Israel to World: "Suck It."

Israel is very easily provoked. I could imagine cheaper, less nuclear weapon-y ways to do it. Like giving a speech and calling them jerks and saying Israel deserves to drown in a sea of blood or something. That'd do it. No need for a nuclear program, if it's just a matter of kicking the hornet nest to rally nationalist fervor.

Like giving a speech and calling them jerks and saying Israel deserves to drown in a sea of blood or something.

They've tried this approach numerous times! That's probably a big part of why Israel is so concerned about them getting nukes. It's hard to make a counter-factual here bc I imagine Israel would be concerned about Iranian nukes no matter what Ahmadinejad said, but I wonder if it would be quite so frightening if he hadn't spent the last seven years denying the Holocaust, threatening to wipe Israel from the map, from the pages of time, and calling Israel a cancer that needs to be cut out.

The usual counterargument is that the rhetoric from Ahmadinejad calls for the state of Israel to stop existing in the form it does now, rather than being a direct threat to blow it up, but it's understandable if it's not interpreted that way in Tel Aviv.

Both sides have been over-playing the other as a threat in order to shore up domestic support. Unfortunately, it makes it harder for either of them to step away from that now.

Yeah, I've always found that argument to be specious apologetics. He only wants to metaphorically cut out the cancerous tumor of Israel.

I'd sooner believe that Iranian threats are all talk and no action before believing that they're not actually threats. I was thinking the other day that I hadn't heard that particular argument in awhile (how 'wipe off the map' shouldn't be understood as literal threat of violence) and I thought it was because Iranian rhetoric has become too obvious to downplay. Certainly no one still believes that the threats are diplomatic as opposed to militaristic in intent, right?

Actually the famous Ahmadinejad quote is an example of pretty poor translation. Its really a call for regime change, such as would happen with a democratic vote in a one state solution.

Arash Nourouzi translates "Imam ghoft een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad." as "The Imam said this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time."

Probably an unending problem for translators of the figurative language of Hafez and Rumi.

http://www.ynetnews.com/PicServer3/2012/05/17/3931629/cover0528_wa.jpg

xp lol, yes, I remember that meme quite well. What's the explanation for the comment that Israel is a cancerous tumor that will soon be destroyed? Is he talking about Bibi's cabinet?

Yeah I don't necessarily think that it literally means "we're going to destroy Israel" but it certainly doesn't sound like "we hope a different party wins the election" either.

Sticks and stones, though, etc. Iran makes a lot of threats, but is it really a threat? Even hypothetically backed a nuke, it's not clear. North Korea has nukes, or something close to nukes, and I don't think anyone considers NK a legit threat. Threatening, sure, but not an active threat. Like, Iran is saber rattling, and wants a nuke, but I have no clue what it would do with atomic leverage.

I think these comments mean "we're going to destroy Israel" but I don't think it's necessarily true. I don't get the impression that Ahmadinejad is so bad at his job that he carelessly makes these provocative statements w/out grasping what they might imply. I do think earlier on he might've hedged rhetorically so that he'd have plausible deniability, but I don't believe he misspeaks.

"Iran makes a lot of threats, but is it really a threat?"

that's only a part of the problem. the other part is for israel to show the area that they wont and cant tolerate nukes in Iran, a situation that might have a domino effect, causing other arab countries (like Syria that already tried) to develop their own nukes, making the middle-east an unbearable place to live in for israelis in the future, and a real threat for sure.
also, the fear is that the Hezbolla might have access to the nukes (is that possible?) which is far scarier than Iran.

North Korea actually has 13,000 artillery tubes in range of Seoul. Iran hasn't invaded a neighbor since 1826.

Yeah, I've always found that argument to be specious apologetics. He only wants to metaphorically cut out the cancerous tumor of Israel.

