Bush launched civil war in Gaza

That explosive claim is the heart of this Vanity Fair exclusive. This pull quote graf from David Rose ought to whet your appetite, drop your jaw, or both:

After failing to anticipate Hamas’s victory over Fatah in the 2006 Palestinian election, the White House cooked up yet another scandalously covert and self-defeating Middle East debacle: part Iran-contra, part Bay of Pigs. With confidential documents, corroborated by outraged former and current U.S. officials, David Rose reveals how President Bush, Condoleezza Rice, and Deputy National-Security Adviser Elliott Abrams backed an armed force under Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan, touching off a bloody civil war in Gaza and leaving Hamas stronger than ever.

Muhammad Dahlan, identified as Fatah’s long-term “heavy” in Gaza, and privately called “our guy” by Bush himself, is fingered as BushCo’s proxy in this, a pro-Zionist? pro-stupidity, for certain head-shaker that even neocon stalwart David Wurmser denounces, in the story, as anti-democratic. (Wurmser resigned from the State Department a month after Dahlan’s Gaza coup was launched.)

Dahlan, the story details, has a long history as a “heavy,” arresting Hamas people, on behalf of Fatah, as early as 1996. And, this isn’t anything new. He personally knows Bill Clinton as well as George Bush; he also knows George Tenet, under the Clinton Administration portion of Tenet’s CIA tenure.

This isn’t all Dahlan’s fault, though. He says he warned the Bush Administration that Fatah wasn’t ready for the January 2006 parliamentary elections:

“Everyone was against the elections,” Dahlan says. Everyone except Bush. “Bush decided, ‘I need an election. I want elections in the Palestinian Authority.’ Everyone is following him in the American administration, and everyone is nagging Abbas, telling him, ‘The president wants elections.’ Fine. For what purpose?”

We all know the end result. Hamas won the elections, as Bush was even more criminally stupid in Palestine than in Iraq in presuming a democracy could be started from the top down.

It’s a long story, but hugely worth your reading.

The State Department, understandably, has refused to comment.

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Bush smokes crack on Palestine

The president claims there will be a Palestine-Israel peace treaty before the end of the year.

Three comments.

1. Do you really expect such a thing to happen overnight, when you’ve done no lifting for seven years?

2. On whose/what terms?

3. Aren’t you suddenly even more concerned about your “legacy” than Bill Clinton?

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Annapolis: The 1 1/2 state solution

Let’s be honest. Even if Annapolis did propose to solve anything, the “solution” it offered would be from the U.S.-Israeli point of view. And that point of view is, bluntly, the 1 1/2 state solution.

Now, that phrase, “1 1/2 state solution,” can be understood in one of two ways. The first way would be that Israel doesn’t want a fully independent Palestine for quite some time. That may or may not be the case, but that’s not what I’m talking about.

No, the U.S.-Israeli 1 1/2 state solution is the solution of only recognizing Mahmoud Abbas’ rump Fatah Palestinian government in the West Bank. That’s been the “solution” both countries jumped on ever since Palestinian Hamas won a free parliamentary election in January by a smashing margin.

For years, Likud-based governments in Israel have deliberately puffed up Hamas’ psychological profile in order to make it easier to demonize Palestinians in general. Labor, the times it’s been in coalition, has basically gone along for the ride.

Well, guess what, Likud? That’s now blown up in your face.

George W. Bush has been all about democracy promotion in the Middle East, ignoring clear evidence, such as Algeria’s late 1990s election, that free elections in the Middle East are most likely to elect Islamicist parties.

Well, guess what, W.? That happened in Palestine and it’s now blown up in your face.

But, it’s not just W. Way too many Democrats, let alone Republicans enthralled by end-time prophecies of the Christian Religious Right involving red heifers, temple rebuildings and Jewish conversions, are under thrall of Zionist strains in Israeli politics and Zionist-grounded Jewish-American political action groups such as AIPAC.

Until these shackles are shaken off, Middle East peace conferences are going nowhere.

