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Jewish World Review Oct. 3, 2008 / 4 Tishrei 5769 Olmert's parting blows By Caroline B. Glick
Olmert noted that he is the first prime minister to state explicitly that he
supports Israel's geographical contraction to within the 1949 armistice
lines. Indeed, none of his predecessors in office were ever so explicit. And
his likely successor in office — Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni — loses her
voice every time she is asked whether she believes that Israel should
withdraw from Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and all of Judea and Samaria.
Olmert's willingness to spell out the expanse of the territorial handovers
he supports makes him unique among Israel's premiers. But his stated view
that Israel has no choice other than to withdraw from almost all the lands
it took control over during the 1967 Six Day War has been the common view of
every Israeli prime minister except Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu since
1993. Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, Ehud Barak and Ariel Sharon all signaled
their support for this view. Indeed all of their central policies in office
were predicated on it.
The question is why has this been the case? Why is it that for the past 15
years, at a certain point in their tenures in office every Israeli prime
minister aside from Netanyahu has come to the conclusion that Israel must
turn over its land to those sworn to its destruction?
Like Rabin, Peres, Barak and Sharon before him, Olmert makes no rational
argument for withdrawal. He simply asserts it. And like his predecessors,
Olmert uses three rhetorical tricks to support his assertion. First, he
notes the uniqueness of his position as Prime Minister. Olmert knows Israel
must surrender its land simply because he is Prime Minister. Sharon
expressed this most clearly when he intoned, "What you see from here, you
don't see from there."
Second, Olmert and his predecessors — and his likely successor Livni — all
claim that "everybody knows" that Israel must withdraw. That is, you have to
be completely out of your mind not to agree with me because every right
minded person agrees with me.
Olmert made this intellectually intimidating point explicitly on Monday in
reference to the Golan Heights when he said, "I want to see if there is one
person in the State of Israel who believes that it is possible to make peace
with Syria without conceding anything on the Golan Heights."
Finally, Olmert and his predecessors — and his likely successor — argue that
it is inevitable that Israel withdraw to the 1949 armistice lines. And since
it is inevitable, it might as well be done right now. As Olmert said — again
of the Golan Heights, "I put it to you, say in the next year or two a
regional war erupts and we find ourselves in a military confrontation with
Syria. ... I ask myself, what happens after we beat them? First of all we will
pay a price [for victory] and it will be painful. And after we pay what we
pay, what will we say to them? 'Let's talk.' And what will the Syrians say?
'Let's talk about the Golan.'"
The assertion that a prime minister knows more than regular people is true.
But no secret information in the world counterbalances empirical evidence
that is open for all to see. While it may or may not be true that Israel can
live at peace with the Palestinians and Syrians without returning to the
1949 armistice lines, it is manifestly true that neither the Syrians nor the
Palestinians are interested in living at peace with Israel. So while an
interesting theoretical question, the issue of whether Israel needs to give
up land for peace is completely irrelevant today.
Both the Syrians and the Palestinians know that Olmert — like his
predecessors since Rabin — is willing to go back to the 1949 armistice lines
in exchange for peace. And operating on this knowledge, over the past 15
years, both societies have gravitated into the Iranian axis. Today, at the
same time as Syrian President Bashar Assad holds indirect talks about an
Israeli surrender of the Golan Heights, he has amassed 25,000 forces on his
border with northern Lebanon. He is rebuilding his nuclear program with
Iranian money and North Korean scientists. He has pledged to the Iranians
that he will continue arming Hizbullah and Hamas and that his negotiations
with Olmert will be coordinated ahead of time with Iran.
As for the Palestinians, at every stage of their relationship with Israel
for the past 15 years, every one of their leaders — from Fatah, Hamas and
Islamic Jihad alike — has been categorical in his refusal to accept
Israel's right to exist. Moreover, insofar as Fatah is concerned, the
violent conflict with Israel was supposed to have ended in 1993. In 1993
Yassir Arafat pledged that from then on, all of the Palestinians' issues
with Israel would be resolved through negotiations and that terror would be
combated, not fostered.
While calling for immediate territorial surrenders to enemies uninterested
in peace, Olmert — like his predecessors— also claims that the risk involved
in surrendering the Golan Heights, Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem is minimal
because Israel is so strong. As Olmert put it, "We are stronger than they
are. I tell you, Israel is the strongest country in the Middle East. We can
handle all our enemies and we can handle all our enemies together and win."