― Mordy, Friday, September 7, 2012 9:03 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't doubt that ahmadinejad would like to personally blow up israel, but even over the top rhetoric is still rhetoric, and commonly deployed. like, some guy in the US called some other countries the axis of evil, and we only invaded one of them! and it wasn't because anyone that was in charge of anything actually thought they were evil, a cancer, and needed to be erased from time itself, it was because it suited that guy's ends, and 'evil-ness' was expedient.

i am not as much of a wonk as y'all, so forgive me if i'm off base here, but i'm not sure why realpolitik suddenly evaporates whenever iran flexes nuts at israel (or, like, when cuba says the US is horrible and very bad). the cultural rift may be larger in the case of iran v israel, but, as sanpaku pointed out, n korea is better positioned to really kill some people they say that they hate a lot and they're not doing it. and it's not because of some failure of character ("if you're going to hate someone that bad then you should at least do something about it"), it's because they know that shelling seoul would mean the complete and total destruction of their thin carapace of existence. p confident the same holds in tehran -- getting nukes (nb i am against anyone getting nukes) and rattling sabers is ~at least~ as much keeping up with the joneses as it is drafting up a psychotic plan for israel's actual destruction and its own murder-suicide. most people do not shoot up movie theaters, most countries do not initiate nuclear war.

nb cuba actually got nukes (sorta) and the thing that we or anyone else didn't do was blow anyone up

also by 'most countries do not initiate nuclear war' i mean 'zero countries to date'

The theory from the right that seems to underpin a lot of this is that Iranians, and Shi'ites in general, value martyrdom above all else and think getting everyone martyred at the same time would be awesome. It's silly.

also, the fear is that the Hezbolla might have access to the nukes (is that possible?) which is far scarier than Iran.

― nostormo, Friday, September 7, 2012 10:00 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this btw is otm -- reliable nation-states (say what you will, but iran is by and large just another place that basically-sensible people live, it is not a 'failed nation' by any stretch) with nukes are alarming if they are your enemy, but they are at least more predictable than a terrorist cell. i would tend to believe that iran is stable enough, from top to bottom, that no one is going to slip someone else the keys to a nuke. i'd be more worried about the russian failure to keep tabs on ALREADY EXISTING nukes than i would iran getting them.

there's a bunch of claims as to what a nuclearized iran would mean: bombing israel directly (the most apocalyptic), giving a "suitcase bomb" to the hizb (middle ground), to merely allowing hizb and other anti-israel elements to act under an iranian nuclear umbrella.

however all of these things currently exist under an israeli nuclear umbrella, right? i wonder if it would even be different.

http://www.salon.com/2012/09/09/can_israel_make_peace/

I pointed out to Shavit that Khamenei’s mentor, the Ayatollah Khomeini, acted rationally in the long Iran-Iraq War (…1980-88).

Shavit countered that Khomeini ended the war only after sending hundreds of thousands of teenage volunteers — the baseej –to their certain death in battles they could not win. To Shavit, Iran’s ayatollahs did not value life. They would do what is necessary, he said, to bring on the global conflagration in which the Hidden Imam will emerge to rebuild the Islamic empire.

“As a practitioner,” Shavit said, “I have to come to my political leadership and recommend what to do. Can I afford to give a recommendation based on a working assumption that is less than worst case?”

His words made me think of Dayan and the intelligence chiefs under Ben-Gurion. They, too, had reached for the worst-case assessment of Nasser’s intentions in the …1950s, which undermined the efforts of Moshe Sharett to open secret negotiations in Paris to reach an accommodation with Egypt.

“Israel cannot afford except to prepare itself according to the worst case scenario,” Shavit said, leveling his gaze to emphasize the point. “If they [Iran] acquire it [the bomb], they will use it. Okay, maybe they will use coercion first, or other steps in between, but they would not hesitate to use it. Iran is eighty million now, and for them to absorb a nuclear strike is not too high a price for achieving their religious goals.

“This is the nature of the threat, and the world is doing next to nothing,” Shavit complained. “My concern,” he added, “especially after the strike in Syria, is that people will say, `What the heck? Let Israel take care of it.’ ”

On September, Kadima’s delegates were set to make their choice. The day before the vote, Olmert summoned Mahmoud Abbas secretly to the prime minister’s residence in Jerusalem. Olmert spread out a map of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. He said he was putting an offer of Palestinian statehood on the table that was new and historic.

Under the terms he proposed, Israel would withdraw from all but 6.3 percent of the West Bank. The Palestinian state would receive an equivalent amount of land from Israel as compensation for the 6.3 percent Israel retained. To join the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israel would build a twenty-five-mile tunnel through the Negev Desert.

The capital of Palestine would be the Arab portion of Jerusalem, but the Old City, including the sacred mosques of the Noble Sanctuary and Temple Mount, would be governed under an international consortium. Five thousand displaced Palestinians would be allowed to return to Israel proper. The rest would move to the Palestinian state or take compensation and relocate elsewhere.

