Implications of Bush speech

By WND Staff

JERUSALEM – President George W. Bush’s speech on the Middle East was interesting for what it implied no less than for what it stated explicitly.

To begin with, the president, by calling on Israel to halt the incursions into Palestinian areas and begin to pull back, raised a basic question: What then?

Suppose the Israeli army were to leave the areas it has recently captured, what would follow suit? What would happen in those areas after the Israelis return to their previous lines of defense?

The areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority have been, prior to the Israeli military incursion, the largest safe haven of terrorists in the world. The different Palestinian terrorist groups acted freely and with the benevolent approval of the head of the Palestinian Authority, Yasser Arafat.

Further, those territories became an organized anarchy of terror.

The most gruesome terrorist attacks perpetrated in recent years were planned and executed from the areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority. Israeli civilians have been murdered on a daily basis by terrorists who operated freely in, and from, those territories.

Now, let us assume the Israeli army pulled back well in advance to its objectives having been achieved. What will happen next?

One can say in favor of the president’s speech that it called for Israel to “begin” withdrawing; a process of withdrawal is entailed in such a call.

But then the same day the Security Council of the United Nations voted, with the full approval of the U.S. delegation, for a resolution calling on Israel to withdraw “without delay.”

Again, has anyone who voted in favor of that resolution began even to imagine what such a withdrawal would imply?

Who would take over the reins of power? What would happen with the countless terrorists in the area? What about the whole infrastructure designed to prepare bombs to carry out suicide bombings in Israel?

This is nothing but armchair diplomacy.

One can understand the enormous pressure that President Bush must have been enduring in recent days. The Arab countries, the European Union, the State Department most probably have been exerting pressure on Mr. Bush “to act,” as though there is some merit in acting for the sake of acting.

No doubt many of those who endeavored to wield their influence on the president were motivated by pure intentions, but not, alas, by an unlimited dose of strategic imagination.

Maybe Mr. Bush’s words, as regards an Israeli pull-back, did not signal a conceptual change on his part but were aimed at silencing his critics.

Rhetoric intended to placate, rather than to change policy, is acceptable and even recommendable on occasion. The problem with that is that even rhetoric has a momentum of its own.

President Bush, whose instincts are healthy, may have been drawn to say things without depicting a realistic scenario of what would – rather than what should – actually occur in their wake.

Which leads us to the passages in his speech about old enemies becoming new friends.

The president advanced three examples of old enemies and rivals who subsequently became good friends of the United States: Germany, Japan and Russia.

How true.

But, again, what is implied in his examples is singularly interesting.

Germany and Japan became friends of the United States after they had been defeated and unconditionally surrendered. Two atomic bombs were dropped on Japanese cities before Japan gave up. Germany was almost completely destroyed.

Should we infer that Israel must do the same before the Palestinians become its friends?

Further, the three examples put forward by the president have one important thing in common: Germany, Japan and Russia became friends of the United States after they had changed their political systems. Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and Communist Russia were not friends of the United States. Only the democratic, peaceful versions of those countries were considered, and actually turned out to be, friends of the United States.

Does Mr. Bush imply that, only after a democratic and peaceful regime is established among the Palestinians, should Israel become their friends?

If so, then, the president’s call for an Israeli withdrawal now, before the Israeli military operation has completed its objectives, fully contradicts what he expects to happen in its wake.


Dr. Yoav J. Tenembaum is a journalist and political analyst based in Israel. He has been published in a variety of newspapers and holds a doctorate degree in Modern History from Oxford University, where his doctoral thesis was on the international relations of the Middle East. Additionally he holds a masters degree in International Relations from Cambridge University and obtained his first degree in History at Tel Aviv University.