Consider This: Iran- talking cure for psychopath
NAOMI RAGEN
March 22, 2012
Can we talk Iran out of wanting to kill every man, woman and child in Israel?
Can we talk Iran out of wanting to kill every man, woman and child in Israel? That seems to be the question these days.
If Iran were a mental patient, in our psychiatric notes we would have to record the following:
On August 28, 2001, at a rally for Quds (Arabic for Jerusalem) Day, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a Tehran crowd that “the Zionist regime is the axis of unity among all the thieves and criminals of the world.” In 2005, he said, quoting the Imam Khamenei, Israel should be “wiped off the map.”
While the world was busy nit-picking the translation of those words, particularly Israel’s “good friend” Jonathan Steele ofThe Guardian, arguing Iran’s leader was just referring to a regime change of the evil expansionist Zionists now in power in Jerusalem, not physical annihilation of a sovereign state, Joshua Teitelbaum pointed out in his important rebuttal of these foolish semantics that Michael Axworthy, Britain’s consular officer in Tehran, testified that slogans draped over missiles in Iran’s military parades stated: “Israel must be wiped off the map.” Ahmadinejad’s own speech was peppered with “Marg bar Esrail” (Death to Israel).
On February 20, 2008, Ahmadinejad called Israel “a black and filthy microbe,” and in 2011 he likened Israel to “a cancer cell that spreads through the body,” stating that “this regime infects any region [and must therefore] be removed.”
As a psychiatrist, we would have to ask the patient: Why, when you have no border with Israel and your citizens are not affected in any way on a daily basis by anything that Israel does, are you filled with enough hatred to want to kill millions of men, women and children, most of whom are the treasured survivors of a nation decimated by mindless atrocities and slaughter only 60 years ago?
The most honest answer would require courage, honesty and some real insight, all three of which are in short supply in the present Iranian regime. However, Robert R. Reilly probably comes closest to the truth in his book The Closing of the Muslim Mind: “The fuel for the permanent war is the same for Islamism as it was for Marxism-Leninism and Nazism; it is hatred. Only the object of hatred changes – from race hatred in Nazism and class hatred in communism to hatred of the infidel in radical Islamism.”
As stated in the Koran (60:4) itself (and quoted by Osama bin Laden): “Battle, animosity and hatred – directed from the Muslim to the infidel – is the foundation of our religion.” Or, as Abdullah Azzam, bin Laden’s mentor, put it: “Glory does not build its lofty edifice except with skulls. Honor and respect cannot be established except on a foundation of cripples and corpses. Jihad and the rifle alone, no negotiations, no conferences and no dialogue.” Ayatollah Khomeini, the supreme spiritual leader of the present Iranian regime, put it this way: “Whatever good exists is because of the sword and the shadow of the sword.”
WITH THE Internet, this “virtual community of hatred,” a phrase coined by Professor Jerrold M. Post, professor of psychiatry, political psychology and international affairs at George Washington University, is now almost exclusively and most murderously directed at the Jews, particularly the Jewish state. This has reached ludicrous proportions.
According to the Middle East Media Research Institute, in 2009, Iranian TV declared swine flu to be an Israeli conspiracy. In June 2008, an Iranian movie critic, Dr. Majid Shah-Hosseini, traced the origins of Saving Private Ryan to exalting the American- Jewish soldier: “Names may be selected for their rhyming value. Zion becomes Ryan.” Hasan Bolkhari, adviser to the Iranian Ministry of Education, wrote in 2006 that the cartoon Tom and Jerry was “a Jewish conspiracy to improve the image of mice because Jews were called dirty mice in Europe.”
Lest anyone point the finger at the Arab-Israeli conflict as the culprit for this mindless hatred, it should be pointed out that one of the first religious laws enacted in Iran in the late 19th century forbids Jews from going outdoors in inclement weather “for fear that the rain or snow carry their impurities to the Muslims” (The Jews of Islam by Bernard Lewis).
Still, the belief in the “talking cure” for Iran continues to be supported throughout the world.
Peter Beaumont, writing in The Observer on March 11, maintains that a rational dialogue with Iran is both possible and necessary. “Israel’s security concerns and its ever-louder threats to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities… far from illuminating what actually motivates Iran in its nuclear ambitions… has tended to obscure Tehran’s motives instead.”
Right. It’s Israelis who are irrational.
But the irrational views of one mediocre journalist would be of little import were they not echoed by Israel’s so-called “best friends.”
Barack Obama told the annual American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference on March 4, “I firmly believe that an opportunity remains for diplomacy, backed by pressure, to succeed.” On March 7, the president of the United States stated even more clearly: “Diplomacy can still resolve the crisis over Iran’s possible pursuit of nuclear weapons,” accusing his Republican critics of “beating the drums of war.”
Echoing the president, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared in a joint press conference with Libyan Prime Minister Abdel Rahim al-Kib on March 9 that Washington wants “to begin discussions with Iran.” British Prime Minister David Cameron said, “We’ve been very clear: If there was an Israeli strike, we wouldn’t support them.”
Charles Krauthammer, a long-time friend of Israel, summed up the dangers of such a view in an article published on March 13: “These negotiations don’t just gain time for a nuclear program [over] whose military intent the IAEA is issuing alarming warnings. They make it extremely difficult for Israel to do anything about it (while it still can) lest Israel be universally condemned for having aborted a diplomatic solution.”
Israel’s enemies, it seems, have all the time in the world to dither. After all, what’s the worst thing that could happen? As an Israeli, I can only feel chilled to the core that the idea of the Jewish state and all its inhabitants being wiped out doesn’t seem to terrify the West nearly as much as a preemptive Israeli strike to prevent it. Israel, it seems, is facing the madman alone.
