Ban's challenges

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255947

Encouraging Israelis and Palestinians to “re-engage” in order to move the peace process forward is one of the professed goals of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as he visits the region this week.

But since low-level talks began between the sides in Amman last month, a number of major obstacles have resurfaced, threatening to turn yet another round of peace talks into a dead-end. If he is to succeed in his mission, it is important for the UN chief to understand that despite two decades of negotiations, huge gaps still need to be bridged.

The concept of settlement blocs is a good example. For Israelis, for US administrations at least since the Clinton era, and for several European countries, including Germany and France, the notion that Israel must retreat to the 1949 Armistice lines and that Judea and Samaria – the cradle of Jewish history – must be made free of Israelis – is an unacceptable proposition.

The 2000 Clinton parameters, former US president George W. Bush’s 2004 letter (endorsed in both houses of Congress), and negotiations conducted by then-prime minister Ehud Olmert in 2008 were all based on the principle that Israel would retain major settlement blocs in any future two-state solution.

A wide range of Israeli politicians, from Yossi Sarid and Yossi Beilin on the Left to Ariel Sharon and Olmert in the center, have said in the past that blocs such as Ma’aleh Adumim would be part of Israel in any future agreement.

For Palestinians, however, settlement blocs are by no means a “given.” This was apparent from documents leaked to Al Jazeera in January of last year that came to be known as “Palileaks.” These documents revealed the content of negotiations that went on in 2008 between high-ranking Israeli and Palestinian Authority officials. They make clear that the concept of Israel’s retaining settlement blocs – which even appeared in the Geneva Accords – was rejected outright by the Palestinians – although they were willing to recognize some Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem.

Last week, Palestinians reiterated their stance against settlement blocs. One Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The New York Times that Israel’s demand to keep settlement blocs “effectively abandons international law and the framework we have been focused on for the past 20 years.”

Ban should also understand the centrality of security arrangements. In the wake of the Arab Spring, Israel is concerned more than ever that a Palestinian state on the West Bank could be taken over by Hamas, which is affiliated with the resurgent Muslim Brotherhood. This would be similar to what happened in Gaza after Israel, in a painful move to end its “occupation,” unilaterally withdrew its forces there, removed all settlers and dismantled all its settlements.

A strong IDF presence in the Jordan Valley and the demilitarization of the future Palestinian state are essential, from an Israeli perspective. Unfortunately, PA President Mahmoud Abbas has said repeatedly he would not let any Israeli soldier remain in a future Palestinian state, though he has not ruled out an international peacekeeping force.

However, international peacekeeping forces are notoriously ineffectual and unreliable. UNIFIL’s failure to stop the rearmament of the Hezbollah after the 2006 Second Lebanon War in accordance with UN Resolution 1701 is just one example.

Another obstacle to peace that Ban should confront is the PA’s unabashed glorification of villainous terrorists who murder innocent Israeli civilians.

The most recent – and shocking – example, as reported by Palestinian Media Watch, was a show on PA television that praised as “heroes” the murderers of Udi and Ruth Fogel and three of their children – 11-year-old Yoav, four-year-old Elad, and Hadas, a four-month-old baby. And just a few weeks ago, Mohammed Hussein, the PA’s mufti in Jerusalem, publicly quoted an Islamic text calling for the murder of Jews.

Meanwhile, Fatah is in the process of forming a unity government with Hamas, an anti-Semitic terrorist group that calls for the destruction of Israel.

Ban faces many challenges in launching his bid to “reengage” Israelis and Palestinians – and we did not even mention the dispute over the Palestinian refugee problem.While we welcome the UN chief and his efforts and wish him luck, we cannot help but be pessimistic when considering his prospects for success.

Ban's challenges

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255947

Encouraging Israelis and Palestinians to “re-engage” in order to move the peace process forward is one of the professed goals of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as he visits the region this week.

But since low-level talks began between the sides in Amman last month, a number of major obstacles have resurfaced, threatening to turn yet another round of peace talks into a dead-end. If he is to succeed in his mission, it is important for the UN chief to understand that despite two decades of negotiations, huge gaps still need to be bridged.

The concept of settlement blocs is a good example. For Israelis, for US administrations at least since the Clinton era, and for several European countries, including Germany and France, the notion that Israel must retreat to the 1949 Armistice lines and that Judea and Samaria – the cradle of Jewish history – must be made free of Israelis – is an unacceptable proposition.

The 2000 Clinton parameters, former US president George W. Bush’s 2004 letter (endorsed in both houses of Congress), and negotiations conducted by then-prime minister Ehud Olmert in 2008 were all based on the principle that Israel would retain major settlement blocs in any future two-state solution.

A wide range of Israeli politicians, from Yossi Sarid and Yossi Beilin on the Left to Ariel Sharon and Olmert in the center, have said in the past that blocs such as Ma’aleh Adumim would be part of Israel in any future agreement.

For Palestinians, however, settlement blocs are by no means a “given.” This was apparent from documents leaked to Al Jazeera in January of last year that came to be known as “Palileaks.” These documents revealed the content of negotiations that went on in 2008 between high-ranking Israeli and Palestinian Authority officials. They make clear that the concept of Israel’s retaining settlement blocs – which even appeared in the Geneva Accords – was rejected outright by the Palestinians – although they were willing to recognize some Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem.

Last week, Palestinians reiterated their stance againstsettlement blocs. One Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The New York Times that Israel’s demand to keep settlement blocs “effectively abandons international law and the framework we have been focused on for the past 20 years.”

Ban should also understand the centrality of security arrangements. In the wake of the Arab Spring, Israel is concerned more than ever that a Palestinian state on the West Bank could be taken over by Hamas, which is affiliated with the resurgent Muslim Brotherhood. This would be similar to what happened in Gaza after Israel, in a painful move to end its “occupation,” unilaterally withdrew its forces there, removed all settlers and dismantled all its settlements.

A strong IDF presence in the Jordan Valley and the demilitarization of the future Palestinian state are essential, from an Israeli perspective. Unfortunately, PA President Mahmoud Abbas has said repeatedly he would not let any Israeli soldier remain in a future Palestinian state, though he has not ruled out an international peacekeeping force.

However, international peacekeeping forces are notoriously ineffectual and unreliable. UNIFIL’s failure to stop the rearmament of the Hezbollah after the 2006 Second Lebanon War in accordance with UN Resolution 1701 is just one example.

Another obstacle to peace that Ban should confront is the PA’s unabashed glorification of villainous terrorists who murder innocent Israeli civilians.

The most recent – and shocking – example, as reported by Palestinian Media Watch, was a show on PA television that praised as “heroes” the murderers of Udi and Ruth Fogel and three of their children – 11-year-old Yoav, four-year-old Elad, and Hadas, a four-month-old baby. And just a few weeks ago, Mohammed Hussein, the PA’s mufti in Jerusalem, publicly quoted an Islamic text calling for the murder of Jews.

Meanwhile, Fatah is in the process of forming a unity government with Hamas, an anti-Semitic terrorist group that calls for the destruction of Israel.

Ban faces many challenges in launching his bid to “reengage” Israelis and Palestinians – and we did not even mention the dispute over the Palestinian refugee problem.While we welcome the UN chief and his efforts and wish him luck, we cannot help but be pessimistic when considering his prospects for success.

