MIDEAST

How We Got to This Point

Three recent books chart the winding path from Kermit Roosevelt with his suitcases stuffed with cash to George W. Bush's gloomy Nobel Prize prospects.

By Kevin Peraino | NEWSWEEK
Published Jan 3, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Jan 12, 2009

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  • Posted By: Getitout @ 01/17/2009 5:23:10 PM

    There is a ceasefire in the horizon. If it comes into reality, that will be sort of an intermission to a play that is beeing going on for a long time. Ms. Livni one the main character of the play said, we arranged a ceasefire with Hamas, but we did not engage with them in any discussions. Very hopeful statement. And also that Isarel needs and I quote" expanded intelligence cooperation to prevent Hamas from rearming". That's a liitle too strong of a statement, that deserves a country such Iran, China, maybe Russia, but Hamas. An unorganized fighter groups, that uses probably pre-WW2 weapons. tin cans home made rockets, and stones for children to use. If Israel wants to elevate Hamas to its own level militarily, they have succeeded. And Hamas ought to thanks Israel for that compliment. A ceasefire probably won't last anyhow. Israel will find a way to beak the truce. And Hamas, good Lord. A super power made in Israel.

  • Posted By: justinr11 @ 01/14/2009 9:49:06 PM

    The Israelis gave the Palestinians Gaza of their own choice complete with nurseries and businesses which the Palestinians demolished and used to fire rockets. The Islamic Quran at verse 9:5 says fight and kill the infidels wherever you find them. Christian and homosexual Arabs are threatened with death or forced to immigrate.The Arabs hide behind innocent civilians.

    Most Jews either went to the death camps or to Israel since no country would help them during the war. They had no choice but to settle. And some families never left Israel all these 2000 years.

    The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem visited Auschwitz during the WWII and asked Hitler to build a killing facility in Palestine. (The Quran at verse 4:50-55 says "Sufficient for the Jew is the flaming fire!") This Grand Mufti was the uncle of Yasser Arafat. Israel would love nothing more than to have settled with its foes and ended the violence. If Westerners lived in Gaza, they long ago would have made peace. Never once have the Arabs been straight and honest at the table-The Quran at verse 16:101 justifies duplicity: "When we substitute one revelation for another,- and Allah knows best what He reveals (in stages),- they say, "Thou art but a forger: but most of them understand not."

    Nobody even mentions all the terrorists trained by Palestinians in the Baca Valley in Lebanon with Syrian, and Iranian help. They trained in the Baca Valley-Angolans, Irish Republican Army, Latin Amercian Insurgents, the Baader Meinhof Gang and the Red Brigade that bombed innocent civilians all over Europe, Hezbollah, the PLO, and the famous terrorist "the Jackal". Palestinians together with Iran, Hezbollah, and Syria were said to be involved in the bombing of the US Embassy and the Marine Barracks in Lebanon in the 80's. My sources are "the Secret War Against the Jews" by John Loftus and "Heros under Fire", a show that aired on the History Channel.

    There used to be organized riots and attacks on old men in Jewish seminaries every few weeks under the English and the Turks. Jewish residents in Hebron were massacred in 1929. In a riot one British officer describes a Palestinian policeman stabbing a Jewish woman to death.
    In an Islamic book, Bukhari, at verse 651 says, ???Jesus, the son of Mary, will descend shortly amongst you Muslims and will judge mankind by the law of the Quran. He will break the (Christian) crosses and kill the swine and there will be no more Jizyah tax from non-Muslims. In the Quran at 4:101 unbelievers are described as "open enemies". Any territory that has been trodden by Muslims is considered permanently a Muslim country. Even a Jewish village in Israel is considered an affront. Another revelatory Islamic book, Ishaq, says at verse 364: Muslims take not the Jews and Christians as friends. Where were the photos of Israeli children killed all through the 3000 rocket attacks from Gaza this year? Where are the suicide b

    • Posted By: abbreviate @ 01/15/2009 11:28:23 AM

      To justinr11

      "Most Jews either went to the death camps or to Israel since no country would help them during the war."

      USSR was protecting Jews by all means, including lives of Russians, Ukrainians and so on. What do they get in response? Mass betrayer, economical sabotage and destruction.


