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One can conclude that what happened in Paris is either a work place incident or an act of Jihadist Terrorism. You decide!
What ever the decision, one thing is evident. The French have only themselves to blame becauthey allowed radical Muslim thinking to infect their nation, they have done little to integrate Muslims into their society and France allowed far too many more to become citizens in the face of obvious threats to their Republic as well as world peace!
(Many years ago the French Amb. to England referred to Israel, at a fancy diplomatic dinner, 'as that shitty little country.' When word got out he was relieved of his post.
At the time he made this remark I thought he should have been talking about his own country. I have not changed my view.)
[I served almost two years in France, and my oldest daughter was born at La Chapelle St Mesmin Hospital. During WW 2 it had been the regional Gestapo Headquarters and prior to that had been a Catholic Convent. The American Army converted it to a hospital, The irony of a Jewish baby being born in a former Gestapo Headquarter has never left me.
I enjoyed my service and came to love the French villagers. It was at a time when Communism and The Communist Party were very strong in France and most particularly in our village of Meung Sur Loire, They were a harmless lot and I paid little attention to their nonsense.
That said, my impression of France was that it was a nation incapable of defending itself because they preferred their wine, food and sex. At the time Parisians still were haughty and aloof. De Gaulle remained an arrogant headache.
I find nothing particularly redeeming about France, beyond their food and wine. They remain anti-Semitic, superior in their attitude and a rather pitiful lot when it comes to having common sense. They are still volatile and remain captives of their former glorious history..
They are hard workers and do know how to enjoy life though they cannot afford the life they live and the one to which they aspire.
America's increasing dependent population suggests we are heading in France's direction and that is disturbing.] (See 1 and 1a below.)
Obama is far more sympathetic because his own parental roots were from a Muslim background and all Obama's contrary protests are not supported by his actions. Wanting to try terrorists in our court system, wanting to close Gitmo and characterizing terrorists as misguided beings are symptomatic of confused and ambivalent thinking at the very least.
Comparably, who can possibly and sincerely believe Mayor de Blasio, truly feels empathy for his police when he stirred up the mess he helped create with his inflammatory encouragement of protests against false police biases.
In all three instances, France, Obama and de Blasio, you reap what you sow.
We are at war and will be for decades, if not centuries, because maggots are hard to kill. The appeal of ideological driven sick minded terrorists finds appeal among a wide circle of the world's disturbed, the fanatical and socially disenfranchised.
It may be important technically from an investigatory and preventative basis to determine whether perpetrators of heinous anti-social acts are loners or members of a group but in the long run it is critical that we realize we are at war and we must rise to the occasion and strike with an iron fist or succumb to random events which will ultimately erode our treasured freedoms and way of life.
The risk is always in order to defeat them you become more like them.
I suspect for America we will have to wait another two years before a rational ,realistic, effective and a suitably co-ordinated approach is crafted because Obama and America are served mostly by incompetents whom he selected, continues to have faith in and many are of Muslim backgrounds themselves..
In the interim as I predicted, in a previous memo, 'work place incidents ne terrorism' will come to our shores. It is only a matter of time. Stay tuned and be alert.
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Snow in Jerusalem and other matters! (See 2 below.)
Time Israel began to lay hard ball. (See 2a below.)
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A recent Pew Report reveals 10% of Jewish support of Democrats no longer there and now the middle class may be drifting away from Democrats.
Once unraveling begins it can develop quickly. How do you get toothpaste back in the tube! (See 3 below.)
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My friend, John Podhoretz, writes about the Paris occurrence that radical liberals tend to dismiss and/or ignore as being nothing more than misguided 'pranks.'.(See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1) Paris attack shows France’s appeasement of Palestinians and Islamists failed
By Stephen M. Flatow/JNS.org
Less than three months ago, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry claimed that there was a link between Islamist terrorism and frustration over the Palestinian issue. Yet despite vigorous recent attempts by the French to champion the Palestinian cause, Islamist terrorists have just struck in Paris, killing 12 people at the offices of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. Where did Kerry’s theory go wrong?
At an Oct. 18, 2014 State Department event celebrating the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, Kerry presented his linkage theory. Discussing the phenomenon of young Muslims flocking to the ranks of Islamist terror groups such as the Islamic State, Kerry said that the issue of “Israel and the Palestinians” is “a cause of recruitment and of street anger and agitation” among Muslims worldwide.
If Kerry were correct, then one would expect the Islamist extremist groups to refrain from harming those who embrace the Palestinian cause. And France certainly has been at the forefront of pro-Palestinian activism, especially in recent weeks.
On Dec. 2, the French parliament voted overwhelmingly to demand that the French government immediately recognize the “State of Palestine.” Not after negotiations. Not with Israel’s agreement. Just do it right away, whether the Israelis like it or not. And the vote wasn’t even close—339 in favor, 151 against.
Four weeks later, the Palestinian Authority presented a resolution to the United Nations Security Council, setting a timetable for Israel to unilaterally withdraw from all of Judea, Samaria, and most of Jerusalem. That is, back to the pre-1967 armistice lines that Abba Eban said would make Israel so vulnerable that it would set the stage for another Holocaust.
That position is so extreme that even the Obama administration, which has not exactly been Israel’s warmest friend, opposed the resolution. Yet France joined with those stalwarts of reason and democracy, China and Russia, to support the resolution. France’s ambassador to the United Nations, explaining his country’s vote in favor of the resolution, said there was “an urgent need to act.”
One would think—if one subscribed to the Kerry Linkage Theory—that Islamist extremists would have appreciated France’s sense of “urgency” regarding the Palestinian issue. But evidently not.