Debunking the 'Israel-firster' slur

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255804

Finally, after nearly two months of bickering, controversy surrounding the use by some on the American Left of the term “Israel-firster” to describe American Jews with a hawkish, pro-Israel orientation seems to have finally settled down. In the process, some important distinctions have been made and lines drawn.

Significantly, some on the Left have stood up and acknowledged the anti-Semitic roots of the slur, which apparently originated with Holocaust deniers on the extreme Right in the 1970s and was co-opted in the past decade by radical leftist, anti-Israel bodies such as Antiwar.com, Indymedia and Norman Finkelstein’s website.

Zaid Jilani, a blogger for the Center for American Progress (CAP), which is affiliated with the Democratic Party, erased the slur from his blogs and tweets after learning of its checkered past. J Street’s Jeremy Ben-Ami, who originally defended use of the term, later admitted that “Israel-firster” was a “bad choice of words.” (Unfortunately, Media Matters for America’s senior foreign policy fellow M.J. Rosenberg remains uncontrite and continues to use the term.)

On the Jewish website Tablet, left-wing journalist Spencer Ackerman, who said he has criticized the American Jewish Right’s “myopic, destructive, tribal conception of what it means to love Israel,” nevertheless admits that by using the term “Israel-firster” one loses the debate by revealing one’s “antipathy and contempt for Jews.”

More profoundly, Ackerman pointed out that many on the Left who are fond of the “Israel-firster” smear and categorically deny its anti-Semitic undertone are “very good at hearing and analyzing dog-whistles when they’re used to dehumanize Arabs and Muslims.”

Besides the distastefulness of using a term with anti- Semitic roots, naming someone an “Israel-firster” is highly problematic because it tends to completely and utterly delegitimize by issuing a nonnegotiable verdict. Thus, free debate is shut down instead of encouraged. Jews are not the only ones in US history who have been vilified for purported “dual loyalties.”

President Theodore Roosevelt denounced the “hyphenated Americanism” of German-Americans during World War I. And during World War II, president Franklin Roosevelt authorized the internment of about 110,000 Japanese-Americans. Both instances are stains on America’s history.

Also, “Israel-firster” is, as The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg has pointed out, an inaccurate term because it “precludes the possibility that the person who supports Israel is doing so precisely because he or she feels that it is in America’s best interest to support Israel.”

Indeed, there are non-Zionist reasons to support Israel, such as the fact that the Jewish state is the only true democracy in the Middle East that protects the rights of minorities, women and homosexuals; or the fact that Israel’s strong military helps protect US interests in the region. But there are also Zionist reasons to support Israel, such as the belief that the Jewish people have the right to political self-determination and sovereignty in their historical homeland; or that the Holocaust has proved that the Jewish people are in need of a country and a military of their own.

Neither Zionist nor non-Zionist arguments in favor of maintaining a strong Israel inherently contradicts American interests. In fact it is difficult to fathom a day in the future when it would no longer be possible to reconcile American and Israeli interests. But if such a day were to come, either Israel or America will have undergone a radical change for the worst.

The controversy surrounding the use of the “Israel-firster” slur has seemingly increased appreciation in America for the need to debate positions on US policy vis-à-vis Israel in an environment untainted by intimidation. Issues such as Israel’s settlement policies in Judea and Samaria must be conducted in a free and open manner regardless of where one is positioned on the political map. Claiming that the building of settlements is opposed to either US or Israel interests or both is legitimate. But those who believe differently should not be silenced with the accusation that they are putting Israel’s interests before America’s. Better to let rational argument and a free exchange of opinions determine American policy.

The Attias plan

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255356

Haredi-bashing has become a widespread phenomenon.

But while some of the criticism directed at the ultra-Orthodox community may be understandable (non-participation in the labor market and the refusal to serve in the IDF or any other National Service framework), the wholesale attack on Construction and Housing Minister Ariel Attias (Shas) was undeserved.

Even before he presented his program for affordable housing, copies were leaked to the press and the haredi minister was summarily lambasted for giving preferential treatment to his own constituency. However, a close look at Attias’s proposals reveals a mixed bag.

True, Attias decided to deviate from the Trajtenberg Committee’s recommendations. One of these recommendations was to place employment or active pursuit of employment at the center of the affordable housing plan. The Trajtenberg Committee recommended that “fully exploiting earning capacity” (which means that together a couple must put in 125 percent of a work week or be actively looking for work) be a condition for receiving rent-controlled apartments.

Under the “lowest price for the homebuyer” program, which pushes housing prices down by awarding projects to building contractors who commit to building at the lowest cost, those who work or who are actively looking for employment should at the very least receive preferential treatment, according to the Trajtenberg recommendations.

Critics claim Attias ignored Trajtenberg in order to benefit the haredim, many of whom are unemployed by choice so as to devote their waking hours to Torah study instead of productive employment. Still, Attias should at least be given the benefit of the doubt when he says that National Insurance Institute representatives called to leave out employment as a criterion for being eligible for affordable housing out of a desire to help the most destitute populations – the haredim and the Arabs – in which the level of participation in the labor market is the lowest (Arab women are often discouraged from leaving the house to work for cultural and religious reasons).

We believe it makes sense to overrule Attias not because he wants to benefit haredim, but because by adopting the Trajtenberg recommendations the plan would remain true to its stated goal of providing affordable housing for the middle class. Other programs such as public housing projects and subsidized mortgages target the poor. At any rate, while finding a job is not based solely on “luck” as Attias claimed Wednesday, we should, nevertheless, be sensitive to claims by various minority groups (haredim, Ethiopian- Israelis, Arabs) that they face discrimination when looking for work. The zeal to attack Attias for benefiting haredim should not eclipse this ability to be sensitive to real discrimination in our society.

Another criticism leveled at Attias is his decision to give preferential treatment to couples who have been married longer. Haredi-bashers claim this discriminates against secular couples, who tend to marry later.

But if Attias is to be believed when he says that on average couples do not get around to buying a home until they have been married for seven years, and since no special preference is given to couples married more than eight years, it seems clear that there will be little discrimination against secular Israelis.

The readiness to attack Attias for partiality has also prevented many from looking at the positive elements of his plan. He adopted a measure that would give preferential treatment to the handicapped. Also, half of about 5,000 apartments that will be made available at a discount under the affordable housing program will be reserved for families in which at least one of the heads – husband or wife – served in the IDF or performed national service. In the past, such a move would have been perceived by some as discrimination against Arabs, who are not obligated to serve in the IDF. But since national service is open to all, this claim can no longer be made.

In short, it is difficult to argue conclusively that Attias’s affordable housing plan discriminates in favor of haredim. Looking closer at the content of his proposal in a serious way leads to the conclusion that the knee-jerk criticism against him may have guided by prejudice against his constituency.

The Florida vote

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255654

Ahead of Tuesday’s primary election in Florida, GOP presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney seemed to be trying to outdo each other over their unequivocal support for Israel.

During Thursday night’s CNN debate, both candidates blamed the Palestinians for being obstacles to peace. Romney said that Israel would be happy to have a two-state solution, “it’s the Palestinians who don’t want a two-state solution. They want to eliminate the State of Israel.”

Gingrich, who reiterated his “invented people” assertion, said that the Palestinians would be entitled to self-government only after they: 1) Recognize Israel’s right to exist; 2) Abandon a right of return to what is now Israel for Palestinian refugees; and 3) Abandon hate speech against Jews.

Gingrich also vowed that he would relocate the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, our capital.

