Rosner’s Domain Blog

Today, the Israeli media is quoting a new paper put out by the Institute for Science and National Security in Washington . Of particular interest is this controversial recommendation:

The Obama administration should make a key priority of persuading Israel to join the negotiations of a universal, verified treaty that bans the production of plutonium and highly enriched uranium for nuclear explosives, commonly called the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT). As an interim step, the United States should press Israel to suspend any production of fissile material for nuclear weapons. Toward this goal, the United States should change its relatively new policy of seeking a cutoff treaty that does not include verification.

I expect such recommendations will become more frequent in the coming months, and so do some Israeli officials familiar with such matters. There are two reasons for this: 1. Some members of the Obama camp will be receptive to these ideas. 2. The international community has found no way of stopping Iran, and is now looking for new solutions to the problem of a nuclearized Middle East.

In fact, the authors of this new paper do understand that the problem starts with Iran:

Because of growing insecurity in the Middle East resulting from Iran’s nuclear progress in defiance of United Nations Security Council demands, other countries will likely start to consider their own options, perhaps including the acquisition of nuclear weapons.

So, do they go to the source and take care of Iran (thus, maybe avoiding the resulting nuclear race)? No. They have no solution for Iran. David Albright, the principal author of this paper, does not believe in the military option, and also doesn’t have any other brilliant ideas - aside from “robust diplomacy.”

Albright, an expert on nuclear issues no doubt, isn’t the only one who can’t find a way out of the Iran crisis. And he will not be the only one to seek the solution for Iran in Dimona. After all, pressuring Israel will presumably be much easier for the U.S. than pressuring Iran.

But here’s the problem: Where Albright and Andrea Scheel see a plan that “would establish international confidence in the peaceful nature of Middle Eastern nuclear programs,” Israel will see a plan concocted by people who failed to deal with a neighborhood bully and turned their attention to other places, so as to avoid a necessary confrontation. This is not establishing “confidence in the peaceful nature…” - but rather establishing disbelief in the ability of the international community to deal with aggressors. In fact, applying the pressure that the authors seem to want will achieve the exact opposite of their intended outcome: It will make Israel even more suspicious, and much less prone to give up whatever capabilities it might have to defend itself. And rightly so.

Couple of updates:

1. Add this to my list of forbidden Obama-clichés: No, he is not Superman of the Arabs:

There are already some worrying signs that on the key issue of Israel, Obama will be following in the footsteps of his pro-Israeli predecessor. The recent appointment of Rahm Emanuel as Obama’s Chief of Staff deflated some optimistic expectations that the new administration would reform their policy. Emanuel is an Israeli-American dual citizen, pro-Iraq War Democrat, and son of a right wing member of Irgun, a notoriously militant Zionist organization operating from 1931 to 1948, which was responsible for acts of terrorism against the British and Palestinians.

2. How ironic is this: “Voter confidence in the War on Terror has reached its highest level ever, with 60% now saying the United States and its allies are winning, according to the first Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey on the issue since Election Day”.

Voters, apparently, are getting wiser by the day as election-dust is settling down. Not only that they better understand the realities of Iraq and the extent to which the US has gained there in recent months (thanks to…John McCain, among others) - but they also become more realistic about the incoming Commander In Chief:

Now 62% think it is likely troops will come home in the next four years, compared to 75% in the last two surveys conducted in October. Even Democrats are slightly less confident, with 78% who say Obama will bring the troops home within his first term, compared to 85% in October.

Yes, they probably still want “change”, but with Obama now getting ready to take responsibility for the war it’s not even clear if “change” means changing policies in Iraq:

Even confidence in President Bush’s handling of the war is at its highest level in a year. Now 35% say the president is doing a good or excellent job handling the Iraq situation, while 44% say he is doing a poor job. Just one week ago, 28% of voters said Bush was doing a good or excellent job. The week before, the percentage was 27%.

See? With more than two months until inauguration day it’s possible that all Obama will have to do by the time we get there is to promise a continuation of Bush’s winning policies in Iraq.