In the meantime, there was more pro-Palestinian news from France. The city council of Aubervilliers, which is a suburb of Paris, voted to grant honorary citizenship to Marwan Barghouti, a Palestinian terrorist leader who is currently service five consecutive sentences of life imprisonment for carrying out a series of terrorist attacks in Israel.
Not many Americans have heard of Aubervilliers, but those who are familiar with the history of World War II may know the name of the city's most famous and longest-serving mayor: Pierre Laval. His 19 years as the leader of Aubervilliers was interrupted when he was called to national service—as the head of Vichy France and chief collaborator with Adolf Hitler. It was under Laval that more than 77,000 Jews were deported from France to Auschwitz and other death camps.
But why dredge up old history, when there are fresh victims to memorialize? One of the attacks that Barghouti masterminded consisted of gunning down a Greek Orthodox monk. Another was a shooting and stabbing attack on a Tel Aviv restaurant, in which three Israelis were murdered and 31 wounded.
France’s national government was not responsible for the decision of Aubervilliers to honor a mass murderer. But when combined with the French parliament’s vote on Palestinian statehood, and the French government’s vote at the U.N., one would think that this French bear-hug of the Palestinians would impress the Islamists. The massacre of journalists in Paris by killers shouting the jihadist call of “Allahu Akhbar” indicates that perhaps the linkage that Kerry imagines is nothing more than that—imaginary.
Appeasement of terrorists never works. Endorsing terrorists’ political demands—such as Palestinian statehood—never satisfies them. And blaming Israel for the rise of terrorist groups is an outrageous theory that has been repeatedly discredited by real-world events.
Stephen M. Flatow, an attorney in New Jersey, is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in a Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is a candidate on the Religious Zionist slate (www.VoteTorah.org) in the World Zionist Congress elections.
1a) France’s Multiculturalist Agenda Makes Jews Pack
A Worthless Country and Society!
As more French Jews face anti-Semitic attacks, many are leaving for Israel. Most of the attacks have come from Muslims, whether immigrants or French-born, many of whom have not assimilated into French society – if not rejecting French society entirely. Compounding the dangerous situation, France’s left-wing government refuses to acknowledge the scope of this crisis, apparently more afraid of losing Muslim votes they depend on than in defending France’s half-million Jews.
It’s more accurate to say that French Jews are fleeing France rather than just moving to Israel. The failure of multiculturalism and the inability of many Muslim immigrants to assimilate into French society have promoted intolerance
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2) The weather and other matters
2a)Are Palestinian Offensives Inviting Israeli Reprisals?
In response to Palestinian Authority [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas's latest diplomatic offensive at the United Nations and the International Criminal Court [ICC], Israel's security cabinet is to meet this week to decide on possible measures to take.
In some of the earlier incidents, the impact on the PA was ameliorated by bridge loans from Arab banks and international donors, as described in anInternational Monetary Fund study of Israeli clearance transfers. In recent years, however, Arab banks have been less willing to increase their exposure for the purpose of paying Palestinian salaries. International bailouts from donor governments have also become more difficult to obtain. Without bridge loans and emergency aid, the PA has been forced to suspend salary payments to many of its 150,000 employees, leading some of those workers to default on their own debt obligations. The PA even had to sell some government assets to meet payment obligations.
But most of the leading thinkers in Israel do not find these threats to dismantle the PA credible. Collapse of the PA would have drastic effects on Fatah's own core constituency. According to theInternational Monetary Fund, nearly a quarter of all Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza are employed in the public sector, including education, health, police, and other sectors. Total public employment (PA and local governments) amounted to about 192,000 in mid-2012. Unemployment in the West Bank is already almost 20%, so half the workforce would be without salaries. Public safety, education, sanitation, medical care, and other services would be severely disrupted.
3)Have Liberals Lost the Middle Class?
Republicans often had trouble selling the argument that an unleashed economy and new technology would relegate poverty to a relative, not absolute, condition — something like suffering with a cheap, outdated iPhone 4 while the better-off could afford an iPhone 6.
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Stephen M. Flatow, an attorney in New Jersey, is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in a Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is a candidate on the Religious Zionist slate (www.VoteTorah.org) in the World Zionist Congress elections.
1a) France’s Multiculturalist Agenda Makes Jews Pack
A Worthless Country and Society!
As more French Jews face anti-Semitic attacks, many are leaving for Israel. Most of the attacks have come from Muslims, whether immigrants or French-born, many of whom have not assimilated into French society – if not rejecting French society entirely. Compounding the dangerous situation, France’s left-wing government refuses to acknowledge the scope of this crisis, apparently more afraid of losing Muslim votes they depend on than in defending France’s half-million Jews.
Israel’s Ministry of Immigrant Absorption is expecting “Little Paris” neighborhoods to pop up all over Tel Aviv, Netanya, and Jerusalem. According to the Jewish Agency, French Jews have become the number-one immigrant group to Israel. In 2014, more than 7,000 French Jews emigrated, twice the number from 2013. Israeli Minister of Immigrant Absorption Sofa Landver said she expects about 10,000 new French immigrants next year.
That’s an astounding 20,000 French Jews moving to Israel, or four percent of that community emigrating in just three years.
Further, a poll conducted the Paris-based Siona organization of Sephardic French Jews found that 74 percent of the 3,833 respondents are considering leaving France.