If you google “Is Iran Sane?” what you get is a stream of articles on the death of Sane Jaleh, who died instantly when he was shot by suspected Basij, the paramilitary wing of the Terrorist IR Regime during a demonstration in Tehran. According to Wikipedia, Sane, a Kurdish Iranian, was a film student at the Tehran Art University and a member of the national student union (Tahkime Vahdat).
“Eyewitness accounts suggest that between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. of the 14th of February Basij paramilitary thugs opened fire on demonstrators, shooting at them indiscriminately.” And thus, with his death, perhaps the only person who could legitimately be called sane in Iran (I refer to the leadership, and not some of the brave opponents of the regime) was buried.
For all of us who retain our sanity and our love for humanity and for Israel, it should be clear that dangerous mental cases like the Iranian regime should not be free to lie on the couch while their nuclear program churns out deadly weapons for them to fulfill their darkest and most insane fantasies.
Mecca pilgrimage ripe for sectarian clash
DAVID ROSENBERG / THE MEDIA LINE
October 26, 2011
Growing tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran threaten to peak in Sunni-Shite cold war, analysts say; Saudi takes security precautions.
The Hajj – The annual pilgrimage in which some three million Muslims converge on the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia – is threatening to become the next flashpoint in the Sunni-Shiite cold war.
Pilgrims have already begun arriving for the event, whose observance according to the Muslim calendar is expected to peak in the first or second week of November. Saudi Arabia is taking security precautions as the Hajj gets underway and officials have warned that they will not countenance disturbances of any kind.
While the Hajj has not been marred by violence since 1987, this year’s pilgrimage comes amid heightened tensions between Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia, each of which regards itself as the leader of its wing of Islam. That could prompt an outbreak of violence, whether planned or not, at the most sensitive time of the Muslim calendar and at its most holy place, analysts say.
“They [the Iranians] have done that in the past. It tends to reflect the state of Saudi-Iranian relations,” Ali Ansari, a researcher on Iran at London’s Chatham House think tank, told The Media Line. “With the Turks and the Saudis, they try to keep things calm. But the relationship with the Saudis has become really bad.
”Traditional rivals occupying opposite sides of the Gulf, both countries have grown anxious as the Arab Spring shakes up the status quo across the Middle East. Meanwhile, the scheduled US troop withdrawal from Iraq, a country with a mixed Shiite-Sunni population, will create a power vacuum that both Iran and Saudi Arabia are concerned with filling.
In March, Saudi Arabia dispatched security forces to put down a largely Shiite rebellion in Sunni-ruled Bahrain, angering Iran. Earlier this month, Shiites in Saudi Arabia’s eastern province rioted, prompting the government to blame a “foreign country,” a code word for Iran. Riyadh reacted with intense anger after the US revealed a plot laid by a secret Iranian military unit, the Quds force, to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to Washington.
While neither country is prepared to risk an open military conflict, analysts say they have shown no hesitation to engage in diplomatic assaults and quietly back their co-religionists in local sectarian conflicts. In that context, the Hajj is a potential hotspot.
“Given the tensions, they seem to be ramping up toward another clash. I’m not saying there will be one, but if there is one, I won’t be surprised,” Joshua Teitelbaum, a senior lecturer in Middle East at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, told The Media Line.
Fuad Bin Abdulsalam Al-Farsi, the Saudi minister of Hajj, told The Saudi Gazette that some 1.8 million foreign pilgrims are expected to arrive this year, outnumbering Saudis. He didn’t cite figures for the number of Iranians, but in past years they have numbered in the tens of thousands.
Last week, Saudi security forces staged a mock drill at Mecca’s Haram Mosque, during which they broke up a sit-in between the Black Stone and the area for circumambulation. “During the exercise, emergency forces were asked to use machine guns and fire live ammunition at certain targets, which they achieved with accuracy,” The Gulf News reported.
All Hajj pilgrims will be fingerprinted on their arrival in the Kingdom, ostensibly to keep out unauthorized visitors but also as a means of keeping tabs on them. Some 500 women have been hired to form a special unit dealing with female pilgrims, a necessity in a country that maintains strict separation between the sexes.
“We will not allow anything that would disrupt the peace of the Hajj pilgrimage and disturb the pilgrims. That is why we shall not tolerate any damage, riots or chaos during the season of Hajj or out of it,” Prince Khaled Al-Faisal, governor of Mecca province, toldreporters earlier this month.
Publicly, Iran is not threatening problems at the pilgrimage even as it threatens the Saudis in other ways. The Hajj should be a “symbol of unity,” Ali Ghazi-Asgar, Iran’s top Hajj official, said on October 9. “I call on all Friday prayer leaders and media in the two countries not to stir up tensions and differences,” he told pilgrims, according to Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency.
But the Saudis have reasons to be nervous. Saudi security forces clashed with Iranian pilgrims holding anti-US and anti-Israeli protests, most notably in 1987, when police efforts to stifle a demonstration ended in clashes that left 402 people dead, including 275 Iranians. Tehran routinely complains about discrimination against Shiites and their unique rites during the Mecca pilgrimage, adding a potential source for clashes.
In recent years, Iranian pilgrims have staged smaller, quieter rallies with speeches and chants calling for Muslim unity and attacking the “enemies” of the faith. The rallies, which they call “distancing from infidels,” take place outside an encampment on the Plain of Mina outside of Mecca during a key part of the Hajj rites.
In 2007, when bilateral relations were better, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made the Hajj himself. But he stayed away from the rally held nearby by several hundred Iranian pilgrims.
