Text of 1997 speech by Stephen Harper to US right-wing think tank
source
For anyone surprised by Harper's moves and plans now that he has a majority, it is enlightening to read this speech our current PM made when he was VP of the 'United Citizens Coalition' to the Council for National Policy.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me begin by giving you a big welcome to Canada. Let's start up with a compliment. You're here from the second greatest nation on earth. But seriously, your country, and particularly your conservative movement, is a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world.
Now, having given you a compliment, let me also give you an insult. I was asked to speak about Canadian politics. It may not be true, but it's legendary that if you're like all Americans, you know almost nothing except for your own country. Which makes you probably knowledgeable about one more country than most Canadians.
But in any case, my speech will make that assumption. I'll talk fairly basic stuff. If it seems pedestrian to some of you who do know a lot about Canada, I apologize.
I'm going to look at three things. First of all, just some basic facts about Canada that are relevant to my talk, facts about the country and its political system, its civics. Second, I want to take a look at the party system that's developed in Canada from a conventional left/right, or liberal/conservative perspective. The third thing I'm going to do is look at the political system again, because it can't be looked at in this country simply from the conventional perspective.
First, facts about Canada. Canada is a Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term, and very proud of it. Canadians make no connection between the fact that they are a Northern European welfare state and the fact that we have very low economic growth, a standard of living substantially lower than yours, a massive brain drain of young professionals to your country, and double the unemployment rate of the United States.
In terms of the unemployed, of which we have over a million-and-a-half, don't feel particularly bad for many of these people. They don't feel bad about it themselves, as long as they're receiving generous social assistance and unemployment insurance.
That is beginning to change. There have been some significant changes in our fiscal policies and our social welfare policies in the last three or four years. But nevertheless, they're still very generous compared to your country.
Let me just make a comment on language, which is so important in this country. I want to disabuse you of misimpressions you may have. If you've read any of the official propagandas, you've come over the border and entered a bilingual country. In this particular city, Montreal, you may well get that impression. But this city is extremely atypical of this country.
While it is a French-speaking city -- largely -- it has an enormous English-speaking minority and a large number of what are called ethnics: they who are largely immigrant communities, but who politically and culturally tend to identify with the English community.
This is unusual, because the rest of the province of Quebec is, by and large, almost entirely French-speaking. The English minority present here in Montreal is quite exceptional.
Furthermore, the fact that this province is largely French-speaking, except for Montreal, is quite exceptional with regard to the rest of the country. Outside of Quebec, the total population of francophones, depending on how you measure it, is only three to five per cent of the population. The rest of Canada is English speaking.
Even more important, the French-speaking people outside of Quebec live almost exclusively in the adjacent areas, in northern New Brunswick and in Eastern Ontario.
The rest of Canada is almost entirely English speaking. Where I come from, Western Canada, the population of francophones ranges around one to two per cent in some cases.
So it's basically an English-speaking country, just as English-speaking as, I would guess, the northern part of the United States.
But the important point is that Canada is not a bilingual country. It is a country with two languages. And there is a big difference.
As you may know, historically and especially presently, there's been a lot of political tension between these two major language groups, and between Quebec and the rest of Canada.
Let me take a moment for a humorous story. Now, I tell this with some trepidation, knowing that this is a largely Christian organization.
The National Citizens Coalition, by the way, is not. We're on the sort of libertarian side of the conservative spectrum. So I tell this joke with a little bit of trepidation. But nevertheless, this joke works with Canadian audiences of any kind, anywhere in Canada, both official languages, any kind of audience.
It's about a constitutional lawyer who dies and goes to heaven. There, he meets God and gets his questions answered about life. One of his questions is, "God, will this problem between Quebec and the rest of Canada ever be resolved?'' And God thinks very deeply about this, as God is wont to do. God replies, "Yes, but not in my lifetime.''
I'm glad to see you weren't offended by that. I've had the odd religious person who's been offended. I always tell them, "Don't be offended. The joke can't be taken seriously theologically. It is, after all, about a lawyer who goes to heaven.''
In any case. My apologies to Eugene Meyer of the Federalist Society.
Second, the civics, Canada's civics.
On the surface, you can make a comparison between our political system and yours. We have an executive, we have two legislative houses, and we have a Supreme Court.
However, our executive is the Queen, who doesn't live here. Her representative is the Governor General, who is an appointed buddy of the Prime Minister.
Of our two legislative houses, the Senate, our upper house, is appointed, also by the Prime Minister, where he puts buddies, fundraisers and the like. So the Senate also is not very important in our political system.
And we have a Supreme Court, like yours, which, since we put a charter of rights in our constitution in 1982, is becoming increasingly arbitrary and important. It is also appointed by the Prime Minister. Unlike your Supreme Court, we have no ratification process.
So if you sort of remove three of the four elements, what you see is a system of checks and balances which quickly becomes a system that's described as unpaid checks and political imbalances.
What we have is the House of Commons. The House of Commons, the bastion of the Prime Minister's power, the body that selects the Prime Minister, is an elected body. I really emphasize this to you as an American group: It's not like your House of Representatives. Don't make that comparison.
What the House of Commons is really like is the United States electoral college. Imagine if the electoral college which selects your president once every four years were to continue sitting in Washington for the next four years. And imagine its having the same vote on every issue. That is how our political system operates.
In our election last Monday, the Liberal party won a majority of seats. The four opposition parties divided up the rest, with some very, very rough parity.
But the important thing to know is that this is how it will be until the Prime Minister calls the next election. The same majority vote on every issue. So if you ask me, "What's the vote going to be on gun control?'' or on the budget, we know already.
If any member of these political parties votes differently from his party on a particular issue, well, that will be national headline news. It's really hard to believe. If any one member votes differently, it will be national headline news. I voted differently at least once from my party, and it was national headline news. It's a very different system.
Our party system consists today of five parties. There was a remark made yesterday at your youth conference about the fact that parties come and go in Canada every year. This is rather deceptive. I've written considerably on this subject.
We had a two-party system from the founding of our country, in 1867. That two-party system began to break up in the period from 1911 to 1935. Ever since then, five political elements have come and gone. We've always had at least three parties. But even when parties come back, they're not really new. They're just an older party re-appearing under a different name and different circumstances.
Let me take a conventional look at these five parties. I'll describe them in terms that fit your own party system, the left/right kind of terms.
Let's take the New Democratic Party, the NDP, which won 21 seats. The NDP could be described as basically a party of liberal Democrats, but it's actually worse than that, I have to say. And forgive me jesting again, but the NDP is kind of proof that the Devil lives and interferes in the affairs of men.
This party believes not just in large government and in massive redistributive programs, it's explicitly socialist. On social value issues, it believes the opposite on just about everything that anybody in this room believes. I think that's a pretty safe bet on all social-value kinds of questions.
Some people point out that there is a small element of clergy in the NDP. Yes, this is true. But these are clergy who, while very committed to the church, believe that it made a historic error in adopting Christian theology.
The NDP is also explicitly a branch of the Canadian Labour Congress, which is by far our largest labour group, and explicitly radical.
There are some moderate and conservative labour organizations. They don't belong to that particular organization.
The second party, the Liberal party, is by far the largest party. It won the election. It's also the only party that's competitive in all parts of the country. The Liberal party is our dominant party today, and has been for 100 years. It's governed almost all of the last hundred years, probably about 75 per cent of the time.
It's not what you would call conservative Democrat; I think that's a disappearing kind of breed. But it's certainly moderate Democrat, a type of Clinton-pragmatic Democrat. It's moved in the last few years very much to the right on fiscal and economic concerns, but still believes in government intrusion in the economy where possible, and does, in its majority, believe in fairly liberal social values.
In the last Parliament, it enacted comprehensive gun control, well beyond, I think, anything you have. Now we'll have a national firearms registration system, including all shotguns and rifles. Many other kinds of weapons have been banned. It believes in gay rights, although it's fairly cautious. It's put sexual orientation in the Human Rights Act and will let the courts do the rest.
There is an important caveat to its liberal social values. For historic reasons that I won't get into, the Liberal party gets the votes of most Catholics in the country, including many practising Catholics. It does have a significant Catholic, social-conservative element which occasionally disagrees with these kinds of policy directions. Although I caution you that even this Catholic social conservative element in the Liberal party is often quite liberal on economic issues.
Then there is the Progressive Conservative party, the PC party, which won only 20 seats. Now, the term Progressive Conservative will immediately raise suspicions in all of your minds. It should. It's obviously kind of an oxymoron. But actually, its origin is not progressive in the modern sense. The origin of the term "progressive'' in the name stems from the Progressive Movement in the 1920s, which was similar to that in your own country.
But the Progressive Conservative is very definitely liberal Republican. These are people who are moderately conservative on economic matters, and in the past have been moderately liberal, even sometimes quite liberal on social policy matters.
In fact, before the Reform Party really became a force in the late '80s, early '90s, the leadership of the Conservative party was running the largest deficits in Canadian history.
They were in favour of gay rights officially, officially for abortion on demand. Officially -- what else can I say about them? Officially for the entrenchment of our universal, collectivized, health-care system and multicultural policies in the constitution of the country.
At the leadership level anyway, this was a pretty liberal group. This explains one of the reasons why the Reform party has become such a power.
The Reform party is much closer to what you would call conservative Republican, which I'll get to in a minute.
The Bloc Quebecois, which I won't spend much time on, is a strictly Quebec party, strictly among the French-speaking people of Quebec. It is an ethnic separatist party that seeks to make Quebec an independent, sovereign nation.
By and large, the Bloc Quebecois is centre-left in its approach. However, it is primarily an ethnic coalition. It's always had diverse elements. It does have an element that is more on the right of the political spectrum, but that's definitely a minority element.
Let me say a little bit about the Reform party because I want you to be very clear on what the Reform party is and is not.
The Reform party, although described by many of its members, and most of the media, as conservative, and conservative in the American sense, actually describes itself as populist. And that's the term its leader, Preston Manning, uses.
This term is not without significance. The Reform party does stand for direct democracy, which of course many American conservatives do, but also it sees itself as coming from a long tradition of populist parties of Western Canada, not all of which have been conservative.
It also is populist in the very real sense, if I can make American analogies to it -- populist in the sense that the term is sometimes used with Ross Perot.\
The Reform party is very much a leader-driven party. It's much more a real party than Mr. Perot's party -- by the way, it existed before Mr. Perot's party. But it's very much leader-driven, very much organized as a personal political vehicle. Although it has much more of a real organization than Mr. Perot does.