It’s more accurate to say that French Jews are fleeing France rather than just moving to Israel. The failure of multiculturalism and the inability of many Muslim immigrants to assimilate into French society have promoted intolerance
As more French Jews face anti-Semitic attacks, many are leaving for Israel. Most of the attacks have come from Muslims, whether immigrants or French-born, many of whom have not assimilated into French society – if not rejecting French society entirely. Compounding the dangerous situation, France’s left-wing government refuses to acknowledge the scope of this crisis, apparently more afraid of losing Muslim votes they depend on than in defending France’s half-million Jews.
Israel’s Ministry of Immigrant Absorption is expecting “Little Paris” neighborhoods to pop up all over Tel Aviv, Netanya, and Jerusalem. According to the Jewish Agency, French Jews havebecome the number-one immigrant group to Israel. In 2014, more than 7,000 French Jews emigrated, twice the number from 2013. Israeli Minister of Immigrant Absorption Sofa Landver saidshe expects about 10,000 new French immigrants next year.
That’s an astounding 20,000 French Jews moving to Israel, or four percent of that community emigrating in just three years.
Further, a poll conducted the Paris-based Siona organization of Sephardic French Jews found that 74 percent of the 3,833 respondents are considering leaving France.
It’s more accurate to say that French Jews are fleeing France rather than just moving to Israel. The failure of multiculturalism and the inability of many Muslim immigrants to assimilate into French society have promoted intolerance
2) The weather and other matters
Snow in JerusalemIn Israel we greeted the New Year with cautious optimism. In March we are due to elect a new government. So far the political analysts are reluctant to predict the outcome of the Knesset elections beyond detecting a growth in support for the right wing parties. However, when it comes to voting for a government Israelis are often fickle and unpredictable.This week politics took second place to the weather as the country went into hibernation mode in preparation for a fierce winter storm that brought strong winds, rain and a token amount of snow in some places. We have been so engrossed with the weather that the crisis in our relations with the Palestinian Authority failed to arouse real interest among rank and file Israelis..A few days before Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas appealed by proxy ( through Jordan) to the Security Council requesting a resolution ordering Israel to end the occupation within two years, a lead article in The Economist called it “Another Gambit.” Reviewing Abbas’ erratic policy moves the author said, “Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, has a habit of lurching from one supposedly game changing initiative to another, then flinching in the face of resistance. After this summer’s war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza Mr. Abbas threatened to join the International Criminal Court and have Israel indicted for war crimes, but then balked. Last week he threatened to cut security coordination with Israel when a Palestinian minister died following a scuffle with Israel’s troops near Ramallah—and promptly backtracked.” … “Palestinians have good reason to ask if Abbas’ latest gambit will be pursued with real vigour.”.. Viewing the international scene The Economist argued,” Regional and Western powers seem preoccupied by matters other than Palestine, not least the war against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. At home Mr Abbas’ own allies are tiring of his diplomatic manoeuvring, which never seems to come to fruition.”Nevertheless, the Palestinian initiative placed the US in an awkward predicament…” The Americans,” said The Economist, “seem torn. They are loth to use their veto to defend an Israeli leader that President Barack Obama regards as obstructive. Equally, they worry that Israelis will interpret an American decision to withhold their veto as meddling in their election in March.” As we know the Palestinian draft resolution failed to gain the required majority in the Security Council. The Economist quoted a number of perplexed Palestinian officials who failed to understand the gambit.” If Mahmoud Abbas really wanted to push a vote through would he not wait until January when more receptive members at the Security Council take up their seats?”They asked.
Less than 24 hours after the Palestinian Authority failed to bring about a UN vote to end the Israeli occupation, President Mahmoud Abbas made good on his promise of a different approach - joining the International Criminal Court, and threatening Israel with charges of war crimes."We want to complain. There's aggression against us, against our land," said Abbas."The Security Council disappointed us."U.S. diplomat Dennis Ross has clocked up many negotiating hours in the Middle East, most of them frustrating and non productive. After Mahmoud Abbas’ Security Council appeal and following his decision to join the International Criminal Court Dennis Ross surveyed Abbas’ puzzling reactions to peace initiatives in an article he published in the New York Times. "Since 2000, there have been three serious negotiations that culminated in offers to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Bill Clinton's parameters in 2000, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's offer in 2008, and Secretary of State John Kerry's efforts last year. In each case, a proposal on all the core issues was made to Palestinian leaders and the answer was either "no" or no response. They determined that the cost of saying "yes," or even of making a counteroffer that required concessions, was too high.
Palestinian political culture is rooted in a narrative of injustice; its anti-colonialist bent and its deep sense of grievance treats concessions to Israel as illegitimate. Compromise is portrayed as betrayal, and negotiations -- which are by definition about mutual concessions -- will inevitably force any Palestinian leader to challenge his people by making a politically costly decision.” Ross goes on to explain how the Security Council ploy does not contradict the traditional Palestinian policy.
“But going to the United Nations does no such thing. It puts pressure on Israel and requires nothing of the Palestinians. Resolutions are typically about what Israel must do and what Palestinians should get. If saying yes is costly and doing nothing isn't, why should we expect the Palestinians to change course?
That's why European leaders who fervently support Palestinian statehood must focus on how to raise the cost of saying no or not acting at all when there is an offer on the table. Palestinians care deeply about international support for their cause. If they knew they would be held accountable for being nonresponsive or rejecting a fair offer or resolution, it could well change their calculus.
Unfortunately, most Europeans are focused far more on Israeli behavior and want, at a minimum, to see Israel's continuing settlement policy change.But turning to the United Nations or the International Criminal Court during an Israeli election is counterproductive. It will be seen in Israel as a one-sided approach, and it will strengthen politicians who prefer the status quo. These candidates will argue that the deck is stacked against Israel and that the country needs leaders who will stand firm against unfair pressure.”Apparently Abbas didn’t take the Israeli elections into consideration, or maybe, as some observers have suggested, he really wants Netanyahu to be reelected.