3. Rob Malley is still not a member of the Obama team. Can we stop obsessing about him, until he becomes a member, if ever?

4. Lee Smith is one of the best when it comes to writing about Syria. His article from Friday says:

[Abdel Halim Khaddam, Syria’s former vice president] dismisses the notion prevalent in some U.S. and Israeli circles that it is possible to split Syria from Iran. “Iranian influence is extensive,” he says. If there are factions in the Damascus government, it is not about whether Syria should lean towards Iran or the West. “The disagreements are about personal interests and cuts of money, not Iran. Everyone agrees about Iran.”

Here’s the list of clichés to be avoided in the coming months (and, if possible, years):

Tzipi Livni is Israel’s Obama: I was foolish enough to be one of many writers comparing the two. But no, Livni is not really Obama. For starters, Obama has the charisma that Livni lacks - but there are also many other differences. As you can see here - when Livni run in the Kadima Party primaries I argued that she can be (wrongly) compared to Hillary Clinton and that Obama can be compared to her rival, Shaul Mofaz. I think it’s time to quit all such comparisons.

Obama is like the first Arab Prime Minister of Israel: Give me a break. Does Obama belong to a group with which the US has an ongoing war? Does he belong to a group fighting to establish an independent state alongside the US? Does he belong to a group to which Independence Day is a day of mourning? This is not just dumb - it’s a political message according to which the fate of Arab Israelis is somehow similar to the one of African-Americans. It’s the kind of cute journalistic inventions with which Israel will be de-legitimized.

Obama will help bring the peace: Maybe, maybe not. I wrote about this belief months ago: In the deceptive reality of the modern era, one can get confused - but Bush was not the president of Israel, and the same will be true of his successor. Therefore, the desire for a kind of “Obama will take care of it” is nothing more than a flight from reality, or from responsibility.

Obama is “the first Jewish president”: no, he is not. He was not a Muslim masquerading as Christian, and he is not Jewish. The fact that he lived in an area in which Jews also lived does not make him Jewish. Colin Powell was growing up among Jews and even knows some Yiddish, but I don’t remember him being called Jewish. True, many great people are Jewish - but it’s time to recognize that not all great people are Jewish. And it’s not even clear yet if Obama is great.

Obama and Bibi can’t get along: I think they can. Netanyahu was ousted in the late nineties partially because he couldn’t get along with Clinton, and he probably learned his lesson. Obama is smart enough to know that taking on Netanyahu will confirm to many the suspicions they had about him during the race. There’s reason to assume that both will try very hard to avoid confrontation. Saying they can’t make it is the wishful thinking of Netanyahu’s political rivals.

Israel needs its own Obama: Israel is in need of many things. Most of all, it needs an experienced, charismatic, measured leader that can help it sail through the stormy waters of present day Middle East. It needs an Ariel Sharon, or a Yitzhak Rabin or a Yitzhak Shamir. Obama might be such great leader one day, but until this happens, it’s much too soon for anyone to want someone like him.

Crossposting: Jewcy.

This article includes some of the most sensible paragraphs I’ve read in the days since Barack Obama won. “I never viewed eliciting delight from non-Americans a reason for choosing a president, including one of color”, writes columnist Froma Harrop. The article’s main argument? Criticism of all things American abroad (especially in Europe) is based on misconception–thus, European praise of America for electing the African-American Obama is also based on misconception.

“It is remarkable how many Americans, young people especially, yearn for an ‘openness seal of approval’ from people in countries whose records on racial integration is worse than ours,” Harrop writes. She’s an Obama supporter, no doubt, and is “delighted that Barack Obama has been elected president.” However:

America is a land of ideas, not ethnicity. That’s its strength. If a change in how America deals with the world is what voters wanted, then a president of any color could have done it. On this score, John McCain would have been a vast improvement over the current White House occupant. Obama’s job is to offer a sage foreign policy — not heartwarming proof that Americans will elect a biracial leader with a Muslim middle name.