But the Reform party only exists federally. It doesn't exist at the provincial level here in Canada. It really exists only because Mr. Manning is pursuing the position of prime minister. It doesn't have a broader political mandate than that yet. Most of its members feel it should, and, in their minds, actually it does.
It also has some Buchananist tendencies. I know there are probably many admirers of Mr. Buchanan here, but I mean that in the sense that there are some anti-market elements in the Reform Party. So far, they haven't been that important, because Mr. Manning is, himself, a fairly orthodox economic conservative.
The predecessor of the Reform party, the Social Credit party, was very much like this. Believing in funny money and control of banking, and a whole bunch of fairly non-conservative economic things.
So there are some non-conservative tendencies in the Reform party, but, that said, the party is clearly the most economically conservative party in the country. It's the closest thing we have to a neo-conservative party in that sense.
It's also the most conservative socially, but it's not a theocon party, to use the term. The Reform party does favour the use of referendums and free votes in Parliament on moral issues and social issues.
The party is led by Preston Manning, who is a committed, evangelical Christian. And the party in recent years has made some reference to family values and to family priorities. It has some policies that are definitely social-conservative, but it's not explicitly so.
Many members are not, the party officially is not, and, frankly, the party has had a great deal of trouble when it's tried to tackle those issues.
Last year, when we had the Liberal government putting the protection of sexual orientation in our Human Rights Act, the Reform Party was opposed to that, but made a terrible mess of the debate. In fact, discredited itself on that issue, not just with the conventional liberal media, but even with many social conservatives by the manner in which it mishandled that.
So the social conservative element exists. Mr. Manning is a Christian, as are most of the party's senior people. But it's not officially part of the party. The party hasn't quite come to terms with how that fits into it.
That's the conventional analysis of the party system.
Let me turn to the non-conventional analysis, because frankly, it's impossible, with just left/right terminology to explain why we would have five parties, or why we would have four parties on the conventional spectrum. Why not just two?
The reason is regional division, which you'll see if you carefully look at a map. Let me draw the United States comparison, a comparison with your history.
The party system that is developing here in Canada is a party system that replicates the antebellum period, the pre-Civil War period of the United States.
That's not to say -- and I would never be quoted as saying -- we're headed to a civil war. But we do have a major secession crisis, obviously of a very different nature than the secession crisis you had in the 1860s. But the dynamics, the political and partisan dynamics of this, are remarkably similar.
The Bloc Quebecois is equivalent to your Southern secessionists, Southern Democrats, states rights activists. The Bloc Quebecois, its 44 seats, come entirely from the province of Quebec. But even more strikingly, they come from ridings, or election districts, almost entirely populated by the descendants of the original European French settlers.
The Liberal party has 26 seats in Quebec. Most of these come from areas where there are heavy concentrations of English, aboriginal or ethnic votes. So the Bloc Quebecois is very much an ethnic party, but it's also a secession party.
In the referendum two years ago, the secessionists won 49 per cent of the vote, 49.5 per cent. So this is a very real crisis. We're looking at another referendum before the turn of the century.
The Progressive Conservative party is very much comparable to the Whigs of the 1850s and 1860s. What is happening to them is very similar to the Whigs. A moderate conservative party, increasingly under stress because of the secession movement, on the one hand, and the reaction to that movement from harder line English Canadians on the other hand.
You may recall that the Whigs, in their dying days, went through a series of metamorphoses. They ended up as what was called the Unionist movement that won some of the border states in your 1860 election.
If you look at the surviving PC support, it's very much concentrated in Atlantic Canada, in the provinces to the east of Quebec. These are very much equivalent to the United States border states. They're weak economically. They have very grim prospects if Quebec separates. These people want a solution at almost any cost. And some of the solutions they propose would be exactly that.
They also have a small percentage of seats in Quebec. These are French-speaking areas that are also more moderate and very concerned about what would happen in a secession crisis.
The Liberal party is very much your northern Democrat, or mainstream Democratic party, a party that is less concessionary to the secessionists than the PCs, but still somewhat concessionary. And they still occupy the mainstream of public opinion in Ontario, which is the big and powerful province, politically and economically, alongside Quebec.
The Reform party is very much a modern manifestation of the Republican movement in Western Canada; the U.S. Republicans started in the western United States. The Reform Party is very resistant to the agenda and the demands of the secessionists, and on a very deep philosophical level.
The goal of the secessionists is to transform our country into two nations, either into two explicitly sovereign countries, or in the case of weaker separatists, into some kind of federation of two equal partners.
The Reform party opposes this on all kinds of grounds, but most important, Reformers are highly resistant philosophically to the idea that we will have an open, modern, multi-ethnic society on one side of the line, and the other society will run on some set of ethnic-special-status principles. This is completely unacceptable, particularly to philosophical conservatives in the Reform party.
The Reform party's strength comes almost entirely from the West. It's become the dominant political force in Western Canada. And it is getting a substantial vote in Ontario. Twenty per cent of the vote in the last two elections. But it has not yet broken through in terms of the number of seats won in Ontario.
This is a very real political spectrum, lining up from the Bloc to reform. You may notice I didn't mention the New Democratic Party. The NDP obviously can't be compared to anything pre-Civil War. But the NDP is not an important player on this issue. Its views are somewhere between the liberals and conservatives. Its main concern, of course, is simply the left-wing agenda to basically disintegrate our society in all kinds of spectrums. So it really doesn't fit in.
But I don't use this comparison of the pre-Civil War lightly. Preston Manning, the leader of the Reform party has spent a lot of time reading about pre-Civil War politics. He compares the Reform party himself to the Republican party of that period. He is very well-read on Abraham Lincoln and a keen follower and admirer of Lincoln.
I know Mr. Manning very well. I would say that next to his own father, who is a prominent Western Canadian politician, Abraham Lincoln has probably had more effect on Mr. Manning's political philosophy than any individual politician.
Obviously, the issue here is not slavery, but the appeasement of ethnic nationalism. For years, we've had this Quebec separatist movement. For years, we elected Quebec prime ministers to deal with that, Quebec prime ministers who were committed federalists who would lead us out of the wilderness. For years, we have given concessions of various kinds of the province of Quebec, political and economic, to make them happier.
This has not worked. The sovereignty movement has continued to rise in prominence. And its demands have continued to increase. It began to hit the wall when what are called the soft separatists and the conventional political establishment got together to put in the constitution something called "a distinct society clause.'' Nobody really knows what it would mean, but it would give the Supreme Court, where Quebec would have a tremendous role in appointment, the power to interpret Quebec's special needs and powers, undefined elsewhere.
This has led to a firewall of resistance across the country. It fuelled the growth of the Reform party. I should even say that the early concessionary people, like Pierre Trudeau, have come out against this. So there's even now an element of the Quebec federalists themselves who will no longer accept this.
So you see the syndrome we're in. The separatists continue to make demands. They're a powerful force. They continue to have the bulk of the Canadian political establishment on their side. The two traditional parties, the Liberals and PCs, are both led by Quebecers who favour concessionary strategies. The Reform party is a bastion of resistance to this tendency.
To give you an idea of how divided the country is, not just in Quebec but how divided the country is outside Quebec on this, we had a phenomenon five years ago. This is a real phenomenon; I don't know how much you heard about it.\
The establishment came down with a constitutional package which they put to a national referendum. The package included distinct society status for Quebec and some other changes, including some that would just horrify you, putting universal Medicare in our constitution, and feminist rights, and a whole bunch of other things.
What was significant about this was that this constitutional proposal was supported by the entire Canadian political establishment. By all of the major media. By the three largest traditional parties, the PC, Liberal party and NDP. At the time, the Bloc and Reform were very small.
It was supported by big business, very vocally by all of the major CEOs of the country.
The leading labour unions all supported it. Complete consensus. And most academics.
And it was defeated. It literally lost the national referendum against a rag-tag opposition consisting of a few dissident conservatives and a few dissident socialists.
This gives you some idea of the split that's taking place in the country.
Canada is, however, a troubled country politically, not socially. This is a country that we like to say works in practice but not in theory.
You can walk around this country without running across very many of these political controversies.
I'll end there and take any of your questions. But let me conclude by saying, good luck in your own battles. Let me just remind you of something that's been talked about here. As long as there are exams, there will always be prayer in schools.
"You won't recognize Canada when I'm through with it". Heh. Indeedy. Scared yet? You should be. This is extreme stuff.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Monday, December 19, 2011
Cohen Inquiry
A government email describing a potentially lethal fish virus as a public relations problem has caused a stir at a federal inquiry in Vancouver.
The federally appointed Cohen Commission was called two years ago to examine what caused the 2009 collapse of the Fraser River sockeye.
The suggestion that an influenza-like virus had penetrated B.C. waters came just as the 21-month inquiry was wrapping up, prompting the commissioner to hold three more days of hearings.
On Friday, the federal inquiry heard from an expert in infectious salmon anemia (ISA) who detected the virus in a handful of B.C. fish earlier this year, setting off a chain of alarm bells throughout the government and the West Coast salmon industry.
Fred Kibenge, who runs a prestigious lab on the East Coast, detected the virus in two of 48 sockeye smolts, and the results of his work were widely publicized in October.
The ISA virus has infected and killed millions of fish in Chile, and is believed to have originated in Norway where its own stocks were devastated.
'Turning the PR tide'
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) immediately set about retesting Kibenge's samples, and told the media several weeks later they had found no evidence of the virus.
When news media made that the headline the next day, officials celebrated in a private email that has now been made public.
"It is clear that we are turning the PR tide in our favour, and this is because of the very successful performance of our spokes at the tech briefing," CFIA B.C. manager Joseph Beres wrote.
"One battle is won, now we have to nail the surveillance piece, and we will win the war, also."
Lawyer Don Rosenbloom, who represents two groups of commercial fishermen at the inquiry, isn't buying it.
"One gets the impression they see themselves at war with parties that are pursuing the best interest of the public," he said. "I think it's ridiculous."
While food inspection managers touted the results of their tests, Fisheries and Oceans officials testified the samples they used were so degraded, the results were unreliable.
Discrediting scientists
Kibenge and another Canadian scientist also told the federal inquiry they feared their reputations were being threatened after discovering signs of ISA in B.C. salmon.
The revelation triggered an assessment of Kibenge's independent lab at the University of Prince Edward Island by inspectors from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. It's one of only two such labs for the virus in the world.
Kibenge told the federal commission in Vancouver on Friday that the way officials behaved led him to believe they were aiming to discredit his work.