Indeed, many of the same positions on the Israeli- Palestinian conflict are shared by all the Republican candidates, with the exception of Ron Paul, whose positions on Israel are at best controversial and who has vowed to cut off all US foreign aid, including to Israel.

The Republican candidates’ outspoken support for Israel is at least in part due to a perception that Americans – particularly American Jews – are dissatisfied with the Obama administration’s policies toward the Jewish state. Emphasizing their support for Israel is, they believe, a way of wooing voters away from support for Obama.

Indeed, in the American Jewish Committee’s annual survey of American Jewish opinion, which was conducted in September, 53 percent of respondents disapproved of the Obama administration’s handling of US-Israel relations while just 40% approved.

However, Republican candidates’ pro-Israel messages – which are sometimes more hawkish than those of some Zionist American Jews – are more likely directed at Evangelical Christians. After all, Florida’s primary is open only to registered Republican Party members, while most of Florida’s Jews – who make up 3.4% of the population – are registered Democrats. Evangelical Christians are undoubtedly a bigger chunk of the Republican electorate in the Sunshine State than the Jews. Exit polls from the 2008 GOP primary show that 39% of voters identified themselves as born-again or Evangelical Christians.

Many of them are no less dissatisfied with Washington’s policies vis-à-vis Israel. In a Gallup poll conducted in May 2011, 39% of white Evangelicals said that Obama’s foreign policies favored the Palestinians too much, compared to 33% who said they struck the right balance.

Nor is it clear that Israel is a determining factor for the Jewish vote. In the above-mentioned AJC survey, Obama easily won a strong majority of the Jewish vote against various Republican candidates, including Romney. And AJC surveys in the past four years have shown that Israel has consistently ranked no more than fifth on American Jewish voters’ priority list. Ranking higher are domestic matters.

In Florida, where much of the Jewish population is elderly, issues such as healthcare rank high. And assuming elderly Jews are concerned for the wellbeing of the next generation, unemployment, house prices and other economic issues will figure prominently as well. In Florida in particular, where there is a large Latino population, immigration and the naturalization of undocumented workers will undoubtedly play a major factor.

(Romney is expected to be hurt in Florida by his publicized opposition to the DREAM Act – supported by 90% of Hispanic voters – which would legalize immigrants who came as children and then enrolled in college or the military.) The pro-Israel rhetoric we are witnessing in the run-up to the Florida primary seems to be directed principally at the Evangelical vote. And even when serious courting of the Jewish vote in Florida commences as the general election approaches, it is not at all clear that talking strong on Israel will be the best way to win hearts.

Pressuring Iran

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=255018

The Islamic Republic is paying an increasingly high price for its stubborn insistence on developing nuclear weapons. By July 1, the European Union will phase out its oil purchases from Iran, which make up about of fifth of Iran’s total oil exports. Italy alone accounts for 10 percent of Iran’s oil exports, according to 2010 data provided by the US Energy Information Administration.

The impact of the EU decision – which includes a freeze on the assets of the Iranian central bank within the EU – was almost immediate: The Iranian currency, the rial, fell to record lows in black market trading against the dollar and there has been a surge in the prices paid by Iranians for basic goods.

Even before the new set of sanctions, Iran was hurting. In December, Deputy Oil Minister Ahmad Qalebani was quoted by the Iranian Students News Agency as saying the country’s crude oil production in 2011 had declined from the year before, “due to lack of investment in oil field development.”

Iran produced about 4 million barrels a day of oil in 2010 and is producing about 3.5 million barrels this year. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi was quoted by the official Islamic Republic News Agency as saying, “We cannot pretend the sanctions are not having an effect,” and the governor of Iran’s central bank, Mahmoud Bahmani, told reporters in Iran last week that the country must act as if it were “under siege.”

Obviously, Israel has a vested interest in seeing Iran’s mullahs prevented from achieving nuclear capability. But nonproliferation in the region is not solely or even principally an Israeli interest.

The EU and the US – led by policy-makers who cannot be suspected of holding neoconservative notions – have adopted equally stringent sanctions against Iran. This reflects the consensus that Tehran’s intentions with regard to its nuclear program are not, as it claims, peaceful.

Recent comments by Yukiya Amano, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, point clearly to Iran’s intention to develop weapons of mass destruction. Researchers from the Center for American Progress and Media Matters, two institutions affiliated with the Democratic Party, who have tried to make the case that Iran’s belligerence and its level of nuclear sophistication are overstated in a pre-Iraq invasion-like way, have thankfully failed to make inroads among Congress members.

The Europeans, perhaps even more than the Americans, are directly threatened by a nuclear-capable Iran with missiles that can reach European cities. Even China’s Premier Wen Jiabao, who during a recent trip to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, defended his country’s oil trade with Iran, nevertheless noted his country’s opposition to Iran achieving nuclear weapons. Without a bomb, Iran’s threat to close the Strait of Hormuz rattled the Chinese. They do not want to imagine such a threat issued by an Islamic Republic with nuclear warheads.

Without nuclear weapons, Tehran’s ability to bully Gulf state neighbors is limited. Despite Iranian threats, Saudi Arabia has said it has enough oil output capacity to meet global customers’ needs, House of Representatives Majority Leader Eric Cantor said after several days of meetings in the Middle East, including in Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are, apparently, willing to make up for banned Iranian oil in order to meet European and American needs, thus minimizing the inevitable rise in oil prices expected to follow from the sanctions.

As Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu noted, the latest round of sanctions are indeed a “step in the right direction,” making it increasingly expensive for Iran to continue with its nuclear program. Coupled with continued covert operations such as the assassination of nuclear scientists and cyber war attacks such as the Stuxnet, we hope that these sanctions will make a full-blown military attack on Iran unnecessary.

Relations with China

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=254858
Twenty years ago today, China and the Jewish state established official diplomatic relations. But long before January 1992, there was extensive, albeit secretive, cooperation. The Chinese were allured by Israeli military prowess and by “Jewish genius” exhibited in men such as Karl Marx and Albert Einstein. Sun Yat-sen – one of the founding fathers of the Chinese national movement who died in 1925 – was said to be empathetic to the Zionist movement. In the 1950s China produced a stamp with a picture of the Yiddish writer Sholem Aleichem.

Until Mao’s death in 1976, China’s foreign policy was driven by Communist ideology and the championing of “oppressed peoples” and “victims of imperialism” which included the Arab nations. But starting in 1979, China began conducting major arms deals with Israel, who was represented by businessman Shaul Eisenberg.

In 1999, The New York Times noted that “Israel has long had a close, secretive military relationship with China.”

The end of the Cold War and the disintegration of the Soviet Union’s influence among Muslim states in the region helped facilitate China’s embrace of a pragmatic, flexible diplomatic strategy in the Middle East driven primarily by the supreme economic interest of maintaining political stability.

During the first decade of relations with Israel, the Chinese were guided to a certain extent by the mistaken notion – held, ironically, to this day by critics of Israel such as John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt – that Jewish and Israeli lobbies had inordinate sway over decisionmaking in Washington.

This misconception was soon dashed after the US, contrary to Israeli interests, put pressure on Jerusalem to cancel a number of highly lucrative military deals with China.

In October 1999, US president Bill Clinton formally opposed the sale to China of Phalcon airborne early-warning and surveillance systems worth $1 billion. In December 2004, the Bush administration objected to the Israeli government’s decision to repair and upgrade the Harpy unmanned aerial vehicle that Israel had sold to China in the 1990s.

