Getting away with murder, literally

The United States' discontent with the expansion of Jewish colonies in occupied East Jerusalem shows the true face of Israel, as manifested by the inverted and twisted argument presented by Israel's Ambassador to the US (in ‘For Israel and America, a Disagreement, Not a Crisis', New York Times, March 18, 2010).

Michael Oren was born in New York. He went to Columbia University and then Princeton for a PhD. He is a historian and author of Power, Faith and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the present (2007) and Six Days of War (2003). He is also apparently a fan of the film Lawrence of Arabia, which may explain his attempts at playing the politician, with no small amount of eloquent inventiveness.

But the ingenious argument advanced by Oren is really not that original. It is one that has been used successfully for decades: Israel is — of course — not at fault for anything and remains attached to the United States by "unbreakable bonds" in a friendship that is "unassailably solid". The redundancies of these terms depict their tired usage.

This would explain why the US has consistently turned a blind eye to the exponential growth of Jewish colonies in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem. The latest spat over the approved 1,600 new colony units in Ramat Shlomo in northern occupied Jerusalem — on Palestinian territory captured in 1967 — was only "unfortunate" because it coincided with the visit by US Vice President Joseph Biden, who was supposedly there to get peace talks going again between Israel and the Palestinians.

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman voiced his dismay when Netanyahu's government "rubbed his [Biden's] nose in some new housing plans", but Oren dismissed such sensitivity with a backhanded explanation about how Israel's policy on occupied Jerusalem has been consistent over the years. The short version is simply to take it all …

The longer version presented by Oren refers to occupied Jerusalem's "reunification in 1967" and how the city will remain Israel's "undivided capital". Oren concedes that "both Jews and Arabs have the right to build anywhere in the city", but does not mention that the Israeli municipality constantly issues demolition orders for Palestinian homes and makes the building paper process and prices so torturous and exorbitant that no Palestinian construction takes place. Where would the Palestinian capital be?

Provocation

The recent opening of the Jewish synagogue in the heart of the Old City of occupied Jerusalem — perhaps the most provocative and blatant demonstration of Israel's intentions since the tunnel excavation below Al Haram Al Sharif — was not only dismissed by Oren but reversed in masterly fashion: he blames Palestinian leaders for inciting the "violent demonstrations in the Old City"!

But Oren does not stop there, and steps into his own trap. He calls on these Palestinian leaders, the most Western-friendly and amenable to peace, to "cease sponsoring attacks against Israel's legitimacy, like the deeply slanted Goldstone Report on the Gaza war." Oren was media relations officer during Israel's 22-day invasion of Gaza in December 2008-January 2009, and is well aware that Palestinian National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas refused a request not to endorse the Goldstone report.

Israel is uneasy with the disclosure of Goldstone's findings for its guilt in creating the Gaza ghetto, so almost expectedly Oren points to Iran as the culprit — Israel is a peace-seeking nation but now is faced with the "direst challenge facing […] the entire world: denying nuclear weapons to Iran." Supporting Israel now means world security …

The contradictions continue to escalate to a ludicrous level when the international Quartet, led by the United States, announced in a joint statement on March 19 that a settlement negotiated between the parties should lead to the end of the Israeli 1967 occupation within a year. This goal is as far from reality as the dissipating 1967 line is in the blurry collective memory of either side.

Meanwhile, Israel continues to colonise occupied Jerusalem and to enforce military rule over the West Bank. In Nablus, for example, the Israel ‘Defence' Forces recently fired on two Palestinian teenagers, killing one of them, for throwing stones; two more were killed the following day. Who shoots unarmed human beings?

Israel is literally getting away with murder and Oren says that "we share fundamental values — democracy, respect of individual rights"… but Israel does not abide by United Nations resolutions. Israel does not listen to its ally — the United States. Israel is an anomaly and nobody's ally. The age of colonies is long over, pertaining to the era of European visions of racial superiority and global dominance. Without borders and without a constitution, Israel is a rogue state in the modern international system.

(Stuart Reigeluth is editor of www.revolve-magazine.com )