With 'friends' like this... former foreign ministry director general supports BDS
In the latest chapter involving former Foreign Ministry Director General Alon Liel, a
good friend of Richard Goldstone's, Liel is in South Africa
advocating for BDS boycotts... but 'only' of Judea and Samaria (Hat Tip:
Asher G).
I can understand the desire, by people of conscience, to reassert an agenda of justice, to remind Israelis that Palestinians exist. I can understand small but symbolic acts of protest that hold a mirror up to Israeli society. As such, I cannot condemn the move to prevent goods made in the occupied Palestinian territory from being falsely classified as "Made in Israel". I support the South African government’s insistence on this distinction between Israel and its occupation.
Having served as Israel’s ambassador to SA, I feel able to venture a view on the differences between the respective conflicts. A "South African-style" solution for Israel-Palestine is, in my view, an end to the Jewish state — our old-time Jewish dream. The two-state model remains the only way to fulfil the dream of at least the past four Jewish generations. Unlike in SA, where urbanisation brought black people to the cities in such numbers that they eventually became the majority, in Israel there is substantial territorial separation and significant replacement of Palestinian labour by foreign workers, especially from Asia. Whereas in SA, almost every white child was cared for in infancy by a black "nanny", in Israel there is little contact at all. This difference must be reckoned with.
Those interested in advancing Palestinian rights must begin by stopping the Israeli settlement enterprise. Every day, Palestine is being gobbled up by settlement expansion. Vagueness over borders strengthens the opposition to the two-state solution. And this is the strength of the act of marking a product as either "Made in Israel" or "Made in Occupied Palestinian Territory". Although this doesn’t create the reality of independence, it defines the principle in clear terms.
Through your choice as a consumer, the border along the internationally recognised pre-1967 line — the realistic basis for peace — is redrawn. This simple act reminds us that settlements are a violation of international law and a tool in a project of de-facto annexation. By defining the task along this line, we confirm that the goal is Palestinian independence, not an Israeli apartheid state.
The simple act of marking settlement products differently to Israeli products pulls the rug from under the refusal to declare a border. It has provoked Zionist outrage because it says: to here and no further. It causes embarrassment because those who claim to want two states cannot morally justify why products from the future Palestine should be marked as "made in Israel".
I buy Israeli products every day and do my best not to buy Israeli products from the occupied territories. I don’t see why you, living outside Israel, shouldn’t have the same choice.
Among other things in Liel's past: Alon Liel tried to pretend that Israel bears no responsibility or obligation to
Jonathan Pollard. Alon Liel
tried to trick the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee into believing that Bashar al-Assad wants
peace and it's all our fault that we don't have it. Alon Liel urged then-Education Minister Comrade Yuli Tamir to prevent Israeli students from
hiking in the Golan. And now, Alon Liel, BDS supporter. What a shmuck.
Labels: Alon Liel
Abu Mazen met with Barak and Peres last month, met with Israeli traitors on Monday
Barack Hussein Obama isn't the only one trying to bring about a change in the Israeli government.
'Moderate' '
Palestinian' President
Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen met with
Defense Minister Ehud Barak in Amman last month, and he has met with President Shimon Peres several times recently. But he will not meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu. No way no how.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas revealed on Monday that he recently met with Defense Minister Ehud Barak in Jordan and discussed with him the future of relations between Israel and the Palestinians.
Abbas made the revelation during a meeting in his office in Ramallah with a group of Israeli intellectuals and academics. He said that the meeting took place on August 24, but did not give further details.
But this story gets even better. Guess why those 'intellectuals and academics' met with Abu Bluff.
Writer Sefi Rachlevsky, who was among the group that met with Abbas, told The Jerusalem Post that he and his colleagues came to Ramallah to express their full support for the PA's plan to ask the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian state along the pre-1967 lines later this month.
"We warmly support the declaration of a Palestinian state," Rachlevsky said. "This is the realization of the Zionist dream when a people declare their independence."
He added that the group of Israelis have called on the international community and US President Barack Obama to support the statehood bid. Rachlevsky also voiced support for the idea of land swaps between the future Palestinian state and Israel.