      Something to think about terrorists:
      http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7656807.stm

  • Posted By: Willy G @ 01/14/2009 9:51:42 PM

    ! Palestinian believe that before 1948, Israel was their Palestine, for the last 2 Melina's short of less than 100 years of crausaders occupation, the rest of the Arabs, Muslims, and others, are not convinced that the promise land was promised to the Jewish people, they believe in Abraham's covenant, where God pledge the land from the Nile, to the Euphrates rives to the nation that comes from Abraham, it came true through the descendants of Ishmael, Abraham's first born, as well as the descendants of Isac, for the last 2000 years, till the early Zionists started bringing Jewish people from around the world to replace the true Semites (Palestinians) besides the fact that none of the early Jewish emigrants from Russia, Poland, Germany who settled from the beginning of the 20th century, are the descendants of any of old Israel's historical 12 tribes, they are the remnants of old Cazar ancient empire, and old Cesar's Russia who converted to Judaism, also according to a major university in Israel conduct a huge DNA study with a hug pool of Palestinians, and Israelis which proved that the vast majority of Palestinians, are the descendants of the old Israelites, who converted to Christianity and later to Islam, mixed with the Arabs whom are descendants of Ishmael, and they are the rightful owners of the land! they are the true Semites!
    They believe that Israel's establishment brought all this misery to the middle east, and the early Jewish gangs like argon & established terrorism as we know it, for example they blew up King David's hotel in Jerusalem killing 200 British solders! these gangs turned into an arm which committed numerous massacres, ethnic cleansing, got the land , kicked the owners, and now acting civilized! this will never end, and Israel will have to offer a real peace like the what they have with Egypt, give these people something that makes sense to them so thy commit to peace, even the peace treaty with Egypt is at stake with the massacre is going on in Gaza, and the public is boiling, the last thing anyone wants is an Islamist revolution in Egypt like Iran!!

  • Posted By: Willy G @ 01/14/2009 9:48:35 PM

    ! Palestinian believe that before 1948, Israel was their Palestine, for the last 2 Melina's short of less than 100 years of crausaders occupation, the rest of the Arabs, Muslims, and others, are not convinced that the promise land was promised to the Jewish people, they believe in Abraham's covenant, where God pledge the land from the Nile, to the Euphrates rives to the nation that comes from Abraham, it came true through the descendants of Ishmael, Abraham's first born, as well as the descendants of Isac, for the last 2000 years, till the early Zionists started bringing Jewish people from around the world to replace the true Semites (Palestinians) besides the fact that none of the early Jewish emigrants from Russia, Poland, Germany who settled from the beginning of the 20th century, are the descendants of any of old Israel's historical 12 tribes, they are the remnants of old Cazar ancient empire, and old Cesar's Russia who converted to Judaism, also according to a major university in Israel conduct a huge DNA study with a hug pool of Palestinians, and Israelis which proved that the vast majority of Palestinians, are the descendants of the old Israelites, who converted to Christianity and later to Islam, mixed with the Arabs whom are descendants of Ishmael, and they are the rightful owners of the land! they are the true Semites!
    They believe that Israel's establishment brought all this misery to the middle east, and the early Jewish gangs like argon & established terrorism as we know it, for example they blew up King David's hotel in Jerusalem killing 200 British solders! these gangs turned into an arm which committed numerous massacres, ethnic cleansing, got the land , kicked the owners, and now acting civilized! this will never end, and Israel will have to offer a real peace like the what they have with Egypt, give these people something that makes sense to them so thy commit to peace, even the peace treaty with Egypt is at stake with the massacre is going on in Gaza, and the public is boiling, the last thing anyone wants is an Islamist revolution in Egypt like Iran!!