In fact, the speeches and chants are not a traditional part of the Hajj, rather an invention of Iranians since the 1979 revolution that overthrew the shah. The Saudis have tried to ban this ceremony. Moreover, while Iranians are free to make their own Hajj travel arrangements, most travel in government-sponsored groups, giving officials greater control over who attends and their actions.
Despite Ahmadinejad’s forbearance four years ago, the regime in Tehran looks at the annual pilgrimage through a very different prism than the hosting Saudis, said Bar-Ilan’s Teitelbaum.
“The Saudis see it as great responsibility and a pillar of Islamic and they want to give the best service possible to perform their obligation,” he said. “The Iranians, since the revolution, have looked at this as a big opportunity to propagandize for the revolution and against the people they don’t like, which are the Saudis, the Americans and Israel.”
Israel delights in Syria’s unrest
Matthew Kalman
April 29, 2011 06:48
JERUSALEM — JERUSALEM — Israeli leaders and commentators could not help gloating as they watched Syrian President Bashar al-Assad writhing under the pressure of the Arab world’s latest revolt.
Unlike Egypt, whose leaders were committed to peace with Israel, or Tunisia and Libya, which long ago became minor players in the anti-Israel coalition, Assad’s Syria is regarded as one of Israel’s deadliest enemies.
“Even in our world colored with grays and not only blacks and whites, the fall of the Assad regime in Damascus would be a great blessing for the Middle East and the world,” wrote Mordechai Nisan, a former lecturer in Middle East studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
“The list of Syria’s misdemeanors and crimes is legion. From belligerent Soviet ally to godfather and patron of Palestinian terrorism, Hafez the father and Bashar the son crafted a policy strategy that demonized Israel, betrayed the Arab world, consolidated the regional hegemony of Iran, and perpetuated an Alawite sectarian regime in defiance of the Sunni Muslim majority in the country,” Nisan wrote in the Israeli daily, Yedioth Ahronoth.
“With the Assads gone, the Middle East as a whole will be able to move to transcend the state of terror and tension with which the Syrian regime poisoned the political atmosphere for over four long decades,” he concluded.
Israeli observers were also bemused by the sudden discomfiture of radical Palestinian groups — including Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine — whose headquarters are in Damascus and who have long enjoyed the financial and political support of the Syrian dictatorship.
The Meir Amit Terrorism and Intelligence Information Center, a clearing-house for Mossad and Shin Bet analysis, said in a commentary that the Hamas leadership in Damascus was “attempting to play both sides of the fence … saying it supported both the Syrian leadership and the Syrian people.”
Hamas was particularly exposed when one of its heroes, Muslim Brotherhood spiritual mentor Sheikh Yusef al-Qaradawi, backed the Syrian protesters in a sermon aired on Al Jazeera on March 25. Calling for all-out revolution in Syria, he lambasted Assad and warned that “those who do not change will be trampled.”
“Hamas has found itself in a predicament over the clash between its solidarity with Muslim Brotherhood elements in Syria interested in toppling the regime, as well as with al-Qaradawi’s attack on Bashar al-Assad, and its dependence on the assistance provided by the Assad regime to its infrastructure and terrorist activity,” observed the center.
But Itamar Rabinovich, a former Israeli peace negotiator with Syria, warned that the picture was more complex. In early April, writing in Foreign Affairs, Rabinovich said that while Assad is no doubt a ruthless adversary, “Israel itself is ambivalent about the future of his rule.”
“Israeli leaders believe that Syria and the Iranian axis have been weakened by the domestic unrest plaguing Assad’s regime. But like others in the region, they wonder what the alternative to Assad might be. Although they are aware of pro-democracy and human rights groups active inside Syria and abroad, they naturally fear the power of the Muslim Brotherhood,” Rabinovich wrote.
In a commentary last week, Rabinovich suggested that Israel open a back-channel dialogue with Assad, offering to help him survive in return for changing the diplomatic dialogue between the two countries.
“People in Bashar Assad’s situation are concerned about their physical survival and Israel has something to offer in this area,” Rabinovich told Israel Radio. “We could change the agenda between us and Syria. The agenda doesn’t just have to be about a peace deal and territorial concessions.”
But for most Israelis the chance to see Assad fall is not to be missed.
“It is difficult to support any position that allows for the Assad regime’s continued rule,” wrote former Justice Minister Tzachi Hanegbi in the Jerusalem Post.
“Syria, via its proxies, spilled Israel Defense Forces blood in Lebanon for three decades,” Hanegbi recalled. “Assad offered a safe haven in Damascus to senior leaders of terrorist organizations and allowed them to continue their terror activities, with unlimited freedom, from his capital. The Syria-Iran alliance has provided Hamas and its satellites with financial aid, training camps, a supply of modern weapons and political backing … Syria’s enthusiastic support for Hezbollah has turned it into Lebanon’s strongest organization.”
Whatever outcome Israel would like to see in Syria, past attempts at interference in neighbors’ affairs are not encouraging. Israel’s effort to foster regime change in Lebanon in 1982 by backing the Christian Phalange movement led to the assassination of its leader, Bachir Gemayel, and the rise of Hezbollah. Israel’s encouragement of Islamic groups in Gaza in the 1980s to counter the influence of the Palestinian Liberation Organization led directly to the creation of Hamas.
Joshua Teitelbaum, principal fellow of the GLORIA Center in Herzilya, said Israel can do little more than watch and wait.
“All things considered, it’s a good thing,” Teitelbaum told GlobalPost. “Israel cannot affect this outcome in either way. I don’t think we can shore him up and I don’t think we can really bring him down.”
