PLAYING BY THEIR RULES

PLAYING BY THEIR RULES

October 18, 2000

Reprinted below is the Israel Defense Forces summary of the post-Sharm e-Sheikh summit violence that took place in Israel on October 17, 2000. It is incumbent upon every Jew to open his or her eyes and see what is unfolding here. By, yet again, showing restraint (--commendable if one has any kind of dispute with Canada or Switzerland--) Israel is, yet again, permitting its enemies to set the agenda for the conflict, this being to conduct a low level war -- a war of attrition -- against Jews which, by its very nature, has the political effect of dissuading Israel from "escalating" the bloodshed because that could lead to real "War". This means that the IDF will not be permitted to initiate actions as one does in cases of War, but it will only be permitted to respond defensively as one does in cases of protest activity and other forms of civil unrest. Now that the Arabs have set the Rules of the Game -- namely, that they will conduct War against Israel under the guise of protest activity -- we will begin to see Jewish casualties increase each and every day. And as long as only a "small" number of Jews are killed or maimed each day, Israel will learn to live with the regularized carnage, as Israel learned to tolerate it from 1987 until 1993 (the period of the first Intifada) -- in fact, as the Jewish people have so accustomed themselves for the past several millennia through successive expulsions, Crusades, Inquisitions, pogroms, farhouds and fatwas. However, with the reconstitution of Israel as a Jewish nation-state and the commencement of the great ingathering of the Jewish people thereto, the despicable concept of "learning to live with it" was supposed to have been thrown into the dunghill of History. Retrieving and reviving this concept is a major defeat for the Jewish people and for Israel's future.

"IDF Spokesperson: Summary of Today's Events in the West Bank and Gaza Strip for 17 October 2000 (as of 19:00)

The West Bank

Fire was opened this evening at the Gilo neighborhood in Jerusalem. IDF tanks responded with accurate machine gun fire at the sources of the fire. When the firing at the neighborhood continued, the IDF called upon the residents of Beit Jallah (located in an area under Palestinian security control), from which the shots were being fired, to evacuate their homes. A Border policeman was seriously wounded and two citizens were wounded lightly in the exchanges of fire. The three were evacuated for medical treatment in the hospital. The family of the wounded soldier has been notified. Fire was opened this afternoon towards the Shadma IDF base, near the Jewish settlement of Beit Sahur (south east of Bethlehem). IDF forces returned fire at the source of the shooting. In addition, shots were fired this evening towards Mt Eibal near Nablus. There were no wounded or damage in this incident. Stones and petrol bombs were thrown towards Rachel's Tomb and tires were burned nearby. In addition, stones and petrol bombs were thrown at the Ayosh junction. A Border Police soldier was very lightly wounded and was treated on the spot. There were also stones thrown at the Pharmacy Junction in Hebron. In all of these incidents the IDF forces used crowd dispersal measures against the rioters.

Gaza Region

Petrol bombs and stones were thrown during the morning towards an IDF post near the Erez cross point. IDF forces responded with crowd dispersal measures against the perpetrators only. In one case only, an IDF sharp shooter fired a single shot towards the legs of a Palestinian throwing petrol bombs, which endangered the lives of the IDF soldiers. The Palestinian was wounded in his leg. Stones and petrol bombs were also thrown this morning towards the IDF outpost at Netzarim junction. During the morning there were two incidents of shooting by Palestinians: One on the Israeli-Egyptian border toward an IDF truck, the IDF soldiers returned fire towards the source. In the second incident, fire was opened from a Palestinian taxi towards a truck in the Katif region. In addition, a grenade was thrown this morning at the Katif police station. The grenade did not explode. In the afternoon, stones were thrown toward an IDF patrol near the Divisional Headquarters of the IDF. The IDF soldiers responded with crowd dispersal measures. Early this evening (17 October), bombs were thrown towards the DCO in the northern Gaza strip, from the Palestinian towards the Israeli side of the camp. An IDF soldier was slightly wounded and was treated on site. Another IDF soldier opened live fire towards the legs of one of the fire bomb throwers. In addition, petrol bombs were thrown towards IDF patrols adjacent to Neve Dekalim and in the Katif Region. In all of these incidents no casualties were reported.

The IDF requests that the Jewish settlers continue to show restraint. The IDF is prepared for any development, is acting with restraint and is refraining from initiating any offensive actions in order to prevent an unnecessary escalation."