Ross poses a question Abbas should have asked himself- “Why not wait? If a new Israeli government after the elections is prepared to take a peace initiative and build settlements only on land that is likely to be part of Israel and not part of Palestine, there will be no need for a United Nations resolution.”
Ross added a rider, “If not, and the Europeans decide to pursue one, it must be balanced. It cannot simply address Palestinian needs by offering borders based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps and a capital in Arab East Jerusalem without offering something equally specific to Israel -- namely, security arrangements that leave Israel able to defend itself by itself, phased withdrawal tied to the Palestinian Authority's performance on security and governance, and a resolution of the Palestinian refugee issue that allows Israel to retain its Jewish character.” However Dennis Ross and everyone who has followed the convoluted history of Palestinian-Israeli peace negotiations knows the answer -
“In all likelihood the Palestinians would reject such a resolution. Accepting it would require compromises that they refused in 2000, 2008 and 2014. There is, of course, no guarantee that the next Israeli government would accept such a resolution. But the Israelis are not the ones pushing for United Nations involvement. The Palestinians are. And if their approach is neither about two states nor peace, there ought to be a price for that.
Peace requires accountability on both sides. It's fair to ask the Israelis to accept the basic elements that make peace possible -- 1967 lines as well as land swaps and settlement building limited to the blocks. But isn't it time to demand the equivalent from the Palestinians on two states for two peoples, and on Israeli security? Isn't it time to ask the Palestinians to respond to proposals and accept resolutions that address Israeli needs and not just their own?”
Journalist Peter Beinart took Dennis Ross to task over the New York Times article in a response he posted in Haaretz – “What David BenGurion could teach Dennis Ross about Israel, the Palestinians and the ICC.”
I thought Beinart engaged in too much nitpicking, especially with regard to the Times editor’s need to demand evidence for the claims made in the article. Although Beinart doesn’t completely exonerate Abbas he tries to refute almost every point in Ross’ NYT op-ed. Washington Institute Middle East affairs analyst David Makovsky examined the possible consequences of Mahmoud Abbas’ signing of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) - “Although the prospect of the ICC actually prosecuting Israeli officials is uncertain at best, the PA has torpedoed any chances for near-term diplomacy merely by opening that door, and perhaps invited U.S. financial countermeasures as well.”
Makovsky argues further,” Beyond the financial realm, groups sympathetic to Israel can be expected to file counterclaims against Abbas in U.S. courtrooms for attacks against Israeli civilians or for the PA's relationship with Hamas, a designated terrorist organization. Yet it is far from certain that Israel would file a countersuit against Abbas at the ICC at the very time it is arguing that the court has no jurisdiction over the West Bank and Gaza.”
The Israeli government took the first step after Abbas signed the statute by announcing that it is withholding about $150 million in Palestinian tax revenues. Israel has repeatedly warned the PA that any move toward the ICC would be met with financial sanctions and possibly increased settlement activity in sensitive areas. The U.S. Congress could decide to follow suit by withholding its $400 million in annual aid to the Palestinians.
If Abbas goes through with the ICC’s accession process nothing will happen before March or April. Makovsky points out additional doubts, ”Yet it is uncertain if the ICC even wants to wade into the murky waters of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. The court has felt under attack recently, with its case against Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta collapsing within the past month. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is renowned for its endurance, highly charged character, and complexity; for example, if the ICC investigated West Bank settlements, would it be willing to take a position and draw borders between Israel and a Palestinian state? And would those boundaries include east Jerusalem?” He notes that the ICC has been careful to take on very few cases, and despite being in existence for over a decade, it has secured only two convictions, both against Congolese warlords of no significant state position. Each case took between six and seven years. Additionally, the court previously rejected taking on the 2011 Gaza flotilla case involving Turkey, stating that the number of fatalities was too few.
Admittedly, some thirty-three other ICC cases are at different stages of investigation, but these preliminary inquiries often take years before the lengthy trials even begin.”
Our meteorologists are predicting a stormy weekend, so I doubt if we will going anywhere.
2a)Are Palestinian Offensives Inviting Israeli Reprisals?
by Steven J. Rosen
The Gatestone Institute
The Gatestone Institute
In response to Palestinian Authority [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas's latest diplomatic offensive at the United Nations and the International Criminal Court [ICC], Israel's security cabinet is to meet this week to decide on possible measures to take.
Israel has floated a number of possible countermeasures. It seems to be considering, among other legal actions, lawsuits against Hamas and the PA for war crimes that they have committed.
The United States, for its part, has threatened to withhold funding from the PA; and Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC) threatened to withhold US funding from the UN if it attempts to impose the terms of a Palestinian statehood.
Israel's Foreign Ministry Director-General Nissim Ben-Sheetrit stated on January 4, 2015 that, "Israel is about to switch from defense to attack mode." He added that Israel had no interest in undermining security cooperation with the PA or causing it to collapse, or in launching a wave of settlement construction. He did, however, mention possible economic actions stronger than freezing Palestinian tax revenues.
In this game of asymmetric diplomatic warfare, the Palestinians can count on nearly automatic support from the 22 members of the Arab League and the 57 members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, as well as most of the rest of the developing nations, while the Jewish state is nearly alone.
The balance of power in the United States Congress, however, goes the other way. Thanks to strong public support for Israel, friends of Israel constitute a clear bipartisan majority in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. The Palestinian campaign at the U.N. could trigger a cutoff of U.S. aid to the PA of $400 million per year.
