Israel to World: "Suck It."

Also not really clear how except for the actual negotiating table idea (which no one posting here can actually ya know influence) those ideas aren't even shittier and more futile than the boycott Beinhart is proposing.

You know the shittiest thing about Beinart's proposal? All the ppl who are going to continue to never buy AHAVA products and think that it discharges their responsibility to improving the matzif. Tbh, it makes me think it's intentional - that he's designed this clever way to make no impact whatsoever while letting ppl feel good about themselves. Guess what? In life there are no easy ways to change complicated political/geographic situations while sitting at home posting on ilx. Sad but true.

a review of beinart's new book: http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/94872/peter-beinarts-false-prophecy/

not so much enamored with the review, but holy shit these statistics i've never seen before:

A whopping 82 percent of American Jews feel that U.S. support for Israel is either “just about right” or “not supportive enough”—and that’s just among those Jews who describe themselves as “liberal” or “very liberal.” Among those calling themselves “middle of the road,” the figure rises to 94 percent. Regarding the settlements, just 26 percent of even liberal Jews think Israel should dismantle all of them; among moderates, the figure drops to 10 percent. Generationally speaking, there even seems to be a rightward tilt among younger Jews. Consider Jerusalem: 58 percent of those between the ages of 18 and 29 oppose re-dividing it. Just 51 percent of their parents and grandparents feel the same way.

“Political differences on the liberal-to-conservative continuum were unrelated to measures of attachment to Israel,” Sasson and his colleagues noted dryly, adding that these attitudes have pretty much held steady over 24 years of polling. Liberal as American Jews might be when it comes to domestic U.S. politics, on Israel their views tend to be fairly conservative.

tell me something i don't know. no wonder i break out in hives whenever i go to synagogue.

i had no idea! when beinart claimed in 2010 that american jews had an all-time low engagement w/ israeli, i believed him!

yeah i admit the statistics are more extreme than i would've guessed. but = "liberal on domestic issues but crazy reactionary when it comes to israel" basically defines my entire extended family.

http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/04/peace-middle-east-now-officially-impossible

israel didn't have any problem moving settlers from gaza (sometimes even by force) so i don't know why they couldn't do it here. i don't know that i believe in the two state solution anymore anyway, tho, and as-of-late i find the futurological demographic arguments kinda full of shit.

Uh because there is a big difference between the moving 7-8,000 Gaza settlers and 125,000.

gaza isn't the jerusalem suburbs (scarequote that if you like) either

the point from that piece was that the 125,000 were from settlements that aren't jerusalem suburbs fyi (which will presumably be land-swapped in the case of a 2 state negotiation)

Where's the suggest-ban button for religion?

i just started reading this, but it's really good:
http://www.amazon.com/What-Is-Palestinian-State-Worth/dp/0674048733

on Israel their views tend to be fairly conservative.

In what sense? As far as I can tell, the views ascribed to liberal American Jews are that U.S. support for Israel is just about right and that not every settlement should be dismantled; on the question of division of Jerusalem they are ambivalent. As far as I can tell, this exactly describes Obama's views.

(And if you asked liberal American Jews, do you admire Netanyahu or Rabin more? I'll bet they, like Obama, prefer Rabin, which is hardly a "rightward" answer.

I think the framing of that poll actually speaks to Beinart's point; there is a concentrated effort to make sympathy towards Israel read as a right-wing view, whereas I think everyone with every view of Israel would agree that both Democratic and Republican US politicans are united in their sympathy towards Israel. I mean, maybe GOP politicians have more sympathy than Democrats for permanent settlement in Hebron and mass involuntary transfer of Arabs into Jordan -- OK, maybe THOSE are accurately described as right-wing positions but I'll bet you dollars to sufganyot they are not held by more than a small fraction of liberal American Jewry.

More precisely, Beinart's point is that if sympathy for Israel gets recoded as a right-wing view, that's really bad for Israel.

Some really beautiful writing in the Nusseibeh, but this passage in particular struck me as really insightful and clear:

It may all begin with initially innocuous identity descriptions: the ways in which we describe our- selves and others and characterize our various af- filiations. Here we look at the individual through binoculars, situating her in a specific context and pinpointing her as being part of that context. Her context may be multilayered and complex (for example, she may be, like Dr. Ahmad Tibi and Hanin Zu’bi, both Israeli and Palestinian, or like Amin Maalouf, both French and Lebanese), but the mul- tiplicity or apparent incongruity of these layers or aspects of individuals’ identities is not what causes the real problem. The problem arises when one such aspect grows out of all proportion and, transformed from a property to an entity or a being in its own right, begins to control the individual’s life. Suppose for a moment that I am that individual. In extreme cases, such an entity or being may compel me (that is, I may imagine that it compels me) to commit acts from which I as a human being would recoil. What I, the individual flesh-and-blood Arab or Jew, ought to do comes to be dictated by what I believe the ab- stract but rigidly defined “the Arab” or “the Jew” would do in similar circumstances, or by what I be- lieve rigidly defined “Arabness” or “Jewishness” re- quires me to do, or even by what someone I trust who claims to speak in that entity’s name tells me I should do. And so I, the natural and primary indi- vidual, the autonomous human being, become a compliant puppet in that entity’s hands.