"Based on the questioning I got, I sensed that the interest here was to confirm my result was the result of contamination," he said while under cross-examination.
"The second point was that probably I was doing shoddy science."
In the past several weeks, additional research has surfaced that potentially identifies the virus' presence as far back as 2002.
'Most feared threat to aquaculture'
At the inquiry, Kibenge said he felt he was being pressured, even though he considered his science to be "above question."
Sockeye salmon waiting for access to spawning grounds in Scotch Creek, B.C.Sockeye salmon waiting for access to spawning grounds in Scotch Creek, B.C. (Matt Casselman)
"Because aquaculture is a business, of course, the virus or the pathogen ... is a problem," he said. "As far as I know, the spread of diseases is the most feared threat to aquaculture."
But in later testimony, Fisheries official Peter Wright, who manages the national aquatic animal health laboratory system, said the assessment wasn't seeking to discredit Kibenge.
He said its goal was to figure out why Kibenge's test results came up positive when examination of the same fish in the government's own lab did not.
During an earlier hearing, a second scientist who works in a lab based in Nanaimo, B.C., was questioned about her own experiences with federal officials.
Findings investigated
Molecular geneticist Kristi Miller, who runs a research lab for the Fisheries Department in Nanaimo, B.C., told the commission on Thursday she has been "alienated" within the department.
She said that began in late November when she revealed to superiors she, too, had detected the virus in B.C. salmon.
On Thursday, a lawyer for the commission asked a panel of three government officials whether Miller's findings are a "game-changer."
No, it just requires further investigation, was the answer from Stephen Stephen, the director to whom Miller reported her findings.
"Although it may have merit," added his colleague Wright, as he pointed out Miller is using a different testing technique. "It needs to be proven."
Kim Klotins, who was appearing on behalf of the food inspection agency, added the agency has already begun a process of investigating Miller's findings. She said staff have run initial tests, which did not corroborate the results.
The virus found was 95 per cent similar to its European strain, Miller said. A North American strain has previously been detected in Atlantic Canada.
CFIA seizes samples
Miller also noted yet another researcher, Prof. Rick Routledge of Simon Fraser University, came under scrutiny after he made Kibenge's initial results public. Routledge had collected the fish and sent them to the P.E.I. lab for testing.
She said the CFIA removed all samples from Routledge's freezer, meaning his work could not continue.
She said Stephen told her she shouldn't conduct research if she didn't understand its potential "ramifications."
That, along with what happened to Routledge's samples, caused her to feel "some level of intimidation," she told the commission.
Miller's lab is funded by the government to conduct research on fish pathogens. She found the evidence of infectious salmon anaemia in the course of that work.
Evidence of ISA dates back 25 years
Miller has told the inquiry she's not clear whether the virus she discovered causes disease, but she noted there appeared to be some signs of damage in the fish.
Government email makes waves at salmon inquiry
Cohen Commission extended after news influenza-like virus detected in B.C.
http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
by cbc
But that virus isn't her greatest concern, she said.
She testified she has also found signs of another virus unknown in Canadian fish that causes a condition called heart and skeletal muscle inflammation. She said those results from migrating wild sockeye salmon came back in early testing, and have not yet been shared with officials or been made public.
Kibenge and Miller are among four expert fish scientists who have told the inquiry there is varying evidence the ISA virus may be carried in B.C. salmon, with some findings dating back 25 years.
The scientists say more research is required to know whether it could be a health risk for wild Pacific salmon.
The inquiry's final report is due by the end of June.
The federally appointed Cohen Commission was called two years ago to examine what caused the 2009 collapse of the Fraser River sockeye.
The suggestion that an influenza-like virus had penetrated B.C. waters came just as the 21-month inquiry was wrapping up, prompting the commissioner to hold three more days of hearings.
On Friday, the federal inquiry heard from an expert in infectious salmon anemia (ISA) who detected the virus in a handful of B.C. fish earlier this year, setting off a chain of alarm bells throughout the government and the West Coast salmon industry.
Fred Kibenge, who runs a prestigious lab on the East Coast, detected the virus in two of 48 sockeye smolts, and the results of his work were widely publicized in October.
The ISA virus has infected and killed millions of fish in Chile, and is believed to have originated in Norway where its own stocks were devastated.
'Turning the PR tide'
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) immediately set about retesting Kibenge's samples, and told the media several weeks later they had found no evidence of the virus.
When news media made that the headline the next day, officials celebrated in a private email that has now been made public.
"It is clear that we are turning the PR tide in our favour, and this is because of the very successful performance of our spokes at the tech briefing," CFIA B.C. manager Joseph Beres wrote.
"One battle is won, now we have to nail the surveillance piece, and we will win the war, also."
Lawyer Don Rosenbloom, who represents two groups of commercial fishermen at the inquiry, isn't buying it.
"One gets the impression they see themselves at war with parties that are pursuing the best interest of the public," he said. "I think it's ridiculous."
While food inspection managers touted the results of their tests, Fisheries and Oceans officials testified the samples they used were so degraded, the results were unreliable.
Discrediting scientists
Kibenge and another Canadian scientist also told the federal inquiry they feared their reputations were being threatened after discovering signs of ISA in B.C. salmon.
The revelation triggered an assessment of Kibenge's independent lab at the University of Prince Edward Island by inspectors from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. It's one of only two such labs for the virus in the world.
Kibenge told the federal commission in Vancouver on Friday that the way officials behaved led him to believe they were aiming to discredit his work.
"Based on the questioning I got, I sensed that the interest here was to confirm my result was the result of contamination," he said while under cross-examination.
"The second point was that probably I was doing shoddy science."
In the past several weeks, additional research has surfaced that potentially identifies the virus' presence as far back as 2002.
'Most feared threat to aquaculture'
At the inquiry, Kibenge said he felt he was being pressured, even though he considered his science to be "above question."
Sockeye salmon waiting for access to spawning grounds in Scotch Creek, B.C.Sockeye salmon waiting for access to spawning grounds in Scotch Creek, B.C. (Matt Casselman)
"Because aquaculture is a business, of course, the virus or the pathogen ... is a problem," he said. "As far as I know, the spread of diseases is the most feared threat to aquaculture."
But in later testimony, Fisheries official Peter Wright, who manages the national aquatic animal health laboratory system, said the assessment wasn't seeking to discredit Kibenge.
He said its goal was to figure out why Kibenge's test results came up positive when examination of the same fish in the government's own lab did not.
During an earlier hearing, a second scientist who works in a lab based in Nanaimo, B.C., was questioned about her own experiences with federal officials.
Findings investigated
Molecular geneticist Kristi Miller, who runs a research lab for the Fisheries Department in Nanaimo, B.C., told the commission on Thursday she has been "alienated" within the department.
She said that began in late November when she revealed to superiors she, too, had detected the virus in B.C. salmon.
On Thursday, a lawyer for the commission asked a panel of three government officials whether Miller's findings are a "game-changer."
No, it just requires further investigation, was the answer from Stephen Stephen, the director to whom Miller reported her findings.
"Although it may have merit," added his colleague Wright, as he pointed out Miller is using a different testing technique. "It needs to be proven."
Kim Klotins, who was appearing on behalf of the food inspection agency, added the agency has already begun a process of investigating Miller's findings. She said staff have run initial tests, which did not corroborate the results.
The virus found was 95 per cent similar to its European strain, Miller said. A North American strain has previously been detected in Atlantic Canada.
CFIA seizes samples
Miller also noted yet another researcher, Prof. Rick Routledge of Simon Fraser University, came under scrutiny after he made Kibenge's initial results public. Routledge had collected the fish and sent them to the P.E.I. lab for testing.
She said the CFIA removed all samples from Routledge's freezer, meaning his work could not continue.
She said Stephen told her she shouldn't conduct research if she didn't understand its potential "ramifications."
That, along with what happened to Routledge's samples, caused her to feel "some level of intimidation," she told the commission.
Miller's lab is funded by the government to conduct research on fish pathogens. She found the evidence of infectious salmon anaemia in the course of that work.
Evidence of ISA dates back 25 years
Miller has told the inquiry she's not clear whether the virus she discovered causes disease, but she noted there appeared to be some signs of damage in the fish.
Government email makes waves at salmon inquiry
Cohen Commission extended after news influenza-like virus detected in B.C.
http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
by cbc
But that virus isn't her greatest concern, she said.
She testified she has also found signs of another virus unknown in Canadian fish that causes a condition called heart and skeletal muscle inflammation. She said those results from migrating wild sockeye salmon came back in early testing, and have not yet been shared with officials or been made public.
Kibenge and Miller are among four expert fish scientists who have told the inquiry there is varying evidence the ISA virus may be carried in B.C. salmon, with some findings dating back 25 years.
The scientists say more research is required to know whether it could be a health risk for wild Pacific salmon.
The inquiry's final report is due by the end of June.
Sunday, December 04, 2011
Before the First Snow
Before the First Snow
by Walter Brasch
Sacramento, Calif. 95834 www.greeleyandstone.com
http://www.greeleyandstone.com/images/QUESTIONS.pdf
“There is in every true woman’s heart a spark of heavenly fire . . . which kindles up, and beams and blazes in the dark hour of adversity.”
—Washington Irving, The Sketch Book
Birmingham. Delano. Chicago. Kent State.
War. The Environment. Worker Exploitation.
Hippies. Yippies. Cops and politicians.
People were marching. People were protesting.
The news media reported, discussed, editorialized, lampooned, misreported, and cynically dismissed the new social movements forged from alienation. And then the 1960s dissolved into the 1970s, evolved into the "Me generation," began a slow descent into the “Happy Days” mentality of the 1950s, and then jerked into the reality by the fear of cultures and events the people didn’t understand.
Mixing humor and pathos, award-winning journalist Walter M. Brasch weaves an intricate psychological and social issues mystery of insight into the people and culture that is America. The places are urban Boston, suburban northern and rural California, and rural northeastern Pennsylvania. The time is January 1964 to Jan. 15, 1991, the day before the U.S. went to war in the Persian Gulf.
Major Social Issues: energy, environment, anti-war movement, First Amendment issues, government intrusion upon individual rights and government "cooperation" with corporations, labor/unions/worker rights, the alternative and mainstream media, all with a focus of music, photography, and journalism as powerful ways to record the history of a nation.