He said that as far as he and his friends were concerned, the West Bank and the Western Wall are under occupation and should be placed under Palestinian control. "When there's a Palestinian state, Israel can always demand that certain parts of the West Bank and the Western Wall be placed under Israeli control," Rachlevsky explained.
He and other members of the group, including historian Yehuda Bauer, former Labor MK Yael Dan [Yael Dan is an actress. This might be a reference to Yael Dayan, the former MK who used to get her picture taken on the beach on Yom Kippur. CiJ], author Yoram Kaniuk and Alon Liel, former director general of the Foreign Ministry, said they were deeply impressed by the "extremely moderate" views expressed by Abbas during the meeting.
"We even think that he's too moderate," he told the Post. "He wants a state only on 22% of Palestine. He is really a very moderate leader. We felt much closer to him than the Israeli government although we are very Zionist and some of us had fought in the War of Independence in 1948."
Mind you that the 'academics' - and probably most of the 'intellectuals' - have their salaries paid by... the State of Israel.
Of course, here in Israel we don't even have a
Logan Act, so morons like Bashar Al-
Assad's shill Alon Liel (that name has
come up a lot lately, hasn't it) can go around creating the impression that they represent more than 3% of the country' s Jews (which they don't).
Given that our
opposition is not any more loyal to the country than these 'intellectuals and academics' what can we expect?
Here's the bottom line: Unless and until Abu Mazen meets with Netanyahu there aren't going to be any meaningful negotiations. Meeting with Peres and Barak does nothing except to prove that Abu Mazen doesn't want peace. But then, we knew that already.
Labels: Abu Mazen, Alon Liel, Ehud Barak, Logan Act, Shimon Peres
Assad's Israeli shills
Yes, you can hit a guy when he's down, especially when he's as nasty as Bashar al-Assad. David Keyes looks at some of the Israelis from whom we ought to (but won't) get
mea culpas for
shilling for Assad over the years.
Alon Liel, for example, is a former director-general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry and a professor at Tel Aviv University. When asked in 2008 if he trusted that the Syrian dictator sincerely desired peace, Liel responded, “Yes, I trust him and believe him. He wants peace and prosperity for his people."
Assad sure has a funny way of showing it -- imposing more than a decade of brutal tyranny, imprisoning bloggers, mowing down protesters in the streets, arresting opposition and rigging elections. When I asked Liel in 2009 if the brutality of Assad’s regime ever weighed on his work toward peace with Syria, he said simply “No.”
Liel was channeling President Jimmy Carter, who said of Assad’s father, "It's true, [Hafez] Assad is a dictator. But you can rely on him. He never lied to me. If you sign an agreement, he'll keep it ... [Hafez Assad] never lies.”
Elie Podeh, professor of Middle East studies at Hebrew University, wrote earlier this year in Haaretz that “Syria's natural place in the regional alignment is with Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and there's nothing to prevent it from returning to that place if given the right incentives. But what is Israel doing? Very little. It hasn't responded to Assad's proposals with the appropriate seriousness.”
Zvi Bar’el, Haaretz’s Middle East analyst who holds a doctorate in history, lambasted Israel’s foreign minister for “babbl[ing] on about the collapse of the Assad family's rule,” and chastised Israel for “shrugging its shoulders at a chance to reach peace with Syria.”
Shortly before the Syrian people bravely rose up and confronted their oppressor, esteemed Yedioth Ahronoth journalist and former bureau chief to Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Eitan Haber, wrote an article titled “Peace now, with Syria." “So why now?” he asked in the piece. “The answer is that now of all times Syrian President Bashar Assad is proposing peace talks.” Is it any wonder, though, that the dictator was proposing talks? What better way to deflect attention from economic ruin, political isolation, endemic torture, restive opposition and bottomless corruption?
Larry Derfner wrote in the Jerusalem Post of the necessity to make peace with Assad “if he’s willing.” “In essence, it means Syria joining the moderate, U.S.-aligned Arab camp with Egypt and Jordan. The U.S., of course, would have to throw in a lot of money for Syria ... If Bashar Assad is willing to take his country out of the ‘axis of evil’ with Iran, Hezbullah and Hamas but Israel turns him down, then we leave him no diplomatic option for retrieving Syria's land, and one way or another we will be endangering our own security ... [I]f we're serious about fighting a long-term ‘war on terror,’ about cracking away at the Middle East's radical Arab/Islamic axis, how can we pass up the chance to extract Syria from it -- to change Syria from being the axis's linchpin to being the wedge that divides it?”