What struck me the most about this article was the headline: “America Doesn’t Need ‘Rebranding’.” Harrop is right. All this talk about rebranding and marketing and fixing the image of America is a trendy way of evading the truth. What American voters want is not “rebranding,” but rather a change in foreign policy (from which they also may hope to benefit in world public opinion). Soon enough, they’ll discover that most of the changes to that policy that Obama has promised are either too dangerous to pursue or just unworkable. Soon enough, they’ll discover that a week of international celebration doesn’t make life easier for Presidents-elect. Creating a pragmatic and visibly non-Bushian foreign policy will be the real challenge (for more about that, read this).

Israeli media is apoplectically busy with the possible emergence of a new lefty political front. The Meretz Party is reportedly discussing the establishment of such a thing with two prospective groups of candidates. One is active Labor defectors, like former General and MK Ami Ayalon and former Minister MK Ophir Pines. The other is former Labor leaders, like ex-Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben Ami, ex-Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg, and others. Novelists Amos Oz and David Grossman are also expected to support the party, but will not be candidates for the Knesset. (Apparently, some people still believe that endorsements from renowned novelists can add to the political clout of a party.)

This reshuffling of the Israeli left can be looked at in many different ways. First and foremost, it is a vote of no confidence in Labor leader Ehud Barak, who long ago ceased to exist as a real leader of the Israeli left wing. If this scheme is to be successful–and time is running out, as Sunday will be the last day in which names of prospective candidates should be submitted to the election committee - Barak will not only face a deadly challenge from the center (Kadima and Tzipi Livni), but also one from the Left (Meretz on steroids).

However, political maneuvering is only one half of the story, and not even the most interesting half. What this new front on the Left is counting on is the existence of a pool of voters who’d like to see a more dovish Israeli government, but have nowhere else to go. They think that if only the right people would join the ticket, Israelis would suddenly see the light and decide to trust policies they’ve rejected long ago. In that respect, what the Left is trying to do here is to gamble on the superficiality of its own voters. They believe that liberal, sophisticated, educated, knowledgeable, articulate voters are no less prone to being swayed by celebrity than less-sophisticated voters.

Will this work? We will have to wait for polls (and election results) before we know the answer. But it didn’t quite work in 2002, when two political “stars” - Yossi Beilin and Yael Dayan - joined Meretz, winning with the party a meager 6 seats. In 2006, it was down to 5. Meretz is still fairly unpopular. As late as 2007 it was looking for solutions. “Unlike its fellow opposition parties,” wrote Yossi Verter in Haaretz, “Meretz has not flourished. It had hoped that the election of Barak - with his hard-edged, right-wing image - as Labor chairman would help. Nor has Labor’s participation in the government brought Meretz more votes.”

And an alleged solution has been found: more “stars.” Recent polls show that Meretz has a better chance now of increasing its number of Knesset members. But that is not because of the new people. It’s because the Labor Party is getting weaker by the day. The Likud Party is leading in the polls, and that’s why so many new recruits are pouring in. Meretz shows some signs of life, and suddenly former Ministers are asking to join.

In short, it is not that the stars help the voters decide. The voters make the stars want to join the better-positioned ticket.

It’s become a Rabin Memorial Day ritual of sort. Starting a week or so before the date, and ending, fading, two-three days later, Israeli leaders and officials are once again warning the public from the “next” political assassination. They are pointing fingers at the violent factions of the radical right, and are operating their warning sirens.

Here’s the head of Shin Bet, Yuval Diskin, last week:

Diskin said the Shin Bet was aware of a “very high willingness among this public for violence, not throwing rocks, but the use of weapons to prevent or stop one diplomatic plan or the other.” Diskin said that hundreds had been involved in the recent spate of incidents, and that there were “dozens of inciters,” but no organized leadership.

And the now-famous Ehud Barak quote:

We used to call them bad seeds, but now they are tumors with secondary growths. This is no longer a warning sign, it’s a threat to democracy, the IDF, the police and on all the authorities of a normal society. I promise you we will uproot this evil from within us,” Barak added.