To counter the Palestinians' recent diplomatic offenses, Israel has at its disposal, apart from diplomatic or legal measures, an array of economic responses, should it feel driven to use them. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on April 6, "Unilateral actions from the Palestinians will be answered with unilateral actions from our side." That economic impact to the PA could be many times greater than a U.S. cutoff of aid.
Clearance Transfers and PA Revenue
To begin with, if it wished, Israel has the ability to withhold "Clearance Transfers." These consist of more than two-thirds of PA revenues.
Under the 1994 Paris Protocol, adopted as one of the Oslo Accords, Israel collects customs taxes on goods shipped to the Palestinian areas, the Value Added Tax [VAT] for goods and services sold in Israel and intended for PA consumption, and petroleum excises, as well as small amounts of income tax from PA residents working in Israel. Under the agreement, these clearance revenues are transferred monthly directly from Israel to the PA Finance Ministry, and are the PA's largest source of funds.
| Israeli Clearance Transfers Are 2/3 of PA Revenues (millions of shekels) | |||
| Year | Net Revenues | Clearance Revenues | Israel Transfers % Net Revenue |
| 2006 | 1,149 | 770 | 67% |
| 2007 | 1,194 | 896 | 75% |
| 2008 | 1,486 | 1,067 | 72% |
| 2009 | 1,665 | 1,196 | 72% |
| 2010 | 1,883 | 1.258 | 67% |
| 2011 | 2,046 | 1,424 | 70% |
| 2012 | 2,072 | 1,457 | 70% |
| 2013 | 2,312 | 1,818 | 79% |
| 2014 (proj) | 2,592 | 1,841 | 71% |
| Sources: IMF annual reports, "West Bank and Gaza: Report on Macroeconomic Developments and Outlook," Table on "West Bank and Gaza: Central Government Fiscal Operations" | |||
In normal times, the government of Israel works to increase these clearance transfers to stimulate the Palestinian economy, not to reduce them. On July 31, 2012, Israel agreed to expanded arrangements regarding taxation and the transfer of goods between Israel and the PA, for the purpose of increasing the PA's revenue. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "The arrangements that have been formulated constitute part of our declared policy of supporting Palestinian society and strengthening its economy."
PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad responded, "I am certain that the arrangements concluded will help to strengthen the economic base of the Palestinian Authority... I am pleased to say that these arrangements will also improve the economic relations between the Palestinian Authority and Israel. I wish to convey my appreciation and gratitude to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu..."
The PA Prime Minister who uttered those words, however, was dismissed by PA President Mahmoud Abbas less than a year later, as part of Abbas' shift to a more confrontational strategy. Today, the PA is on the path to confrontation, not cooperation.
Israel is not willing to have a one-sided relationship in which it tries to help the PA while the PA crusades against Israel at the U.N. and allies with Hamas to harm Israel. While it does not wish to harm the Palestinian economy, on eight occasions since 1994, Israel has suspended transfers of clearance revenues in response to Palestinian threats:
- Summer of 1997, in response to a rise in terrorist activity in the West Bank and Gaza.
- December 2000 to December 2002, in response to the outbreak of the second intifada in September 2000.
- March 2006 to July 2007, when Hamas's victory in Palestinian legislative elections gave it control of the Palestinian Authority.
- 2008, to protest Palestinian diplomatic efforts to turn European governments against Israel at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.
- May 2011, in response to Palestinian efforts to seek diplomatic recognition at the U.N.
- December 2012 to January 2013, in response the PA's successful bid for nonmember observer status at the U.N.
- April 10, 2014, in response to PA applications to join U.N. agencies as a state.
- On January 2, 2015, the government of Israel decided once again to withhold the December 2014 clearance transfer of $127 million, in response to the PA's hostile activity at the International Criminal Court.
In some of the earlier incidents, the impact on the PA was ameliorated by bridge loans from Arab banks and international donors, as described in anInternational Monetary Fund study of Israeli clearance transfers. In recent years, however, Arab banks have been less willing to increase their exposure for the purpose of paying Palestinian salaries. International bailouts from donor governments have also become more difficult to obtain. Without bridge loans and emergency aid, the PA has been forced to suspend salary payments to many of its 150,000 employees, leading some of those workers to default on their own debt obligations. The PA even had to sell some government assets to meet payment obligations.
Israel's direct leverage through clearance transfers has grown considerably in recent years, particularly compared to budget aid provided to the PA by international donors. Until 2009, donor support exceeded the Israeli clearance transfers, but in more recent years Israeli transfers amount to nearly twice the budget support the PA receives from international donors. In 2014, U.S. direct aid to the PA was $400 million, and other donors gave another $900 million. But Israel clearance transfers were $1.8 billion, giving it a greater role than all other outside parties.
| Israeli Clearance Transfers Are Larger than Foreign Aid to the Palestinian Authority Millions of shekels | |||
| Year | Clearance Aid to PA | Foreign Budget to Foreign Aid | Israel Transfers Compared |
| 2006 | 770 | 1,022 | 75% |
| 2007 | 896 | 1,012 | 89% |
| 2008 | 1,067 | 1,736 | 61% |
| 2009 | 1,196 | 1,348 | 89% |
| 2010 | 1.258 | 1,145 | 110% |
| 2011 | 1,424 | 762 | 187% |
| 2012 | 1,457 | 826 | 176% |
| 2013 | 1,818 | 1,251 | 145% |
| 2014 (proj) | 1,841 | 1,310 | 141% |
| Sources: IMF annual reports, "West Bank and Gaza: Report on Macroeconomic Developments and Outlook," Table on "West Bank and Gaza: Central Government Fiscal Operations"; Congressional Research Service, "U.S. Foreign Aid to the Palestinians," July 3, 2014, Figure 1, p. 7, "International Budget Support for the Palestinian Authority." | |||
Palestinian Guest Workers in Israel
Another potential pressure point under Israeli control is the number of citizens of the PA permitted to work in Israel and the settlements. In normal times, Israel welcomes
Palestinian workers. But in periods of conflict and confrontation, into which Mahmoud Abbas is now headed, the entry of Palestinian workers may need to be restricted for security reasons.