The principal characters are:
Apryl Greene (aka Rachel Greenberg), a flower child of the '60s, a musician and photographer primarily for labor unions and social issues causes, who had worked for civil rights and for peace, who experienced college and the communes, who once held an establishment job. Now, two decades after the revolution, all she wants is to build a school for peace and the arts, but powerful forces have already begun a process to legally seize her land. As we unthread some of this intrigue, we learn that Apryl's land is part of an undisclosed tract that government and a large industry needs in order to complete its purchase of land to build the nation’s largest nuclear waste disposal facility. But, there are problems with that plant, and with both the ownership and the regulators. Apryl is faced not only by trying to build a school for peace in a nation rushing to war, but also a compelling need to stop the proliferation of nuclear energy in a society that is torn by its dependence upon oil and the need for an alternative. As the novel progresses, the mystery accelerates, leading to an explosive conclusion based upon existing legislation and practices.
David Ascher, executive editor of Century, a 375,000-circulation social issues magazine. He's cynical, liberal, and burdened with the responsibilities of editorship. While it appears we are looking at Apryl through David's narrative, we are really seeing the nature of American media and, more important, David and how he has changed.
Sam Weissmann, editor-in-chief/publisher of Century. He was a newspaper reporter more than 20 years. Had the New York Herald Tribune not have been merged and then destroyed in 1967 by management incompetence and an industry that had already begun a descent into placing profit above courage and the fight for truth, he would still have been the national correspondent for what once was one of the nation’s most respected newspapers. However, the death of the Herald-Tribune would ironically lead to the birth of Century, which would become one of the major voices of social justice and the New Left.
Before the First Snow is 29 separate but inter-related short stories, each building upon the previous one. The odd-numbered chapters, literary fiction with a humor base, carry the plot as Apryl Greene tries to build her school for peace, while David tries to balance the business-management demands of a magazine with the demands of social justice. The even-numbered chapters, more non-fiction than literary fiction, are vignettes and news stories David Ascher had written for newspapers and magazines during the previous 25 years. Some of these articles focus upon major news events; some are personality profiles. Individually, these seem to be separate, but they are the thread that holds the story together, for each is an insight into the life of Apryl Greene, who sometimes is a major character, sometimes a tangential passerby.
Before the First Snow is an insight not just of a few moments in history but of lessons of contemporary American culture and values, lessons about people, attitudes, issues, and governments, all of which have become even more relevant since 9/11. The fusion of history, contemporary society, and character make this a powerful insight into the collective consciousness of a people.
“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil but because of those who look on and do nothing.” —Albert Einstein
Sunday, November 13, 2011
A New Strategy for Securing the Realm
A Zionist plan for the Middle East
Richard Perle et al
http://radioislam.org/islam/english/zionism/zioniststrategy.htm
Here follows a document published by The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies’ "Study Group on a New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000." as a framework for Zionist Strategies for the ruling Likud Party in Israel. When reading this Zionist document compare the recommendations in this document from 1996 with the actual polititical acts of the U.S. government in 2003 - almost 7 years later - concerning Iraq and Syria. The Jewish authors Perle, Feith and Wurmser have since the conceivement of this document advanced to high positions in th U.S. Administration and were acting as Zionist moles from those positions as some of the main architects behind the so-called "U.S." led aggression och occupation of Iraq in 2003.
A Clean Break:
A New Strategy for Securing the Realm
By Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser
The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
July 8, 1996
Following is a report prepared by The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies’ "Study Group on a New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000." The main substantive ideas in this paper emerge from a discussion in which prominent opinion makers, including Richard Perle, James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser participated. The report, entitled "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," is the framework for a series of follow-up reports on strategy.
Israel has a large problem. Labor Zionism, which for 70 years has dominated the Zionist movement, has generated a stalled and shackled economy. Efforts to salvage Israel’s socialist institutions—which include pursuing supranational over national sovereignty and pursuing a peace process that embraces the slogan, "New Middle East"—undermine the legitimacy of the nation and lead Israel into strategic paralysis and the previous government’s "peace process." That peace process obscured the evidence of eroding national critical mass— including a palpable sense of national exhaustion—and forfeited strategic initiative. The loss of national critical mass was illustrated best by Israel’s efforts to draw in the United States to sell unpopular policies domestically, to agree to negotiate sovereignty over its capital, and to respond with resignation to a spate of terror so intense and tragic that it deterred Israelis from engaging in normal daily functions, such as commuting to work in buses.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s government comes in with a new set of ideas. While there are those who will counsel continuity, Israel has the opportunity to make a clean break; it can forge a peace process and strategy based on an entirely new intellectual foundation, one that restores strategic initiative and provides the nation the room to engage every possible energy on rebuilding Zionism, the starting point of which must be economic reform. To secure the nation’s streets and borders in the immediate future, Israel can:
Work closely with Turkey and Jordan to contain, destabilize, and roll-back some of its most dangerous threats. This implies clean break from the slogan, "comprehensive peace" to a traditional concept of strategy based on balance of power.
Change the nature of its relations with the Palestinians, including upholding the right of hot pursuit for self defense into all Palestinian areas and nurturing alternatives to Arafat’s exclusive grip on Palestinian society.
Forge a new basis for relations with the United States—stressing self-reliance, maturity, strategic cooperation on areas of mutual concern, and furthering values inherent to the West. This can only be done if Israel takes serious steps to terminate aid, which prevents economic reform.
This report is written with key passages of a possible speech marked TEXT, that highlight the clean break which the new government has an opportunity to make. The body of the report is the commentary explaining the purpose and laying out the strategic context of the passages.
A New Approach to Peace
Early adoption of a bold, new perspective on peace and security is imperative for the new prime minister. While the previous government, and many abroad, may emphasize "land for peace"— which placed Israel in the position of cultural, economic, political, diplomatic, and military retreat — the new government can promote Western values and traditions. Such an approach, which will be well received in the United States, includes "peace for peace," "peace through strength" and self reliance: the balance of power.
A new strategy to seize the initiative can be introduced:
TEXT:
We have for four years pursued peace based on a New Middle East. We in Israel cannot play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent. Peace depends on the character and behavior of our foes. We live in a dangerous neighborhood, with fragile states and bitter rivalries. Displaying moral ambivalence between the effort to build a Jewish state and the desire to annihilate it by trading "land for peace" will not secure "peace now." Our claim to the land —to which we have clung for hope for 2000 years--is legitimate and noble. It is not within our own power, no matter how much we concede, to make peace unilaterally. Only the unconditional acceptance by Arabs of our rights, especially in their territorial dimension, "peace for peace," is a solid basis for the future.
Israel’s quest for peace emerges from, and does not replace, the pursuit of its ideals. The Jewish people’s hunger for human rights — burned into their identity by a 2000-year old dream to live free in their own land — informs the concept of peace and reflects continuity of values with Western and Jewish tradition. Israel can now embrace negotiations, but as means, not ends, to pursue those ideals and demonstrate national steadfastness. It can challenge police states; enforce compliance of agreements; and insist on minimal standards of accountability.
Securing the Northern Border
Syria challenges Israel on Lebanese soil. An effective approach, and one with which American can sympathize, would be if Israel seized the strategic initiative along its northern borders by engaging Hizballah, Syria, and Iran, as the principal agents of aggression in Lebanon, including by:
striking Syria’s drug-money and counterfeiting infrastructure in Lebanon, all of which focuses on Razi Qanan.
paralleling Syria’s behavior by establishing the precedent that Syrian territory is not immune to attacks emanating from Lebanon by Israeli proxy forces.
striking Syrian military targets in Lebanon, and should that prove insufficient, striking at select targets in Syria proper.
Israel also can take this opportunity to remind the world of the nature of the Syrian regime. Syria repeatedly breaks its word. It violated numerous agreements with the Turks, and has betrayed the United States by continuing to occupy Lebanon in violation of the Taef agreement in 1989. Instead, Syria staged a sham election, installed a quisling regime, and forced Lebanon to sign a "Brotherhood Agreement" in 1991, that terminated Lebanese sovereignty. And Syria has begun colonizing Lebanon with hundreds of thousands of Syrians, while killing tens of thousands of its own citizens at a time, as it did in only three days in 1983 in Hama.
Under Syrian tutelage, the Lebanese drug trade, for which local Syrian military officers receive protection payments, flourishes. Syria’s regime supports the terrorist groups operationally and financially in Lebanon and on its soil. Indeed, the Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley in Lebanon has become for terror what the Silicon Valley has become for computers. The Bekaa Valley has become one of the main distribution sources, if not production points, of the "supernote" — counterfeit US currency so well done that it is impossible to detect.
Text:
Negotiations with repressive regimes like Syria’s require cautious realism. One cannot sensibly assume the other side’s good faith. It is dangerous for Israel to deal naively with a regime murderous of its own people, openly aggressive toward its neighbors, criminally involved with international drug traffickers and counterfeiters, and supportive of the most deadly terrorist organizations.
Given the nature of the regime in Damascus, it is both natural and moral that Israel abandon the slogan "comprehensive peace" and move to contain Syria, drawing attention to its weapons of mass destruction program, and rejecting "land for peace" deals on the Golan Heights.
Moving to a Traditional Balance of Power Strategy
TEXT:
We must distinguish soberly and clearly friend from foe. We must make sure that our friends across the Middle East never doubt the solidity or value of our friendship.
Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq — an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right — as a means of foiling Syria’s regional ambitions. Jordan has challenged Syria's regional ambitions recently by suggesting the restoration of the Hashemites in Iraq. This has triggered a Jordanian-Syrian rivalry to which Asad has responded by stepping up efforts to destabilize the Hashemite Kingdom, including using infiltrations. Syria recently signaled that it and Iran might prefer a weak, but barely surviving Saddam, if only to undermine and humiliate Jordan in its efforts to remove Saddam.
But Syria enters this conflict with potential weaknesses: Damascus is too preoccupied with dealing with the threatened new regional equation to permit distractions of the Lebanese flank. And Damascus fears that the 'natural axis' with Israel on one side, central Iraq and Turkey on the other, and Jordan, in the center would squeeze and detach Syria from the Saudi Peninsula. For Syria, this could be the prelude to a redrawing of the map of the Middle East which would threaten Syria's territorial integrity.
Since Iraq's future could affect the strategic balance in the Middle East profoundly, it would be understandable that Israel has an interest in supporting the Hashemites in their efforts to redefine Iraq, including such measures as: visiting Jordan as the first official state visit, even before a visit to the United States, of the new Netanyahu government; supporting King Hussein by providing him with some tangible security measures to protect his regime against Syrian subversion; encouraging — through influence in the U.S. business community — investment in Jordan to structurally shift Jordan’s economy away from dependence on Iraq; and diverting Syria’s attention by using Lebanese opposition elements to destabilize Syrian control of Lebanon.