Yesterday, it was Prime Minister Olmert’s turn:

Today, 13 years later, the incitement is not reduced; the instigation has not decreased; the hatred has not dissipated. Israeli citizens strike Palestinians who wish to harvest their olives, as they have for centuries in the places where their personal and family homes were located, with brutal violence - and no one puts a stop to it. Young Israelis, gripped by messianic dreams which have no basis in the reality of our lives - beat our soldiers, break their bones, threaten their lives - and no one stops them. I say these difficult words not just to other people, but also to us, to the Government, to the law enforcement agencies, to my ministerial colleagues, and first and foremost to myself. We stand here using grandiose words about what was and can never happen again, and accept those things which are increasingly leading to the next murder - and we do not do the simplest, most obvious things to stop it. This cannot continue. I will not let it continue.

Are you impressed by these blatant words, alarmed? There’s a good reason for that, but also reason for some skepticism. Here’s why:

1. Olmert is right: “no one stops” those violent, radical, lunatic fringes. “No one” in this case means Olmert. He is the “one” Prime Minister we have, for the time being.

2. Barak is also right: these are “tumors with secondary growths”. Removing such growths is the trade of the doctor - doctor Barak, Defense Minister Barak. I didn’t see him do much, no more than Olmert and the rest of them.

3. It is the job of dispensable people like me to warn, write, talk, predict, alarm, analyze. It is the job of people like Olmert and Barak to lead and to act. If the danger is as great as they claim, let’s see some action. If it’s not – if all these warning signs are the old clichés they think we expect to hear at Rabin’s Memorial Day – they should give it a rest. We are no longer impressed.

4. And I know, Olmert has smartly admitted yesterday that he had failed, that he didn’t act. But it’s kind of late in the game for him to add that “I will not let it continue”. How exactly is he going to do this when his time in office is almost up? He can’t and he won’t.

5. In fact, he shouldn’t even try - because legitimacy is key for leaders more serious than he is about ending the dangerous game these West Bank radicals are playing.

5. This means that we will have to wait, again, for someone to do something.

6. Netanyahu? - this will be a good way for him to start with the right message.

In the ongoing debate over the possibilities available for those wanting to reform the Republican Party, I found Max’s post from yesterday especially interesting. Abortion is an issue on which many so-called “moderate” conservatives find it difficult to adhere to Party rules, because anti-abortion sentiment is mostly identified with the more religious camp of the GOP base, and is also an issue on which the American public seems to be moving away from the party. Not that Americans want abortions - but they a) don’t want abortion to become illegal (and are mostly against the overturning of Roe v. Wade), and b) don’t want abortion to be central to the political battle between right and left.

Max is right: abortion prevents the Party from nominating otherwise worthy candidates like Joe Lieberman (for VP) and Rudy Giuliani. However, making the case against this purist anti-abortion position on this ground is somewhat problematic. Arguably, this limiting abortion litmus-test is not unique to the Republican Party, but rather shared by both parties. The Republicans will never nominate a worthy pro-choice candidate the same way Democrats can hardly nominate a worthy pro-lifer to be their presidential candidate. In both cases, the problem isn’t the “party,” but rather the “primaries” and their tendency to overemphasize the power of the more ideological groups within each party.

Data presented by the “Republican Majority for Choice” suggests that most Republican voters, unlike the subset of Republican primary voters, would vote for a pro-choice candidate if they believed him to be the right candidate on all other matters. In a 2007 poll, for example, the group found “that 72% of Republicans asserted that the government should not play a role in controlling choices for women, believing instead that the decision to have an abortion should lie with women, their doctors, and their families. Further, the majority of the Party, 53%, believes that the GOP has spent too much time focusing on moral issues such as abortion and gay marriage.”