“When all is said and done, if his regime is gone, it has the possibility of being good for us. This is an ally of Iran, one who props up Hezbollah. The people who come into control, and we don’t know who they are, might choose a different policy. They might seek the comfort of the United States for all we know. There are many options.
“What we do know is that this is a very damaging regime — damaging to its own people, damaging to Lebanon and the independence of Lebanon, totally supporting Hezbollah and Iran’s main ally in the Arab world. So the weight of things from Israel’s perspective and also from an American perspective is clearly against this regime,” Teitelbaum said.
But he said it was doubtful the uprising would lead to a sudden flowering of democracy because of the ruthless suppression under the Assad regime — father and son.
“This is an authoritarian regime that’s been there for a long time controlling its people. Economically it’s horrible for them. They are not advanced. They are not sharing the fruits of globalization,” Teitelbaum said. “There’s no civil society in Syria. There’s no way to organize in Syria.”
“I think it’s more likely there’ll be some kind of regime change. There are so many unknowns here. If it’s an Alawi takeover, and they’re going to switch for another Alawi leader, it’s not going to be democracy.”
Saudi Arabia uses Facebook as conduit for grievances
DAVID E. MILLER / THE MEDIA LINE
02/15/2011 21:32
Many citizens greet the page as a new way to reach officials, but experts are skeptical as to whether it will help.
In a country where public protests are banned, women can’t travel alone and only one election has even been held (in 2005 for municipal offices), having the king’s cellphone number is a giant leap foreword for citizens with a complaint.
Even as Facebook has emerged as the chief toll for spreading revolution across the Middle East, the Saudi royal court opened a dedicated page on the 
social network this week, where citizens can forward their grievances to the King Abdullah Ibn Abdulaziz Al-Saud with the click of a button.
The face of the page, however, belongs to Khaled Bin Abd Al-Aziz Al-Tuwaijri, chief of the Saudi royal court, saying the government wants citizens to voice their appeals directly “and without barriers.” The page includes the telephone and fax numbers at the royal court secretariat, in addition to Al-Twaijri’s mobile phone number and e- mail.
But while some Saudis welcomed the move, experts said it hardly changed the authoritarian nature of the conservative Arabian kingdom.
“I think it’s a great initiative,” Eman Al-Nafjan, a Saudi blogger living in the capital Riyadh, told The Media Line. “There already is an open-door policy for appeals, but this will make it easier for Saudis, especially women, to submit their appeals.” Social networks such as Facebook and Twitter have served as a rallying point and organizing tool for protesters in Tunisia and Egypt, but these tools can just as easily be used by officials to monitor opponents, experts said. Syria last week ended a five- year ban on Facebook and other social media.
In Saudi Arabia, the Culture and Information Ministry issued new regulations six weeks ago requiring electronic news and information sharing sites not to harm national security or offend the pride of individuals. News and chat websites, blogs, text messaging and group e-mails must be licensed.
The royal court’s Facebook page doesn’t allow for anonymous griping. For an appeal to be answered, the complainant must register his full name and telephone number.
Nevertheless, that didn’t appear to deter critics.
“We require proof that this web page is indeed run by Khaled Bin Abd Al-Aziz Al-Tuwaijri, so that we aren’t suckered into wasting our time on blabber at a fake picture,” a commentator named Fahad Atieah wrote on the page’s Wall this week.
Another, Abdulrahman Al-Amari, claimed the new page was no better than Saudi Arabia’s tedious bureaucracy.
“We want to speak with you directly without going through 10,000 offices,” he wrote. “We want direct and transparent dialogue for everyone’s benefit. Are you prepared for that?!” But for many Saudis, women in particular, filing a virtual grievance opens up unprecedented opportunities.
Saudis usually bring their written complaints to Saudi government offices, which are mostly closed to women, explained Al-Nafjan.”Women can enter some buildings but only with a male guardian, or mahram. It’s very awkward and they want the women out as soon as possible,” she said.
Saudis won’t hesitate to reveal their personal details through the site, she added, since most grievances are not political but personal in nature, pertaining to issues such as land rights and inheritance disputes.
But Joshua Teitelbaum, an expert on Saudia Arabia at Bar Ilan University and the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, downplayed the significance of the new Facebookpage, saying contact information for the royal court was readily available on other government websites.
“This is a defensive reaction, not a game-changer,” Teitelbaum told The Media Line. “No oppositionist is impressed by a Facebook page.” Teitelbaum said the Saudi regime has long been responsive to the population’s grievances has undertaken a series of political reforms since 2000, albeit very slowly.
Access to rulers has increased through local councils, known as Majalis, similar to town hall meetings, convened by local princes The Arab Middle East ranks low in global rankings of web freedom, although some leaders have been more embracing of the Internet than others. Jordan’s King Abdullah maintains a personal website through which he speaks to the nation. His wife, Queen Rania, keeps a Twitter account and an active Facebook page with over half a million fans.
Teitelbaum said rulers have had little choice but to go virtual as their traditional monopoly over information began to crack with the emergence of the Al Jazeera satellite news channel in 1996 and opened to a gaping fissure with the Internet. The new Saudi Facebook page, he added, was a small and symbolic way of adapting to this new reality.
Cristoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabian researcher at Human Rights Watch, called the Facebook page an act of cynicism by the royal court.
“There is great irony in fact that the Saudi king opens a new Facebook page while his government continues to shut down human rights group pages that have existed for years,” Wilcke told The Media Line.
Wilcke said the government was able to block access to certain Facebook accounts, such as the Monitor of Human Rights in Saudi (MHRSA), a local watchdog, without shutting down the entire site. Nevertheless, he said the new page would likely be used citizens who yearn for an ear with the court.
