The Arabs are not a threat to the State of Israel

For the entire history of the Arab-Israeli conflict the Israeli public has been told two lies: that the Arabs in general - and the Palestinians in particular - are a threat to the continued existence of the Jewish state, and that the reason there is no peace in the region is because the Arabs don't "recognize" Israel.  

Why would any country call its own existence into question by insisting that its neighbors acknowledge that it exists?  

What it really means is that if an Arab country does acknowledge Israel's right to exist, it can expect something in return. So if Israeli diplomatic strategists had been smart, decades ago they would have announced that, the Israeli government doesn't acknowledge the existence of any Arab country. Then, if an Arab country decided to acknowledge Israel's existence, and asked what Israel would give it in return, Israel could say, "Israel will acknowledge your country's existence." Instead, Israeli leaders called their own nation's legitimacy into question by asking the Arabs to grant it legitimacy.

Israel is, therefore Israel is, and no recognition from any country - Arab or otherwise - is needed to confirm that fact. It matters not at all if Tunisia, Bahrain, Oman, Yemen, Libya, Syria or Iraq fails to acknowledge Israel's existence. In the past half century, not only has Israel survived without her existence being acknowledged by the majority of the Arab world, it has flourished.

 The claim that the Arabs threaten Israel 's existence is also wrong. Even if the Arab world wanted to destroy Israel, this doesn't mean it can.  Israel has the seventh largest military infrastructure in the world, and is technologically light years ahead of the Arab world. Despite Israel's clear military superiority, its national leadership keeps the Israeli public focused on the "Arab threat" so that the Israelis will continue to believe they are embroiled in a conflict with the whole Arab world.

To dispel the notion that the Arabs are a threat to Israel, take a close look at any Arab country. They are usually overpopulated, undereducated, economically undeveloped, and led by a dictatorship. No Arab country is able to produce its own weapons. No Arab country possesses any significant technological abilities, or has any real political or economic influence in the world.  

So why should Israelis be afraid of Arab nations?

The only reason why Arab dictators are feared by the Israeli public is because the world's media present these dictators as "radicals" and "disturbers of regional peace" when in fact their nations are helpless, powerless, poor and weak.

 Why should Israel fear that Arab dictators like Saddam Hussein could destroy or seriously harm the Jewish state when we know that all the weapons and military technology   Iraq has acquired is from companies in the US, Britain, France, and Germany? If Israelis were to fear for their security, they should point a finger at these countries and accuse them of trying to destroy Israel by supplying military technology and weapons to "unstable" Arab dictators.

But that isn't what the Israeli national leadership tells its citizenry. It tells them "Arabs want to destroy Israel" rather than direct their collective anger at the western countries that approved these weapons sales.  By doing so, it keeps the Israeli public convinced that the Arabs are the reason why the conflict continues.

Another falsehood presented by Israel's leaders - particularly those on the Right - is that if a Palestinian state were created it would promote terrorism and those terrorists would threaten the security of Israel. While terrorism is a problem for Israel, it doesn't pose a threat to her existence.

And while the Palestinian Authority definitely promoted terrorism right from the start of the Oslo Accords, the terrorism never came anywhere near destroying the Jewish state.

Since the early 1980s, Israel's leaders have been warning that Iran is "five years away from attaining nuclear weapons." Twenty years later, on June 5, 2003, Israel's foreign minister declared that "Iran would have Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) by 2006."

 Why do Israeli national leaders try to scare the Israeli public into thinking the Arabs are a much bigger threat than they really are?

Oslo and beyond

One of the enigmas about the Oslo Accords is why the Israeli government agreed to allow the Palestinian Authority to maintain armed security forces, and why Israel even armed those security personnel with Israeli weapons? We were told that the Palestinian Authority needed those weapons to keep radical Palestinian groups in check. Yet from the very beginning, when Hamas began its suicide bombing in l994, the Palestinian Authority never cracked down on the organization. While the Israelis complained to all who would listen that this was happening, no foreign entity ever criticized Arafat for not stopping the rise of Hamas in the West Bank and Gaza.

