Israel Matzav

The latest peace piece-by-piece negotiations

What is perhaps the most important symbol of the current 'negotiations' for Israel's unconditional surrender is that sexual predator Haim Ramon has been named chief negotiator. Ramon was convicted in February of putting his tongue where it was not wanted (the picture was from the same 'session') and was forced to resign as 'justice minister' but Olmert brought him back into the cabinet. I warned you all that Ramon is Olmert's good friend and that Olmert was using him as a trial balloon the same way Ariel Sharon used to use Olmert. So let's see what the Olmert-Barak-Livni government is trying to give away now:

Among the proposals made by the Israeli team is an offer to share control of the Temple Mount between the three major religions (Judaism, Islam and Christianity) and to cede control of the Arab neighborhoods of east Jerusalem to the PA. The policing of major West Bank towns Ramallah, Jenin and Nablus would also be given to the Palestinians.

An unconfirmed Al Jazeera report said that the Israeli proposal made no mention of the Palestinian "right of return," but that it called to create a demilitarized Palestinian state along the borderlines of June 4th 1967.

In place of large settlements Israel would like to keep, it would turn over unsettled ground equal in size to the Palestinians, the Qatar-based channel claimed. Neither Palestinian nor Israeli sources verified any of the details reported by Al Jazeera.

I'm afraid al-Jazeera probably has this right. Let's go through what each of these points means.

We don't really know what 'ceding control' to the three major religions means, but the last time non-Jews had any say in anything having to do with the Western Wall - let alone the Temple Mount - Jews were banned from sitting there so that large numbers would not come to pray and were banned from sounding the shofar on Rosh Hashanna, the Jewish New Year. That was under our good friends the British. Olmert would likely give up the Temple Mount in a New York minute and move to France even with all the pain it would cause the Jewish people. And don't count on Netanyahu to 'save us' - he's waiting for Olmert to do it so that it's not an issue for him anymore - he'll be 'bound by an agreement' just like he was by Oslo. Don't expect him to lead demonstrations in the streets to bring the government down.

As for the neighborhoods in Jerusalem, Barak tried to do that as a 'goodwill gesture' before he went to Camp David. Here's what would have happened in Jerusalem if he had succeeded:

Someone needs to remind those who wanted to give the 'Palestinians' the Arab-populated neighborhoods of 'East Jerusalem' in the summer of 2000 (Ehud Barak, Shimon Peres and the Shas party) that we would have had rockets being shot from close range at Ramot, Neve Yaakov, Pisgat Zev, Ramat Shlomo, French Hill, Ramat Eshkol, Sanhedria Murchevet.... Do I need to go on?

And here's how it was stopped:

This does sound like the Barak plan. In the late spring and early summer of 2000, then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak actually wanted to give the 'Palestinians' all of the Arab-populated neighborhoods of 'East Jerusalem' before Camp David as a 'concession' in the hope that it would soften them up for Camp David. The shocking extent of the Israeli government's willingness to return almost to the borders of 1949 forced Shas, Yisrael B'Aliya and the National Religious party to quit Mr. Barak's government even before the Camp David Summit could begin. Foreign Minister David Levy, from Barak's own One Israel party, refused to attend the summit due to his opposition to the concessions. There was also a massive demonstration against the concessions in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square on July 16, 2000. The demonstration was one of the biggest in Israel's history.

In the case of Shas in particular, it was the plan to give away Abu Dis that forced them to leave the government. In a Friday meeting at Rav Ovadia Yosef's home, other Rabbis (particularly the Bostonner Rebbe) showed Rav Yosef that the 'Palestinians' could reach the Mount of Olives with ordinary handguns from Abu Dis.

Had Barak succeeded in giving away the Arab-populated neighborhoods of Jerusalem, what happened to Gilo during the Oslo War could have happened to Neve Yaakov, Pisgat Zev, Ramot, Ramat Shlomo, Talpiyot Mizrach and many other Jewish neighborhoods. We all would have been sitting ducks.

The plan to divide Jerusalem is extremely dangerous, both to our national psyche and for the security of Jerusalem's Jewish residents. Given that our national psyche will not play well with the NIMBY-afflicted center of the country, those of us who love Israel and Jerusalem have to concentrate on security arguments and how the Olmert-Schneller plan endangers Jerusalem, its Jewish residents and the Jewish residents of surrounding communities.

As to giving the cities to the 'Palestinians' to police, that has been done before and was stopped by Operation Defensive Shield after a series of 'Palestinian' terror attacks, culminating in the Seder Night Massacre brought the IDF back into 'Palestinian' cities. And that's without mentioning the possible missile attacks on Jerusalem, Ben Gurion Airport and Sheikh Munis.

For those of you who think that Israel will not agree to do this, I suggest that you re-read this post and this post and tell me honestly that you believe that enough Israelis will rise up to stop Olmert from giving our country away. I don't believe it.

I ask that you please NOT comment on this post unless you have read the last two posts linked above and this one. I'm finding this too painful to discuss with people who don't understand.

Appropriately, I have to run out to a funeral now.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:49 PM