“The general fear of complaining has subsided recently,” he said. “More and more Saudis are complaining to us about their inability to gain access, and prove with mail receipts that they have tried.”
‘Dubai debt impact on Israel minor’
Sharon Wrobel
11/30/2009 00:37
Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said Sunday that the country’s exposure to Dubai’s debt problem was minimal removing fears over spill-over effects for the local economy.
“Over the last few days, the world has been watching the debt crisis in Dubai,” said Steinitz at a round table discussion in Jerusalem with the Histadrut Labor Federation and the Israel Manufacturers’ Association. ”At the moment we can say that the repercussions on the country’s pension funds, insurance companies and banks is minimal or close to zero. It will not have a macro-economic impact for Israel.”
Dubai, which is part of the United Arab Emirates, said at the end of last week, that it would have to ask creditors to postpone paying back its $59 billion debt, which triggered worries over a large default and big losses at banks and companies involved.
Speaking on national television on Saturday evening, Steinitz said that although the Treasury did not see macro-economic repercussions for Israel, there was some concern over possible aftershock.
“This is further proof of the resilience of the Israeli economy which has weathered the global economic crisis better than most countries and is on the path to recovery,” said Steinitz. The exposure of Israeli business in Dubai has been very limited since the two do not share any diplomatic relations and Israelis need a visa to visit. In addition Dubai follows the Arab League boycott against direct business with the Jewish State.
It is, nevertheless, “a relatively liberal place” for the region, according to Joshua Teitelbaum, professor of Middle East History at Tel Aviv University. “I personally know many Israelis who do business in Dubai, even on a weekly basis, by traveling there on foreign passports,” he said Sunday, by telephone.
Among the local tycoons doing business in Dubai is diamond mogul Lev Leviev, who owns two jewelry shops and is involved in the Dubai Diamond Exchange.
Real estate tycoon Yitzhak Tshuva, who is said to be involved in property and shopping center projects in Dubai through a joint venture, said in an interview with Army Radio on Sunday that he had not invested “even one cent” in Dubai. On a global level, Dubai’s attempt to reschedule debt may spur a “correction” in emerging markets, according to Mark Mobius, who oversees about $25b. of developing-nation assets as chairman of Templeton Asset Management Ltd.
A 20 percent drop for shares is “quite possible,” he said over the weekend. “The overall impact on stocks here can only be indirect, which comes from a loss of risk appetite when confidence is battered by something with global implications like the Dubai default,” said Michael Sarel, chief economist at Tel Aviv-based Harel Insurance Investments Ltd. “Bonds are being seen as a safe haven here in Israel, much as in the US.” The Tel Aviv-Index fell to its lowest level in a week, dropping 0.5% to 1,073.07 at the close on Sunday. Bonds gained for a third day with the yield on the 5.5% benchmark Mimshal Shiklit bond declining two basis points to 4.28%.
Local analysts and economists commenting on Sunday on the crisis fears in Dubai agreed that the reaction was blown out of proportion and that its impact on the global economy will be minor.
“Most likely Dubai will not default on its debt at the end of the day,” said Dan Halman, CEO of Halman-Aldubi Group, a mutual funds firm. “The major impact will be short-term mainly bringing oil prices down (financing of Dubai’s debt) and on the emerging markets.”
Similarly, Yoram Gabbai, chairman of Peilim Investments, said that the debt crisis in Dubai in itself was not likley to endanger the financial stability around the world. “The fallout though remind us that the world is still at the foot of an active lava mountain,” said Gabbai.
Bloomberg contributed to this report.
DAVID M. WEINBERGHis Royal Highness Abdullah bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud, the king of Saudi Arabia, works hard to get good press. He throws swell up-market galas, puts on grand interfaith conferences and finances numerous think tanks and lobbying firms. He also hands out fancy gold medals on thick gold chains – of which Barak Hussein Obama was a recent enchanted recipient.
Every once in a distant while, the savvy Saudi king also pulls the best trick in the book. He lets loose a feeble – but tantalizing – hint about the remote possibility of a theoretical chance that he might, someday, under exceptional circumstances and only if he unconditionally gets his way, begrudgingly accede to some faint warming of ties with Israel. It’s a soft lob, a pain-free ploy, Saudi sophistry at its best.
Yet the ruse works wonders. Speak very vaguely and indirectly about peace with Israel, and presto! You’re in Washington’s good books. You’re now a peace process “leader” with a diplomatic “initiative” in your name.
No concrete follow-up required. No need to put your money where your mouth is. Not that the king doesn’t know how to act decisively, or spread around a few American dollars, when he needs and wants to.
The Saudis hauled in truckloads of cash to buy the recent elections in Lebanon to ensure a Sunni (i.e., non-Hizbullah) victory. They’ve bankrolled Lashkar e-Taiba (of Mumbai infamy), Hamas and other radical Islamic movements worldwide when it suited them, while brutally crushing other groups, like al-Qaida, when these became a threat to them. They’ve openly embraced, then bluntly cold-shouldered, different Palestinian and American leaders, as per their changing interests.
Riyadh also funds madrassas and mosques the world over to aggressively promote its purist Wahhabi brand of Islam.
Thus, Saudi Kings and princes know how to make things happen, when they want to. So, if King Abdullah, really wanted to lead the Arab world toward peace with Israel, he could find a way or two to express his “moderation” more clearly and make things happen.
But the sanctimonious Saudis always seem to hew to the PR minimum. When they had a 9/11 image problem (15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, remember?), then-Crown Prince Abdullah nattered to The New York Times about “full normalization” with Israel in exchange for “full withdrawal” from the territories. It sounded pretty good. In a flash, Abdullah transformed the discourse from Saudi involvement in terrorism to Saudi peacemaking.