Between a fifth and a third of West Bank Palestinian employment is in Israel. Average wages for Palestinian workers in Israel are double those in the West Bank and triple those in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Finance. Remittances from these workers back to the PA economy play a key role in offsetting the imbalance of external trade in goods and services. The impact on the Palestinian economy comprises about 15% of the PA's GDP.
Palestinian workers contribute to the Israeli economy too. But there are security risks for Israel in admitting large numbers in times of tension. At the height of the Camp David peace negotiations, the number of Palestinians working in Israel and the settlements reached a high of 127,000, but during the Second Intifada, which began in late September 2000 and ended around 2005, restrictions cut that number by more than 60%. In June of 2004, as part of then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan, the Israeli government decided "to reduce the number of Palestinian workers entering Israel, to the point that it ceases completely."
However, since 2005, contrary to that decision, the government of Israel has permitted the number of Palestinians working in Israel and the settlements to rise more again more than 100%, back over 100,000.
| Remittances of PA Citizens Working in Israel | ||
| Year | Thousands of PA Citizens Employed in Israel and Settlements | Estimated Remittances to PA |
| 1999 | 127,000 | 1,740 |
| 2000 | 116,000 | 1,589 |
| 2001 | 70,000 | 959 |
| 2002 | 49,000 | 671 |
| 2003 | 54,000 | 739 |
| 2004 | 50,000 | 685 |
| 2005 | 64,000 | 877 |
| 2012 | 80,000 | 1,096 |
| 2013 | 89,000 | 1,219 |
| 2014 | 109,000 | 1,493 |
| Employment figures compiled from various reports by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. Remittances in constant 2012 dollars from PA citizens working in Israel projected from State of Palestine Ministry of Finance, Macro-Fiscal Unit, 03/03/2013, Fiscal Developments & Macroeconomic Performance: Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2012, which estimated Palestinian workers remittances from work in Israel at "about $ 1.1 billion... for 2012." In 2005, the World Bank estimated that "An additional 10,000 workers [in Israel and settlements] would add approximately U.S.$120 million to the Palestinian economy." "The Palestinian Economy and Prospects for Its Recovery, Economic Monitoring Report to the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee", No. 1, December 2005, p. 16. | ||
Israel can also influence the PA through import and export controls. In 2013, 87.9% of total PA exports and 63.9% of total imports were to or from Israel, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Finance.
Constraints on Israeli Leverage
Israel's economy, with a 2014 GDP of nearly $300 billion, dwarfs its Palestinian neighbor, whose GDP is estimated at less than $10 billion. This enormous asymmetry gives Israel even more leverage in many areas of Palestinian economic life than the United States and the other international donors to the PA possess.
But Israel also has a stake in the economic success of the PA, as it constantly emphasizes in its annual reports to the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee of foreign donors, boasting of "Measures Taken by Israel in Support of Development of the Palestinian Economy." The Israeli security establishment believes that impeding the Palestinian economy, or undermining the ability of the PA to maintain public services and keep order, is not in Israel's interest. Israel's international allies, especially the United States and the European Union, often urge caution in using Israeli economic pressure against the frail Palestinian economy and government. Israel's Coordinator of Government Activity in the Territories [COGAT], an official of the Ministry of Defense, responsible for maintaining order in the territories, also act as an internal lobby for support to the PA.
There have even been occasions when the government of Israel chose to make accelerated clearance transfer advances to the PA to relieve budgetary distress, in effect lending money to the PA Israel also tolerates some arrearages in Palestinian payments to the government-owned Israel Electric Corporation and the Mekorot Water Company, although it cannot tolerate payment delays that stretch over years.
Economic sanctions against the PA risk undermining stability in the West Bank, and need to be used with great caution. What Israel is trying to achieve is to apply just enough pressure to change the behavior of the PA, but not so much as to bring about its collapse or failure.
Abbas's Threats to Dismantle the PA
PA President Mahmoud Abbas is well aware of Israel's economic leverage. But he seems to believe that he can block the Israeli counterattack with the threat of dismantling the PA and leaving Israel to pick up the pieces. Abbas told Haaretz in December 2012, "I will take the phone and call Netanyahu. I'll tell him, 'my dear friend, Mr. Netanyahu, I am inviting you to the Muqata [the PA presidential headquarters in Ramallah]. Sit in the chair here instead of me, take the keys, and you will be responsible for the Palestinian Authority." In April 2014, Maariv quoted Abbas as threatening to disband the PA. "I don't need Netanyahu. ... Give me a junior [Israeli] officer or even a lieutenant and I will deliver the PA keys to him. Here you are, take charge and I will leave in an hour."
According to a November 2014 report in the newspaper Al-Quds, "President Mahmoud Abbas told the German Foreign Minister: 'Let [the Israelis] take the keys and manage the occupied Palestinian territories'." In response to Israel's January 2015 suspension of clearance transfers, Saeb Erekat, the former chief Palestinian negotiator in the peace negotiations with Israel, toldHaaretz, "Let Israel worry about paying the salaries and worry about the daily needs instead of the Palestinian Authority. The time has come for Israel to take responsibility for the occupation."