During the Cold War, Washington did not oppose Israeli arms deals with China because Beijing was needed as a counterweight to Moscow. But after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it began to see China as a threat to its strategic interests in the Asia-Pacific region. US opposition has essentially put an end to all significant military trade with China.

One of the main challenges facing Israel, therefore, is developing non-military trade with China, which will soon become the world’s largest economy, even if it grows at just half of the present rate of 8.7 percent annually. Bilateral trade, which in 1992 was worth $60 million, is now worth about $8b. a year, one-third of which is Israeli exports to China.

More than 1,000 Israeli companies operate in China and there is cooperation in the fields of industrial R&D, water, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. A consulate was opened in the southern city of Guangzhou, and another is planned for Chengdu, in the underdeveloped western province of Sichuan. Both locations offer unique opportunities in parts of China with untapped economic potential.

A Chinese firm built the Carmel tunnels, ChemChina acquired a controlling stake in Makhteshim Agan Industries and Chinese chemical companies have opened R&D facilities here.

Unfortunately, one area in which China’s interests are at odds not only with the US’s but also with Israel’s involves Iran’s nuclear program. But according to Prof. Yitzhak Shichor of University of Haifa’s Department of Asia Studies, China’s ties with Iran must not be misconstrued as expressing Beijing’s identification with Iranian belligerence. Rather, it is a tactical move against US influence in the region.

According to Shichor, there is nothing that China wants more than quiet and stability so that its economy can continue to grow unheeded. Iran’s threat to block the Hormuz Straits is seen by China as extremely counterproductive. Chinese foreign policy in the region has troubling elements. Beijing maintains strong trade relations with Iran while conveniently ignoring the threat posed by an Islamic Republic with nuclear capability.

But China is an economic powerhouse that Israel simply cannot afford to ignore. Hopefully, the Iranian crisis will be resolved peacefully so that mutually beneficial economic interests shared by Jerusalem and Beijing can be pursued against the backdrop of a stable, safe Middle East.

Off the tracks

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=254698



A collective state of hysteria has taken hold of our nation. An eminently reasonable – and temporary – solution to the ongoing problem of overcrowding on our railways on Sunday mornings has been transformed beyond recognition into a horrible injustice perpetrated against our poor soldiers.

And the news media have been stoking the populist flames.

On Saturday night, Yediot Aharonot’s editors chose the headline, “Nightmare Sunday,” to describe what they could not know would transpire the next morning.

Radio stations devoted huge swathes of air-time in the morning to disgruntled soldiers and their outspoken and assertive parents. One father lamented that only “soldiers and dogs” were kept off the trains. A mother vowed that she would not condone the travesty of her poor soldier son being jostled by bus across the nation.

Encountering the discourse without knowing the facts, one could easily arrive at the mistaken conclusion that our soldiers were the victims of some unconscionable transportation offense.

In reality, something else altogether happened.

One day a week, between the hours of 6 a.m. and 9 a.m., about 10,000 able-bodied conscripts aged 18 to 21 – many of whom are combat soldiers used to crawling in the mud, sleeping outdoors, running long distances with heavy backpacks, and generally “roughing it” – will not be granted free access to trains.

Instead, a fleet of 300 air-conditioned buses has been placed at their service, free of charge, to transport these soldiers to their bases.

The idea is to alleviate chronic overcrowding during rush hour. On Sunday mornings, occupancy levels regularly reach 200 percent, according to Israel Railways Director-General Boaz Tzafrir.

Not all the lines have been affected – only the most crowded ones that carry residents from the north to Tel Aviv, or from Tel Aviv to certain destinations in the north. And not all soldiers will be affected – reservists will continue to travel on the train free of charge.



overcrowding caused by the thousands of soldiers returning to their military bases after the Shabbat. Duffel bags strewn underfoot, M-16s poking into rib-cages and sleeping soldiers sprawled out on the few available seats will all hopefully become less prominent features of commuting by train on Sunday mornings.

While a few hundred soldiers chose to pay full price and take the train anyway, thousands more opted to use the free buses. As a result, occupancy was “only” 140%, and trains ran on time in 84% of the cases, compared to less than half of time on a regular Sunday.

True, many soldiers arrived late to their bases due primarily to road traffic. But IDF commanders were ordered in advance to excuse soldiers’ tardiness.

The solution, in short, was utterly reasonable. But if so, how are we to explain the public outcry, further amplified by the news media? Perhaps part of the answer lies in perceptions.

Soldiers who spoke with The Jerusalem Post’s Ben Hartman expressed a fundamental lack of trust in the IDF. They were skeptical about whether the IDF would truly stand behind its promise not to punish soldiers who arrived late due to the transportation changes.

Also, many of our young citizens who are drafted into the military, and the parents that send them, seem to be fed up. The number of IDF conscripts as a percentage of the total population is gradually shrinking.

Unless present trends change, within a decade or two, less than half of males eligible for military service will actually serve. Already, the idea that military service is the obligation of every 18 year old is no longer a given.

Those who do serve expect appreciation. For some, having their free train passage rights taken away – even for three hours a week – is perceived as a slap in the face.

The solution offered to alleviate overcrowding on our trains was a rational one, while the disproportional reactions seemed less so.

But it would be a mistake to ignore the root causes of the widespread discontent revealed on Sunday.

Halting discrimination

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=254399 

In the six decades since its founding, the State of Israel has prided itself on the successful integration of diverse populations from around the globe. The nearly insurmountable endeavor of bringing together immigrants from such radically different cultural backgrounds was given direction and purpose by the knowledge that all were members of a single Jewish people bound by a shared fate.

The “ingathering of the exiles” foreseen by the prophets seemed to be unfolding after nearly two millennia of yearning.

But recent revelations of racial discrimination faced by the Ethiopian-Israeli community continue to remind us that the national challenge of absorption and integration has yet to be completed.

These include a grassroots initiative by residents of a Kiryat Malachi neighborhood to keep out Ethiopian olim they referred to as “cockroaches”; a bus driver in Mevaseret Zion telling Ethiopian schoolchildren that they smell bad; racial segregation ofkindergartens in Beit Shemesh; and a decision by the Israel Broadcasting Authority not to renew the contract of an Ethiopian-born executive.

Even a murder and suicide in Rishon Lezion in which an Ethiopian immigrant stabbed his wife to death and then took his own life were reported in the media against the backdrop of the Ethiopian community’s difficulties in making the transition from life in a patriarchal, traditional, Third World society to a highly developed Jewish state striving for gender equality.




It would be unfair to claim that Israel and Diaspora Jewry have ignored the plight of the Ethiopian community, which now numbers about 120,000. Organizations such as the Jewish Federations of North America, the Jewish Agency, the American Jewish JointDistribution Committee and Keren Hayesod-UIA in conjunction with the State of Israel have invested hundreds of millions of dollars over the past decade or so in initiatives such as the Ethiopian National Project, Parents and Children Together (PACT) and a five-year interministerial plan launched in 2008 to improve Ethiopian-Israelis’ academic achievement, job training and socioeconomic conditions.

In 2005, the Knesset passed an amendment to the Civil Service Law that obligates government offices to hire Ethiopians in accordance with their representation in the general population (1.5 percent). In March 2011, the law was expanded to include state-owned companies and municipalities. However, while there appears to be a lot of goodwill on the part of Diaspora Jewry and consecutive governments, implementation on the ground has been lacking, according to Efrat Yarday, spokeswoman for Israel Association for Ethiopian Jews.