Israel's leaders at the time knew full well that the result was going to be a terrorist state, yet they agreed to this because that is what the foreigners wanted from Oslo - to strengthen the Palestinian side and weaken the Israeli side so the conflict could continue. The goal of Oslo's planners was never peace and stability; it was further bloodshed. That is why Oslo and Hamas came on the scene at the same time.

 As for the reasons why the second intifada broke out, the mainstream press told us Arafat "was pissed because at Camp David in August 2000 Barak and Clinton didn't give him enough honor and respect" and thus Arafat was "posturing." The mainstream media also gave us another version - that because Sharon dared walk around on the Temple Mount, this "enflamed" the Palestinians. 

That it could have been arranged (and thus didn't have to happen) never enters into the debate. Nobody asks whether Arafat thought he could really win a war against Israel. No western leader criticized Arafat for reneging on an international agreement which he signed with Israel never to return to war. Instead, the Middle East conflict was once again ignited, serving the foreigners while causing more death and destruction for the people who live in the region.

Sharon plays his part by remarking after every Hamas suicide bombing attack that Arafat is to blame, even though we are told the PA can't control Hamas. Then Bush throws the "moral card" out there and accuses Arafat of not doing enough to stop terrorism, so we are led to believe that Arafat is being morally irresponsible by initiating terrorism against Israel.

Presto. The Middle East conflict has been recharged. Israel's high moral ground is that "Arafat is behind the terrorism" and the Arabs' "high moral ground" is that Israel is "oppressing the Palestinians." Both claims are true, yet neither is the reason why the conflict continues. Such a scenario - whether by design or not - keeps the "you're wrong. No, you're wrong" structure of the conflict in place.

Like most things that happen between Israelis and Arabs, anything the Israelis do will be held up by the Arab side as proof that "Israel isn't serious about peace" ( i.e. they are morally flawed), and by the same token, anything the Palestinians/Arabs do is held up by Israel as proof that "you see, the Arabs are not serious about peace" (i.e. they are morally deficient). This is the basic configuration of the conflict. Each side blames the other while the real culprits remain in the shadows.   

Back in the early 1990s the only way to keep the Palestinian-Israeli conflict alive was to re-energize Arafat - arm his henchmen, and provide the PLO with a base of operations close to Israel. So if the Palestinian Authority supports terrorism it is with the complete knowledge and consent of Israel's leaders. Blaming Arafat merely serves the goal of the foreigners, which is to keep the conflict from dying out and to give the Israeli public an enemy to blame.

Therefore it really makes no sense for Israelis to continue to blame the Palestinians for the conflict not being solved, as neither Arafat nor anyone else in the Palestinian Authority has any real political or economic power. They aren't pulling any of the world's strings, so why concentrate on whether Arafat does or does not really want to put an end to terrorism? Whatever Arafat or any other Palestinian leader does or doesn't do will not have any impact on whether the conflict remains alive. The Palestinians/Arabs don't have the power required to keep the Middle East conflict alive. Only foreign elements do. The continued attempt to brainwash the Israeli public into thinking that the Arabs are a threat to Israel's security and survival is one reason why the conflict continues. If you want to have a conflict, you have to convince both sides that the other is to blame, always and forever. This is the way the Arabs and Jews have been pitted against each other.

Instead of rational explanations for why Middle East leaders do what they do, we are handed "morally-inspired" rationale. For instance, President Bush declared that Arafat had to be made "irrelevant" because, according to the US leader, he "disappointed him by not doing enough to stop terrorism." Having taken the high moral ground, Bush then began yet another Middle East peace initiative with the Roadmap. Once again, the mainstream media failed to present the picture as anything other than a moral crusade of the President to put his weight behind the peace process.