But most of the leading thinkers in Israel do not find these threats to dismantle the PA credible. Collapse of the PA would have drastic effects on Fatah's own core constituency. According to theInternational Monetary Fund, nearly a quarter of all Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza are employed in the public sector, including education, health, police, and other sectors. Total public employment (PA and local governments) amounted to about 192,000 in mid-2012. Unemployment in the West Bank is already almost 20%, so half the workforce would be without salaries. Public safety, education, sanitation, medical care, and other services would be severely disrupted.
Collapsing the PA would also undermine Abbas' own core objectives. How could the statehood initiative at the United Nations and the PA's offensive at the International Criminal Court proceed if "Palestine" was without a government? Building a state and removing its government are opposites.
Without a government, how would foreign aid be received? U.S. State Department spokesmanJen Psaki said on April 21, 2014, "That type of extreme step would obviously have grave implications. A great deal of effort has gone into building Palestinian institutions ... and it would certainly not be in the interests of the Palestinian people for all of that to be lost. The United States has put millions of dollars into this effort. It would obviously have very serious implications for our relationship, including our assistance going forward."
Rash action by Abbas would also open doors for his political rivals, who might be very happy to see the PA dismantled. Collapsing the PA would mean an end to security cooperation with Israel -- an act that would be suicide for Fatah. Chaos would open many opportunities for Hamas and other militant Islamic movements, with the PA's security forces in disarray. Mohammed Dahlan and other rivals inside Fatah could move to reconstruct the PA under their leadership.
Restraint by Both Sides
Collapsing the Palestinian Authority is not a rational choice for the Palestinian leadership. Nor is it wise for the PA to provoke Israel. Israel can take measures that will have much more immediate effect than anything the PA can do at the United Nations.
But Israel, too, faces risks in the game of asymmetric political and economic warfare. The rational choice for both parties is to end these tit-for-tat reprisals and return to the pursuit of common interests through cooperation.
Steven J. Rosen is a Senior Fellow at the Middle East Forum-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3)Have Liberals Lost the Middle Class?
Democrats for over a century were associated with the American middle class.
Working-class voters once believed that Democratic-inspired intervention into the economy — minimum-wage laws, overtime pay, Social Security, Medicare, workers’ compensation — protected their interests better than unfettered free-market capitalism.
Republicans often had trouble selling the argument that an unleashed economy and new technology would relegate poverty to a relative, not absolute, condition — something like suffering with a cheap, outdated iPhone 4 while the better-off could afford an iPhone 6.
Why, then, have Democrats lost the working class — especially white, lower-middle-class voters?
There are several obvious reasons.
For one, high-profile progressives are largely rich, and their relatively small numbers live in a gentrified cocoon. Politicians, academics, media personalities, celebrities, and other Democratic-aligned professionals had just the sort of academic brands or technological, linguistic, cultural, and service skills that were well-compensated during the transition to globalism.
Their out-of-touch privilege, however, led to agendas — radical green politics, hyper-feminism, transgender advocacy, forced multiculturalism, open borders — that were not principle concerns of the struggling working classes. A techie in Silicon Valley, an actor in Hollywood, a trial lawyer in Washington, or a professor at Yale had the income to afford the steeper taxes and higher housing, energy, and college costs that were the natural dividends of their own political agendas.
High-speed rail, expensive graduate degrees, and European-level gas prices are logical aims for elites. They insist that the planet is cooking, that cities are the sole generators of cultural advancement, and that tony academic stamps are proof of knowledge superior to the kind absorbed through religious instruction or pragmatic experience.
In the short term, liberal elites had little clue how the ramifications of their own unworkable ideology always fell on distant others. Before one can damn fracking, guns, traditional religion, and tract suburbia, one has to have a high income that allows for expensive energy, exorbitant college tuition, and $500-a-square-foot housing. Obamacare, with its higher average deductibles and premiums, is far more of a burden than a bargain for the working class.
Race proved a second Democratic Waterloo. The constant push for identity politics, open borders, expanded federal entitlements, and inflated government was based on the idea that an increasingly non-white America would soon swallow up the old European majority, and that would ensure a new Democratic century.
But class is always a more telling divide than race. In contemporary straitjacket Democratic orthodoxy, there is no concession that a white male mechanic could face more economic difficulty than a Latina journalist, African-American federal employee, or Asian dentist. Lockstep obedience to the mantras of diversity, affirmative action, and preferential hiring does not allow that race can be increasingly divorced from class.
Moreover, race is not always either absolute or easily definable.
Former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson has to emphasize that he is Latino. Otherwise, based on his name, appearance, and speech, he appears to be just another successful grandee of unknown lineage. Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren can cynically claim to be Native American — with all the perks that such lineage entails. Warren knew that no one is quite sure which particular racial percentage qualifies for special consideration or why, much less how racial heritage is authenticated.
To the working class, Democrats appeared to reward Americans not just on the basis of their race, but also on the assumption that some sections of the population have an easily identifiable racial pedigree, and that it has resulted in a proven need for reparations. In a multiracial America, that orthodoxy appears untenable — and unfair to those without claims to the correct genealogy or the money and privilege to navigate around such rules.
Finally, Democrats are now easily caricatured as both snobbish and condescending in the same way bluestocking Republicans used to be.