Abbas stared across the table at Olmert, who was trying to conceal the desperation he must have felt. His premiership was in its final hours. Even a peace agreement with Abbas might not save him; indeed, it might lead to a government collapse and a rejection of the terms Olmert had offered. The thin reed that Olmert was grasping was his belief that an Olmert-Abbas accord would render the world awestruck, that the Bush administration would immediately embrace it, and that the seismic magnitude of peace would overpower the poisonous politics of the right wing and create a centrist, pro-peace majority where none had existed since Rabin’s time.

Olmert could even call a special election to ratify peace.

Abbas sat there silently, evaluating where he and Olmert stood.

When he spoke, he told the Israeli leader that he could not decide immediately. The gaps were still large and questions hung in the air about a myriad of details. Abbas needed time.

“I told him he was making a historic mistake,” Olmert later wrote. Abbas repeated that he needed time to consult.

“No,” Olmert said, perhaps surprising his guest with his bluntness. “Take the pen and sign now. You will never get a more fair or just offer.”

Still nothing.

“Even in another fifty years there will not be a government in Israel that will offer you what I offered,” Olmert insisted.

From Goldberg

Goldberg: You're an expert on, among other things, Israeli politics, and you know how to read the Israeli press (which is to say, carefully, and skeptically). Would you care to speculate about the recent stories suggesting that Ehud Barak has changed his mind about a military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities? To the extent that this is not all opaque, can you analyze the workings of the security cabinet, and the Barak-Netanyahu dynamic?

Satloff: Two important caveats: First, I think there is a potential for over-psychoanalysis of Israeli leaders and the interplay among the members of the security cabinet. Second, there is also the possibility of disinformation in anything one reads or hears on the issue. My experience is that this is a remarkably disciplined security cabinet, with internal debates quite closely held. To the extent there are differences among members of the group, I don't think there are differences over estimates of Israeli military capabilities or the likelihood of technical success of any military mission; rather, there have been serious discussions as to how military action fits in a larger strategy of ensuring that the Iranians don't get a military nuclear capability one year, two years, five years down the road, i.e., the real "day after" question. And this connects to the American relationship.

so yeah netanyahu's basically threatening WWIII even though the israeli military, much of the knesset, and the majority of israelis want him to suck a deluxe bag of dicks.

is obama really that beholden to the mystical "jewish vote"? are american jews really so fucking stupid? (NB: i am an american jew.) whose vote does obama really stand to lose if he tells netanyahu to fuck off?

Floridians.

I mean, it's a totally anecdotal not-representative-of-anything thing, but I think of PBS Newshour interviewing an old Jewish woman in a retirement home in Florida who would have voted for Obama again but he hasn't visited Israel so she's going for Romney.

so basically bubbe and zayde are going to flip this election? oy vey.

the thing that is so ass-backwards about many american jews is that they just. don't. get. that there are real debates within israel--they stupidly imagine whatever the prime minister's position is to be the Voice of Israel that a presidential candidate must support blindly. when the reality is that all the major military folks in israel have had it up to -here- with netanyahu.

apparently theres a rumor going on in israel that bibi's gonna attack iran in october to force the issue..

my only source is my roomate who works at a jewish summer camp with a bunch of israelis..

Seems like if there's anything that would sew this up for Obama would be for the election to happen in the middle of a Middle East war. "Don't change horses midstream" and all that.

christ why can't the military just tell bibi to fuck off? i guess that would force a big constitutional crisis.

call me pollyanna but does anyone think iran is really going to nuke israel? wtf would they stand to gain?

they think that the Iranians want to bring about armageddon and are willing to accept all casualties necessary

hmmm where have I heard that before

In the war room?

the thing is the ayatollahs who have ultimate power over the military are probably much less interested in bombing israel than ahmenijabad (sp?) who has no power to start wars.

the system works!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9545597/Armada-of-British-naval-power-massing-in-the-Gulf-as-Israel-prepares-an-Iran-strike.html

great timing

http://plus.maths.org/content/game-theory-and-cuban-missile-crisis

I wonder if Obama arranged this international show of power as a message to Bibi as much as to Iran. Relax, we got this, etc.

I feel these days like how I felt before the Iraq war; just day after day wondering if war was going to come and becoming more certain it would. I hope it doesn't.

Wanted to post something about the Romney comments, but I kind of don't like that a thread with this title has become the main Israel/Palestine discussion thread. Would it be stupid to ask mods to change it? Is there another thread we can revive?