Most important, it is understandable that Israel has an interest supporting diplomatically, militarily and operationally Turkey’s and Jordan’s actions against Syria, such as securing tribal alliances with Arab tribes that cross into Syrian territory and are hostile to the Syrian ruling elite.
King Hussein may have ideas for Israel in bringing its Lebanon problem under control. The predominantly Shia population of southern Lebanon has been tied for centuries to the Shia leadership in Najf, Iraq rather than Iran. Were the Hashemites to control Iraq, they could use their influence over Najf to help Israel wean the south Lebanese Shia away from Hizballah, Iran, and Syria. Shia retain strong ties to the Hashemites: the Shia venerate foremost the Prophet’s family, the direct descendants of which — and in whose veins the blood of the Prophet flows — is King Hussein.
Changing the Nature of Relations with the Palestinians
Israel has a chance to forge a new relationship between itself and the Palestinians. First and foremost, Israel’s efforts to secure its streets may require hot pursuit into Palestinian-controlled areas, a justifiable practice with which Americans can sympathize.
A key element of peace is compliance with agreements already signed. Therefore, Israel has the right to insist on compliance, including closing Orient House and disbanding Jibril Rujoub’s operatives in Jerusalem. Moreover, Israel and the United States can establish a Joint Compliance Monitoring Committee to study periodically whether the PLO meets minimum standards of compliance, authority and responsibility, human rights, and judicial and fiduciary accountability.
TEXT:
We believe that the Palestinian Authority must be held to the same minimal standards of accountability as other recipients of U.S. foreign aid. A firm peace cannot tolerate repression and injustice. A regime that cannot fulfill the most rudimentary obligations to its own people cannot be counted upon to fulfill its obligations to its neighbors.
Israel has no obligations under the Oslo agreements if the PLO does not fulfill its obligations. If the PLO cannot comply with these minimal standards, then it can be neither a hope for the future nor a proper interlocutor for present. To prepare for this, Israel may want to cultivate alternatives to Arafat’s base of power. Jordan has ideas on this.
To emphasize the point that Israel regards the actions of the PLO problematic, but not the Arab people, Israel might want to consider making a special effort to reward friends and advance human rights among Arabs. Many Arabs are willing to work with Israel; identifying and helping them are important. Israel may also find that many of her neighbors, such as Jordan, have problems with Arafat and may want to cooperate. Israel may also want to better integrate its own Arabs.
Forging A New U.S.-Israeli Relationship
In recent years, Israel invited active U.S. intervention in Israel’s domestic and foreign policy for two reasons: to overcome domestic opposition to "land for peace" concessions the Israeli public could not digest, and to lure Arabs — through money, forgiveness of past sins, and access to U.S. weapons — to negotiate. This strategy, which required funneling American money to repressive and aggressive regimes, was risky, expensive, and very costly for both the U.S. and Israel, and placed the United States in roles is should neither have nor want.
Israel can make a clean break from the past and establish a new vision for the U.S.-Israeli partnership based on self-reliance, maturity and mutuality — not one focused narrowly on territorial disputes. Israel’s new strategy — based on a shared philosophy of peace through strength — reflects continuity with Western values by stressing that Israel is self-reliant, does not need U.S. troops in any capacity to defend it, including on the Golan Heights, and can manage its own affairs. Such self-reliance will grant Israel greater freedom of action and remove a significant lever of pressure used against it in the past.
To reinforce this point, the Prime Minister can use his forthcoming visit to announce that Israel is now mature enough to cut itself free immediately from at least U.S. economic aid and loan guarantees at least, which prevent economic reform. [Military aid is separated for the moment until adequate arrangements can be made to ensure that Israel will not encounter supply problems in the means to defend itself]. As outlined in another Institute report, Israel can become self-reliant only by, in a bold stroke rather than in increments, liberalizing its economy, cutting taxes, relegislating a free-processing zone, and selling-off public lands and enterprises — moves which will electrify and find support from a broad bipartisan spectrum of key pro-Israeli Congressional leaders, including Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
Israel can under these conditions better cooperate with the U.S. to counter real threats to the region and the West’s security. Mr. Netanyahu can highlight his desire to cooperate more closely with the United States on anti-missile defense in order to remove the threat of blackmail which even a weak and distant army can pose to either state. Not only would such cooperation on missile defense counter a tangible physical threat to Israel’s survival, but it would broaden Israel’s base of support among many in the United States Congress who may know little about Israel, but care very much about missile defense. Such broad support could be helpful in the effort to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
To anticipate U.S. reactions and plan ways to manage and constrain those reactions, Prime Minister Netanyahu can formulate the policies and stress themes he favors in language familiar to the Americans by tapping into themes of American administrations during the Cold War which apply well to Israel. If Israel wants to test certain propositions that require a benign American reaction, then the best time to do so is before November, 1996.
Conclusions: Transcending the Arab-Israeli Conflict
TEXT: Israel will not only contain its foes; it will transcend them.
Notable Arab intellectuals have written extensively on their perception of Israel’s floundering and loss of national identity. This perception has invited attack, blocked Israel from achieving true peace, and offered hope for those who would destroy Israel. The previous strategy, therefore, was leading the Middle East toward another Arab-Israeli war. Israel’s new agenda can signal a clean break by abandoning a policy which assumed exhaustion and allowed strategic retreat by reestablishing the principle of preemption, rather than retaliation alone and by ceasing to absorb blows to the nation without response.
Israel’s new strategic agenda can shape the regional environment in ways that grant Israel the room to refocus its energies back to where they are most needed: to rejuvenate its national idea, which can only come through replacing Israel’s socialist foundations with a more sound footing; and to overcome its "exhaustion," which threatens the survival of the nation.
Ultimately, Israel can do more than simply manage the Arab-Israeli conflict though war. No amount of weapons or victories will grant Israel the peace its seeks. When Israel is on a sound economic footing, and is free, powerful, and healthy internally, it will no longer simply manage the Arab-Israeli conflict; it will transcend it. As a senior Iraqi opposition leader said recently: "Israel must rejuvenate and revitalize its moral and intellectual leadership. It is an important — if not the most important--element in the history of the Middle East." Israel — proud, wealthy, solid, and strong — would be the basis of a truly new and peaceful Middle East.
Participants in the Study Group on "A New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000:"
Richard Perle, American Enterprise Institute, Study Group Leader
James Colbert, Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Johns Hopkins University/SAIS
Douglas Feith, Feith and Zell Associates
Robert Loewenberg, President, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
Jonathan Torop, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
David Wurmser, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
Meyrav Wurmser, Johns Hopkins University
Richard Perle et al
http://radioislam.org/islam/english/zionism/zioniststrategy.htm
Here follows a document published by The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies’ "Study Group on a New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000." as a framework for Zionist Strategies for the ruling Likud Party in Israel. When reading this Zionist document compare the recommendations in this document from 1996 with the actual polititical acts of the U.S. government in 2003 - almost 7 years later - concerning Iraq and Syria. The Jewish authors Perle, Feith and Wurmser have since the conceivement of this document advanced to high positions in th U.S. Administration and were acting as Zionist moles from those positions as some of the main architects behind the so-called "U.S." led aggression och occupation of Iraq in 2003.
A Clean Break:
A New Strategy for Securing the Realm
By Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser
The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
July 8, 1996
Following is a report prepared by The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies’ "Study Group on a New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000." The main substantive ideas in this paper emerge from a discussion in which prominent opinion makers, including Richard Perle, James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser participated. The report, entitled "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," is the framework for a series of follow-up reports on strategy.
Israel has a large problem. Labor Zionism, which for 70 years has dominated the Zionist movement, has generated a stalled and shackled economy. Efforts to salvage Israel’s socialist institutions—which include pursuing supranational over national sovereignty and pursuing a peace process that embraces the slogan, "New Middle East"—undermine the legitimacy of the nation and lead Israel into strategic paralysis and the previous government’s "peace process." That peace process obscured the evidence of eroding national critical mass— including a palpable sense of national exhaustion—and forfeited strategic initiative. The loss of national critical mass was illustrated best by Israel’s efforts to draw in the United States to sell unpopular policies domestically, to agree to negotiate sovereignty over its capital, and to respond with resignation to a spate of terror so intense and tragic that it deterred Israelis from engaging in normal daily functions, such as commuting to work in buses.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s government comes in with a new set of ideas. While there are those who will counsel continuity, Israel has the opportunity to make a clean break; it can forge a peace process and strategy based on an entirely new intellectual foundation, one that restores strategic initiative and provides the nation the room to engage every possible energy on rebuilding Zionism, the starting point of which must be economic reform. To secure the nation’s streets and borders in the immediate future, Israel can:
Work closely with Turkey and Jordan to contain, destabilize, and roll-back some of its most dangerous threats. This implies clean break from the slogan, "comprehensive peace" to a traditional concept of strategy based on balance of power.
Change the nature of its relations with the Palestinians, including upholding the right of hot pursuit for self defense into all Palestinian areas and nurturing alternatives to Arafat’s exclusive grip on Palestinian society.
Forge a new basis for relations with the United States—stressing self-reliance, maturity, strategic cooperation on areas of mutual concern, and furthering values inherent to the West. This can only be done if Israel takes serious steps to terminate aid, which prevents economic reform.
This report is written with key passages of a possible speech marked TEXT, that highlight the clean break which the new government has an opportunity to make. The body of the report is the commentary explaining the purpose and laying out the strategic context of the passages.
A New Approach to Peace
Early adoption of a bold, new perspective on peace and security is imperative for the new prime minister. While the previous government, and many abroad, may emphasize "land for peace"— which placed Israel in the position of cultural, economic, political, diplomatic, and military retreat — the new government can promote Western values and traditions. Such an approach, which will be well received in the United States, includes "peace for peace," "peace through strength" and self reliance: the balance of power.
A new strategy to seize the initiative can be introduced:
TEXT:
We have for four years pursued peace based on a New Middle East. We in Israel cannot play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent. Peace depends on the character and behavior of our foes. We live in a dangerous neighborhood, with fragile states and bitter rivalries. Displaying moral ambivalence between the effort to build a Jewish state and the desire to annihilate it by trading "land for peace" will not secure "peace now." Our claim to the land —to which we have clung for hope for 2000 years--is legitimate and noble. It is not within our own power, no matter how much we concede, to make peace unilaterally. Only the unconditional acceptance by Arabs of our rights, especially in their territorial dimension, "peace for peace," is a solid basis for the future.