Yet Olmert — like his predecessors — fails to acknowledge that if we give
up the lands we took control over in 1967 that we will be much weaker. And
our ability to deter our enemies from joining together to attack us will be
severely curtailed. He ignores the fact that it was Israel's withdrawal from
Lebanon in May 2000 that inspired the Palestinians to attack us in September
2000. He ignores the fact that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in 2005
inspired Hizbullah to attack us in 2006. And he ignores the fact that
Israel's failure to defeat Hizbullah in 2006 inspired Hamas to take control
of Gaza in 2007. And in all of this, he ignores the fact that Hamas,
Hizbullah and Syria are controlled by Iran.
As to Iran, when the issue of Iran's nuclear weapons program comes up, the
leader who says we can beat all our enemies at once is suddenly singing
another tune. Israel, "the strongest country in the Middle East" is crazy if
it thinks it can defend itself against its most formidable foe.
In Olmert's view, "Part of our exaggeration of our power and our lack of any
sense of proportion is found in the statements being made here about Iran. ...The assumption that if America, Russia and China and Britain and Germany
don't know how to handle the Iranians that we the Israelis do know — this
is an example of a loss of proportions."
So Olmert, like Sharon, Barak, Peres and Rabin before him, has made the
determination that the only strategy that Israel can follow is one of utter
defeatism and surrender. And he — like they before him — has made this
strategic calculation in the face of empirical evidence which shows that
whatever the costs of retaining the status quo — or of actually defeating
our enemies — the cost of surrender and defeatism is surrender and defeat.
That is, the cost to the country of following their lead to surrender is
higher than the cost of not surrendering or subcontracting our survival to
outside powers.
So if the view that Israel's only option is surrender has no basis in
empirical evidence, what accounts for Olmert's baseless assertions?
The answer unfortunately, is clear. Quite simply, life is easier for
premiers, and much better for former premiers on the Left than on the Right.
As Olmert considers his options going forward, he knows two things. First,
he knows that the international lecture circuit is eminently more generous
to former Israeli prime ministers who speak ill of Israel than it is for
former premiers who defend Israel. Second, he knows that if he ever hopes to
return to politics, he will only be able to return as the head of the Left.
His explicit statements on the need for Israeli capitulation will serve him
well in both ventures.
Then there is the issue of Olmert's legal woes. While Olmert's policy
decisions are the same as all of his predecessors, the circumstances in
which he is leaving office are analogous only to those that confronted Ehud
Barak.
Like Olmert, Barak left office under a cloud of criminal probes. And in his
final months in office, he cast all remaining vestiges of strategic
rationality to the seven winds in his desperate negotiations with Arafat.
Despite the fact that his government had already collapsed, neither the
Supreme Court nor the Attorney General's office told him he lacked the legal
right to concede Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem. And in recognition of
his embrace of post-Zionism, once Barak was out of office, all the criminal
probes against him were quietly closed.
Like Barak, Olmert probably won't be around long enough to conclude the
surrenders he strives for. But that doesn't mean that his statements are not
dangerous for the country.
Far Left politicians and their counterparts in the media claim that Olmert
is brave to speak as openly as he has. And this is true. It does take some
bravery to stick your finger in the eye of the general public — which
doesn't support your views.
Olmert's statements and actions, which contradict the pledges he made to
voters in 2006 are a slap in the face of the Israeli electorate.
Unfortunately, the public has grown all to used to such blows. Rabin, Barak
and Sharon were all elected on the basis of their hawkish platforms. And
they all abandoned their platforms after they were elected. This constant
deceit has made the public cynical and engendered a sense of powerlessness
among Israeli citizens. This sense is merely exacerbated by the sight of
Livni working madly to avoid standing for election by attempting to form a
new government. This is all the more true given that she rests her claim to
governing legitimacy on her narrow victory in a tiny primary race riven by
allegations of corruption.
So by ignoring the basic reality of Israel's strategic challenges and
speaking of irrelevant concessions to imaginary peace partners while
demonstrating his abject contempt for the public, Olmert is causing us great
harm. He is reinforcing our belief that we have no option other than
deceitful leaders who ignore our rights and reality. And this is a dangerous
delusion. Because the truth is that not all of Israel's leaders are
defeatists. There are still leaders that put the country first. They are
simply not friends of Olmert's.
JWR contributor Caroline B. Glick is the senior Middle East Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC and the deputy managing editor of The Jerusalem Post. Comment by clicking here.
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