The naivete of Israel’s diplomatic and journalism elite is shocking. Should a man who does not hesitate to murder thousands of his own citizens be trusted to treat his historic enemy with equanimity? Is a leader who does not trust his own people to vote freely worthy of the West’s trust? The answer, of course, is no. And that was the answer long before Assad's regime started openly butchering protesters in the street.
Read the whole thing.
Labels: Alon Liel, Bashar al-Assad, Eitan Haber, Elie Podeh, Larry Derfner, Syrian uprising, Zvi Bar'el
Goldstone's retraction an attempt to escape ostracism?
Natalie Wood claims that Richard Goldstone's retraction of the infamous report that bears his name is nothing more than an attempt to
regain acceptance into the Jewish community.
Indeed, Israel’s Ynet News reported that his decision was influenced by the constant harassment and cascades of threatening letters and emails he received in the wake of the report which bears his name.
Goldstone’s friend, Dr. Alon Liel says the ‘hell’ that he endured contributed to his decision to write his retraction.
"When Israel decided to boycott him, it was an overwhelming insult. 'I'm a Jewish judge, a respected Zionist – and Israel doesn't trust me?', Liel quoted his friend as saying. He was a broken man.
"I'm not saying that the threats he received and the hell he went through are what made him publish his article, but there is no doubt in my mind that it influenced his decision," says Liel.
Alon Liel. Former Director General of the Foreign Ministry. What a perfect soulmate for Goldstone. Alon Liel, who tried to pretend that Israel bears no responsibility or obligation to
Jonathan Pollard. Alon Liel, who
tried to trick the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee into believing that Bashar al-Assad wants
peace and it's all our fault that we don't have it. Alon Liel, who urged then-Education Minister Comrade Yuli Tamir to prevent Israeli students from
hiking in the Golan. Yes, Alon Liel is a perfect soulmate for Goldstone. A mendacious shmuck.
But I digress. Let's go back to Goldstone. It seems things aren't quite working out as planned.
While his unexpected intellectual somersault has caused much cynical mirth on social networking sites, it has generated even more serious anger. Thus far his efforts at social rehabilitation have been thwarted.
...
Moreover, far from welcoming the prodigal back into the bosom of his extended ‘family’, the international Jewish community is considering further social ostracism.
Bwahahahahaha.
Wood also cites unnamed "other lawyers" who say that Israel should have argued its case in front of Goldstone. You've got to be kidding. Refusing to appear before a court that you believe has no jurisdiction is one of the oldest and most respected tactics in the book. Had Israel appeared before Goldstone and (as is likely) had the same conclusion been reached, Israel would have no avenue of appeal, and it would be far less likely that Goldstone would have written a retraction.
Goldstone is a long way from re-acceptance into the Jewish community. And deservedly so. Unlike the kapos of the Nazi era, he cannot even claim that he did what he did to save his own life.
Labels: Alon Liel, Goldstone Report, Richard Goldstone
Who abandoned Jonathan Pollard?
I guess it won't (or shouldn't) surprise most of you that much of the blame for the abandonment of Jonathan Pollard can be laid quite squarely on the doorstep of the
foreign ministry.
Invited to participate were: MK Nachman Shai (who said courageous and constructive things); Yitzhak Oren, who was the Israeli Congressional liaison in Washington and the first Israeli official to visit Pollard; and the former Director of the Foreign Ministry, Alon Liel.
On the air, Liel said some shocking things: “In my eyes, Pollard is no hero. When Pollard lands here, I am not going to Ben Gurion Airport to greet him. Just a minute ago someone mentioned how the US relates to traitors. How do we relate to traitors? After all he betrayed the United States, our best friend. I served as an Israeli official for 30 years. What Pollard did was not a heroic deed in my eyes.”