I’m not excusing past terrorist acts by Hamas, as wingers are wont to claim left-liberal dialogue about Palestine and Israel does. Nor am I excusing Yassir Arafat’s post-Oslo lack of statesmanship. I’m simply stating the fact that anything short of a full two-state solution is bound to fail.

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If I were the Platonic philosopher-king at Annapolis

Here’s my solution to the Palestine-Israel section, in several points.

First, a sidebar. Let’s not forget that Jordan, for 19 years, and not Israel, was the first occupier of the West Bank. Problem is, Jordan didn’t want actual Palestinian people after 1948 a whole lot more than Israel did after 1967; it too wanted land first, people second. Anyway, keep that fact of Jordanian occupation tabbed away in a corner of your mind, as it will tie in with one of my talking points.

That said, let’s get down to brass tacks.

A Palestine-Israel peace treaty would be crafted, which would explicitly include all the following to be done:

1. Eliminate the Gaza Strip; it would be a legitimate way of meeting Israeli security concerns. Arab residents would be given five years to decide whether to move to the West Bank, rather, the newly-created country of Palestine, with Israeli compensation, or stay. Obviously, the former Gaza Strip would become part of Israel.

2. Most of the West Bank would be made into the nation of Palestine. Israelis would be given five years to move out freely, without visa restrictions, etc. Where possible and achievable, direct land swaps between Israeli families now in the West Bank and Palestinian families now in Gaza might be done. Palestinian Arabs who wished to remain part of Israel would have that same five-year chance of moving; those who did would be guaranteed a path to Israeli citizenship should they so desire.

3. While most of the West Bank would become Palestine, some adjustment of the border for the best defensive line per geographic and other considerations, especially in the southwest corner of the West Bank, would be done.

4. Re the “right of return,” Palestinian families who lost land in 1947 would be compensated by a pool derived from the following resources: Israel, the United Nations, and all Arab countries who attacked Israel at the time of its birth. (That’s why I said remember Jordanian occupation of the West Bank.) At least half of the cost would fall on the aggressor Arab nations. A U.N. tribunal of representatives of nations who have not participated in the peace process or armed nations involved in Middle East wars would be convened to assess land values of former Palestinian holdings. The physical right of return would be considered to be waived as part of the Israel-Palestine peace treaty; Palestinian refugees could either accept the monetary compensation or reject it, but the physical right of return would be waived no matter what.

5. With minor modifications, Jerusalem would go back to its pre-1967 boundaries. I believe internationalization is impractical.

6. All of the Arab aggressors of 1947 and beyond (see point four) would also be required to be signatories to the treaty, which would include their express recognition of Israel and its right to exist.

7. Regarding nuclear issues, Israel would be required to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which would be a de facto admission of its having nuclear weapons.

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Democracies in the Middle East — Big Schmuck McCain flubs it

The Schmuck Talk Express™, John McCain, claimed today that Israel is the only freely elected democracy in the Middle East.

Ignoring our puppet state in Iraq, and ignoring the fact that he’s dissing such beloved allies as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Big John is making just a little mistake or two.

Mistake one: Lebanon. (Nice to know all his Senate years got him a lot of foreign policy knowledge.)

Mistake two, which both Republicans and most Democrats keep trying to shove under the rug: Palestine. Hate Hamas all you want, they won an election. Oops.

What is all boils down to is that the Bipartisan Foreign Policy Establishment in the U.S. is all in favor of free elections when it elections the people we think it should.

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Annapolis

After seven years of diplomatic neglect, George Bush has set aside a day - yes, one day - tomorrow - to try to work out the intractable six-decades-long Israel/Palestine problem.

What, pray tell, do they think they can accomplish in one day? Ask the people in the Middle East and you discover that Arabs and Jews can indeed agree on at least one thing: When asked that question, they all answer "Not much."

Oy vey. Even the choice of location is damning: The United States Naval Academy is the setting, and the motto of the Navy is "Don't give up the Ship" - invoking tenacity and determination, not diplomatic acumen and compromise. In Arabic, "Ana" means "I" and people the world over know the word "police." A Saudi humorist joked that the choice of location was an arrogant message from Bush to the Middle East "I am the police."

[Keep reading...]