saw nuseibbeh speak once and was completely transported by his groundedness and good sense, walked away thinking "why don't they just put this dude in charge of the middle east and everything will be fine" but apparently that is not possible

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_05/behind_the_political_shift_in037185.php

So all in all, there may be less in the political shift than immediately meets the eye.

http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/the-axis/the-most-important-report-on-nuclear-iran-you-are-likely-to-read.premium-1.429774

Here is a short summary of the document. I hope I do it justice:

- Anyone who believes that Iran is not yet actively pursuing a nuclear-weapons program and merely developing the capabilities is committing an act of willful delusion. The intelligence supplied to the IAEA and verified by different "member countries," is clear on that Iran has been working on a wide range of projects for over a decade, all of which are specifically aimed at acquiring the capabilities necessary not only to enrich uranium to weapons-grade, but to assemble a nuclear advice that can be launched by long-range missile. Talk of a fatwa against nuclear weapons is just that: talk.

- Despite sanctions and international monitoring, Iran has received highly specialized instruments and equipment, benefited from the knowledge of foreign nuclear weapons designers and made impressive advance in its own scientific centers, so as to be able to carry out most of the necessary testing for a nuclear device, without actually creating a nuclear detonation. There has also been preparation for an actual nuclear test.

- The P5+1 talks will be useless if they continue to focus only on an Iranian commitment to curtail uranium enrichment for two main reasons. First, Iran is simultaneously advancing on multiple fronts of nuclear development and can continue even if it delays enrichment. Second, advances in centrifuge technology by Iran mean that it could well be capable of building a new network of smaller, easily dispersed enrichment installations unknown and unmonitored by the IAEA.

- A military strike on Iran, whether by the U.S, Israel or anyone else, may take out some of the key installations but the technological advances already achieved by Iran, mean that the damage will be limited and not prevent the continuation of the nuclear program. Only a willingness by whatever country attacks Iran to carry out a series of follow-on attacks can seriously endanger the nuclear weapons project.

- Iran will be extremely reluctant to abandon its nuclear program as it is a key element to the regime's entire regional strategy. In order to offset Iran's inferiority in conventional weapons when compared to other regional powers, it sees the nuclear option as its only way of fully countering that imbalance of force. Any future dealings with Iran or military strikes must take that into consideration.

welcome to the nuclear club you crazy kids

a series of follow-on attacks

An easy thing to do as well I'm sure.

well put but seems to ignore the israeli tactic of killing nuclear scientists and other acts of sabotage. people are probably harder to replace than equipment.

also i know everyone's got their tits up about nuclear iran giving shit to terrorists but isn't pakistan nuclear too? surprised nobody's shitting pants abt that

everyone is always shitting their pants about pakistan

i kind of am

only so many pant tho, if you get me

xp ha

true but i haven't heard about pakistani WMD security, fingers crossed its not the ISI's job and/or they realize that would not be wise

honestly, i think pakistani WMD security and concerns about what would happen to said WMDs in light of a governmental crisis have been circulating for a long time

stratfor link or it didn't happen

re:Pakistan - you guys have already forgotten about AQ Khan eh

nah but he was supplying to nations not suicide bombers

ha there's a semantic argument to be had there, but i get you

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/17/selling_zionism_in_the_1920s/

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/18/world/middleeast/crackdown-on-african-immigrants-tugs-at-israels-soul.html?pagewanted=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120618

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/31/world/middleeast/nuclear-inspectors-confirm-iranian-progress.html?_r=1&hp

fuuck

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/intelligence-committee-chair-describes-explosive-confrontation-between-netanyahu-and-american-ambassador/262056/

maybe we'll be so busy being entertained by election season that we won't notice when the world ends

Plus there's this related item:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/06/world/middleeast/netanyahu-cancels-security-meeting-after-leak.html

Atlantic piece reads like Israelis pissed the US won't give them blanket permission to bomb Iran. Puts Obama in a no-win situation. Don't give them the OK, and Iran likely finishes its work. Give them the OK, and Iran gets bombed, and surely something goes wrong, and surely a regional war is in the cards, too. Do nothing and possibly all three things might happen: Iran finishes work, Israel bombs it, and there's a war.

my guess is the Obama administration would be totally fine with Israel doing a preemptive strike against Iran as long as they could plausibly deny US approval of it

this is a republican congressman talking 2 months before an election btw

is there really any doubt there's going to be a war over this at some point?

the only scenario I can envision in which there isn't a war is if the Iranian regime totally collapses, which is not really likely.

also max OTM I don't really give a shit about what got leaked from some meeting between the US and Israel, this is all "optics" (a term I hate)

xp

when was the last time two non-contiguous, non-US countries went to war over anything?