The moderator, Oded Shachar, tried to explain to Liel that it was Israel that requested and received the information from Pollard. But Liel persevered: “First of all, whether or not that is so, is also subject to debate. I served for 30 years in the Israeli Foreign Ministry in the United States, and indeed in all the years that I worked in Chicago (where Pollard was first held) and then in Atlanta (near where Pollard is now held) we never made any effort to free him, and we were right not to. Today it is already another matter since he has been in prison for so many years.”
Incredible to hear such things! I picked up the phone and called Liel this week, but he just continued his tirade. Pollard, Liel told me, is a traitor in the same league as Vanunu. “When I was an Israeli consul in the United States, the policy was, we do not visit Pollard, we do not have anything to do with him, and if anyone ever mentions him, we must silence them and calm things down, lest it harm the Jewish community. Pollard betrayed his employers. I was an official for 30 years. How am I supposed to feel towards someone who took the most sensitive documents and gave them, for money, to someone else?”
Liel was, as has been pointed out, the Director General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Was he also the Director General of the American Foreign Ministry? Pollard endangered his life to pass (pass, not sell) information he saw as vital to “someone else”. That “someone else” was us. For this, he is now paying an exorbitant price.
Liel’s bitter comments contain no small amount of unwarranted evil, but other than that, they prove beyond a shadow of a doubt what was written in this column last week: the State of Israel never really came to the rescue of Jonathan Pollard.
To the credit of the first Netanyahu government in 1998, Pollard was officially recognized as an Israeli agent. Period. There is no argument about this fact, nor can there be. But this did not change things much for Liel (or the rest of the Foreign Ministry staff). It is true that he was a consul before this recognition was granted and he did not go to visit Pollard, because that was the policy at the time. But in the years 1999 to 2001, after Pollard was granted official recognition, Liel was the Director General of the Foreign Ministry under Ehud Barak. Did someone forget to update Liel? He says,“Even when I was the Director General of the Foreign Ministry, I do not recall a single time when the issue of Pollard was raised. There was never any discussion of Pollard raised at the level of the Director General.”
So now it is perfectly clear. Liel was the superior of the Deputy General Manager of the Foreign Ministry for North America, the one who held responsibility for the Pollard file for the Government of Israel all of these years. And as the chief of staff, Liel admits that nothing was ever done to secure Pollard’s release. Indeed, quite the opposite!
Today top American officials say that Pollard has served far too long in prison, that the charges against him were fabricated, and that he should be released at once. But this means nothing to Liel. When Pollard arrives, Liel won’t go to the airport to welcome him. After all, says Liel, he’s a traitor.
None of this should come as any surprise. Three years ago, Liel sent a letter to then Education Minister Yuli Tamir asking that Jewish kids not be taken
hiking in the Golan so that they would not have a connection to it.
Give Liel credit: He's consistent.
Labels: Alon Liel, Jonathan Pollard
Goldwasser and Regev to be returned on July 12?
On its Hebrew web site, Maariv is reporting this morning on a news item from al-Ithad, which is published in the Persian Gulf. The item claims that Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev will be
returned to Israel on July 12 (the one-year anniversary of their abduction) in exchange for a large number of
prisoners terrorists, including murderer
Samir al-
Kuntar.
I've already told you that I don't believe that
Goldwasser and Regev are alive.
The 'transaction' will also allegedly include Lebanese terrorists Yichye Nasaf and Naseem Nasser, as well as three Hezbullah terrorists who were captured during this past summer's war.
Meanwhile, Hezbullah refuses to give any information on Goldwasser or Regev and will neither confirm nor deny the story I blogged last week that claimed that
at least one of the two is dead.
The Jordanian newspaper al-Rai also reports that former foreign ministry director general Alon Liel is attempting to convince Syria to intervene to hasten the completion of a transaction. I would think that after Liel's
last fiasco, he would have lost all credibility.
No, I don't believe this story.
Labels: Alon Liel, Ehud Goldwasser, Eldad Regev, exchange, Hezbullah
In the latest chapter involving former Foreign Ministry Director General Alon Liel, a good friend of Richard Goldstone's, Liel is in South Africa advocating for BDS boycotts... but 'only' of Judea and Samaria (Hat Tip: Asher G). 