See, I think this thread, especially under Bibi and his cabinet, is appropriately titled for what it covers.

A cursory search of "palestine" leads to at least a half-dozen threads dedicated more closely to the Israel/Palestine conflict.

I kinda like the thread title.

Ok well anyway, I thought that parts of Romney's analysis were pretty cogent and honest, although absolutely not the kinds of things a person running for president should ever say out loud.

is obama really that beholden to the mystical "jewish vote"? are american jews really so fucking stupid? (NB: i am an american jew.) whose vote does obama really stand to lose if he tells netanyahu to fuck off?

This is silly btw. By all accounts Bibi has totally written off Romney (dude is an American educated world leader - he can read poll results too). He's either a) trying to get Obama to attack, b) trying to lay groundwork for American acceptance and material support if Israel attacks, or c) believes that a red line or more threats will stop Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapon so no one will have to attack. Obama isn't going along with it bc he's desperate for American Jewish votes, which he more or less already has in the bag*. He's probably a) trying to keep Bibi from attacking Iran and b) trying to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons without going to war. It could be that they're both maneuvering around the 2012 election but I think it's a very silly view of geopolitical situation to think either are seriously thinking about Romney while negotiating.

* Ironically my community is probably one of the few where Obama's responses to Bibi may influence votes, but I think it's a big mistake to extrapolate very small group of Jews to Jewish community at large.

Israel to World: "Hey, let's you and him fight."

Also - I haven't seen Romney's comments yet but I suspect they don't matter. No one voting for Romney at this point will care and tbh, it seems like Palestinian issue is off the table for most people right now. It has been marginalized by Iran, the Arab Spring (esp in Egypt), Syria, etc. My prediction: I think 2 state solution idea is over. Future is gonna be 1 state.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/romney-secret-video-israeli-palestinian-middle-east-peace

Obviously I don't agree on some of his key points (that Palestinians are "committed" to the destruction of Israel and under no circumstances want peace, or w/e) but I think he gets a lot right about why the situation is intractable

I'm torn by two perspectives in this regard. One is the one which I've had for some time, which is that the Palestinians have no interest whatsoever in establishing peace, and that the pathway to peace is almost unthinkable to accomplish. Now why do I say that? Some might say, well, let's let the Palestinians have the West Bank, and have security, and set up a separate nation for the Palestinians. And then come a couple of thorny questions. And I don't have a map here to look at the geography, but the border between Israel and the West Bank is obviously right there, right next to Tel Aviv, which is the financial capital, the industrial capital of Israel, the center of Israel. It's—what the border would be? Maybe seven miles from Tel Aviv to what would be the West Bank…The other side of the West Bank, the other side of what would be this new Palestinian state would either be Syria at one point, or Jordan. And of course the Iranians would want to do through the West Bank exactly what they did through Lebanon, what they did near Gaza. Which is that the Iranians would want to bring missiles and armament into the West Bank and potentially threaten Israel. So Israel of course would have to say, "That can't happen. We've got to keep the Iranians from bringing weaponry into the West Bank." Well, that means that—who? The Israelis are going to patrol the border between Jordan, Syria, and this new Palestinian nation? Well, the Palestinians would say, "Uh, no way! We're an independent country. You can't, you know, guard our border with other Arab nations." And now how about the airport? How about flying into this Palestinian nation? Are we gonna allow military aircraft to come in and weaponry to come in? And if not, who's going to keep it from coming in? Well, the Israelis. Well, the Palestinians are gonna say, "We're not an independent nation if Israel is able to come in and tell us what can land in our airport." These are problems—these are very hard to solve, all right? And I look at the Palestinians not wanting to see peace anyway, for political purposes, committed to the destruction and elimination of Israel, and these thorny issues, and I say, "There's just no way." And so what you do is you say, "You move things along the best way you can." You hope for some degree of stability, but you recognize that this is going to remain an unsolved problem. We live with that in China and Taiwan. All right, we have a potentially volatile situation but we sort of live with it, and we kick the ball down the field and hope that ultimately, somehow, something will happen and resolve it. We don't go to war to try and resolve it imminently. On the other hand, I got a call from a former secretary of state. I won't mention which one it was, but this individual said to me, you know, I think there's a prospect for a settlement between the Palestinians and the Israelis after the Palestinian elections. I said, "Really?" And, you know, his answer was, "Yes, I think there's some prospect." And I didn't delve into it.