Israel’s quest for peace emerges from, and does not replace, the pursuit of its ideals. The Jewish people’s hunger for human rights — burned into their identity by a 2000-year old dream to live free in their own land — informs the concept of peace and reflects continuity of values with Western and Jewish tradition. Israel can now embrace negotiations, but as means, not ends, to pursue those ideals and demonstrate national steadfastness. It can challenge police states; enforce compliance of agreements; and insist on minimal standards of accountability.
Securing the Northern Border
Syria challenges Israel on Lebanese soil. An effective approach, and one with which American can sympathize, would be if Israel seized the strategic initiative along its northern borders by engaging Hizballah, Syria, and Iran, as the principal agents of aggression in Lebanon, including by:
striking Syria’s drug-money and counterfeiting infrastructure in Lebanon, all of which focuses on Razi Qanan.
paralleling Syria’s behavior by establishing the precedent that Syrian territory is not immune to attacks emanating from Lebanon by Israeli proxy forces.
striking Syrian military targets in Lebanon, and should that prove insufficient, striking at select targets in Syria proper.
Israel also can take this opportunity to remind the world of the nature of the Syrian regime. Syria repeatedly breaks its word. It violated numerous agreements with the Turks, and has betrayed the United States by continuing to occupy Lebanon in violation of the Taef agreement in 1989. Instead, Syria staged a sham election, installed a quisling regime, and forced Lebanon to sign a "Brotherhood Agreement" in 1991, that terminated Lebanese sovereignty. And Syria has begun colonizing Lebanon with hundreds of thousands of Syrians, while killing tens of thousands of its own citizens at a time, as it did in only three days in 1983 in Hama.
Under Syrian tutelage, the Lebanese drug trade, for which local Syrian military officers receive protection payments, flourishes. Syria’s regime supports the terrorist groups operationally and financially in Lebanon and on its soil. Indeed, the Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley in Lebanon has become for terror what the Silicon Valley has become for computers. The Bekaa Valley has become one of the main distribution sources, if not production points, of the "supernote" — counterfeit US currency so well done that it is impossible to detect.
Text:
Negotiations with repressive regimes like Syria’s require cautious realism. One cannot sensibly assume the other side’s good faith. It is dangerous for Israel to deal naively with a regime murderous of its own people, openly aggressive toward its neighbors, criminally involved with international drug traffickers and counterfeiters, and supportive of the most deadly terrorist organizations.
Given the nature of the regime in Damascus, it is both natural and moral that Israel abandon the slogan "comprehensive peace" and move to contain Syria, drawing attention to its weapons of mass destruction program, and rejecting "land for peace" deals on the Golan Heights.
Moving to a Traditional Balance of Power Strategy
TEXT:
We must distinguish soberly and clearly friend from foe. We must make sure that our friends across the Middle East never doubt the solidity or value of our friendship.
Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq — an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right — as a means of foiling Syria’s regional ambitions. Jordan has challenged Syria's regional ambitions recently by suggesting the restoration of the Hashemites in Iraq. This has triggered a Jordanian-Syrian rivalry to which Asad has responded by stepping up efforts to destabilize the Hashemite Kingdom, including using infiltrations. Syria recently signaled that it and Iran might prefer a weak, but barely surviving Saddam, if only to undermine and humiliate Jordan in its efforts to remove Saddam.
But Syria enters this conflict with potential weaknesses: Damascus is too preoccupied with dealing with the threatened new regional equation to permit distractions of the Lebanese flank. And Damascus fears that the 'natural axis' with Israel on one side, central Iraq and Turkey on the other, and Jordan, in the center would squeeze and detach Syria from the Saudi Peninsula. For Syria, this could be the prelude to a redrawing of the map of the Middle East which would threaten Syria's territorial integrity.
Since Iraq's future could affect the strategic balance in the Middle East profoundly, it would be understandable that Israel has an interest in supporting the Hashemites in their efforts to redefine Iraq, including such measures as: visiting Jordan as the first official state visit, even before a visit to the United States, of the new Netanyahu government; supporting King Hussein by providing him with some tangible security measures to protect his regime against Syrian subversion; encouraging — through influence in the U.S. business community — investment in Jordan to structurally shift Jordan’s economy away from dependence on Iraq; and diverting Syria’s attention by using Lebanese opposition elements to destabilize Syrian control of Lebanon.
Most important, it is understandable that Israel has an interest supporting diplomatically, militarily and operationally Turkey’s and Jordan’s actions against Syria, such as securing tribal alliances with Arab tribes that cross into Syrian territory and are hostile to the Syrian ruling elite.
King Hussein may have ideas for Israel in bringing its Lebanon problem under control. The predominantly Shia population of southern Lebanon has been tied for centuries to the Shia leadership in Najf, Iraq rather than Iran. Were the Hashemites to control Iraq, they could use their influence over Najf to help Israel wean the south Lebanese Shia away from Hizballah, Iran, and Syria. Shia retain strong ties to the Hashemites: the Shia venerate foremost the Prophet’s family, the direct descendants of which — and in whose veins the blood of the Prophet flows — is King Hussein.
Changing the Nature of Relations with the Palestinians
Israel has a chance to forge a new relationship between itself and the Palestinians. First and foremost, Israel’s efforts to secure its streets may require hot pursuit into Palestinian-controlled areas, a justifiable practice with which Americans can sympathize.
A key element of peace is compliance with agreements already signed. Therefore, Israel has the right to insist on compliance, including closing Orient House and disbanding Jibril Rujoub’s operatives in Jerusalem. Moreover, Israel and the United States can establish a Joint Compliance Monitoring Committee to study periodically whether the PLO meets minimum standards of compliance, authority and responsibility, human rights, and judicial and fiduciary accountability.
TEXT:
We believe that the Palestinian Authority must be held to the same minimal standards of accountability as other recipients of U.S. foreign aid. A firm peace cannot tolerate repression and injustice. A regime that cannot fulfill the most rudimentary obligations to its own people cannot be counted upon to fulfill its obligations to its neighbors.
Israel has no obligations under the Oslo agreements if the PLO does not fulfill its obligations. If the PLO cannot comply with these minimal standards, then it can be neither a hope for the future nor a proper interlocutor for present. To prepare for this, Israel may want to cultivate alternatives to Arafat’s base of power. Jordan has ideas on this.
To emphasize the point that Israel regards the actions of the PLO problematic, but not the Arab people, Israel might want to consider making a special effort to reward friends and advance human rights among Arabs. Many Arabs are willing to work with Israel; identifying and helping them are important. Israel may also find that many of her neighbors, such as Jordan, have problems with Arafat and may want to cooperate. Israel may also want to better integrate its own Arabs.
Forging A New U.S.-Israeli Relationship
In recent years, Israel invited active U.S. intervention in Israel’s domestic and foreign policy for two reasons: to overcome domestic opposition to "land for peace" concessions the Israeli public could not digest, and to lure Arabs — through money, forgiveness of past sins, and access to U.S. weapons — to negotiate. This strategy, which required funneling American money to repressive and aggressive regimes, was risky, expensive, and very costly for both the U.S. and Israel, and placed the United States in roles is should neither have nor want.
Israel can make a clean break from the past and establish a new vision for the U.S.-Israeli partnership based on self-reliance, maturity and mutuality — not one focused narrowly on territorial disputes. Israel’s new strategy — based on a shared philosophy of peace through strength — reflects continuity with Western values by stressing that Israel is self-reliant, does not need U.S. troops in any capacity to defend it, including on the Golan Heights, and can manage its own affairs. Such self-reliance will grant Israel greater freedom of action and remove a significant lever of pressure used against it in the past.
To reinforce this point, the Prime Minister can use his forthcoming visit to announce that Israel is now mature enough to cut itself free immediately from at least U.S. economic aid and loan guarantees at least, which prevent economic reform. [Military aid is separated for the moment until adequate arrangements can be made to ensure that Israel will not encounter supply problems in the means to defend itself]. As outlined in another Institute report, Israel can become self-reliant only by, in a bold stroke rather than in increments, liberalizing its economy, cutting taxes, relegislating a free-processing zone, and selling-off public lands and enterprises — moves which will electrify and find support from a broad bipartisan spectrum of key pro-Israeli Congressional leaders, including Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
Israel can under these conditions better cooperate with the U.S. to counter real threats to the region and the West’s security. Mr. Netanyahu can highlight his desire to cooperate more closely with the United States on anti-missile defense in order to remove the threat of blackmail which even a weak and distant army can pose to either state. Not only would such cooperation on missile defense counter a tangible physical threat to Israel’s survival, but it would broaden Israel’s base of support among many in the United States Congress who may know little about Israel, but care very much about missile defense. Such broad support could be helpful in the effort to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
To anticipate U.S. reactions and plan ways to manage and constrain those reactions, Prime Minister Netanyahu can formulate the policies and stress themes he favors in language familiar to the Americans by tapping into themes of American administrations during the Cold War which apply well to Israel. If Israel wants to test certain propositions that require a benign American reaction, then the best time to do so is before November, 1996.
Conclusions: Transcending the Arab-Israeli Conflict
TEXT: Israel will not only contain its foes; it will transcend them.
Notable Arab intellectuals have written extensively on their perception of Israel’s floundering and loss of national identity. This perception has invited attack, blocked Israel from achieving true peace, and offered hope for those who would destroy Israel. The previous strategy, therefore, was leading the Middle East toward another Arab-Israeli war. Israel’s new agenda can signal a clean break by abandoning a policy which assumed exhaustion and allowed strategic retreat by reestablishing the principle of preemption, rather than retaliation alone and by ceasing to absorb blows to the nation without response.
Israel’s new strategic agenda can shape the regional environment in ways that grant Israel the room to refocus its energies back to where they are most needed: to rejuvenate its national idea, which can only come through replacing Israel’s socialist foundations with a more sound footing; and to overcome its "exhaustion," which threatens the survival of the nation.
Ultimately, Israel can do more than simply manage the Arab-Israeli conflict though war. No amount of weapons or victories will grant Israel the peace its seeks. When Israel is on a sound economic footing, and is free, powerful, and healthy internally, it will no longer simply manage the Arab-Israeli conflict; it will transcend it. As a senior Iraqi opposition leader said recently: "Israel must rejuvenate and revitalize its moral and intellectual leadership. It is an important — if not the most important--element in the history of the Middle East." Israel — proud, wealthy, solid, and strong — would be the basis of a truly new and peaceful Middle East.