  • Posted By: concerned4all @ 01/14/2009 6:27:23 PM

    Having been in numerous locations in the West Bank in September and October plus visiting Jerusalem and other places in Israel the concern is not so much the thousand of years old histories but "recent history". 70 and 80 year old Palestinians who woke one morning in Israel. Torn from their villages that were flattened and sent to refugee camps even into Lebanon and Jordan. These were Christian, Muslim, Druse and others. Add to that now "economic Settlements" miles into the West Bank Area which some don't realize are settlements, they consider them to be housing developments with great mortgage rates and incentives from the Israeli Government. Israel doesn't even include the 1948 Green line in their history books despite recent attempts by their Minister of Education to do so. The children in Sderdot see bombs from Gaza, likely from Syria and Iran firing into their neighborhoods and the children from the West Bank have to pass through the "Separation Barrier" to try to get to a school or had to stop going to school Artwork from all the children usually includes pictures of helicopters in the air. Electricity can be sporadic, water is only available in the WEst Bank on certain days. There is hate to go all around that needs to be healed. Add to that the fact that Hamas gained power and votes by initially supplying necessary human services in communities. Many people are working hard to provide services and hope, both Israeli and Palestinian, but you never hear about them.

  • Posted By: isjust @ 01/14/2009 4:34:13 AM

    To our Muslim brethren, we beg of you to not let the terrorists within continue terrorising the Jews with their

    suicide bombings of Jewish women and children on busses, weddings, restaurants, and nightclubs:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1197051.stm

    We beg, please stop train your children from age 4 to be suicide bombers to kill us:
    http://youtube.com/watch?v=JhVDwrfoTOg

    Please stop saying that it is all because of Israel, what about what the palestinians did to the christians in

    Lebanon:
    http://multimedia.heritage.org/content/wm/Lehrman-092706a.wvx

    Please don't support their lies that the Jews "stole palestine" from the "palestinians"
    http://www.imninalu.net/myths-pals.htm

    At that point maybe we'll start talking about peace! Now what do you support?

  • Posted By: Aardwolf @ 01/12/2009 1:26:23 PM

    schucthtern, your rationale makes good sense, would love to say no thats bullsh**..but I cant. I will say that the palestinians have not now, nor did they ever allow for the possibility that they can coexist with the Israelis. they are refugees because they put themselves in that position, Mandatory palestine never included either the west bank or gaza..they belonged to egypt and jordan. both countries are happy enough to let the Israelis deal with what is essentially their problem. If a seperate palestinian state where to be established in the west bank, it would be basically carved from jordanian territory. there is a knee jerk reaction in islam to possess every square speck of dirt that ever had a muslim so much as poop on it. regardless of how they got it to begin with...I mean come on,...Jerusalem..City of the Jews...they built the dump, its named after them, and while I could give a rats behind about the "holy" places there,..they have exactly 0 religious value to me personally. there are alternatives to butchering each other over them. obviously fighting since 1948 hasnt gotten them anywhere but "Got-my-ass-kicked-ville" maybe then try the other route...negotiate realistically...you lost, deal with it and move on to something you can reasonably expect. th palestinians need to stop playing the victim, they arent victims. they are just as bloody as Israel...just considerably weaker.

  • Posted By: schuchtern @ 01/12/2009 11:12:24 AM

    Yes, it is all of our responsibility to make sure that both the Isrealis and the Palestinians are protected. The UN made a decision to buy up some Palestinian land and fund the Jews in a post-Halocaust europe to a safer place. Since then the isrealis have been indiscriminately supported by the US and UN, and have forced the palestinians onto a small strip of land. This is an OLD issue, and it's beyond me to figure out how we are supposed to get God down here to ask "who's land IS it?" because it does go deeper than just a line in the sand. In the mean time, genocide is not an option - even if logic tells us that danger is bad and when you are in danger you should run away, it could make the Palestinians seem deserving of this fate. But we are not being sympathetic. If Canada launched so much as a water balloon at us, we'd have their asses in a second, flat. Even if Canada could whoop our arses, we wouldn't give up OUR land! It doesn't make logical sense, but when you believe you are fighting for your home, it doesn't have to make sense. You might be willing to die fighting for your home.

  • Posted By: Aardwolf @ 01/12/2009 9:43:15 AM

    yeah the youtube pretty much summed up palestinian hypocrisy and idiocy...wont miss them

  • Posted By: sidthorat @ 01/12/2009 7:34:00 AM

    hmmm..frankly the Palestine fellows deserve to get whacked... they dont know when they have been defeated..no ,the still want to shoot rockets into Israel and march up and down streets with AKs..well here come the chickens to roost... in fact Israel must deal such a collective punishment that any Islamofascist who ever thinks of harming Israel will remember that even if he is with 72 Virgins,his privacy will soon be disturbed by his wife ,sister and little kids knocking on the heavens door :-D

  • Posted By: Anju Chandel @ 01/12/2009 5:20:14 AM

    A peaceful and lasting resolution to the seemingly never-ending Palestine-Israel conflict is the responsibility of all: Israel, Palestine - Hamas included, Middle-East, the US, and the rest of the world.