However, as Prof. Joshua Teitelbaum of the Dayan Center has pointed out, by the time the Abdullah trial balloon reached the Arab summit in Beirut in March 2002, the initiative had been modified and its terms hardened. It watered down “full normalization,” rewarded Syria with a presence on the shores of the Sea of Galilee and enshrined a Palestinian “right of return” to Israel. Since then, the sangfroid Saudis haven’t been willing to bat an eyelash at Israel. But the dodge worked so well that today the Obama administration is touting the Saudi “led” Arab peace initiative as a cornerstone of its regional peace diplomacy.
The only problem is that the supercilious Saudi king doesn’t really want to lead. He can’t even bring himself to give President Obama some rope with which to entice, or hang, Israel. According to news reports, Washington can’t seem to squeeze any commitments about normalization from the Saudis, even if Israel freezes all settlement activity and paints the Jerusalem Old City walls in the Saudi national colors.
Now, nobody was expecting the supreme Saudi king to come to Jerusalem, God forbid, Anwar Sadat style. Nor could we reasonably expect Abdullah to
offer cash for resettling Palestinian refugees outside of Israel. Nor will he likely curtail the vicious anti-Israel propaganda pumped out daily to the Arab world by his Middle East Broadcasting channel (MBC) or through films like the malevolent Saudi-produced Olive Dream.
Naw, that would be asking too much.
But Abdullah might have, and still could – if peace truly was his goal – authorize a meeting of Israeli and Saudi academics on desertification and 
desalinization or other nonpolitical environmental matters. He could quietly allow the opening of a low-level Saudi commercial interest section in a Tel Aviv-based foreign embassy, as some of the other Gulf states have already done. He could send us a Rosh Hashana card.
Heck, Israel would settle for something simple, like approval for El Al to fly over Saudi airspace en route to New Delhi and Beijing. We would even be
willing to refrain from serving kosher food, flushing toilets and playing “Hava Nagila” on the speaker system as our Zionist planes traverse the sacrosanct Saudi heavens.
But no. King Abdullah can’t countenance such muffled gestures toward Israel. Not even for his friend Obama.
Now here’s a thought: Perhaps Obama isn’t pressing the Saudis and other Arabs hard enough about normalizing ties with Israel? Perhaps Abdullah has the impression that Obama is going to “deliver” Israel to the Arabs, and wrest from Binyamin Netanyahu a settlement freeze, then withdrawals and then a handover of Jerusalem?
Where oh where could Abdullah have possibly gotten that impression?
The writer is director of public affairs at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies.
Analysis: Despite rifts, Arab peace plan still reflects consensus
Brenda Gazzar03/30/2009 23:36
Leaders at Doha summit still question whether a divided Arab world can embrace peace with Israel.
Arab leaders convening in Doha for the 21st Arab League summit are reiterating their commitment to the Arab peace initiative, but some question whether a divided Arab world can even embrace a comprehensive, just peace with Israel. It appears unlikely that Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu will lend his support to the initiative as written or to the creation of a Palestinian state as envisioned by the Arab world.
The initiative, first introduced in 2002, calls for a full Israeli withdrawal from all territoriesoccupied since 1967, establishment of a Palestinian state on those territories with Jerusalem as its capital, and achievement of “a just solution” to the Palestinian refugee problem. In exchange, Arab states would enter into a peace agreement with Israel and establish “normal relations” with it. But with divisions still evident between the Western-backed camp led by Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and the pro-Iranian camp that includes Syria, Qatar and Sudan, would Arab states be willing and capable of such a peace with Israel? While a split Arab world may complicate matters, many experts say the answer is yes.
“The Arab initiative reflects a broad consensus among Arab governments and ruling elites for the need for a political solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, understanding [that] the solution needs to be one that recognizes the State of Israel and [that] conflict with Israel is brought to an end,” said Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, a senior research fellow at Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies.
The initiative is not considered a substitute for negotiations, but “lays out the basic principles of what that settlement has to include for it to be acceptable to the Arab world,” he said. And while Israel does not consider the document ideal, “it can be used to help steer the process forward.” Countries like Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, Egypt and Morocco have all signed on to the agreement, as has Syria – although the latter takes a more “militant” position on it and has made it clear that it is not willing to wait for an unlimited time, Maddy-Weitzman said.
However, the fact that Palestinians are divided between Fatah and Hamas – which is reluctant to recognize Israel and has not signed on to the Arab initiative – certainly makes it more difficult for Israel to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians.
Others argue that Iran, which has helped foster divisions among Arabs as well as Palestinians, will continue to do all it can to prevent Arab states such as Syria, which benefits economically and militarily from its relationship with the Shi’ite state, from making peace with Israel.
Dore Gold, president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, argued that Syria was more interested in maintaining regime stability than in retrieving the Golan Heights in a peace deal.
Still others, such as Moshe Dayan Center director Eyal Zisser, said that the divisions in the Arab world could place obstacles in implementing a comprehensive peace initiative, as there may be differences of opinion on the best way to negotiate or execute such a deal. And some wonder whether Lebanon, where the Iranian-backed Hizbullah plays an increasingly dominant role, would also be willing and able to make peace.
Emad Gad, who heads the Israeli unit at al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, argued that Hizbullah would be greatly weakened once Syria and Israel make peace, as weapons would no longer be transferred into Lebanon from Syrian territory.
The Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs recently released a report entitled “The Arab Peace Initiative: A Primer and Future Prospects.” The report, written by Joshua Teitelbaum, argues that while the Arab Peace Initiative represents significant and positive developments on the part of the Arab world, Israel should refrain from accepting the initiative as a basis for peace negotiations “because it contains seriously objectionable elements.” One of these elements is the assured rejection of all forms of Palestinian refugee patriation in Arab host countries, which means the “refugees would have nowhere to go but Israel,” the report said. In addition, Israel should also reject the “all or nothing” approach of the Saudis and the Arab League, as “peacemaking is the process of negotiation, not diktat.”
“Peace would be best served by Israel going on the diplomatic offensive and presenting an initiative of its own, emphasizing the positive aspects of the initiative, and including an invitation to Arab leaders to a meeting in Israel to discuss the initiative in its entirety,” the report said.
Far right boosts Netanyahu’s chances
Matthew Fisher, Canwest News Service
February 20, 2009
Nationalist hardline party’s support gives Likud leader edge to become Israeli prime minister
Benjamin Netanyahu’s path to becoming Israel’s next prime minister moved forward Thursday when controversial nationalist hardliner Avigdor Lieberman endorsed his fellow right-winger for the Jewish state’s top job.
Tzipi Livni and her Kadima party, which won one more seat than Likud in elections last week, was the likely loser after Lieberman revealed to President Shimon Peres that his Yisrael Beiteinu party had decided that it wantedNetanyahu to be prime minister.
The president is now expected to tell Netanyahu early next week that he had six weeks in which to try to form a coalition. Lieberman, who is to the right of Netanyahu on many issues, hedged his bets slightly by stating that he preferred Netanyahu’s government to include Livni and members of her party in what would be a grand coalition of right and centre.
“Netanyahu will be prime minister, but it will be a Bibi-Livni government,” Lieberman told Peres, according to Army Radio, referring to the Likud leader by his nickname as most Israelis do.
There were three possible results of the coalition talks, Lieberman said. They were “a broad government, which is what we want. A narrow government, that will be a government of paralysis, but we don’t rule out sitting in it. The third option is going to elections, which will achieve nothing.”
Livni once again emphatically ruled out Kadima’s participation in a grand coalition unless it was committed to continuing the peace talks with the Palestinian Authority that she has led as foreign minister since November 2007 — something which Netanyahu has opposed, as do religious parties that have volunteered to join a Likud-led government.
“I will not serve as fig leaf for a government of paralysis,” Livni said. “I have no intention of changing even a fraction of Kadima’s path.”
Kadima won 28 seats in the 120 seat Knesset, followed by Likud with 27 seats and Yisrael Beiteinu with 15 seats.
Lieberman’s decision was not a total surprise, but it came much earlier in the coalition-building process than most analysts had expected, possibly saving Israel weeks if not months of political deadlock.
Netanyahu, who was prime minister for three years in the 1990s, had been widely tipped to eventually win the struggle for power because right-wing parties, which would make the most natural allies for Likud, won 65 Knesset seats. Livni had been dealt a weaker hand by voters who abandoned the left for factions from the centre and right. She had been hoping that Netanyahu might be forced to agree to a rotating government, with she and Netanyahu each serving two years as prime minister.
“Bibi needs to get used to talk of a broad government and Tzipi needs to get used to the fact that there can be no rotation, which contains an element of instability and has not proven itself in past instances,” Lieberman said.
One of the reasons Lieberman favoured a broad coalition was that there have been profound differences between Yisrael Beiteinu and several ultra-orthodox religious parties which would have to be part of Netanyahu’s government if Livni and Kadima do not participate.
Lieberman, for example, has been pushing for civil marriages and has said he is willing to discuss the future of Jerusalem with Palestinians — both absolute “no-go” areas for the religious parties.
“This arrangement would open the issue of whether Lieberman will press for civil unions,” said Joshua Teitelbaum of Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Centre for Middle Eastern Studies.
“This will upset the Haredi (religious) parties, but there may be a way to finesse this or perhaps Lieberman will give it up.”
As for the status of the Palestinian peace talks and the emotive issue of Jewish settlements in the West Bank leading to a clash between a narrow Netanyahu-led coalition and U.S. President Barack Obama, Teitelbaum said: “On one hand it looks kind of bad. But Netanyahu says he has changed and that he is open to discussion on anything. What it mostly looks like, though, is that we will see movement on the Syrian track and that will stop the Palestinian thing dead in its tracks.”
But with the global economy in difficulty and Afghanistan at the top of the new U.S. president’s foreign agenda, “there is a lot on his plate,” Teitelbaum said, and the Middle East might not receive that much attention.
Peres was expected to have separate meetings between Netanyahu and Livni today to discuss the ramifications of Lieberman’s preference for Netanyahu.
A decision of who is formally chosen to try to form a government could come as early as Sunday, a spokesman for Peres said.
Hardliner backs Netanyahu in bid to become Israeli PM
Matthew Fisher, Canwest News Service
February 20, 2009
Benjamin Netanyahu’s path to becoming Israel’s next prime minister moved forward Thursday when controversial nationalist hardliner Avigdor Lieberman endorsed his fellow right-winger for the Jewish state’s top job.
Tzipi Livni and her Kadima party, which won one more seat than Likud in elections last week, was the likely loser after Lieberman revealed to President Shimon Peres 
that his Yisrael Beiteinu party had decided that it wantedNetanyahu to be prime minister.
The president is now expected to tell Netanyahu early next week that he has six weeks in which to try to form a coalition. Lieberman, who is to the right of Netanyahu on many issues, hedged his bets slightly by stating that he preferred Netanyahu’s government to include Livni and members of her party in what would be a grand coalition of right and centre.
“Netanyahu will be prime minister, but it will be a Bibi-Livni government,” Lieberman told Peres according to Army Radio, referring to the Likud leader by his nickname as most Israelis do.