Participants in the Study Group on "A New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000:"
Richard Perle, American Enterprise Institute, Study Group Leader
James Colbert, Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs
Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Johns Hopkins University/SAIS
Douglas Feith, Feith and Zell Associates
Robert Loewenberg, President, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
Jonathan Torop, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
David Wurmser, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies
Meyrav Wurmser, Johns Hopkins University
The Zionist Plan for the Middle East
The Zionist Plan for the Middle East
Translated and edited by Israel Shahak
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20832.htm
In his Complete Diaries , Vol. II. p. 711, Theodore Herzl, the founder of Zionism, says that the area of the Jewish State stretches: "From the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates."
Rabbi Fischmann, member of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared in his testimony to the U.N. Special Committee of Enquiry on 9 Jul y 1947: "The Promised Land extends from the River of Egypt up to the Euphrates, it includes parts of Syria and Lebanon."
from Oded Yinon's
"A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties"
Published by the
Association of Arab-American University Graduates, Inc.
Belmont, Massachusetts, 1982
Special Document No. 1
(ISBN 0-937694-56-8)
Table of Contents
Publisher's Note
1
The Association of Arab-American University Graduates finds it compelling to inaugurate its new
publication series, Special Documents, with Oded Yinon's article which appeared in Kivunim
(Directions) , the journal of the Department of Information of the World Zionist Organization. Oded
Yinon is an Israeli journalist and was formerly attached to the Foreign Ministry of Israel. To our
knowledge, this document is the most explicit, detailed and unambiguous statement to date of the
Zionist strategy in the Middle East. Furthermore, it stands as an accurate representation of the "vision"
for the entire Middle East of the presently ruling Zionist regime of Begin, Sharon and Eitan. Its
importance, hence, lies not in its historical value but in the nightmare which it presents.
2
The plan operates on two essential premises. To survive, Israel must 1) become an imperial regional
power, and 2) must effect the division of the whole area into small states by the dissolution of all
existing Arab states. Sma ll here will depend on the ethnic or sectarian composition of each state.
Consequently, the Zionist hope is that sectarian-based states become Israel's satellites and, ironically, its
source of moral legitimation .
3
This is not a new idea, nor does it surface for the first time in Zionist strategic thinking. Indeed,
fragmenting all Arab states into smaller units has been a recurrent theme. This theme has been
documented on a very modest scale in the AAUG publication,Israel's Sacred Terrorism(1980), by
Livia Rokach. Based on the memoirs of Moshe Sharett, former Prime Minister of Israel, Rokach's study
documen ts, in convincing detail, the Zionist plan as it applies to Lebanon and as it was prepared in th e
mid-fifties.
4
The first massive Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1978 bore this plan out to the minutest detail. The
second and more barbaric and encompassing Israeli invasion of Lebanon on June 6, 1982, aims to effect
certain parts of this plan which hopes to see not only Lebanon, but Syria and Jordan as well, in
fragments. This ought to make mockery of Israeli public claims regarding their desire for a strong and
independent Lebanese central government. More accurately, they want a Lebanese central government
that sanctions their regional imperialist designs by signing a peace treaty with them. They also seek
acquiescence in their designs by the Syrian, Iraqi, Jordanian and other Arab governments as well as by
the Palestinian people. What they want and what they are planning for is not an Arab world, but a world
of Arab fragments that is ready to succumb to Israeli hegemony. Hence, Oded Yinon in his essay, "A
Strategy for Israel in the 1980 's," talks about "far-reaching opportunities for the first time since 1967"
that are created by the "very stormy situation [that] surrounds Israel."
5
The Zionist policy of displacing the Palestinians from Palestine is very much an active policy, but is
pursued more forcefully in times of conflict, such as in the 1947-1948 war and in the 1967 war. An
appendix entitled "Israel Talks of a New Exodus" is included in this publication to demonstrate past
Zionist dispersals of Palestinians from their homeland and to show, besides the main Zionist document
we present, other Zionist planning for the de-Palestinization of Palestine.
6
It is clear from the Kivunim document, published in February, 1982, that the "far-reaching
opportunities" of which Zionist strategists have been thinking are the same "opportunities" of which
they are trying to convince the world and which they claim were generated by their June, 1982 invasion.
It is also clear that the Palestinians were never the sole target of Zionist plans, but the priority target
since their viable and independent presence as a people negates the essence of the Zionist state. Every
Arab state, however, especially those with cohesive and clear nationalist directions, is a real target
sooner or later.
7
Contrasted with the detailed and unambiguous Zionist strategy elucidated in this document, Arab and
Palestinian strategy, unfortunately, suffers from ambiguity and incoherence. There is no indication that
Arab strategists have internalized the Zionist plan in its full ramifications. Instead, they react with
incredulity and shock whenever a new stage of it unfolds. This is apparent in Arab reaction, albeit
muted, to the Israeli siege of Beirut. The sad fact is that as long as the Zionist strategy for th e Middle
East is not taken seriously Arab reaction to any future siege of o ther Arab capitals will be the same.
Khal il Nakhleh
July 23, 1982
Foreward
1
The following essay represents, in my opinion, the accurate and detailed plan of the present Zionist
regime (of Sharon and Eitan) for the Middle East which is based on the division of the whole area into
small states, and the dissolution of all the existing Arab states. I will comment on the military aspect of
this plan in a concluding note. Here I want to draw the attention of the readers to several important
points:
2
1. The idea that all the Arab states should be broken down, by Israel, into small units, occurs again and
again in Israeli strategic thinking. For example, Ze'ev Schiff, the military correspondent of Ha'aretz
(and probably the most knowledgeable in Israel, on this topic) writes about the "best" that can happen
for Israeli interests in Iraq: "The dissolution of Iraq into a Shi'ite state, a Sunni state and the separation
of the Kurdish part" ( Ha'aretz 6/2/1982). Actually, this aspect of the plan is very old.
3
2. The strong connection with Neo-Conservative thought in the USA is very prominent, especially in
the author's notes. But, while lip service is paid to the idea of the "defense of the West" from Soviet
power, the real aim of the author, and of the present Israeli establishment is clear: To make an Imperial
Israel into a world power. In other words, the aim of Sharon is to deceive the Americans after he has
deceived all the rest.
4
3. It is obvious that much of the relevant data, both in the notes and in the text, is garbled or omitted,
such as the financial help of the U.S. to Israel . Much of it is pure fantasy. But , the plan is not to be
regarded as not influential, or as not capable of realization for a short time. The plan follows faithfully
the geopolitical ideas current in Germany of 1890-1933 , which were swallowed whole by Hitler and the
Nazi movement, and determined their aims for East Europe . Those aims, especially the division of the
existing states, were carried out in 1939-1941, and only an alliance on the global scale prevented their
consolidation for a period of time.
5
The notes by the author follow the text. To avoid confusion, I did not add any notes of my own, but
have put the substance of them into this foreward and the conclusion at the end. I have, however,
emphasized some portions of the text.
Israel Shahak
June 13, 1982
A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties
by Oded Yinon
This essay originally appeared in Hebrew in KIVUNIM (Directions) , A Journal for Judaism and
Zionism; Issue No, 14--Winter, 5742, February 1982, Editor: Yoram Beck. Editorial Committee: Eli
Eyal, Yoram Beck, Amnon Hadari, Yohanan Manor, Elieser Schweid. Published by the Department of
Publicity/The World Zionist Organization , Jerusalem.
1
At the outset of the nineteen eighties the State of Israel is in need of a new perspective as to its place, its
aims and national targets, at home and abroad. This need has become even more vital due to a number
of central processes which the country, the region and the world are undergoing. We are living today in
the early stages of a new epoch in human history which is not at all similar to its predecessor, and its
characteristics are totally different from what we have hitherto known. That is why we need an
understanding of the central processes which typify this historical epoch on the one hand, and on the
other hand we need a world outlook and an operational strategy in accordance with the new conditions.
The existence, prosperity and steadfastness of the Jewish state will depend upon its ability to adopt a
new framework for its domestic and foreign affairs.
2
This epoch is characterized by several traits which we can already diagnose, and which symbolize a
genuine revolution in our present lifestyle. The dominant process is the breakdown of the rationalist,
humanist outlook as the major cornerstone supporting the life and achievements of Western civilization
since the Renaissance. The political, social and economic views which have emanated from this
foundation have been based on several "truths" which are presently disappearing--for example, the view
that man as an individual is the center of the universe and everything exists in order to fulfill his basic
material needs. This position is being invalidated in the present when it has become clear that the
amount of resources in the cosmos does not meet Man's requirements, his economic needs or his
demographic constraints. In a world in which there are four billion human beings and economic and
energy resources which do not grow proportionally to meet the needs of mankind, it is unrealistic to
expect to fulfill the main requirement of Western Society, i.e., the wish and aspiration for boundless 1
consumption. The view that ethics plays no part in determining the direction Man takes, but rather his
material needs do--that view is becoming prevalent today as we see a world in which nearly all values
are disappearing. We are losing the ability to assess the simplest things, especially when they concern
the simple question of what is Good and what is Evil.
3
The vision of man's limitless aspirations and abilities shrinks in the face of the sad facts of life, when we
witness the break-up of world order around us. The view which promises liberty and freedom to
mankind seems absurd in light of the sad fact that three fourths of the human race lives under
totalitarian regimes. The views concerning equality and social justice have been transformed by
socialism and especially by Communism into a laughing stock. There is no argument as to the truth of
these two ideas, but it is clear that they have not been put into practice properly and the majority of
mankind has lost the liberty, the freedom and the opportunity for equality and justice. In this nuclear
world in which we are (still) living in relative peace for thirty years, the concept of peace and
coexistence among nations has no meaning when a superpower like the USSR holds a military and
political doctrine of the sort it has: that not only is a nuclear war possible and necessary in order to
achieve the ends of Marxism, but that it is possible to survive after it, not to speak of the fact that one
can be victorious in it. 2
4
The essential concepts of human society, especially those of the West, are undergoing a change due to
political, military and economic transformations. Thus, the nuclear and conventional might of the USSR
has transformed the epoch that has just ended into the last respite before the great saga that will
demolish a large part of our world in a multi-dimensional global war, in comparison with which the past
world wars will have been mere child's play. The power of nu clear as well as of conventional weapons,
their quantity, their precision and quality will turn most of our world upside down within a few years,
and we must align ourselves so as to face that in Israel. That is, then, the main threat to our existence
and that of the Western world. The war over resources in the world, the Arab monopoly on oil, and the 3
need of the West to import most of its raw materials from the Third World, are transforming the world
we know, given that one of the major aims of the USSR is to defeat the West by gaining control over
the g igantic resources in the Persian Gulf and in the southern part of Africa, in which the majority of
world minerals are located. We can imagine the dimensions of the global confrontation which will face
us in the future.