Just three months ago, the same group conducted a poll showing that “nearly 70 percent of Republican voters do not consider abortion as a litmus test for the party’s vice presidential nominee.” In a Gallup poll from May 2008, only 15% of pro-life voters polled said that their candidate “must” share their views on abortion in order for them to vote for him or her (for the pro-choice camp it was similar: only 11% saw their position as a “must” for their candidate). 53% of pro-lifers polled said it was “one of many” important issues, and for 31% it wasn’t even a “major issue.”

Thus, what both parties share as far as the abortion-litmus-test is concerned is the problem created by the laziness of the average voter. Going to the polls to vote for the president is fine, but going twice — first to select the nominee and second to elect the president - is just too much trouble. Suggesting that an anti-abortion stance should not be a defining quality of the Republican candidate is not as provocative as it might seem. The problem is more practical than it is moral or ideological: how does one neutralizes the power of the anti-abortion groups in the primary process?

Can such a goal be achieved? I don’t know. But a month ago, in an article by William Saletan - one of the leading experts on the politics of abortion and the author of Bearing Right: How conservatives won the abortion war - an alternative to reforming the primaries has been offered. Saletan’s argument sees the most critical role played by none other than Barack Obama:

We’re a pragmatic country. What disgusts most people about abortion as a political issue is that on that topic, unlike economics or foreign policy, nothing ever seems to be accomplished. It’s the same damned debate, election after election, with each side trying to scare you about the other. If only it were more like economics, where you can actually have growth-or maybe like energy, where you can develop a new source or a new technology. If Obama can make abortion more like those issues and couple it with a record of material progress in the form of fewer procedures, he’ll take much of the political heat out of it. He might even make it boring. Wouldn’t that be great?

For the Republican Party, it would definitely be great.

I didn’t see this Financial Times’ piece but Marty Peretz did. Apparently, it was published Friday, and was calling on Barack Obama to appoint Bill Clinton ASAP to be the special envoy for Middle East peace (as we all know, Clinton must be the man since he had such great successes). Anyway, here’s Peretz:

A special envoy for the Middle East is an old hat idea. In fact, it is not exactly an idea and certainly not a new idea. By my count, there have been perhaps a dozen special envoys to the region in the last dozen years, perhaps more, and many of them appointed by the president of the United States as his personal representative to the disputants. Here are the a few of the designees of the White House: Philip Habib, William Burns, Anthony Zinn, James Jones, Curtin Wilson. Didn’t George Tenet also play this role for President Bush? And wasn’t James Wolfenson a special rep of someone or other, as well? Then, of course, there is the present special envoy of the Quartet, come straight out of 10 Downing Street to the Middle East bazaar, Tony Blair. Very important person, accomplished nothing. Someone once suggested that George Bush Sr. be appointed to this prestigious office. And someone else suggested that James Baker be the one to do the miracle of Middle East peace. The problem with the last two men is that they don’t much like Jews. This might be called a disqualification.

In his short piece, Peretz quotes something I wrote quite a while ago, “a special envoy for Middle East peace…is a diplomatic tool that has become a cliche, an envoy in the guise of a messiah” (it is a good line - is it not?). Most Israeli officials assumed way before the election that such envoy will be appointed as way of showing “involvement” in the peace process (the involvement presumably lacking during the Bush years), and Clinton’s name was bound to come up, as the “envoy” scheme is also a tribute to the peace making days of the Clinton era.

And Clinton is free, and somewhat bored. And his good friend, Tony Blair, is already in the region, making peace. That’s why we added Clinton’s name to the list of possible envoys presented to the Israel Factor panel last week. As you can see here, the panel, generally speaking, liked the idea.

But Peretz doesn’t like it:

Bill Clinton is by now a very frivolous man. He is full of self-love and, thus, can no longer be trusted with an important public chore, as Obama must have noticed during the campaign. It is true that Clinton is invested in the historic struggle between Israel and the fissiparous Palestinians. It is hard to imagine that he is not still committed to the Camp David principles to which Ehud Barak committed but Yassir Arafat would not even discuss.

My guess: it will not be Clinton.