The question of borders has plagued both Israel and the neighbors for over 40 years, since June 4, 1967; and the implementation of the Six Day War armistice. Since then, conservative, some would say fundamentalist whack-job, settlers have made the occupied territories their home. Kicking them out of the West Bank will not be as easily achieved as the same feat was two years ago, when the settlers were evicted from Gaza. The Gaza Strip is not biblically significant. Jews do not have deep emotional or historical attachments to Gaza. Not so the West Bank, which is historically, theologically and emotionally significant to most Jews worldwide - let alone the "fundamentalist whack jobs" I just referenced. I can't see removing them without violence. The issue of borders certainly isn't going to be achieved in a day.

And you can't talk about the borders without acknowledging the 800-pound-gorilla playing the zither in the sitting room: Jerusalem.

On paper, the equation balances. The Arab neighborhoods would fall under Palestinian control, and the Jewish neighborhoods would be controlled by Israel. Except it gets dicey real quick - the neighborhoods are intertwined.

Ask any chemist - when you are working with volatile compounds, the slightest variation from the recipe and it will blow up in your face. And what cocktail could be more volatile than the 35 acres of the walled city of Old Jerusalem? All three of the major monotheistic religions consider Old Jerusalem and the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount to be sacred ground.

The problems are exacerbated by Christianist Zionists (who should make with the butting out already) who stick their noses where they don't belong and urge their constituencies to pressure the Israeli government to take Jerusalem off the negotiating table. Fortunately, we are making headway, and even the occasional Zionist Rabbi Is waking up and smelling the coffee. But before any Jew throws in with that lot, remember they are mentally ill. They want to precipitate Armageddon and damn us all to their hell. Those Jews who wake up pissed every morning that the Messiah didn't come last night find natural allies in them. The rest of us find ulcers, migraines and anxiety. Again we have a problem that's going to take more than a day to sort out.

And then you have nearly four and a half million Palestinians living in limbo, many still in refugee camps. And everyone, Jew and Arab alike, needs to be scolded by my grandmother for being obstinate jackasses and using the Palestinian people as pawns, especially the Arab world. They really screwed the Palestinians in 1948, the bastards. All of the Arab neighboring states should be held accountable. They are every bit as culpable as Israel in contributing to the suffering of the Palestinian people and need to be called out on that publicly. There is plenty of sin and blame to go around. Everyone has behaved abominably and nobody gets a pass. This can't even be mentioned at Annapolis. Hell, it would take a good 6 months of Arabs storming the door every time that little bit of reality comes up and is said aloud. I shake my head in disbelief. They offer a day? Oh, the humanity...

And how the hell do they even bring up security in the time allowed?

This is why I don't often write about Israel and Palestine. It's damned infuriating. No one is asking me, but if anyone did, I would say Frost was employing irony; good fences do NOT make good neighbors. The first order of business should be to tear down that damned fence and fill in the trenches, and restore the 10% of the territory that it's construction seized.

Then I would say let Gaza go to Egypt. Give the West Bank to Jordan. Give the Golan Heights to Syria, and let a disinterested third party settle the border with Lebanon, and nobody would get to whine about it. And suck it up. Learn to live with a divided Jerusalem.Until everyone concerned learns how to act, I would make Old Jerusalem a U.N. protectorate. Don't like it? Learn how to act.

But no one is asking me. Probably because they are afraid I would tell them.

UPDATE FROM COMMENTS @ Blue Girl, Red State: Pale Rider is spot on as usual.

You can't make this shit up:

[Indeed! You gotta get this...BG]

"Annapolis" was named after Queen Anne of England:

Queen Anne was the last of the Stuarts, the second daughter of James II and his first wife Ann Hyde.

She was shy, conscientious, stout, gouty, shortsighted and very small.

Anne was 'homely', and she did not have a particularly happy married life. Her husband, Prince George of Denmark, was a drunk and a crashing bore!

Prince George was a gross, rather ridiculous figure, even King James, Anne's father, remarked "I have tried him drunk and I've tried him sober, but there is nothing in him".

