The Day After...
By Gerald A. Honigman (07/03/07)
As I was walking my two-year old Chocolate Labrador Retriever, Tess (Contessa for you royals out there), along the ocean this morning, I found myself daydreaming. Not being able to fish today, I just admired the clear, calm ocean and felt sorry for myself for having my son, Jonathan, and my fishing trip cut short by rain the other day. I don’t get the boat out often...yet we do need the rain (but why then!?!?)
Well, in a semi-trance brought on by Mother Nature, I started to think “what ifs?” as Tessa took me for a walk. Like many Labs, she flunked out of obedience school.
So, here’s the picture generated by my neurons on this Florida summer day…
Israel carried out new elections later this summer. Olmert and his pathetic crew have been given the boot, and a mixture of old and new faces have come to the fore.
A depressed Israeli public, thirsting for peace and tiring of war, finally woke up in August and realized that both parties in a conflict must want peace for it to occur. The painful truth--obvious to some, but avoided by too many others--finally sunk in: The only long-term “peace” their Arab enemies have in mind for Israel is the peace of the grave. Makes no difference whether it’s the State Department’s alleged Arafatian Fatah good cops or Hamas bad cops.
Olmert’s opposition ran away with the election.
The day after taking office, the new Israeli Prime Minister made a phone call to Fatah’s Abbas. Olmert, pressured by the American President, and Secretary Rice and her Foggy Folks, had released hundreds of millions of dollars in tax funds, eased security restrictions, and so forth to prop up Abbas in the wake of Hamas’ Gaza victory. Abbas and his staff were now called to a meeting with the new Israeli leadership.
Previous, concrete, one-sided concessions by Israel in return for Fatah’s promises had only led to the shedding of more Jewish blood--and Arabs laughing at the Jews falling for their Trojan Horse and destruction in stages traps due to pressure from, ironically, their American best friends.
But, those days were now gone. Baruch HaShem.
And here’s the new Prime Minister’s steadfast position as expressed during his meeting with Abbas’ crew:
“ My Arab colleagues--colleagues, not friends--for up ‘til now, you have not been friends…
We both know the game that you have been playing for decades now. We Jews may have appeared ignorant, but we were squeezed to behave this way--as you well know and have taken advantage of many a time.
Those days are gone.
You have just received additional hard, concrete concessions from us as further gestures of good will and a sincere hope for a better future for both of our peoples.
The ball is now in your court.
There will be no more concessions from us until we see concrete evidence that you have decided to pursue a true peace--not your so-called hudnas, designed only to buy time to further strengthen yourselves in pursuit of your openly-admitted real goal of our destruction .
So, along these lines, we demand that you place Israel on your official maps. It’s not there now.
We demand that you monitor, very carefully, the imams in your mosques who collect salaries from you and preach the slaughter of Jews, along with your teachers, newspaper editors, commentators, television stations, and so forth.
We demand that you remove the textbooks from your schools which, along with your children camps and so forth, only teach your youth how to hate--not how to get along with Jews who finally have in one, tiny resurrected state, where their ancestors have lived for thousands of years, what you Arabs have almost two dozen of. This is urgent, and a true test of your willingness to accept us as neighbors and not as fools.
We demand that you crack down hard--which you have refused to do up until now--upon those among you who find glory in murdering our innocents. You have the means to do this, but not the will. What does this say to us, from whom you expect more and more concessions?
While one half of our people fled Arab lands--were refugees (but with no UNRWA to help , as you Arabs received)--after the attack Arabs launched upon our tiny, reborn state--much of the other half had just undergone the nightmare of the Holocaust, which you, Abbas, claim never occurred.
Despite this, our leaders cracked down on those some perceived to be Jewish hardliners in the fight for Jewish survival. The ship, Altalena, was sunk and Jews killed fellow Jews right after the nightmare of Auschwitz to see to it that there would be just one unified command.
There’s an important lesson for you here, Abbas, and you’d best learn it.
Our patience with Arab self-centeredness--others, besides yourselves, are entitled to their slivers of justice in this region too-- has worn out as has our willingness to cave in to the pressure of the world’s oil-addicted hypocrites.
So, here’s what’s expected next…
United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, in the wake of the ‘67 War we were forced to fight after being blockaded at the Straits of Tiran ( a casus belli) , etc., once again, for our very survival (before we were in Sinai, the Golan, Gaza, back in Judea and Samaria, and so forth) called for the creation of “secure and recognized borders” to replace those ridiculous armistice lines which made our state a mere stone’s throw wide after 1948.
Given all the above, we realize that you still refuse to recognize us within our pre-’67 armistice lines…let alone anything more.
Even worse, after you expect us to cave in to a retreat to those lines--in opposition to 242--you then expect us to accept being flooded by millions of jihadi-raised alleged refugees--whom you caged in camps, and who were created as a result of your own aggression--while we took in more of our own Jewish refugees fleeing what you call “Arab” lands into our sole state about the size of America’s New Jersey.
Knowing this, we are thus forced to come up with our own solution.