Most problematic, says Yarday, is a counter-productive government policy of providing generous housing grants to Ethiopians on condition apartments are purchased in designated neighborhoods.

As a result, Ethiopian ghettos have been created in cities such as Netanya, Rehovot, Beersheba, Ashkelon, Hadera and Ashdod. There are 23 neighborhoods in which Ethiopians make up at least 25% of the population, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics.

Schools in which Ethiopians make up a significant minority if not the majority, well beyond the recommended limit of 25% of the student body, tend to perpetuate a cycle of poverty (over half of all Ethiopian- Israelis live under the poverty line) and low academic achievement.

In 2008, just 21% of Ethiopians finished high-school matriculation at a university-entry level compared to a national average of 48%. Ethiopian children are twice as likely to be referred to special education and to drop out.

Though 91% of 18-year-old Ethiopian males born in Israel enlisted in the IDF in 2009 – significantly higher than the national average of 75% – they arrived with educational, cultural and socioeconomic deficits that prevented them from becoming officers or joining the most elite units. And a significantly higher than average proportion end up in military prison – many for going AWOL to help support their families.

Ethiopians are less likely to finish an academic degree or to find a job and are more likely to be on welfare and commit suicide (48 per 100,000 compared to a national average of seven per 100,000). It is abundantly clear that the endeavor of fully integrating Ethiopians is a work in process. Combating the debilitating effects of Ethiopian ghettos is the first order of business.

After Tal

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=254065 

The Tal Law failed to achieve its goal. In April 2000, when a committee headed by former judge Zvi Tal presented recommendations to the Knesset to help more haredim (ultra-Orthodox) make the transition from the study hall to the job market without forgoing mandatory national or military service, a total of 31,000 yeshiva students between the ages 18 and 41 received deferrals from the IDF.

Today, 10 years after the Tal Committee’s recommendations became a law conditional upon renewal by the Knesset every five years, that number is more than 60,000. And the haredi population is growing at a breathtaking rate.

Already, 13 percent of 18-year-olds defer military service to pursue Torah studies. Another 12% dodge the draft due to psychological or physical incompatibility, because they are not in the country or, in a fraction of cases, due to conscientious objection tomilitary service. However, while non-haredi draft-dodging has remained more or less steady, the number of military-age young men requesting deferrals to study Torah has been growing steadily.

Part of it is the result of the high rate of natural growth among haredim, and part of it is the result of a “haredization” process among national religious youths. Unless the situation changes, within a decade or two half of all 18-year-old boys will opt out of mandatory military service – completely undermining in the process the Zionist ideal of “the people’s army,” which advocates mandatory military service for all.

Nevertheless, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will ask the cabinet to renew the Tal Law for an additional five years. The prime minister argued that while the total number of haredim being drafted into the IDF or National Service was still low compared to the multitudes choosing to devote their time to Torah study, there were signs that the trend was slowly changing.

According to Netanyahu, 1,282 haredim were drafted in 2011, a 40% rise from last year. Another 1,118 opted for National Service (sherut leumi). And according to its director-general, 1,800 haredim have volunteered this year for National Service.





Indeed, more haredim have been integrated into the IDF thanks to special programstailored to the needs of the community. The old “melting pot” ethos, which aimed to resocialize young soldiers, has been replaced with a softer, multicultural approach.

Greater gender equality, soldiers swearing an oath of loyalty on the New Testament, and the ascendancy of “peripheral” groups to top ranks once dominated by kibbutzniks are all signs of this change. The IDF has also taken major steps to reach out to haredi soldiers. Via frameworks such as Nahal Haredi or Shahar – strictly gender- segregated environments that provide regular Torah classes, access to spiritual guidance and glatt-kosher food – the IDF has gone out of its way to accommodate haredi requirements. A parallel process has taken place in National Service, which allows haredi young men to serve one or two years within their communities.

Still, it would be unwise to renew the Tal Law for an additional five years. Doing so is liable to lead to complacency.

Instead, Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s recommendation of extending the law for just one year and reevaluating the situation makes more sense. Doing away with the Tal Law altogether, abolishing deferrals and forcing young haredi men to join the IDF under threat of fine or imprisonment would only strengthen the most extreme elements in the haredi community who are fundamentally opposed to any form of military or national service.

Instead, the state must find ways to maintain gentle but insistent pressure on haredi young men to share with their non-haredi brethren in the collective endeavor to defend the Jewish state. Providing economic incentives to those who do serve, creating additional frameworks within the IDF and National Service that include the haredi population, and allowing evolutionary changes within this population to proceed unhindered are the best methods of facilitating integration.

It is disconcerting to imagine that due to haredi natural growth, within a decade or two, half of all 18-year-old boys will opt out of mandatory military service. But it is possible to imagine something else – that in another decade or two, the haredi population will have changed dramatically, and significantly larger numbers will be sharing in the collective burdens of the Jewish nation. Coercion will not expedite this inevitable change; it will only delay it.

The price of popularity

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=253913


People do not like to pay taxes. Relieving them of this burdensome obligation is, therefore, an easy way to their hearts.

Politicians understand this. Around election time they tend to remind constituents of the favor bestowed upon them.

Judging from last summer’s socioeconomic demonstrations, which placed our unreasonably high cost of living at the center of public scrutiny, citizens’ sensitivity to high taxes has never been higher. This might explain Interior Minister Eli Yishai’s decision at the end of December to accept recommendations by the Kehat Commission and provide discounts and exemptions on municipal taxes to students, reserve soldiers, the handicapped, institutions and families with children under the age of five.

Unfortunately, local authorities – some of which have been in a state of near insolvency for over a decade – will foot the bill. These latest discounts and exemptions come after previous interior ministers, who like Yishai grasped the connection between tax cutsand popularity, put in place discounts and exemptions of their own amounting to NIS 2 billion, or 7.5 percent of local authorities’ revenues from property tax, or arnona.

According to Shlomo Bohbut, chairman of the Union of Local Authorities, Yishai’s new cuts will reduce revenues by another NIS 1b.

Not surprisingly, local authorities’ garbage collectors, preschool teachers’ assistants, traffic police and other employees have called a strike rightly fearing that Yishai’s generosity will come at the expense of their monthly paycheck. (There have been periods in the recent past when some local authority employees have gone unpaid for months). And even the strongest local authorities – such as Tel Aviv and Ra’anana – or settlements in Judea and Samaria – such as Beit El that are poor but have a strong ethic of paying taxes – are joining forces with Arab and haredi local authorities, which are the poorest because in many cases only a fraction of residents, who already receive exemptions of up to 90%, do not pay.

The reason for the across-the-board opposition, according to Prof. Eran Razin, of the Hebrew University’s Department of Geography, an expert in the workings of the local authorities, is that the latest exemptions and cuts in arnona taxes are simply unreasonable. For instance, one proposal would make it exceedingly easier for anynonprofit organization that advances a religious, cultural, scientific, health or welfare cause to receive a 66% discount in property tax. Critically, this discount would apply going back three years. Nowhere is it explained precisely where the local authorities willfind the money to provide this retroactive discount.

Another proposal, suggested by the Justice Ministry, would clamp severe limitations on donations made by private individuals to the municipalities, to prevent corruption.

