Welcome to MST - Mideast Saving Time

Recent incidents in and around Israel have been driven primarily by local factors, but the sweeping drama elsewhere in the region has eclipsed what might otherwise have been sharp reactions in the West.

The barbaric attack on a Jewish family in the West Bank settlement of Itamar prompted Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to announce hundreds of new housing units over the pre-1967 Green Line. The attack could have been an effort to remind Israelis and the world that Palestinians are dangerous, even when Muammar Qaddafi seems to be hogging the title of Mideast menace, but more likely this was just the one successful terrorist mission of the many that Israeli forces thwart almost on a daily basis. The same set of factors can explain the latest Jerusalem bombing attack.

The fact that Washington and even the United Nations were distracted with the momentous jockeying over international Libyan intervention – and that U.S. President Barack Obama has accepted for now that Netanyahu is unwilling or incapable of acting more constructively than his Palestinian counterparts – meant that little notice was taken of the massacre or the Israeli response.

Rocket strikes from Hamas-ruled Gaza against civilian targets deep inside Israel may have been meant to test the new security regime between Israel and a still rudderless Egyptian regime, as well as showing that Gaza can be at least as dangerous as the West Bank – a headline grabber. If Netanyahu’s response to the Itamar attack was knee-jerk and politically calculated, the mobilization against Gaza was obvious and unavoidable. The State of Israel must be able to protect its citizens.

When my friends complain that the murder in Itamar of both parents and three of their young children got next to no coverage in the American press, they are mistaken. However, it was understandably overshadowed by Qaddafi’s campaign against thousands of Libyans, continuing protests and mass killings elsewhere in the Arab world… oh, and the Japanese earthquake-tsunami-nuclear trifecta (!!). Downplaying the deliberate butchering of a Jewish family is unseemly, and so is overstating its significance relative to other immediate crises near and far.

Had the Itamar murders taken place a few months earlier, they would have received far more press, and Netanyahu’s decision to build more West Bank housing would have attracted far more condemnation. When Israel launched Operation Cast Lead two years ago in Gaza, President Bush was preparing to conclude his White House tenure and Americans and the rest of the world were out on Christmas break. That timing definitely worked to Israel’s advantage, reducing the unavoidable negative publicity. It cuts both ways.

Libya can save U.S. in Mideast

Rather than compounding the military campaigns to which President Bush originally committed us a decade ago, the intervention in Libya can become part of a broader transformation that ultimately stabilizes the region, restoring and even breaking new ground in the credibility and legitimacy of U.S. influence and power in the Middle East.

Libya seems to be a perfect fit for U.S. intervention. Despite the Bush administration's rapprochement with Libya, unlike Mubarak in Egypt, Muammar Qaddafi is hardly seen as Washington's ally, so there's little of that imperialist baggage or angst. The United States is acting under a genuine coalition, including participation of Arab forces. The Arab League, and China and Russia, have stepped back from their original assent to the Libya intervention, but they were fully aware that the UN Security Council resolution was authorizing more than a simple "no fly zone".

The United States was too involved in Mubarak's fortunes to intervene in Egypt, and Bahrain is home to our Fifth Fleet and it's Arabia's new Achilles' Heel. Qaddafi has established himself as the quintessential isolated fanatic dictator, and not without merit. Also, enabling the rebel tribes to remove him may open opportunities for further mayhem, but in reality Al Qaeda has failed to manifest itself in any of the Mideast turmoil, including in Libya where Qaddafi and other critics of international intervention have revived Osam bin Laden as the poster child for status quo tyranny.

About those Iraq comparisons...

Who can forget that famous line from Newt Gingrich, who told Fox News that “the more difficult it gets, the more the President golfs and the more the President hides.” Relax, Gingrich wasn't dissing former President George W. Bush -- notorious for playing golf and vacationing -- he was actually criticizing President Barack Obama, just two days ago.

It was genuinely entertaining to watch members of the Republican foreign policy elite warn of Libyan mission creep last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press". Of course, NBC identified Richard Haass as President of the Council on Foreign Relations rather than as a former policy advisor for both Presidents Bush. To their credit, both Haass and the elder Bush understood the limitations of U.S. unilateral force. As for the younger President Bush, well…

The coordinated international military effort in Libya bears no resemblance to the junior Bush adventure in Iraq, especially since it was authorized under an expansive resolution by the United Nations Security Council. What's more, France -- which Bush 43 left behind -- is not only on board, it took the diplomatic lead. And even the Arab League found a rare moment of courage, just long enough to sign off on the Security Council resolution. (For all those complaining that Obama isn't taking the lead on Libya, see under: Bush 43.) 


There may be good reasons to not act or to do even more in Libya, or to do it differently, but this is not comparable to Iraq, for the reasons above and for so many more reasons that should be as obvious as they are tedious to list. Also, George W. Bush was the President of the United States who reopened diplomatic and trade relations with Muammar Qaddafi's Libya, with some fanfare. Yup, that would be another difference. 

Does U.S. Senate really value international religious freedom?