And:

Alex Haley, the late author of the world-famous account of his family entitled Roots, was able to trace back the arrival of his ancestors, who had been kidnapped from Africa, to the Annapolis City Dock. Although Maryland was formally a slave state, many of its citizens opposed the institution. Archaeologists have found that there was a large, free African American population in the area before the Civil War.

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Rice and Gates are off to the Middle East on a Salvage Operation

On Monday, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will leave on a highly unusual joint mission to the Middle East. They leave with three objectives, and low expectations.

They need to persuade Iraq’s neighboring states to do more to help stabilize the country, they need to counter the growing influence of Iran in the region, and they hope to get some significant motion going on the development of a peace plan between the Palestinians and Israelis.

Lofty goals, but not likely to be very successful. The United States has little or no credibility in the region. The U.S. has caused massive death and instability in Iraq, and strengthened al Qaeda; they have also failed to calm the strife in Lebanon, bolster the Palestinian Authority, or bring pressure to bear on Syria.

Quite the contrary – U.S. policies have fanned the flames of Sunni extremism, and strengthened Iran. Those are the two things that cause the greatest consternation among the moderate Arab countries, because those are the two entities that threaten their grip on power.

Also not playing well to the locals is U.S. support for the ill-fated Israeli war against Hezbollah last summer. Continued attempts to undermine the popularly-elected Hamas in the Gaza strip. "The strategy is based on the assumption that you could isolate, weaken ... Hamas," while strengthening Abbas and his Fatah faction, said Shibley Telhami, a Middle East expert at the University of Maryland. "It cannot succeed. ... Everybody agrees that you can't simply isolate Hamas." Couple that failed strategy with United States’ continued support for Mubarak in Egypt, it pretty much puts the lie to claims that the United States “fosters Muslim democracy.”

The leaders of friendly states have lost faith in the Bush administration and do not believe he will deliver on his promises. Therefore, they are reluctant to risk anything for Bush. “Our credibility is in tatters. They are not going to commit because they don’t trust us. That doesn’t mean they are not concerned about Iran. It just means they just don’t know what we are going to do,” said one senior State Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to reporters.

One needn’t read Runes to see other signs of discord in the administration.

On the eve of the trip, unnamed U.S. officials told The New York Times that Washington believes Saudi Arabia has been unhelpful in Iraq by not supporting Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki's government. The administration publicly disavowed the report, but said that Saudi Arabia could do more to help. The leaked complaint seems unlikely to make life easier for Rice and Gates when they arrive in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, early in the trip.

Pentagon and State Department officials said the trip is intended to reassure Arab leaders that the U.S. will uphold its security commitments in the region, and meanwhile, Arab diplomats in Washington resolutely maintain that they need more than reassurances. They have heard a lot of proposals and reassurances, but they have not seen a clear plan for peace or security in the region. The U.S. promises a more active role, but consistently fails to deliver. Arab diplomats in Washington voiced skepticism – anonymously – that the trip would be fruitful.

More than what Rice and Gates say on the trip, “[P]eople will be monitoring the debate in Washington. Everybody is watching that very closely and then will draw their own conclusions.” said one anonymous diplomat.

“There is no clarity,” another diplomat said on condition of anonymity, because he didn't want to disagree publicly with the administration. “The trip in and of itself is not important. What’s important is that the administration commit to dealing with the substantive issues.”

Rice and Gates have their work cut out for them. With 18 months left in office, it will be difficult to reshape the way the region sees the United States, said William Quandt, a professor of international relations at the University of Virginia, who as an aide to President Jimmy Carter helped craft the 1978 Camp David accords between Israel and Egypt.

“I don’t think they have a real strategy that has much chance of working,” Quandt said. Gates, who joined the administration in December, “may be able to calm things down a little. But that won’t change the course.”

The two Secretaries will attend meetings together in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, then they will part company. Gates will visit “other gulf states” and Rice will head for Israel and the Palestinain territories to meet with Mahmood Abbas and Israeli leaders. Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other U.S. allies in the region want the United States to reach out to the popularly-elected Hamas, which now controls Gaza, but Rice has steadfastly maintained that there will be no dealing with the Hamas, which is the U.S. classifies as a terrorist organization.

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