If municipalities were receiving enough money from the state, a coherent argument could be made in favor of more stringent monitoring of donations. However, with the state cutting to a minimum its transfers to local government, municipalities have no choice but to pursue other sources of revenue such as donations. And while there is a danger that municipalities that receive large donations would give the donors preferential treatment, at least the proceeds from such arrangements benefit the wider public and are not pocketed by individuals.

Local authorities are being stifled by other Interior Ministry reforms, such as a move aimed at alleviating the housing crisis. Known as the “house dividing law,” this building ordinance would allow existing apartments to be split into smaller flats and rented or sold individually.

However, the increased population density would lead to adverse side effects such as the overcrowding of schools, parks and other public and municipal services originally planned for smaller populations. And a recent Supreme Court decision will make it harder for mayors to sign deals with business developers, further dampening potentialproperty tax revenue and local economic activities.

Aware of voters’ aversion to taxes, Yishai has decided to boost his popularity by makingproperty tax cuts worth millions of shekels. Unfortunately, local authorities will be the ones forced to foot the bill for these populist measures.

It is perfectly honorable for Yishai to want to help students, reserve soldiers, the handicapped and families with children under the age of five. But the state, not embattled local governments, should pay the price.

Stopping Iran's nukes

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=253763



Iran seems intent on pushing forward with its nuclear program and there is no surefire way of stopping it. If the current situation continues, we might have to face the horrific prospect of learning to live with a nuclear Iran.

It has been five years since the UN Security Council first demanded that Iran cease enriching uranium. But the Islamic Republic continues to defy international pressure and is stubbornly advancing with what appears to be a bid to acquire nuclear weapons in the coming year.

On November 8, the International Atomic Energy Agency released a report expressing “serious concerns regarding possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear program.” The most recent development is Iran’s announcement that it is beginning to enrich uranium in a new facility in Fordo, near the holy city of Qom.

The imminent opening of the new enrichment site further complicates a military option. Since the new facility is buried deep underground at a well-defended military site, it is considered far more resistant to air strikes than the existing enrichment site at Natanz. And even if a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities succeeded, the geopolitical fallout is liable to be nightmarish, although the prospect of a nuclear Iran is no less of a nightmare.

Covert actions, in contrast, carry much less of a risk, but are also less effective. For instance, last week’s assassination of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, director of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility, undoubtedly dealt a blow to Iran’s nuclear program.




But the delay, if any, is only temporary since Roshan is obviously not the only person in Iran privy to nuclear know-how. And these sorts ofoperations have negative side effects. Theoretically, if the US was behind the killing of Roshan or one of the other four (or five, depending on which reports you believe) scientists killed since 2007 and this became known, the Obama administration might have a more difficult time putting together a unified front consisting of Russia, China and other countries against Iran.

Some say that targeted killings strengthen extremists, though it is difficult to claim today that there is any significant “moderate” opposition challenging the Islamic Republic’s leadership.

In contrast, cyber warfare or other non-lethal covert operations such as the Stuxnet virus are less likely to hurt American attempts to muster a broad coalition against Iran. Some of these operations can be presented by the Iranians as “accidents.”

Economic sanctions, meanwhile, have so far not changed Iranian nuclear policy, though they have caused some damage. Indeed, since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, there have been numerous attempts to influence Iranian policy through economic sanctions.

Arguably, such sanctions helped end Iran’s war with Iraq in 1988. At the same time, Iran’s economy has been forced to adapt to functioning under various Western boycotts while developing alternative trade ties with Russia, China and several South and Central American countries.

Still, Tehran’s threat to close the Strait of Hormuz, gateway to much of the world’s oil trade, could be a sign of its growing economic desperation. Iranians are plagued by inflation, unemployment and economic stagnation. And the economic situation will only worsen. Though a new round of Security Council-backed sanctions has been delayed due to opposition from Russia and China, the US and Europe have put in place their own penalties. Japan pledged to buy less Iranian oil while South Korea said it was looking for alternative suppliers. And even China can take advantage of a situation in which fewer countries are buying Iranian oil to put pressure on Tehran to lower prices.

A new US law that would penalize foreign companies that do business with Iran’s central bank and an oil embargo that EU foreign ministers plan to approve on January 23 could have an even bigger impact.

A combination of covert operations, economic sanctions and diplomatic pressure, while at the same time keeping the military option “on the table,” is the only way to convince Tehran to back down. And maintaining a broad coalition of countries behind the sanctions is the best way to make them effective.

Protecting Israel

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=253446





Critics were quick to attack the High Court of Justice’s decision Wednesday to uphold the Citizenship and Entry Law, which severely restricts the right of Palestinians married to Israelis to receive Israeli citizenship.

Before rushing to accuse our highest court of discrimination, racism or worse, it would be instructive to recall how the Citizenship and Entry Law came about in the first place.

Prohibitions on “family reunification” were first introduced by the Interior Ministry on April 1, 2002, following the suicide bombing at the Matza restaurant in Haifa’s Neveh Sha’anan neighborhood in which 16 Israelis were killed and more than 40 were wounded. The driver of the car bomb was a Hamas terrorist who had married an Israeliand carried a blue Israeli identity card.

Since the Oslo era, about 130,000 Palestinians have exercised their right to acquireIsraeli residency or citizenship through family reunification, according to figures quoted by the Metzilah Center in a 2009 study titled “Managing Global Migration: A Strategy forImmigration Policy in Israel.”

Between 2001 and 2010 there were 54 cases in which Palestinians who receivedIsraeli citizenship via marriage (or whose parents did) were involved in terror activities, according to data provided to the High Court by the state.

While the vast majority of Palestinians married to Israeli Arabs are not terrorists, it is eminently reasonable to assume that members of a people with which Israel is in a state of conflict, if not war, present a high risk. And the State of Israel has not only the right but the obligation to protect its citizens.

Even in times of peace, Western jurisprudence strongly supports the right of lawmakers to decide, without judicial interference, who can and cannot enter the country and who can be deported, as Prof. Liav Orgad noted in a 2008 article titled “Love and War: Family Migration In Time of National Emergency.”

In Fiallo v. Bell, for instance, the US Supreme Court supported Congress’s right to denycitizenship to the father of an illegitimate child with US citizenship while recognizing it for the mother, under the assumption that the mother’s ties are stronger. New Zealand bans migration of citizens’ foreign spouses if they fail a body mass index test, under the assumption that obese immigrants burden the healthcare services. The Netherlands bans family migration of people who do not speak Dutch or who do not accept Dutch culture. In Denmark, marriage-sponsored migration is possible only if both spouses are above the age of 24, out of concern over forced marriages. Many Western countries simply do not recognize their citizens’ right to establish a family with anyone they choose.

In times of war this is all the more true. The 9/11 Commission, noting that “for terrorists, travel documents are as important as weapons,” found that the US government’s laximmigration policies hurt national security. All 19 9/11 hijackers were lawfully admitted into the US on nonimmigrant visas. Eighteen other terrorists who operated between the early 1990s and 2004 were granted permanent status due to their marriages to American citizens.

Israel, surrounded as it is by enemies, must be even more vigilant regardingimmigration policies.