Next week, for the second time in less than 12 months, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will hold a confirmation hearing for Reverend Suzan Cook Johnson, popularly known as Sujay. President Obama has renominated for the post of Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom ("IRF"), after her first nomination last year expired at the end of the 111th Congress. Nominations do not just "expire", like a loaf of bread -- her nomination was torpedoed through the arcane rules of the Senate, also known as inside politics.

Numerous friends of mine have served as U.S. ambassadors, including a few with no international experience but compelling professional backgrounds and -- often -- a personal connection to a sitting President of the United States, either Democrat or Republican. They have mostly served with distinction, because successful diplomacy is not limited to career diplomats. I do not believe Sujay is a personal friend of Barack Obama, so how did she get the nomination? 

Sujay has lived and worked overseas, she has organized international summits of religious leaders, and she has led an organization of 12,000 ministers. She is a gifted communicator, author, pastor, and humanitarian. On 9/11, she ministered to first-responders, victims and families at Ground Zero. 

Most importantly, Sujay "gets" religious freedom. She understands that religious freedom is not an excuse for Christian triumphalism, but an affirmation that the majority of the world's population who hold religious views also have rights including the freedom of belief, and freedom from discrimination. She understands that these are human rights, and that religious freedom can be the catalyst for millions of American Christians to get behind specific policies promoting human rights and U.S. global leadership. There is an untapped constituency for religious freedom here in America, and globally there is a swath of persecuted humanity in desperate need of diplomatic attention. 

Israel's military occupation that is, and isn't

My previous post has generated some discussion about the status of Israel's presence in the West Bank. During the past decade, various Israeli Supreme Court decisions have reaffirmed that the West Bank is under "belligerent occupation" for purposes of imposing Israeli military restrictions on individual Palestinians. Yet when the term "Israeli occupation" is tossed around in the United Nations General Assembly or on university campuses across the United States, Jewish activists and pro-Israel advocates turn apoplectic.

Israel is on record as an occupying power. It occupied the West Bank, along with Jerusalem, Gaza and the Golan Heights in 1967. It has annexed Jerusalem and the Golan, which means those zones do not qualify as military occupation under Israeli law (though other nations do not recognize those annexations). Israel has withdrawn from Gaza, which leaves the legal status unclear. This leaves the West Bank.

With policies like these, who needs terrorists?

"Aw, Johnny, 40 years old and she's still runnin' your life!" -- Moonstruck.

Too often, politicians claim they're leading when they're really just reacting, and they subordinate their priorities to outside influence rather than really taking charge and asserting national interest. Worst of all, most people seems to go along without noting what should be obvious. Over the past several days, this has been the case in the United States and in Israel.

HOW U.S. JUST HELPED THE TERRORISTS

In the United States, last week's first Congressional hearing on the presumed threat from the radicalization of American Muslims got underway. No hard evidence was presented that American Muslims are inherently a threat or that this discrete topic is useful for Members of the House of Representatives to devote their attention. However, it is only the latest in a long series of public actions since September 11, 2001, where we have allowed our enemies to determine our national agenda.

Al Qaeda has declared their goal of radicalizing American Muslims, so naturally some Members of Congress have now made a big fuss about the radicalization of American Muslims. If this has any real effect, it will be... the radicalization of American Muslims. We have handed a victory to Al Qaeda without the need for any further attacks on U.S. soil. Our real emphasis, and that of the House Homeland Security Committee, should be on preventing the actual terrorists, whoever they may be, based on the best available intelligence forensic analysis. And yet, the hearings are advertised as safeguarding America. Is Rep. Peter King really a better American than those who oppose his hearings?

HOW ISRAEL JUST REWARDED THE TERRORISTS

In Israel, the government has responded to the monstrous massacre of a young family in the West Bank by announcing hundreds of new housing units in the West Bank. Evidently, the timing is meant to show that the Netanyahu government will not allow Palestinian terrorism to force Israel into risking its national security. For the past few decades, however, very few settlements have served a security purpose, rather they have compelled a massive military presence to protect each additional residential neighborhood that gets built over the Green Line. If those settlements are a fundamental statement of Zionist fulfillment, then why package them as a response to Palestinian attacks on Israeli settlements?

What's wrong with hearings on American Muslims

It is hard to imagine how the public hearings on Islamic terror in the United States, which opened today in the U.S. House of Representatives, could be any more counter-productive. I will attempt to list some of the most apparent problems, without resorting to labels or innuendo.

NO CREDIBILITY: The Chairman of the committee holding the hearings is an unrepetentant and longtime supporter of the ruthless Irish Republican Army.

UNJUSTIFIED: The claim that such hearings will help crack down on terror cells in the United States has been debunked by the bulk of local and federal law enforcement officials -- most of those commenting have emphasized that the hearings will actually undermine the generally excellent cooperation they receive from Muslim-Americans and community leaders.

ALIENATING: The hearings, and the publicity they have generated, further stigmatize and alienate Muslim-Americans, and send an adversarial message to one billion Muslims around the world, just as the Islamic world is getting over the perception that post-9/11 America is at war with Islam -- and just as millions of Muslims are looking to America for leadership in their own risky leap toward democracy.