  • Posted By: benkrapf @ 01/10/2009 7:34:37 PM

    Berserker, thumbs up for the energy of your argument, but don't you think isolationism simply leads to more bad stuff happening out there that we DON'T know about but SHOULD? Look at WW2.

    • Posted By: Berserker @ 01/12/2009 4:48:33 AM

      Maybe, but I think it is time for the rest of the world to be responsible for the rest of the world. We have two oceans to provide some protection and we can focus on controlling our northern and southern borders, apply the funds previously for the UN and for foreign aid to educating and improving the lives of our own citizens. It might be different if we could afford more, but we can't. It is bad enough what the burden of present bailouts as well as the predicted one will be on my grandchildren and their children.

  • Posted By: isjust @ 01/11/2009 9:25:20 PM

    There is a reason why gaza is under INTERNATIONAL blockade.
    Poor Palestinians? The ones who are training their kids to be suicide bombers?
    You really have to see this before they flood youtube with their cover-up.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvsAzF2MxcA&feature=related

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znRWKwUzCoQ

    The ones who elected a governing terrorist body responsible for this... besides the 8000 rockets?
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1197051.stm

  • Posted By: vanabavi @ 01/05/2009 9:17:15 AM

    I believe that the only solution is change in policies of US. The whole world is suffering economic and other consequences of US policies. We should change our basic policy of supporting wars all over the world. We can reestablish our strategy and become the good superpower of the world again with support of nations all over this world.
    Please read the interesting discussion of Time with Avrum Burg, the scion of one of Israel's founding families (His father was the deputy speaker of the first Knesset, and Burg himself later became speaker of the legislature, and a member of Israel's cabinet) :
    http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1869325,00.html

    • Posted By: Wahhabi @ 01/07/2009 3:29:13 PM

      Burg is what is known as a "Self-Loathing Jew.

      • Posted By: Catch_22 @ 01/11/2009 5:27:52 PM

        Wahhabi, it is not himself that he loathes; it is people like you. He is not alone; christians, hindus, buddhists all through the world -- all historically with greater reasons to hate islam than you do -- think Israel is committing serious crimes against humanity. From the opressed, you have become the oprressors and the occupiers.

  • Posted By: Aardwolf @ 01/11/2009 11:29:13 AM

    Here is the worlds smallest violin playing for the poor palestinians. They have done everything in their power to harm Israel and failed. The rhetoric against Israel is tired. There arent any "war crimes" going on. If combatants hide behind civilians then they are the cowards. I dont buy any of this "thats the only way to resist" crap either. The Tamils of Sri Lanka fight head up and they started far worse off then the palestinians. They may or may not be losing, but they fought as cleanly as just about anyone else. War is dirty and ugly and brutal. It should be, so God forbid we actually start to lose empathy over it. Truth be told, Israel is showing great restraint. The world will condemn their actions regardless of what they do, but as we have seen the international comunity is quite impotent. Who really cares what the UN says or wants. It cannot enforce its will without American involvement anyway. Europe and Asia will quite happily wring their hands and tear at their heads and bemoan the fate of the poor wretches being butchered but wont lift a finger to help. If Israel wanted to kill all the palestinians, they would. period. And no power on earth has both the strength AND will to stop them.

  • Posted By: n83nbu @ 01/11/2009 7:23:14 AM

    Any self-respecting citizen would find for their homeland as the Palestinians are doing now against overwhelming firepower and technology. May God give them the strength to defeat the Israeli aggressors and may the Bush administration be prosecuted for aiding the Israelis in the commission of WAR CRIMES.

  • Posted By: jasonmarke @ 01/11/2009 3:47:18 AM

    As Sadat of Egypt use to say most the problem is psychological. I think that there will never be peace in the middle east unless the Arabs apologize to the Jews for trying to throw them into the sea in 1948 just three years after Hitler threw them in gas chambers. . Plain and simple. Now with all the talk about pressure then, Israel has shown now that she ihas her own freedom of self determination. America has a strong ally in Israel , for better or worse. Period.

