It's time for real disengagement

[ChangoLoa]

By Aluf Benn
The "flotilla affair" offers a good opportunity to complete the disengagement from the Gaza Strip, five years after Israel withdrew. It's time to sever the last ties of the occupation and leave Hamastan to its own devices.

The attempt to control Gaza from outside, via its residents' diet and shopping lists, casts a heavy moral stain on Israel and increases its international isolation. Every Israeli should be ashamed of the list of goods prepared by the Defense Ministry, which allows cinnamon and plastic buckets into Gaza, but not houseplants and coriander. It's time to find more important things for our officers and bureaucrats to do than update lists.

How could a disengagement be done? Israel would inform the international community that it is abandoning all responsibility for Gaza residents and their welfare. The Israel-Gaza border would be completely sealed, and Gaza would have to obtain supplies and medical services via the Egyptian border, or by sea. A target date would be set for severing Gaza's water and electricity systems from those of Israel. The customs union with Israel would end, and the shekel would cease to be Gaza's legal tender. Let them print their own Palestinian currency, featuring portraits of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

Israel would also make it clear that it will exercise its right to self-defense by inspecting suspicious cargo on the high seas in order to thwart arms smuggling. That is also how the Western powers behave: They search cargo ships for nuclear weapons and missile components. And if we are shot at from Gaza, we will shoot back - with intent to cause harm. We have already proved that we can do so.

More:
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/it-s-time-for-real-disengagement-1.293671

[EFerrari]

1. Benn was on Charlie Rose last night and he, among others,

pointed out there what he says here: Israeli policy in Gaza has only empowered Hamas, it is a failure.

[ChangoLoa]

4. It looks like they've been empowering Hamas forever

Without the intervention of the US, the KSA AND Israel in favor of the muslim brotherhood and against the PLO's influence, Hamas would never had been able to become a major political force in Palestine. All this goes back to the late 60's, after the 1967 war.

Right now, Hamas is the ONLY justification for the status quo. Very very precious...

[EFerrari]

5. Yes. Hamas has been extremely useful. n/t

[Cary]

2. When has Israel ever enjoyed respect of the international community?

It sure seems to me that what Israel has enjoyed is a respite from homicide terrorist bombers and rocket attacks. Why would that be?

[Tripmann]

3. And why were there terrorist bombers and rocket attacks?

An acknowledgement of atrocities committed by both sides is the only reasonable path to useful debate.

[Cary]

6. I would think a mutual commitment for peace would be more useful.

I don't see that. In the case of the Arabs the only two nations who have truly committed have been Egypt and Jordan, and they seem to have paid a price.

In the case of Israel, I can understand their skepticism.

[ChangoLoa]

7. How could Lebanon justify any commitment with Israel after what happened in 2006?

Do you imagine the cost for a developing country of the systematic destruction of its most expensive infrastructures? Remember that Lebanon did not declare war to Israel.

It's important to understand that Israel has never accepted any int'l community decision/UN resolution. Israel has always acted like an outlaw State. It may have been understandable in the past and I can understand Israel's skepticism about their neighbors who decades ago tried to destroy it, but it doesn't justify the last decade of TOTAL madness. They have become the main factor of violence in the region.

In 2010, Israeli expansionism is completely unethical.

[Cary]

8. It wasn't just decades ago.

You make no allowance for what the PLO did to Lebanon, or the fact of what Hezbollah and Syria were doing.

That's okay but don't try to claim you're objective.

The Israelis aren't "mad". You just really don't want to piss them off. At least the ones I know, that is. It kind of comes from living the way they do, I think.

Israel isn't a 51st state. It is very much a foreign nation. Unless and until you can live in their shoes it's really not fair to judge them this way.

[ChangoLoa]

9. You're not answering my comment, Cary

But I'll try to answer yours. Hezbollah being in southern Lebanon launching rockets to Israel doesn't justify the destruction of roads, highways, airports, water purification and power generating structures in all Lebanon. I didn't say Israelis were "mad" or that their country was a "51st state" of the US. Why take the conversation to this level?

Cheers

[Cary]

10. Who decides what justifes what?

I don't think you get to do that all by yourself. There are two sides to the story and my point about the way Israelis respond to threats is that you're not in their shoes. They live in a different world.

I'm not so sure Hezbollah wasn't a sufficient threat. They were getting bolder, going across the border to kidnap Israeli soldiers and making significant inroads into the Lebanese government.

I think they had an argument and I'm not so sure your second guessing is as legitimate as you may think.

[ChangoLoa]

11. Was the outcome of that intervention positive?

I think it was disastrous.

[Cary]

12. War has a tendency to be unpredictable.

Some things were definitely achieved so I don't know that it really was "disastrous". Hezbollah paid a huge price and its capabilities were exposed.

I keep getting back to this: you aren't hearing about rocket attacks or suicide bombers right now.