camp david: spurning divine gifts…

Camp David Peace Accords. Almost all concessions were unnecessary. Begin could have walked away with a treaty without making any substantial concessions. Is this mere conjecture? Not at all, because on one of the most sensitive points of the negotiations, Begin stood his ground, and Sadat conceded. Sadat had demanded that Begin make concessions with regard to Jerusalem. On this point Begin stood firm and said, “No.”

Whatever else, Jerusalem has sentimental value to the Arabs. A pledge from Begin on an altered status for Jerusalem would have been very flattering to Sadat’s image. But when Begin stood firm, the matter was erased from the agenda.

---I half-expected–though I knew by now this was crazy–that they’d come out with submachine guns, shooting.  I must have been thinking of the opening of the Martian cylinder in H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds. Instead Sadat came out, smiling, waving.  As much at ease as if he’d been in his living room. A 21-gun salute went off.  An Israeli military band struck up the Egyptian national anthem.  (I read afterward that they’d had a rough time learning, in a few days, a tune they never thought they’d need to play.)  Sadat walked up and down the ranks of the Israeli honor guard, inspecting the polish of their buttons.  I assume he found it satisfactory. A Close Encounter of the Fifth Kind, so far unknown to UFOlogy.  This is a meeting, accompanied by verbal communication, between hostile aliens with a view to bridging their differences and understanding each other as fellow-citizens of the universe.  It’s a category I just invented.  (I call it “Fifth Kind” because the Fourth Kind is already used for UFO abductions.  Which are a very different matter.) The next day–Sunday, November 20–Sadat spoke to the Knesset in Jerusalem.  Again, I watched it on TV.  He began his address, Bismillahi ‘r-rahmani ‘r-raheem, “In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate,” the formula with which nearly every chapter of the Qur’an opens.---click image for source...

—I half-expected–though I knew by now this was crazy–that they’d come out with submachine guns, shooting. I must have been thinking of the opening of the Martian cylinder in H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds.
Instead Sadat came out, smiling, waving. As much at ease as if he’d been in his living room.
A 21-gun salute went off. An Israeli military band struck up the Egyptian national anthem. (I read afterward that they’d had a rough time learning, in a few days, a tune they never thought they’d need to play.) Sadat walked up and down the ranks of the Israeli honor guard, inspecting the polish of their buttons. I assume he found it satisfactory.
A Close Encounter of the Fifth Kind, so far unknown to UFOlogy. This is a meeting, accompanied by verbal communication, between hostile aliens with a view to bridging their differences and understanding each other as fellow-citizens of the universe. It’s a category I just invented. (I call it “Fifth Kind” because the Fourth Kind is already used for UFO abductions. Which are a very different matter.)
The next day–Sunday, November 20–Sadat spoke to the Knesset in Jerusalem. Again, I watched it on TV. He began his address, Bismillahi ‘r-rahmani ‘r-raheem, “In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate,” the formula with which nearly every chapter of the Qur’an opens.—click image for source…

The same motif could have been followed with regard to other matters. Sadat could have made demands, but Begin could have said “no.” If he had said “no” firmly, the American pressure that had been placed on him would have shifted to Sadat. And Sadat would have had to concede, for he had more to lose. Indeed, the whole approach by Israel, within the wider context of the idea of autonomy quickly morphed into an armed and belligerent Palestinian state that threatened the basic security of her Jewish inhabitants.

When Egypt violated the agreements putting far more military men in the Sinai than the treaty allowed, very few called for a halt to the Israeli implementation of the remaining clauses, or the outright shredding of the accords in their entirety. The basic question always unanswered is; “Why continue withdrawing from land when the Egyptians are not maintaining their commitments?” “why the stubbornness on the part of the Israelis to observe every minor detail of the agreement, when the Arabs, those who have benefited most from it, violate the few restrictions which they undertook to honor?”

---Daniel Gordis:until the Palestinian Terror War (mistakenly called the second intifada) – that is. Those four years destroyed the Israeli political Left because they washed away any illusions Israelis might have had that the Palestinian leadership was interested in a deal. And, to be fair, why should the Palestinians be interested in a deal? Their position gets stronger with each passing year. No longer pariahs, they are now the darlings of the international community. They have seen the world shift from denying the existence of a Palestinian people to giving them observer status at the UN. If you were the leader of the Palestinian Authority, would you make a deal now? Of course not. With the terms bound to get sweeter in years to come, only a fool would sign now. Our enemies are not fools. But they are consistent. Hamas’s Mahmoud al- Zahar, in a much-quoted statement, said last year that the Jews have no place among the nations of the world and are headed for annihilation. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared to Egyptian TV that he would never, in a thousand years, recognize a Jewish state....click image for source...

—Daniel Gordis:until the Palestinian Terror War (mistakenly called the second intifada) – that is. Those four years destroyed the Israeli political Left because they washed away any illusions Israelis might have had that the Palestinian leadership was interested in a deal. And, to be fair, why should the Palestinians be interested in a deal? Their position gets stronger with each passing year. No longer pariahs, they are now the darlings of the international community. They have seen the world shift from denying the existence of a Palestinian people to giving them observer status at the UN. If you were the leader of the Palestinian Authority, would you make a deal now? Of course not. With the terms bound to get sweeter in years to come, only a fool would sign now.
Our enemies are not fools. But they are consistent. Hamas’s Mahmoud al- Zahar, in a much-quoted statement, said last year that the Jews have no place among the nations of the world and are headed for annihilation. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared to Egyptian TV that he would never, in a thousand years, recognize a Jewish state….click image for source…

At the bottom of all these monkey-shines is a fundamental argument that must be dealt with. At the bottom of all the Arab rhetoric lies one basic claim: You are intruders who stole our land. Once it is established that the Jews have a valid right to the Land of Israel, then the violence, hatred, and disregard for life that has characterized the Arab position can be judged for what it is. Unfortunately, once validity is granted to the Arab goal, the debate whether all means are acceptable to attain it or not, moral relativity, becomes one of philosophy, and in the case here the dark sides of Kant and Heidegger.

From the Biblical claim, the perspective of God’s gift to the Jews, the entire Land of Israel, every tiny portion of the land is part of an organic whole, an indivisible and sanctified unity. This explanation is moreover, the only rationale that cannot be efuted by the Arabs or the United States. The connection is rooted in the Bible’s prophecies and not on Mandates, Balfour Declarations, UN resolutions, etc. Is it proper to spurn a Divine gift? ( to be continued)…

This entry was posted in Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>