[Note: Eleven years later, Israel is still playing by its enemies’ despicable Rules. Read on! -- Mark Rosenblit]

Into the Fray: White flag over Gaza...

By MARTIN SHERMAN

August 25, 2011

Political correctness has precluded the pursuit of strategic imperatives; Israel can no longer credibly deter terrorists.

We cannot go on as we are... to remain at peace when you should be going to war may be often very dangerous. The tyrant city... is a standing menace to all.... Let us attack and subdue her, that we may ourselves live safely for the future. – Thucydides, The History of the Peloponnesian War, Book I, paragraph 124, 431 BCE

If you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with the all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival – W.S. Churchill, The Second World War (Vol. I - The Gathering Storm), 1949

The strategic wisdom encapsulated in these excerpts, straddling almost two-and-a-half millennia of human history, seems to have escaped both Israeli policy-makers and opinion makers alike.

Reasons for restraint or excuses for inaction?

True, the government’s arguments for avoiding escalation have a ring of plausible prudence. The lack of international legitimacy, the limited number of deployable Iron-Dome batteries, relations with Egypt are all weighty considerations militating in favor of restraint.

Those unburdened with responsibility for the fate of millions can make jingoistic demands for large offensive initiatives against Gaza with cavalier abandon. They will not be held accountable for the consequences of such decisions or the costs they entail.

However, as weighty as the caveats are for refraining from wider military action, in today’s realities they sound more like excuses than reasons.

The nation’s leaders should remember that history will judge them not only for what they do, but also for what they don’t. Indeed, the government’s position would more convincing if it showed credible signs of being aware of the unavoidable necessity for wide-scale IDF action but merely biding its time for a more judicious opportunity to present itself. However, its penchant for restraint appears to be a regrettable reflection of permanent mindset, described by one prominent scholar as “the fundamental reorientation from deterrence to appeasement that took place in 1993 [due to the advent of the Oslo Accords].”

As Yossi Beilin once said

Indeed, just how far the Israeli leadership has “reoriented” itself can be judged by remarks made immediately after the signature of the Oslo Agreement by none other than one its principal architects, [super-dove] Yossi Beilin: “The ultimate test of this agreement will be a test of blood. If it becomes clear that [the Palestinians] cannot overcome terror, this will be a temporary accord and... we will have no choice but abrogate it. And if there is no choice, the IDF will return to the places it is about to leave in the upcoming months. (Ma’ariv, November 26, 1993)

Sadly, neither Beilin – nor any other Israeli politician – has been held to fulfill this sensible prescription, which was also reflected in the long-forgotten pronouncement by Yitzhak Rabin that the Oslo process was “reversible” and if Israel’s security was threatened, the pre-Oslo status quo would be reinstated.

It is difficult to overstate the gravity of this “reorientation.”

It has stripped Israeli policy of credibility in the eyes of both friend and foe – undermining its value as a reliable ally on the one hand, and as a formidable adversary on the other.

It has taken a devastating toll on Israel’s deterrent capabilities – with far reaching operational repercussions, now rapidly beginning to unfold.

Of course, in the public discourse, there is near wall-to-wall endorsement of the need “to reestablish Israel’s deterrence.”

Sadly, such endorsements are invariably reduced to empty lip-service by the equally universal proviso calling for “proportionality” and “restraint” – the very reasons that deterrence was eroded in the first place and which virtually guarantee that it will never be reestablished.

An inconvenient truth

Deterrence must by definition be “disproportionate.” It entails instilling the belief in one’s adversary that he/she will suffer unacceptable costs if he/she undertakes certain undesirable actions. To be effective, the scale of the threatened retaliation cannot be “proportionate” – i.e. limited by the scale/nature of the undesirable initiatives – since this would allow one’s adversary to determine the scale of retaliation to be expected.

Thus as long as Israel’s adversaries expect retaliation to be limited to the “proportionate,” they need not fear the prospect of unacceptable (i.e. disproportionate) losses.

This is clearly a formula for a never-ending tit for- tat cycle of attacks and “proportionate” counterattacks, in which the aggressor can persist in unending attrition, secure in the knowledge that all he/she will face are losses he/she is prepared to absorb!

