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The elephant in the room?
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The elephant in the room

If America is to midwife a Palestinian state, hard questions must be asked

In America today there is much talk of a two-state solution. But not a word about the elephant in the room.

 

President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton, and the world’s media all seem mesmerized by the idea of a two-state solution. But not a word about the elephant in the room.

 

American Mideast policy is shaped by President Obama’s push to create a Palestinian state. We are transfixed by the words… a “solution.”

 

Presto. Create a Palestinian state and problem solved. In one stroke America will defang Islamic terrorism and achieve political detoxification of the Middle East. Acting as midwife to a Palestine state, America’s image in the Muslim world will be remade. Transformed. Americans like to be liked.

 

But there is that elephant in the room.

 

Outposts are dispensable, settlements can be dismantled. Still, there is an elephant in the room.

 

Driven by a need to woo the Muslim world, American emissaries trek to Damascus, presidential interviews are provided to al-Arabia, al-Jazeera is in the loop, messages of friendship are transmitted to Tehran, apologies are proffered for past American insolence. A world media praises “bold leadership” as President Obama speaks to an Islamic audience and issues his call for a two-state solution in a speech from Cairo.

The American president intends to apply unrelenting pressure on Israel, we are told. Cheering from the sidelines a spellbound media chants, “And about time.”

 

The train carrying the two-state solution has left the station. The elephant in the room is ignored.

 

Is there an exit strategy?

The details of the two-state solution are referred to as a “land swap.” But the land that Jews will be asked to “swap” is Hebron, where the Jewish patriarchs are buried; Shiloh, where the first Tabernacle stood; Beit El, the site of Jacob’s ladder; and Jerusalem, the heart of the Jewish soul.

 

A “land swap” sheen prettying up things does not change history or reality.

 

We are assured that the forcible removal of Jews living on the other side of the line – the demolition of their homes and synagogues - is practicable. But Israelis have seen this movie before. The concept has been tested and failed. Then they called it, “Disengagement.” Now the world is asking Jews to repeat “Disengagement.” Fantasy.

 

There is an elephant in the room. It is ignored, a taboo subject, best left unspoken. But I will speak of it here.

 

The elephant in the room is Jewish armed resistance aimed at Palestinian Arabs.

 

Implementing a Palestinian state all but guarantees Jewish armed resistance. Not Jewish armed resistance directed towards the IDF or the State of Israel. Jews will not war with Jews. No, no, no – Jewish armed resistance will be aimed at Palestinian Arabs.

 

Weapons will be obtained. Fighters will join the resistance. It will be brutal. Horrific. And very, very bloody. It is lunacy to think otherwise.

 

If President Obama is promising a “solution,” he is promising something that is not his to promise. There is an elephant in the room.

 

I do not advocate violence, but I am not an ostrich. If we speak of a Palestinian state we must speak of all its implications. If America is to midwife a Palestinian state, hard questions must be asked.

 

What are the consequences? What are the entanglements? What are the costs? And surely, Americans should ask, if things do not go well with this two-state idea, is there an exit strategy?

 

The stakes are high. A two-state venture is fraught with risk and peril.

There is an elephant in the room.

 

Michael Fenenbock is a long-time American political consultant. He and his wife Daphne are the founders of “Denuke Iran” (www.denukeiran.com), an online advocacy campaign aimed at preventing the Islamic Republic of Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. They live in New York, but spend a great deal of time in Jerusalem.

 


פרסום ראשון: 06.15.09, 23:02
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