And this is especially true considering the fact that Israel was created to be the national home of the Jewish people, a tiny minority in a region dominated by Muslim states. Israel is already struggling to integrate Arab Israelis who make up 20 percent of the population, many of whom do not identify with Israel’s main goals as a Jewish and democratic state. Israel also faces the challenge presented by a growing number of foreign workers – legal and illegal – who number about 250,000, and the steady stream of migrants and refugees from Sudan and Eritrea who continue to make their way into Israel via Sinai at a rate of as much as 2,000 a month.

Under the circumstances, the State of Israel cannot allow itself to take the risk of absorbing a potentially dangerous population that in the best case is indifferent to the aims of Zionism and in many instances is downright hostile to them. Instead of being attacked for racial discrimination or worse, the High Court should be praised for making a tough but necessary decision that strikes the proper balance between recognition of personal liberty and maintaining the integrity and security of the world’s only Jewish state.

India's delicate balance

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=253065



On Monday evening at the Dan Tel Aviv Hotel, Israel and India celebrated the 20th anniversary of the establishment of official relations between the countries. In attendance was India’s External Affairs Minister S. M. Krishna, the highest-ranking Indian politician to come to Israel in an official capacity in over a decade.

Addressing Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Krishna noted that cooperation between the countries “would not have been possible if there did not exist a wealth ofgoodwill and cultural empathy,” and declared his “commitment” to long-term partnership “for the mutual benefit of our peoples.”

Nevertheless, the rarity of a visit by such a high-ranking Indian official underlines the delicate balance New Delhi maintains in its relations with Jerusalem. On one hand, commercial ties have improved immensely since January 1992, when the two countries formally established ties after the collapse of the Soviet Union and India’s dramatictransition from a centrally planned socialism under Soviet influence to a free market economy. Israel’s ability to fight devastating and rampant poverty and hunger by meeting India’s huge development needs in the fields of agriculture, water management and medicine boosted trade between the two from just $200 million in 1991 to about $5 billion. Meanwhile, Israel has much to gain from the Indians’ vast experience in the management of multinational corporations, a stage in economic development thatIsraeli firms have rarely achieved (with a few exceptions, such as Teva).




Trade will undoubtedly continue to flourish in the future after the signing of a long-awaited free trade agreement, delayed in part by opposition from Israeli firms that will find it difficult to compete with India’s consumer goods. Also, about 40,000 Israelis, many of them post-army backpackers, visit India every year, and about 20,000 Indians visit Israel.

ON THE other hand, as S. Samuel C. Rajiv of the Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses in New Delhi noted in an article published in this month’s Strategic Analysis, India has tended to playdown military deals with Israel, estimated to be worth over $9b. over the past decade or so, while pursuing high-profile foreign relations with the Palestinian Authority. Those relations include tens of millions of dollars in direct aid, frequent visits by PA President Mahmoud Abbas, and public declarations by senior Indian officials supporting the creation of a Palestinian state. The 2008 terror attack in Mumbai, which left 170 dead, including four Israelis, was a tragic reminder of the mutual challenges the two countries face and helped strengthen military relations.

At the same time, India prefers to avoid conflict with a significant Muslim minority there that opposes military ties with Israel. Also, out of clear economic and political interests – combined, perhaps, with a throwback to India’s role during the Cold War era as a leader of nonaligned states – New Delhi continues actively and publicly to foster relations with Arab and Muslim states.

Political leadership in India is openly critical of Israel’s policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians and has supported Palestinian initiatives in the UN – such as the September 2011 statehood bid, and the February 2011 resolution defining Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria as “illegal.” In addition, India opposes using military means to stop Iran’s nuclear program (though it is also opposed to allowing Iran to achieve nuclear capability).

YET DESPITE their country’s decidedly pro-Palestinian policies, Indians are remarkably supportive of Israel. A 2009 survey sponsored by the Foreign Ministry, involving 5,200 people in 13 countries, reportedly ranked India as the most “pro-Israel country” in the world, higher even than the US. Fifty-eight percent of Indian respondents had positive feelings about Israel, followed by US respondents at 56% and Russia and Mexico at 52% each.

India’s foreign policy is proof that a strong pro-Palestinian stance is not an obstacle to robust and mutually advantageous relations with Israel. Indians understand the complexity of resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and that a majority of Israelis support a two-state solution in principle, provided it brings about a final resolution of the conflict. But in the meantime, until a peace for which most Indians, Palestinians and Israelis pray is achieved, life – and foreign relations – must go on maintaining a delicate balance.

The Lapid effect

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=252893




The prominent journalist, lecturer, screenwriter and novelist Yair Lapid will soon add another title to his name – politician. Ending years of speculation, Lapid officially announced Sunday that he would be entering the political fray.

Though he probably would have preferred delaying his decision, to put off an inevitable drop in popularity until closer to the national election slated for October 2013, Lapid was prompted to make the transition now, before passage of a problematic bill being advanced in the Knesset to institute a cooling off period for journalists making the move to politics.

Indeed, Lapid had on occasion used his prominent media position to advance his political standing. One blatant example was a column written for Yediot Aharonot in August, at the height of the socioeconomic demonstrations sweeping the nation, in which Lapid put forward his “Social Contract,” a quasi-political platform.


Thankfully, now that Lapid has committed himself, the so-called “Yair Lapid Bill,” which would require a cooling off period of six months to a year for journalists interested in entering politics, will probably not pass.

Though concern for the blurring of lines between politics and journalism is understandable, it is the responsibility of newspaper editors and TV and radio producers – not lawmakers – to ensure the professionalism and objectivity of reporters, anchormen and commentators. And legislation aimed at a specific person – particularly when that person appears to be singled out because of his popularity – is wrongheaded.

Lapid’s plunge into politics has garnered massive media coverage. Undoubtedly, part of the public interest in Lapid is related to the impact he is expected to have on the political order. Kadima, which according to opinion surveys has been steadily losing the support of its voters, is expected to be the hardest hit.




A poll conducted for the Knesset Channel by the Panels Institute that was broadcast Monday found that if an election were held now a party led by Lapid would muster 20 Knesset seats while Kadima, which currently has 28 seats, would shrink to just nine if led by Tzipi Livni.

However, pollster Ma’agar Mohot, in a survey that appeared on Monday on Channel 10, gave Lapid just seven seats, while Kadima fell to 12. Lapid should be lauded for abandoning a highly successive and lucrative career in journalism for the uncertainties and cutthroat life of politics. He seems to be motivated by an honest desire to do good.

And Lapid’s decision has rejuvenated the political scene. Talented and articulate newcomers to politics such as Lapid add color and diversity. And robust competition, whether it be among businesses producing consumer goods or politicians offering new ideas and policies, brings out the best in human endeavor. And Lapid seems to lack the anti-haredi streak that characterized his father, Yosef “Tommy” Lapid, late chairman of the defunct Shinui party.

In a memorable speech before haredi undergraduates at the Lander Institute in Jerusalem, Lapid admitted that the haredi community had “won” the culture war with secular Zionism. But he went on to say that this victory brought with it responsibilities: “If an Ethiopian child in Netivot is hungry it is your responsibility no less than it is mine, if rockets fall on Kiryat Shmona it is your responsibility no less than it is mine.”

Unfortunately, Lapid’s impressive popularity seems less to do with substance and more to do with appearances. He definitely is charismatic and comes off well on TV. But Lapid has yet to put forward a comprehensive platform. His Social Contract, for instance, consisted of vague populist declarations such as the need to “strengthen technological education,” “protect the quality of water and the environment” and “respect democracy, the courts, the IDF and the police.”