This inexorable logic too seems to have eluded mainstream pundits. The mundane mélange of their proposals for dealing with the emerging situation on our borders has already been tried – and failed. Surgical strikes, enlisting the US and/or the EU to apply political pressure on Hamas, urging the Egyptians and other Arab “moderates” to restrain the terror organizations have all proven – jointly and severally – ineffectual.

When confronted with this “inconvenient truth, the disdainful, almost Pavlovian-like retort is, “So what do you suggest? Retake Gaza?”

The question is invariably posed rhetorically because the dismissive tone clearly indicates that an affirmative answer is considered inconceivable.

And indeed, with a few commendable exceptions, even those allegedly representing more “rightwing” hawkish viewpoints, cringe and recoil from a positive response, usually hemming-and-hawing that “ways must be found that allow Israeli citizens to live normal lives.”

The dissipation of deterrence

But today Israel can no longer enable its citizens to “live normal lives” without retaking Gaza. Post- Oslowian “restraint” and “proportionality” have so degraded Israel’s deterrence that it is not longer able to dissuade its adversaries from attacking them almost at will.

Intermittent lulls in the North or the South should not deceive us. They do not reflect the efficacy of Israeli deterrence. Neither Hamas nor Hezbollah has been “deterred” in the sense that its will to fight has been broken. They have merely been forced to regroup – with manifest success. Unlike Germany and Japan after World War II, their appetite to engage remains undiminished. They are brazenly spoiling for a fight – albeit on their own terms, which Israeli pliancy invariably permits them.

Indeed, there is good reason for their buoyancy. Both Hamas and Hezbollah have emerged from protracted conflicts with the IDF able to plausibly claim victory.

Having withstood the might of one the world’s most potent military forces for weeks, both were clearly able to retain their operational capabilities, and despite taking heavy damage, prevented the IDF from imposing its will on them – the fundamental objective of any military action. Accordingly, in many respects they now enjoy greater political prestige and military capabilities than before the military engagements with Israel.

Expunging the concept of ‘victory’

Cowered by the tyranny of political-correctness, Israel has abandoned the pursuit of military imperatives. The dread of being bogged down in a “quagmire” of a land operation has ensnared it in the quicksand of impotence, leading to a string of strategic failures that have left its adversaries stronger than they were before Israeli action.

In effect, the post-Oslowian reorientation has expunged the notion of victory from Israeli strategic thinking, both as an admissible cognitive entity and as an attainable, even desirable, military goal.

This was aptly expressed by Daniel Pipes in his 2008 analysis of Israel’s strategic incompetence in Gaza. He laments that “...the worst news of all [is] that no one at the upper echelons of Israel’s political life articulates the imperative for victory.” Ominously, he concludes that “For this reason, I see Israel as a lost polity, one full of talent, energy... but lacking direction.”

Jewish blood will no longer be shed with impunity

Some might protest that the idea of victory over the Arab world is a dangerous, unattainable delusion. Perhaps – but imposing surrender on the enemy in specific theaters of military engagement is not. Surrender could have been imposed on Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006; it could have been imposed on Hamas in Gaza in 2008. It can and must be imposed on Hamas today.

Israel’s leadership must acknowledge that decades of concession and capitulation have created a situation in which it cannot dissuade the Palestinians to forgo aggression without comprehensive “kinetic” coercion. It cannot diminish the Palestinians’ will to attack by threats of punitive action. It can only protect its citizens by physically eliminating the Palestinian ability to attack. It can only defend its civilian population from Palestinian assaults by taking and keeping control of the territory from which they are launched.

Yes, such measures with create severe difficulties – international outrage, collateral civilian casualties, IDF losses. These are all daunting problems and how they are to be addressed – and what resultant political paradigms should be pursued – must await elaboration elsewhere. But however severe the challenges, they must be met by the Israeli leadership – not embraced as justification for further ineffectual retaliatory restraint. A clear message must be burned in the collective Arab consciousness. Jewish blood will no longer be shed with impunity.

White flag over Gaza

Hamas must be crushed by overwhelming force, from the land, sea and air. Its leaders must be seized or slain. It must be forced to admit defeat; it must be forced to hoist a white flag over Gaza as unambiguous acknowledgment of surrender.

Now is the time to vindicate Yitzhak Rabin’s claim that Oslo is “reversible”; now is the time to implement Yossi Beilin’s warning that “if the Palestinians cannot overcome terror, the IDF will return to the places it evacuated.”

Any delay will make it more difficult and more dangerous.

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