander holocaustlaadje opentrekken. Markuszower?

anzi

Anoniem zei

Twitterende Naftaniel

Gauw onderhandelen dus


RonnyNaftaniel@leolewin @kleinekale @JoelErwteman Beledigen op afkomst of onveranderlijke kenmerken is anders dan beledigen van religie. Die kies je
38 minutes ago via web in reply to leolewin
@leolewin @kleinekale @JoelErwteman Ontkenning of belachelijk maken van genocide vergroot het gevaar van herhaling. "Zo erg is het niet".
40 minutes ago via web in reply to leolewin
De afweging vrijheid meningsuiting-bescherming tegen discriminatie, in de #AEL zaak moet door hogere rechter worden beoordeeld.
about 1 hour ago via web Teleurgesteld in vrijspraak AEL voor antisemische cartoon. Met als argument dubbele moraal aan te tonen kunnen we voortaan misdrijven plegen
about 1 hour ago via web #AIVD waarschuwt dat de Iraamse inlichtingendienst Iraniers in Nederland intimideert. http://bit.ly/aRLdVU
about 6 hours ago via web RT @CIDI_nieuws: Recycling: Een 25-jarenplan voor de vuilnisbelt. Vuilnisbelt bij Tel Aviv wordt al 12 jaar gerecycled: op naar het park ...
about 16 hours ago via web @Erwin_vd_V #CIDI neemt alleen standpunten in nav concreet beleid. Wij zijn voor een 2 statenoplossing, tegen racisme en antisemitisme.
about 22 hours ago via twibble in reply to Erwin_vd_V
Ondanks ontkenning van zijn woordvoerder houden de geruchten aan dat Palestijnse president #Abbas ernstig ziek is. Gauw onderhandelen dus.
8:25 AM Apr 21st via web Europese oproep tot maatregelen tegen Iraanse Revolutionare Garde is nog te tekenen op http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/petition/
5:58 AM Apr 21st via web Prominente Europeanen roepen op tot #sancties tegen #Iraanse Revolutionaire Garde. O.m: #Bolkenstein #Peper #Weisglas. http://bit.ly/d1h4xC
5:51 AM Apr 21st via web Direct. Btnl. Politiek Brookings Martin #Indyk: "#Netanyahu moet kiezen tussen Obama en rechterflank van de #Likoed". http://bit.ly/diwDvB
2:26 AM Apr 21st via web @kajleers Klopt die idiote eiergooier. Maar misschien ook de gelegenheid de BTW op eieren van 6 naar 19% te brengen. Zo gezond zijn ze niet.
2:17 AM Apr 21st via web in reply to kajleers
Nog beter zou zijn als de #kroonprins en Maxima dit jaar een officieel bezoek zouden brengen aan Israël.
5:54 PM Apr 20th via twibble Dank. Interessant maar wel een beetje simpel. En teveel gericht op Jimmy Carter, alsof hij de personifiering van al het kwaad is.
3:51 PM Apr 20th via web RT @CIDI_nieuws: Armeniers willen een monument in Den Haag als erkenning van de Armeense genocide: 95 jaar na de moord op 1,... http://b ...
2:20 PM Apr 20th via web Opmerkelijk al die politici die zich met de kandidatenlijst van andere partijen bezighouden.
9:14 AM Apr 20th via web Gaat #Sabeel met een correcte versie van het Palestijnse #Kairos document komen, omdat de vertaling gesjoemeld is? http://bit.ly/c29vbl
9:11 AM Apr 20th via web @kajleers #D'66 en #PvdA waren er niet. Wel Ferrier van het CDA. Ook Van Bommel sprak.
6:58 AM Apr 20th via web in reply to kajleers
Sprak demo van Armeniers toe op Plein in DH. Veel parlementariers. @HantenBroeke @KeesvdStaaij @JoelVoordewind voor Armeens monument
6:50 AM Apr 20th via web @menno77 Goed om te lezen. Dan feliciteer ik jou ook van harte met Israels 62ste verjaardag.
1:56 AM Apr 20th via web in reply to menno77
@anzi 62 jaar terreur, een felicitatie waard in reply to Naftaniel.

anzi

Paul zei

The Barack Obama administration's declaration in its Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) that it is reserving the right to use nuclear weapons against Iran represents a new element in a strategy of persuading Tehran that an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear sites is a serious possibility if Iran does not bow to the demand that it cease uranium enrichment.

Although administration officials have carefully refrained from drawing any direct connection between the new nuclear option and the Israeli threat, the NPR broadens the range of contingencies in which nuclear weapons might play a role so as to include an Iranian military response to an Israeli attack.

A war involving Iran that begins with an Israeli attack is the only plausible scenario that would fit the category of contingencies in the document.

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51172