Also, Lapid’s decision to create his own party, instead of joining Kadima (according to a recent poll Kadima would garner 32 seats if headed by Lapid), further splinters the political system, which for some time now lacks the stability offered by two large parties – one to the right and one to the left.

As a result, smaller parties are likely to continue to leverage their influence in narrow coalition governments in which any single party’s threat of defection unless its demands are met can trigger a crisis.

Lapid’s bid brings new energies to o

ur nation’s political scene, a decidedly positive development. But it also threatens to further splinter the political system while raisingquestions about the increasingly blurred line separating journalism from politics.

Part of the solution

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=252746 

Sectarian clashes over the social exclusion of women simply refuse to go away. The latest controversy surrounds a Jerusalem conference slated for Wednesday on “Innovations in Gynecology and Halacha.”

The organizer is the Puah Institute, run by Orthodox rabbis and spiritual leaders with expertise in medicine for religious Jews, particularly those suffering fertility problems.

Puah provides counseling on how to perform procedures such as artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, prenatal genetic diagnosis, surrogate motherhood and a wide variety of other medical issues while at the same time adhering to the strictures of Jewish law. The institute serves as an important bridge among gynecologists, urologists and other experts in the field of medicine and a religious community that places an extremely high value on childbearing.

Subjects to be discussed at Wednesday’s conference, which is open to both men and women (though seating is separate), include ovary implants, prostate problems, testicular implants, choosing the right contraceptive, preserving fertility for older single women and gynecological surgery via the da Vinci robot.

Unfortunately, while many of the issues to be dealt during the conference have a direct impact on women; and while many of the leading medical experts in the field happen to be women; and while many women would feel infinitely more comfortable hearing women discuss intimate gynecological matters, no females will be permitted to address the conference. Women will be excluded out of deference to a male-dominated rabbinic leadership that has determined that it is improper for women to stand before men and lecture.

No fewer than 40 feminist and human rights organizations have taken issue with Puah’s policy of gender-based social exclusion. In a letter addressed to the “health minister” – technically Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu though haredi Deputy Health Minister Ya’acov Litzman runs the ministry on a day to day basis – the organizations called to denounce Puah, which they claim receives funding from the Health Ministry and the Religious Services Ministry. And pressure has been brought to bear on male physicians and scientists to backtrack on their agreement to speak at the conference.

It is easy to understand why these organizations are up in arms. The true motivations of the late Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, a former chief rabbi of Israel, and other spiritual leaders who have consistently ordered Puah to prevent women from speaking before men for the past 12 years since the organization began to hold it annual conference are unclear. Is it a perverted sort of prurience that reads into a commonplace intellectual exchange an unconscionable sexual distraction? Or is it a rabid chauvinism that refuses to consider changing outdated conventions since a woman could not possibly have something of intellectual value to share?

Neither possibility is particularly palatable. Excluding women hinders the free exchange of information, but it is also causes economic damage to women physicians who will not benefit from the exposure afforded by appearing at the well-attended conference.

Still, while activists for gender equality have every right to protest Puah’s exclusion of women and to prevent the state from funding a conference that excludes women, Puah, a self-declared religious organization, has the right to adhere to its version of religious expression when organizing a private conference.





Infringing on Puah’s right is not only wrong it is unwise from a tactical point of view. Since it was established in 1990, Puah has made tremendous headway in exposing the most parochial haredi communities to the wonders of medical science. Rabbis have been challenged to adapt Jewish law to the latest innovations.

Puah provides a “safe” framework in which the most intimate medical subjects can be discussed openly, without fear of self-censorship.

To ensure that this framework continues to be perceived by extremist segments of the religious community as safe, Puah must signal to them that it is ready to play by the rules set by the rabbis. Coercing Puah to allow women to speak at its conference is liable to lead to the cancellation of the conference altogether, hardly a desired outcome. Puah is not part of the problem of haredi intolerance; it is part of the solution.

Dealing arms responsibly

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=251803

A massive arms deal clinched between the US and Saudi Arabia has received surprisingly little attention at home.

Last Thursday, the US finalized the sale of 84 top-of-theline F-15SA fighter jets to the Saudi air force. From the US’s standpoint, the deal appears to achieve a number of goals.

First, it provides a boost to relations with the Saudis, after a period of turbulence over America’s unwillingness to prop up autocratic regimes in the region in the face of popular uprisings.

The arms deal is also a hedge against Iranian aggression. It comes during a weekwhen Iran again threatened to block ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz – a main artery for the passage of oil – in response to international economic sanctions. Finally, the transaction is a major boon for a weak US economy.

But from an Israeli perspective, the deal appears somewhat problematic.

Though Washington’s intention is to build the Saudis’ confidence in the face of an increasingly belligerent Iran, these fighter planes could, in theory, just as soon be used against the Jewish State as against the Islamic Republic. The present Saudi regime seems stable – but so did the Mubarak’s and Ben Ali’s.

Jerusalem has not opposed the deal for a variety of reasons.

The F-15s being sold to the Saudis apparently will not be equipped with standoff systems – long-range missiles to be used against land and sea targets. The US has ensured that Israel will maintain air superiority in the region, most notably through the sale of 20 F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jets to be supplied by 2017. Also, pro-Israel US lawmakers had ample opportunity to study the details of the deal and verify that Israel’s core military interests were protected.
And if the US had not gone through with the deal, EU countries, or the Russians, who are less receptive to Israeli interests, might have filled the vacuum. By engaging with the Saudis, the US retains its influence.

It is also important to note that the deal is being finalized at a time when military cooperation between the US and Israel is at an all-time high, despite seeming tension between the Obama administration and the Netanyahu government.

But there is another reason Israel will most likely not oppose the deal. Riyadh and Jerusalem, while hardly allies, share a common enemy. The Islamic Republic is threatening to tip the delicate balance of power in the region by attaining nuclear capability. Differences between the Gulf States and Israel pale in comparison to the Iranian threat.

At least regarding the Islamic Republic, the US, Israel and the Saudis seem to agree.

In fact, the Gulf States appear to be adamant about stopping Iran. United Arab Emirates’ ambassador to Washington, Yousef Al Otaiba, estimated publicly last year – before he backtracked under pressure – that bombing Iran was preferable to an Iranian bomb. Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal has said sanctions are not enough.

Particularly revealing is a Wikileaks document dated April 2008 in which Saudi’s late King Abdullah told Gen. David Petraeus to “cut off the head of the snake.”

While the Saudi arms deal makes some sense, it is bit more difficult to justify long-term multi-billion dollar US military obligations to Egypt and Iraq.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki seems to be seeking to position himself as an autocrat at the head of a Shi’ite regime. Three leaders of the Sunni Iraqiya Party warned of such a scenario in a recent New York Times op-ed. Iran already enjoys inordinate influence in Iraq. A Shi’ite leadership opposed to power-sharing with Sunnis is likely to move even closer to Teheran.

And in Egypt a reassessment of US military aid is even more in order.

As the Egyptian parliament is taken over by the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists, it is entirely unclear how long the military junta, which is committed to the old status quo, will continue to hold onto power.

In what is euphemistically being called the “Arab Spring,” the US need to reevaluate its military ties in the region, not primarily out of a concern for Israeli interests, rather as a means of preventing religious extremists from imposing their radical policies with the aid of advanced US arms.