There were three possible results of the coalition talks, Lieberman said. They were “a broad government, which is what we want. A narrow government, that will be a government of paralysis, but we don’t rule out sitting in it. The third option is going to elections, which will achieve nothing.”
Livni once again emphatically ruled out Kadima’s participation in a grand coalition unless it was committed to continuing the peace talks with the Palestinian Authority that she has led as foreign minister since November 2007 — something which Netanyahu has opposed, as do religious parties which have volunteered to join a Likud-led government.
“I will not serve as fig leaf for a government of paralysis,” Livni said. “I have no intention of changing even a fraction of Kadima’s path.”
Kadima won 28 seats in the 120 seat Knesset, followed by Likud with 27 seats and Yisrael Beiteinu with 15 seats.
Lieberman’s decision was not a total surprise, but it came much earlier in the coalition-building process than most analysts had expected, possibly saving Israel weeks if not months of political deadlock.
Netanyahu, who was prime minister for three years in the 1990s, had been widely expected to eventually win the struggle for power because right-wing parties, which would make the most natural allies for Likud, won 65 Knesset seats. Livni had been dealt a weaker hand by voters who abandoned the left for factions from the centre and right. She had been hoping that Netanyahu might be forced to agree to a rotating government, with she and Netanyahu each serving two years as prime minister.
“Bibi needs to get used to talk of a broad government and Tzipi needs to get used to the fact that there can be no rotation, which contains an element of instability and has not proven itself in past instances,” Lieberman said.
One of the reasons that Lieberman favoured a broad coalition was that there have been profound differences between Yisrael Beiteinu and several ultra-orthodox religious parties which would have to be part of Netanyahu’s government if Livni and Kadima do not participate.
Lieberman, for example, has been pushing for civil marriages and has said he is willing to discuss the future of Jerusalem with Palestinians — both absolute “no-go” areas for the religious parties.
“This arrangement would open the issue of whether Lieberman will press for civil unions,” said Joshua Teitelbaum of Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Centre for Middle Eastern Studies.
“This will upset the Haredi (religious) parties but there may be a way to finesse this or perhaps Lieberman will give it up.”
As for the status of the Palestinian peace talks and the emotive issue of Jewish settlements in the West Bank leading to a clash between a narrow Netanyahu-led coalition and U.S. President Barack Obama, Teitelbaum said: “On one hand it looks kind of bad. But Netanyahu says he has changed and that he is open to discussion on anything. What it mostly looks like, though, is that we will see movement on the Syrian track and that will stop the Palestinian thing dead in its tracks.”
But with the global economy in difficulty and Afghanistan at the top of the new U.S. president’s foreign agenda, “there is a lot on his plate,” Teitelbaum said, and the Middle East might not receive that much attention.
Peres was expected to have separate meetings between Netanyahu and Livni on Friday to discuss the ramifications of Lieberman’s preference for Netanyahu. A decision of who is formally chosen to try to form a government could come as early as Sunday, a spokesman for Peres said.
Barak urges swift retaliation on terrorists’ homes
Jason Koutsoukis in Jerusalem
September 24, 2008
The Israeli Defence Minister, Ehud Barak, wants the homes of terrorists demolished shortly after they commit an attack as part of a plan to deter further terrorism-related incidents.
His comments were broadcast on Israeli Army Radio yesterday following an attack on Monday in which a 19-year-old Palestinian man drove a car into a crowd of Israeli soldiers at a busy intersection near Jerusalem’s Old City.
At least 17 people were injured in the “car terrorism” attack, the third of its kind since July.
Two soldiers were reported to be in a serious condition, four were moderately hurt and the rest were lightly wounded.
The driver, 19-year-old Qassem al-Mughrabi, a resident of Al Farouk in East Jerusalem, was shot dead by one of the soldiers.
An angry Mr Barak denounced the attack as an act of terrorism and said legal steps should be taken immediately to enable the security establishment to demolish homes of terrorists shortly after an attack. “The demolition of the houses could contribute to deterrence,” he said.
Demolitions of this nature have previously been banned by the Israeli Supreme Court after they were judged to provide negligible deterrent effect.
In July, two Arab residents of East Jerusalem carried out separate attacks with vehicles used in construction work in the city, killing three people and wounding many others.
Both drivers were shot dead.
Jonathan Spyer, an expert on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at the Tel Aviv-based Global Research in International Affairs Project, said such attacks were common in other countries.
“It seems to me to be self-motivated and disorganised but obviously with the same deadly intent as the suicide-bomb type incidents that have characterised terrorism in Israel in the past,” Dr Spyer told the Herald.
He said Israel needed “better intelligence from Palestinian sources identifying what exactly is motivating the attacks, and then better law enforcement to stop such acts before they are carried out”.
The attacker in Monday’s incident was driving a car with ordinary yellow Israeli number plates, highlighting how difficult it is to prevent attacks of this nature. Israeli Jews and Arabs are able to move freely between West and East Jerusalem.
An 800-kilometre security barrier enclosing the Palestinian West Bank – ordered by the then prime minister, Ariel Sharon, in 2004 – is credited with ending the wave of suicide bomb attacks in Jerusalem and other Israeli cities.
Joshua Teitelbaum, a senior research fellow at the Moshe Dayan Centre for Middle Eastern and African Studies, advocated similar restrictions on movement between East and West Jerusalem.
“That’s the stick. The carrot is that Israel has to start investing in infrastructure in East Jerusalem. It’s clearly a disadvantaged area and it has suffered because successive Israeli and municipal government authorities have refused to put the resources into East Jerusalem that has been invested in other parts of the city.”