Here’s an interesting question: Does it matter if the mayor of the “first Hebrew city” of Tel Aviv is a Zionist?

Tomorrow, Israel is going to the polls to elect its municipal legislatures. I wrote here about the race in Jerusalem– still a very tight one–between the secular Nir Barkat and the ultra-orthodox Meir Porush. But Tel Aviv is also electing a mayor. The incumbent, Ron Huldai, a former General and air force pilot, is a good mayor, but not a very popular one. He has “no soul,” former mayor Roni Millo complained, and many agree:

Huldai belongs to the old style of obnoxious politicians who know how to work, not how to talk. He’s an energetic, dedicated mayor with values, but even when he was principal of Tel Aviv’s Gymnasia Herzliya high school he was accused of arrogance when he stood at the gate in the morning and shook the hand of every student who entered. His list of candidates is not exactly thrilling.

Huldai is portrayed, for good reason, as friendly to the rich. He seems to make Tel Aviv less friendly to the young, the bohemian, the artistic, the trendy. All the people, in other words, who make the city what it is. And, yes, many are to the left, even far left, of Israel’s center. Naively - almost comically - to the left.

Huldai’s emerging opposition is Dov Khenin: smart, personable, interested in management, and with a challenging agenda for the city. Oh - and he’s also a communist, a Knesset Member from the Chadash Party. And post-Zionist, or so they say. Khenin has gone a bit shy since he started running for mayor, and is having trouble exactly saying what he believes. “Do you sing Hatikvah, the national anthem?” he was asked by a TV anchor. “I respect the national anthem,” he responded.

Khenin argues that municipal politics should be about municipal issues, and many among the more trendy Tel Avivians support this claim:

Yes, Dov Khenin is a communist. It is not easy for a Zionist to support a communist. But these elections are municipal, not national. The question that hangs in the balance is not whether Israel will become a state of all its citizens, but whether Tel Aviv will be a city of all its residents. Khenin, for his part, has proven his incorruptibility by adding Likudniks and skullcap-wearing politicians to his list. As such, there is no justification for the ugly campaign being waged against him. He, as well as the political movement he heads, are a reason for national pride, not a pretext for McCarthyist persecution.

Thus, both in Jerusalem and in Tel Aviv, we have competitive races that share an important characteristic:

On the face of it, the campaigns in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem are as different as these cities are from each other - in appearance, lifestyle and temperament. Yet in both races, the contests are between those who represent mainstream Zionism and those with a more narrow constituency aiming to rebrand.

In Jerusalem, this means the ultra-orthodox Porush; in Tel Aviv, it means Khenin. No wonder the other ultra-orthodox party, Shas, has considered endorsing Khenin. Like him, they care about the poor, and propagandize against the rich. Like him, they don’t much care for the Zionist cause.

Huldai is leading in the polls, but municipal politics, even more than national elections, are all about turnout, and it seems now that Khenin has the more enthusiastic constituency. It should also be said that he made this race much more interesting, partially by way of making young people more interested in their local politics, but also by forcing upon many the need to choose camps. He’s split the city electorate into those who do not really care if their mayor is a Zionist, and those who have suddenly discovered that they do care. I know people who generally don’t care about the mayoral race, but will go the polls tomorrow just to make sure that they do not wake up the next morning with a mayor who “respects” the national anthem, but does not sing it.

In the last 24 hours I was bombarded by emails from Jewish supporters of Barack Obama (well, it was really 3-4 emails) saying something like: “see? He appointed Rahm Emanuel! See how much he loves Israel?”

These emails convinced me of two things:

1. Some Jewish supporters of Obama still have some doubts - otherwise, why would they feel the need to use the appointment of Emanuel, which has nothing to do with the fact that he has some Israeli background, to prove that Obama’s a friend.

2. People tend to think that Emanuel’s Israeli roots mean that he will be “friendly” to Israel. That’s nonsense. Emanuel, no doubt, wants Israel to survive and to thrive, but as an American official he can still be rather annoying for an Israeli government - as he has been in the past.

Read it all..