The hysteria over Sarah Palin’s gaffes in comparison to the more frequent lapses of Joe Biden was due to cultural bias. Palin was ridiculed as an ill-informed, working-class Alaskan mom. Good ol’ Biden earned a smile as an occasionally too candid East Coast liberal.
Snobbery’s twin is hypocrisy. For a liberal, when the poor waste money on $300 Air Jordans, such spending should not be criticized. But for the middle class to supposedly squander cash on a shotgun or Jet Ski is gauche. If an undocumented immigrant has seven children, it is not declared to be unwise family planning with the same disdain shown a Mormon blue-collar roofer with a comparably large family.
If Hillary Clinton, Al Sharpton, or the masters of Silicon Valley wish to talk about how growing inequality and the unfairness of American life demand more regulations and higher taxes, they should at least show some symbolic class solidarity by now and then flying commercial, eschewing limousines, and avoiding Martha’s Vineyard.
The new bifurcated Democratic party of rich and poor shows a sort of contempt for those who do not share the privileged tastes of the elites and can’t earn their easy sympathy by being dependent on liberal government largesse.
Democrats’ problem is that the working classes are large and know that they no longer fit into what liberalism has become.
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Wednesday’s unspeakable slaughter in Paris, with Islamic radicals mowing down the staff of the satirical magazine called “Charlie Hebdo” for daring to run cartoon depictions of Mohammed, points to a sea-change in the fight for Western culture against anti-Western barbarism.
Once the fight for free speech was conducted on the lofty terrain of high art. Now, perforce, it must be conducted on less exalted terrain — tasteless and sophomoric would-be humor.
And yet the fight is no less important, because the enemies of free expression today are adopting terrorist tactics to do battle with Western freedoms in an entirely novel and uniquely terrifying way.
There is some commonality between what happened in Paris and the cyberattack against Sony over Seth Rogen’s “The Interview.” The cartoons for which 12 people died in the offices of Charlie Hebdo are gleefully adolescent in their sensibility, just as “The Interview” is.
That sensibility is part of what was so enraging about the cartoons and the movie to those who sought to avenge them.
In the past, the great free-speech battles generally featured states acting against distinguished works of art they mischaracterized as worthless and immoral trash — Flaubert’s “Madame Bovary,” Joyce’s “Ulysses,” Nabokov’s “Lolita.”
Hitler conducted a war against what he called “degenerate art.” Stalin and his successors in the Soviet Union tormented, jailed, and killed the country’s greatest novelists, poets and thinkers.
In these cases, acts of state censorship sought to criminalize the production of art and thereby put these states in conflict with enlightened elite opinion makers who had independent cultural standing and power of their own.
So these weren’t mere battles for free expression; they were fights against provincialism and philistinism.
Not now. For a quarter century, the key free-speech battles in the West have mostly been over works that are almost literally sophomoric and often really are trash.
Hustler magazine’s disgusting pornographic depiction of Jerry Falwell in 1983 proved to be the vehicle by which the Supreme Court affirmed constitutional protections for parody in 1988.
In 1990, a US district court judge in Florida declared that the gross rap lyrics of the group 2Live Crew were works of obscenity and therefore undeserving of First Amendment protection.
This outrageous offense against free speech stood for a year and a half until the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned it.
Fighting for the right of rappers to talk about hos and for Larry Flynt to defame preachers just doesn’t have the same righteous quality as fighting for the publication of “Ulysses,” a novel many (wrongly) considered the greatest of the 20th century.
That also helps explain why the worldwide outrage that greeted Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1989 fatwa against Salman Rushdie upon the publication of “The Satanic Verses” wasn’t duplicated in 2005 when the Jyllands-Posten, a Danish newspaper, published 12 lame cartoons making fun of Mohammed.
The publication led to worldwide protests against the paper; the government of Denmark issued a milquetoast statement in response; most of the political opposition in that country criticized the government for not acting more forcefully against the newspaper.
That response was not just a failure to defend free speech. It was the craven acceptance of the notion that saying anything provocative about Islam was at best irresponsible since it would trigger demonstrations and protests — and that people who did so might in some sense have had it coming to them.
In 2004, in the Netherlands, the filmmaker Theo van Gogh was assassinated for making a movie called “Submission” that took on the mistreatment of women in Islamic countries.
After his killing, his co-writer, Dutch parliamentarian Ayaan Hirsi Ali, needed police protection; a judge revoked that protection; she came under attack in the Dutch media; she left for the United States.
Last year, Brandeis University shamefully revoked the honorary degree she was to have received due to protests by Islamic groups.
The problem here in the United States isn’t limited to craven academic hacks like Brandeis’ loathsome president, Fred Lawrence.
Back in 2012, it was startlingly easy for no less a Western personage than presidential press secretary Jay Carney to attack Charlie Hebdo from his White House podium for its “judgment” in producing “offensive” images even as he was offering pro-forma support for the right to free expression.
After all, these were just silly cartoons; why publish them at all if they were going to offend people?
The Obama administration’s cravenness in this regard, mirrored by the alacrity with which it sought to calm Islamist attacks in Egypt (and on our consulate in Benghazi) in 2012 by attacking a YouTube video called “Innocence of Muslims” and going after its shady maker, represents a low and shameful moment for the nation that invented the First Amendment.
The fantasy in which extremist fanatics and those who listen to them can be mollified by “balanced” appraisals like Carney’s, or by abject surrender on the part of the Fred Lawrences of the world, should have been shattered forever by the events in Paris yesterday.
But for far too many people in positions of power, it has proved dreadfully easy to remain lost in fantasy rather than to accept we are in an existential battle against the world’s most evil men.
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