I'm highly dubious of anything leaked or released about the Iranian nuclear program this close to a major election. I wonder, though, exactly who would go to war if Israel bombed Iran. Most of the countries in the region just not up to it at the moment: Iraq, Syria, Libya ... I'm not even sure how Iran would go about retaliating.

Atlantic piece reads like Israelis pissed the US won't give them blanket permission to bomb Iran.

As far as I understand things (and I'll admit my knowledge on this is imperfect - I don't have inside information) Israel isn't looking for permission from the US to attack Iran. If Israel does attack Iran, US will likely support them w/ fuel + ammo reserves in Negev. Obama does not want Israel to airstrike Iran (for the many obvious reasons), but the only way he can keep Israel from doing that is by a) convincing Bibi that sanctions + international pressure will work to stop the nuclear program and b) that if they do not, America will step in at the final hour (American zone of immunity is longer than Israeli zone of immunity re taking out nuclear facilities). (A) seems less likely every day, Iran is going full steam ahead w/ program acc to most recent IAEA reports. Only chance that (A) still works is with more time, but zone of immunity closing for Israel. So if you believe Iran can't still be stopped from getting nuclear weapons through diplomatic means, you need to promise Israel that you'll step in even after their zone of immunity has closed (ie: while US is still able to drop bunker busters or whatever magic war technology means that they can take out program). This whole thing rests on Obama convincing Bibi that after X occurs, he will attack. This seems to indicate that Obama has been wavering over what X is. If that is true, and Bibi loses confidence that X even exists, he will want to launch the strike as soon as possible lest he lose the chance to strike at all.

Basically, the tension is over whether the US will attack Iran before they develop nukes. Not whether US will condone Israel doing so.

I wonder, though, exactly who would go to war if Israel bombed Iran. Most of the countries in the region just not up to it at the moment: Iraq, Syria, Libya ... I'm not even sure how Iran would go about retaliating.

Major question, I think, is what Arab participation in war would be. If Israel could get Saudi Arabia to participate it would be a totally different ballgame (and a serious realignment of politics in Middle East). Obv concern for SA is that if they join Israel in attacking Iran, that might be the end of their government in SA. Oops.

Arab countries broadly support ending Iranian nuclear program tho and most would probably not get involved at all. Certainly not in any overt fashion.

I'm not even sure how Iran would go about retaliating.

^^^yeah this, hence my question about the last time a war like this happened. what, are they just gonna lob missiles at each other? Iraq and Syria are in the middle and both of those countries are handling their own internal disasters, and neither Iran nor Israel is seriously gonna mobilize troops across any of the countries in between (or through the Suez Canal for that matter). neither country can invade the other, so would this just be an aerial war? if so I can't imagine that Israel, with the US's backing, wouldn't summarily crush Iran's air force. I suppose Israel could just nuke Qom or something and be like "What? You gonna do something about it?"

The other big question is whether Israel can actually shut down the program thru an airstrike. Worst case scenario - you don't want to deploy your airforce, expend all that fuel, ammo, bodies, etc, fly home and the job isn't done.

Sunni monarchies not super fond of Iranian nukes. Would likely vocally condemn and privately shrug. Iraq would be further destabilized. Syria is a shitshow and will be for tff. Libya probably rankled and divided but unlikely to do much. Egypt is the scariest unknown here. Iran would retaliate primarily via Hezbollah, methinks.

I don't think the US will bomb Iran. I'm not even sure that would be a better option than Israel doing it, and it could end up being worse. We're just not in a postion to bomb anyone these days, and the fact that we held back so much during all the Arab spring stuff pretty much underscores that we've benched ourself barring extreme circumstances.

Is the "red line" referred to in the piece basically the proverbial line in the sand?

Iranian nukes means Assad stays in power.

Hezbollah proxy war a good call, but I'm not sure how effective that would be. Could spark another Intifada, but so could anything.

I don't think Iran loves Assad so much it would wiggle nukes at folks to make them leave him alone.