Israel, Beware!

I understand that certain US diplomats and politicians, Colin Powell for one, are giving Israel marching orders with respect to disputed territories, sovereignty rights and rights to exercise its security needs (to the extent required).

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the Left, those at the Center and those of the Right had best be very careful about the demands from the US that they become willing to fulfill. Sadly, there are forces in the US that consciously support evil and there are those who support evil out of the blindness of self-interest and fear. More and more, it appears that the US is taking a more pro-Palestinian, a more pro-Arab and a more anti-Israel approach to the Middle East conflict. The US Administration and others are running scared; they have basically botched Iraq, and the war of terror is more and more becoming an appeasement model of conflict resolution.

The US State Department, apparently, and with great arrogance, is humiliating Israel by replacing the Israeli people and its government with its dictates and "wisdom". With the Bush Administration's blessings, the US State Department is pressing ahead with its revised and twisted version of the Saudi Road Map -- Israel concedes to everything without a halt to violence against Israel by the Palestinian Islamofacists and their cohorts in crime, the rest of the Arab world. Mr. Sharon's concerns and points of contention about the Road Map are impulsively being ignored by the likes of Colin Powell and others in the Bush Administration and previous US Administration hacks (Dennis Ross, etc.). US President George Bush is like a "wounded animal" (Iraq is not going well, the humiliation of Iraqi prisoners, and John Kerry almost in dead heat with Bush). Bush's "wounds" appear to be affecting his judgment and this may very well make the Bush Administration more dangerous to the security needs and sovereignty rights of Israel.

The US is terribly humiliated and fearful, because Iraqi prisoners were mild to moderately abused by US service personnel; yet the US appears to be becoming less concerned about humiliating and putting Israelis at risk, than it is about making sure that the Islamofacists and the Muslims of the world feel comfortable and protected. This is no different than what US President Roosevelt did when he refused safe haven in the US to Jews who were trying to escape the Holocaust (at minimum, a boatload of some 900 escaping Jews were not allowed asylum in the US and had to return to the warmth of Nazi ovens). The US military machine refused to bomb Auschwitz, because it was risky to their war effort. The US tried to appease and buddy-up to Hitler. The US embraced land for peace deals (Oslo, Road Map, etc.) that were and still are primarily advantageous to the Saudis, the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world; Israel's needs and rights appear to be less of a concern.

I truly hope that I can be written off as being overly paranoid and incapable of grasping the "holier than thou" and failed approach to peace making so common to the diplomats of "evenhandedness" and their failed land-for-peace arrangements. However, if I am not wrong, then Israeli concessions will not be allowed to stop at even the 1967 borders, and Israelis and many Jews may be unpleasantly surprised to find that the US, along with other nations, and the UN, will push relentlessly to drive Israel back to pre-1949 borders.

I wish I had a good answer on how to resolve this conflict of interest (Israel's needs versus the needs of the US). All that I really do feel securely about are what I see as some facts: 1) Israel probably has more negotiating room with the US than it is willing to exercise; 2) It is an election year in the US and Bush is scared, and therefore he will be more willing to follow advisors that are less supportive of Israel; 3) History repeats itself, and cowardice and appeasement can be counted on to become major forces for conflict resolution; 4) Israel has become a "path of least resistance" for securing the national interests of most of the other nations of the world; and 5) Jews and Israel have been promised many things about security before, only to find that when "push came to shove" the noble "heroes" that made promises to Israel ran to their beds and pulled the covers over their heads.

I am sure that I have not covered all the factors, but there is enough of them here to suggest that Israel better not let itself be "painted into a corner" that will render it vulnerable and helpless (by the way, this is the way the world likes to see its Jews; sometimes Jews get a little help when they are being decimated).

So, Mr. Sharon, those on the Left, those in the Center and those of the Right (overly confident about appeasing the US) need to become more cautious about US demands. They must "push the envelope" to its fullest to make sure that Israel gets the best deal possible from a world that is morally bankrupt. I truly believe that Israel and its leaders do not have to join the US in its hysteria and the US' often-misguided efforts to combat terrorism. Israel does not have to start singing "Yankee Doodle Dandy" and allow itself to be pushed off the pier into the water.