  • Posted By: nawawimohamad @ 01/10/2009 10:09:01 PM

    Israel doesn't want peace until they have achieved their goal of creating Greater Israel with Jerusalem as the capital and rebuilding their Temple and with all Jews from the other parts of the world returning back to the so-called promised land.

  • Posted By: IndianOpinion @ 01/06/2009 1:09:44 AM

    I have great hopes and faith on Obama, but his silence is deafening. He cannot skip this catastrophe by just saying that there is only one President. I want to know his personal views on Israel's use of Cluster Bombs given by US which is killing innocent children and women and driving them out of their last resort.

    • Posted By: Wahhabi @ 01/07/2009 4:43:16 PM

      What kind of Indian are you?

      The kind that lives in the US?

      or are you

      The kind that lives in India? It seems that you guys have irritated the "Followers of the Prophet" as well.

      • Posted By: joseph jacir @ 01/10/2009 9:37:27 PM

        Obama will not be able to do anything as long as he is advised on this iissue by the likes of Indike and the israeli lobby has succeeded sidelining Brewsinki

  • Posted By: Wahhabi @ 01/07/2009 4:13:38 PM

    What an Intellectual Wasteland.

    We got to this point by thinking that Islam is a Religion of Peace. Peace occurs when you (any & all infidels) Rest In Peace. AKA - 6 feet under.

    No such nation as Palestine exists in history. There are no articfacts of such a civilization. Palestinian people did not appear until some time in latter 1967.

    During WWII, the Brits raised the Palestinian Regiment. It was led by British officers and it comprised of Jewish & Arab soldiers. The few Arabs (they were problably Christian Arabs) that did not ally themselves with Hitler. It seems now that the term Palestinian could apply to a Brit (many Brit soldiers retired there), Jews or Arabs, that is Christian Arabs or Islamic Arabs.

    I don't see how this could be considered Arab lands either. The Arabs lost control of it in 1077 when the Turks conquered the area. Arabs had it from 336, when they took it from the Christian Byzantines until 1077. The Turks & Mameluks had it from 1077 to 1917 when the Brits conquered it. The Byzantines had it back for a bit & the Crusaders had it for a while as well.

    The piece of real estate has been won & lost by conquest & defeat since the beginning of civilization. Strange that wars never began until we became civilized, but that's another discussion. But the only time that Arabs or Islam had that area was betwen 636 & 1077, minus the Byzantine return.

    So will someone please explain why the people known as Palestinians think they own it?
    Will someone please explain why anyone else thinks the Palestinians should own it.

    It was British territory & the Brits divided it between the Jews & Arabs (still no Palestinians). The decsion was made during the 1920s, but the actual division did not occur until 1948.

    Stanger yet. In 1813, the Sultan/reigning Caliph invited & allowed unlimited Jewish immigration in to this neck of the woods. In 1909, the Sultan/reigning Caliph granted permission for the Jews to build Tel Aviv. Why would the Caliph, the head of Islam invite large numbers of Jews to that part of his Islamic Empire?

    The invitation probably had something to do with the whole area was a wasteland & near unfit for habitation. The Jews arrive, they dig wells, irrigate the land, plant orchards, build houses, & create towns. The Jews brought ambition & brains to the neighborhood, something that wasn't there until the Caliph used some common sense & brought in the people who could & would work. The Jews didn't give the Caliph any trouble,something that can't be said for the Islamic Arabs. By the 1930s, because of Jewish work, it was becoming a desirable place to live.

    The UN got involved in this whole thing when the Brits wanted to make the UN seem useful and allowed them to pretend to establish areas for the Jews & Arabs to live separately. Even then, there were no Palestinians, Gaza was to be controlled by Egypt & the West Bank was to be con

    • Posted By: Berserker @ 01/10/2009 2:19:05 PM

      Exactly right...and I appreciate your quite accurate synopsis of the history. But I fear there are no logical answers to your questions. The peoples of the middle east have long resorted to violence to resolve disputes. We (the West) err in attempting to make others solve disputes using our matrix. Hasn't worked and never will work. The area would benefit from a period of benign neglect.

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