Tuesday, September 29th, 2009

1. Goldstone Report Moves On - As noted in a previous blog entry, the Goldstone report is now being "debated" by that most impartial, transparent and virtuous of world bodies - the United Nations Human Rights Council. My sense is that the "debate" that can be expected is solely as to how to sanction Israel. Even B'tselem, the left wing Israeli human rights group criticized the report (in part) - B'tselem says Goldstone report is wrong | Israel | Jerusalem Post

Here are a number of other posts on this subject:

2. Iran - This issue gets more and more worrisome by the day. Here are some recent stories:

So now that the situation has been allowed to develop (deteriorate is a better word to use), how can it be neutralized? I had this discussion with a fellow congregant at synagogue on Yom Kippur - and it appears that the only certain thing is that the solution is not easily apparent. Military action against the Iranian facilities is a difficult option - it seems clear that this is not just a case of replicating Israel's pinpoint raid on the Osirak reactor in Iraq - the distance is much further, the Iranians are anticipating an attack whereas the Iraqis were pretty much asleep at the switch, the facilities are spread out and well-protected.

I do not doubt that the IAF could hit the targets, but the question is what damage they will effect and what losses are likely. Here is an interesting article from the spring 2007 edition of the International Security journal that examines the likelihood of success from a military perspective.

My sense is that in order to really cause major harm to the facilities and significantly set back the Iranian nuclear program, there would have to be a ground component to the operation - such as was apparently the case in the destruction of the nuclear facilities in Syria a year or so ago. This would make the mission much more risky and raise the spectre of serious losses. As good as the various special forces of the IDF might be, this ain't the movies, where James Bond, Jason Bourne or Rambo can go into a seriously hostile environment, wipe out all the defenders and accomplish the assigned task.

So what to do? We had the pleasure of hosting Kadima Party MK Nachman Shai in Halifax recently. He spoke convincingly of the seriousness of the Iranian threat. When asked what he thought should be done, he simply more or less said that there could be many ways to stop the program.

To be clear - he (I assume deliberately) did not say anything specific, but I believe that he meant tactics such as - in no particular order - (a) sanctions, (b) targeted killings of people in the nuclear program, (c) targeted killings of the Iranian leadership, (d) seeking the overthrow of the regime from within, (e) diplomacy, and (f) seeking to deny or delay the supply of essential materials to Iran.

Here is commentary on the sanctions issue - ANALYSIS / Why is Israel suddenly praising Iran sanctions? - Haaretz - Israel News. Targeted killings evokes memories of Gerald Bull - may he not rest in peace. Diplomacy? Dealing with Iran will require diplomacy with a hard edge - The Globe and Mail Regime change from within? here is a piece that suggests that what might be most devastating to Iran is a well organized and funded human rights campaign.

My final thought for the day on this issue, which clearly will be at the forefront as the days pass, is to think back to the situation with Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Hitler and his henchmen had made their intentions regarding many issues - specifically regarding Jews - perfectly clear. The West had many chances to stand up to the Nazis and stop them, but Hitler's bluster and bravado and his contempt for international treaties and law, compounded by the weakness, fatigue and moral failure of France and Great Britain (in particular) resulted in the Nazi ascendancy over Europe.

"In the course of my life I have very often been a prophet, and have usually been ridiculed for it. During the time of my struggle for power it was in the first instance only the Jewish race that received my prophecies with laughter when I said that I would one day take over the leadership of the State, and with it that of the whole nation, and that I would then among other things settle the Jewish problem. Their laughter was uproarious, but I think that for some time now they have been laughing on the other side of their face. Today I will once more be a prophet: if the international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevizing of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe!"

Six years later, 6,000,000 Jews and millions more Russians, Poles, French, Brits, Yanks, and others were dead and large parts of Europe has been utterly devastated. Shall we dither and allow history to repeat itself?

3. From Jabotinsky to Netanyahu - American Thinker: Two Jews

4. William Safire - Commentary » Blog Archive » Safire and the Day of Atonement

5. Big Deal - Egyptian minister declares 'culture war' on Israel - Israel News, Ynetnews - at the rate that the Arab world, let alone Egypt by itself, produces legitimate cultural works - this will be a short war. This pledge by the sore loser of the UNESCO election rings very hollow.

6. Clown Show - The Middle East clown show

7. A Friend Indeed - Canada shows the way

8. Settlements and Their Legitimacy - want to argue facts? OK - then read this.

9. OK, Like We Need Something Else To Threaten Us - Time for Straight-Talk About Assimilation – Forward.com

10. Speaking Of Threats From Within - Pajamas Media » Where’s the Outrage Among Liberal American Jews?

11. Crappy Journalism - Witch-hunters and anti-Semites at the Village Voice « NewsReal Blog

12. BESA Paper - a new paper from the wonderful BESA Center at Bar-Ilan University (which I visited in May) about President Obama and Israel - BESA Center for Strategic Studies.

13. History Lesson For The President - American Thinker: The History Lesson Obama Missed

14. Obama and the Useless Nations - Institute for Global Jewish Affairs – Global Antisemitism, Anti-Israelism, Jewish Studies

15. Kafka - The Trial: Fight for Kafka's Papers Winds through Israeli Courts - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International. Perhaps a weirdly appropriate since the adjective 'Kafkaesque" can be defined as follows:

The term, which is quite fluid in definition, has also been described as "marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity: Kafkaesque bureaucracies" and "marked by surreal distortion and often a sense of impending danger...

- aptly descriptive, in many ways, of the world today.