We will never return to our 9-mile wide existence again. Get used to that--for your own good…regardless of what your State Department friends may be telling you.
We learned Gaza’s lessons well--though were not shocked at what occurred after our withdrawal over two years ago. It just brought your terror closer to our main population centers.
Wise up, Mahmoud…
We have the means to flatten you, literally, and are approaching the time when this will indeed become a real option. Nations at war have done what’s needed to be done to achieve victory in the past…and their very existence was not on the line. Ours is…The dispute with you has never been about how “big” we are…but that we “are.”
While Gaza will be obliterated if Hamas attacks us, you will be held accountable as well. At least Hamas has been straightforward with its genocidal intentions towards us. This makes your own deception only more dangerous. Among other things, it is designed to win massive amounts of Western support. Anyway, your Fatah and its affiliates have as much or more of our blood on their hands as Hamas. You just play the game better.
No more games, Mahmoud…
We will draw a new set of lines unilaterally. Again, you don’t offer us a true peace even if we caved in to all of your suicidal demands.
Our nation will never be nine miles wide again.
The previous 1949 armistice lines--drawn up where the fighting halted after your invasion of us in 1948--were never meant to be permanent borders, as America’s UN representative, Ralph Bunche, pointed out at the time. Most of our people and industry--as you well know--are confined to a zipper-sized coastal waist, 9-16 miles wide.
We will double the above width…which still makes us a rump state.
Any additional state for Arabs--your 22nd--will not come at the expense of the security of the Jews’ sole, tiny nation. And this will indeed be the Arabs’ 2nd, not first, state in “Palestine.” Jordan emerged after 80% of the original 1920 Mandate was handed over to Arab nationalism in 1922. The original maps are available for all to see. If you don’t like it because some Arabs came from elsewhere as Transjordan‘s rulers, what are we to say? We Jews have come from both here but also from many “elsewheres” as well. Should we thus demand dozens of Jewish states instead of our one? Yet, that’s your game…
Arabs caught on our side of the new border will be offered Israeli citizenship in return for a loyalty pledge. If they mess up, they risk being expelled to your side of the new border. The same will go for our own Israeli Arab citizens--some of whom have indeed been acting treasonously. We will deal with the latter as other nations would. They are the freest Arabs in the region.
As Jews, Kurds, Assyrians, Armenians, Copts, Berbers, black Africans, and so forth live in “Arab” states, some Arabs will live in a Jewish State. If this is too much to ask of them, then they will be ejected. We Jews won’t apologize for wanting in one state what your Arab brothers mostly conquered and created for themselves in some two dozen others.
What you do on your side of the new border is your own business…as long as it doesn’t negatively impact upon us. Create that second “Palestinian” Arab state (however you define it, since most of your folks were newcomers--settlers--from other states as well after World War I), confederate with Jordan…whatever.
Just be a good neighbor…
If you are, you will find us meeting you far more than half way on the road to a better life for your children as well as our own. We have lots to offer to friends…
But we will offer far more than has been dished out in the recent past to enemies as well.
Violence from territories you control will be responded to exponentially. Just ask America’s former Secretary of State, General Colin Powell, about his own Doctrine regarding such things. Hopefully, you’ll see to it that it doesn’t have to come to this.
While you, of course, are free to reject what I’m laying out here today, please understand that we are serious about the ball being in your own court right now…regardless of Secretary Rice’s (and the President’s?) short-sighted threats to us. If they materialize, they will likely backfire during the next, upcoming American elections. The American people largely know “what’s up” now as well.
Know also that we are prepared to take cuts in American aid and support if that’s what’s required to not cave in to our own suicide. And we will not be a part of your openly-admitted, “destruction in phases” plans for us any longer.
So, make your decision…
Will it be a true peace among neighbors--with all that can truly blossom from it--or your continued quest to see and seek justice through Arab eyes only?
The choice, Mahmoud, is yours.
Be honest and present this realistic compromise to the Arab Street, for they elected Hamas as they elected you earlier when you--one of Arafat’s chief lieutenants--also ran on a platform for the destruction of the sole State of the Jews.
As always, our hands are extended in friendship.
But the time for your excuses is fast running out.
You will have six months to earnestly begin the measures we laid out here that are designed to create an atmosphere of acceptance that you have ignored up until this very moment in time. You’ve received billions of dollars in aid over the years. What has been lacking is the will to do so.
While you can’t do anything about that unfortunate past, you can take steps towards a better future.
Be honest with your people before it’s too late.
We Jews waited too long for the resurrection of Israel to see it destroyed. Please understand and convey what this means for those who have the latter in mind.
After six months, if we have seen no concrete, positive changes, we will treat the territories you control in Judea and Samaria (renamed by British imperialism, only in the last century, the “West Bank“) as we will deal with those now under the control of Hamas. When you ruled Gaza, we were continuously attacked anyway. Other nations would have never put up with what we have already been doing for so long without taking massive action. Be advised…It’s coming. Olmert and his head-in-the-sand, inept folks are out.
Please don’t make it come to this.”
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