5
The Gorshkov doctrine calls for Soviet control of the oceans and mineral rich areas of the Third World.
That together with the present Soviet nuclear doctrine which holds that it is possible to manage, win and
survive a nuclear war, in the course of which the West's military might well be destroyed and its
inhabitants made slaves in the service of Marxism-Leninism, is the main danger to world peace and to
our own existence. Since 1967, the Soviets have transformed Clausewitz' dictum into "War is the
continuation of policy in nuclear means," and made it the motto which guides all their policies. Already
today they are busy carrying out their aims in our region and throughout the world, and the need to face
them becomes the major element in our country's security policy and of course that of the rest of the
Free World. That is our major foreign challenge. 4
6
The Arab Moslem world, therefore, is not the major strategic problem which we shall face in the
Eighties, despite the fact that it carries the main threat against Israel, due to its growing military might.
This world, with its ethnic minorities, its factions and internal crises, which is astonishingly self-
destructive, as we can see in Lebanon, in non-Arab Iran and now also in Syria, is unable to deal
successfully with its fundamental problems and does not therefore constitute a real threat against the
State of Israel in the long run, but only in the short run where its immediate military power has great
import. In the long run, this world will be unable to exist within its present framework in the areas
around us without having to go through genuine revolutionary changes. The Moslem Arab World is
built like a temporary house of cards put together by foreign ers (France and Britain in the Nineteen
Twenties), without the wishes and desires of the inhabitants having been taken into account. It was
arbitrarily divided into 19 states, all made of combinations of minorites and ethnic groups which are
hostile to one anoth er, so that every Arab Moslem state nowadays faces ethnic so cial destruction from
within, and in some a civil war is already raging. Most of th e Arabs, 118 million out of 170 millio n, 5
live in Africa, mostly in Egypt (45 million today).
7
Apart from Egypt, all the Maghreb states are made up of a mixture of Arabs and non-Arab Berbers. In
Algeria there is already a civil war raging in the Kabile mountains between the two nations in the
country. Morocco and Algeria are at war with each other over Spanish Sahara, in addition to the internal
struggle in each of them. Militant Islam endangers the integrity of Tunisia and Qaddafi organizes wars
which are destructive from the Arab point of view, from a country which is sparsely populated and
which cannot become a powerful nation. That is why he has been attempting unifications in the past
with states that are more genuine, like Egypt and Syria. Sudan, the most torn apart state in the Arab
Moslem world today is built upon four groups hostile to each other, an Arab Moslem Sunni minority
which rules over a majority of non-Arab Africans, Pagans, and Christians. In Egypt there is a Sunni
Moslem majority facing a large minority of Christians which is dominant in upper Egypt: some 7
million of them, so that even Sadat, in his speech on May 8, expressed the fear that they will want a
state of their own, something like a "second" Christian Lebanon in Egypt.
8
All the Arab States east of Israel are torn apart, broken up and riddled with inner conflict even more
than those of the Maghreb. Syria is fundamentally no different from Lebanon except in the strong
military regime which rules it. But the real civil war taking place nowadays between the Sunni majority
and the Shi'ite Alawi ruling minority (a mere 12% of the population) testifies to th e severity of the
domestic trouble.
9
Iraq is, once again, no different in essence from its neighbors, although its majority is Shi'ite and the
ruling minority Sunni. Sixty-fiv e percent of the population has no say in politics, in which an elite of 20
percent holds the power. In addition there is a large Kurdish minority in the north, and if it weren't for
the strength of the ruling regime, the army and the oil revenues, Iraq's future state would be no different
than that of Lebanon in th e past or of Syria today. The seed s of inner conflict and civil war are apparent
today already, especially after the rise of Khomeini to power in Iran, a leader wh om the Shi'ites in Iraq
view as th eir natural leader.
10
All the Gulf principalities and Saudi Arabia are built upon a d elicate house of sand in which there is
only o il. In Kuwait, the Kuwaitis co nstitute only a quarter of the population. In Bahrain, the Shi'ites are
the majority but are deprived of power. In the UAE, Shi'ites are once again the majority but the Sunnis
are in power. The same is true of Oman and North Yemen. Even in the Marx ist South Yemen there is a
sizable Shi'ite minority. In Saudi Arabia half the population is foreign, Egyptian and Yemenite, but a
Saudi minority holds power.
11
Jordan is in reality Palestinian, ruled by a Trans-Jordanian Bedouin minority, but most of the army and
certainly the bureaucracy is now Palestin ian. As a matter of fact Amman is as Palestinian as Nab lus. All
of these countries have powerful armies, relatively speaking. But there is a problem there too. The
Syrian army today is mostly Sunni with an Alawi officer corps, th e Iraqi army Shi'ite with Sunni
commanders. This has great significance in the long run, and that is wh y it will not be possible to retain
the loyalty of the army for a long time except where it comes to the only common denominator: The
hostility towards Israel, and today even th at is insufficient.
12
Alongside the Arabs, split as they are, the other Mo slem states share a similar predicament. Half of
Iran's population is comprised of a Persian speaking group and the other half of an ethnically Turkish
group. Turkey's population comprises a Turkish Sunni Moslem majority, some 50%, and two large
minorities, 12 million Shi'ite Alawis and 6 million Sunni Kurds. In Afgh anistan there are 5 million
Shi'ites who constitute one third of the population. In Sunni Pakistan there are 15 million Shi'ites who
endanger the existence of that state.
13
This national ethnic minority picture extending from Morocco to India and from Somalia to Turkey
points to the absence of stability and a rapid degeneration in the entire region. When this picture is
added to the economic one, we see how the entire region is built like a house of cards, unable to
withstand its severe problems.
14
In this giant and fractured world there are a few wealthy groups and a huge mass of poor people. Most
of the Arabs have an average yearly income of 30 0 dollars. That is the situation in Egypt, in mo st of the
Maghreb countries except for Libya, and in Iraq. Lebanon is torn apart and its economy is falling to
pieces. It is a state in which there is no centralized power, but only 5 de facto sovereign authorities
(Christian in the north, supported by the Syrians and under the rule of the Franjieh clan, in the East an
area of direct Syrian conquest, in the center a Phalangist controlled Christian enclave, in the south and
up to the Litani river a mostly Palestinian region controlled by the PLO and Major Haddad's state of
Christians and half a million Shi'ites). Syria is in an even graver situation and even the assistance she
will obtain in the future after the unification with Libya will not be sufficient for dealing with the basic
problems of existence and the maintenance of a large army. Egypt is in the worst situation: Millions are
on the verge of hunger, half the labor force is unemployed, and housing is scarce in this most densely
populated area of the world. Except for the army, there is not a single department operating efficiently
and the state is in a permanent state of bankruptcy and depends entirely on American foreign assistance
granted since the peace. 6
15
In the Gulf states, Saudi Arabia, Libya and Egypt there is the largest accumulation of money and oil in
the world, bu t those enjoying it are tiny elites who lack a wide base of support and self-confidence,
something that no army can guarantee. The Saudi army with all its equipment cannot defend the regime 7
from real dangers at home or abroad, and what took place in Mecca in 1980 is only an example. A sad
and very stormy situation surrounds Israel and creates challenges for it, problems, risks but also far-
reaching opportunities for the first time since 1967 . Chances are that opportunities missed at that time
will become achievab le in the Eighties to an extent and along dimensions which we cannot even
imagine today.
16
The "peace" policy and the return of territories, through a dependence upon the US, precludes the
realization of the new option created for us. Since 1967, all the governments of Israel have tied our
national aims down to narrow political needs, on the one hand, and on th e other to destructive opinions
at home which neutralized our capacities both at ho me and abroad. Failing to take steps towards the
Arab population in the new territories, acquired in the course of a war forced upon us, is the major
strategic error committed by Israel on the morning after the Six Day War. We could have saved
ourselves all the bitter and dangerous conflict since then if we had given Jord an to the Palestinians who
live west of the Jordan river. By doing that we would have neutralized the Palestinian problem which
we nowadays face, and to which we have found solutions that are really no solutions at all, such as
territorial compromise or autonomy which amount, in fact, to the same thing. Today, we suddenly face 8
immense opportunities for transforming the situation thoroughly and this we must do in the coming
decade, otherwise we shall not survive as a state.
17
In the course of the Nineteen Eighties, the State of Israel will have to go through far-reaching changes
in its political and economic regime domestically, along with radical changes in its foreign policy, in
order to stand up to the global and regional challenges of this new epoch. The loss of the Suez Canal oil
fields, of the immense potential of the oil, gas and other natural resources in the Sinai peninsula which
is geomorphologically identical to the rich oil-producing countries in the region, will result in an energy
drain in the near future and will destroy our domestic economy: one quarter of our present GNP as well
as one third of the budget is used for the purchase of oil. The search for raw materials in the Negev and 9
on the coast will not, in the near future, serve to alter that state of affairs.
18
(Regaining) the Sinai peninsula with its present and potential resources is therefore a political priority
which is obstructed by the Camp David and the peace agreements . The fault for that lies of course with
the present Israeli government and the governments which paved the road to the policy of territorial
compromise, the Alignment governments since 1967. The Egyptians will not need to keep the peace
treaty after the return of the Sinai, and they will d o all th ey can to return to the fold of the Arab world
and to th e USSR in order to gain support and military assistance. American aid is guaranteed only for a
short while, for the terms of the peace and the weakening of the U.S. both at home and abroad will bring
about a reduction in aid. Without oil and the income from it, with the present enormous expenditure, we
will not be able to g et through 1982 under the present conditions and we will have to act in order to
return the situation to the status quo which existed in Sinai prior to Sadat's visit and the mistaken peace
agreement signed with him in March 1979 . 1 0
19
Israel has two major routes through which to realize this purpose, one direct and the other indirect. The
direct option is the less realistic one because of the nature of the regime and government in Israel as
well as the wisdom of Sadat who obtained our withdrawal from Sinai, which was, next to the war of
1973, his major achievement since he took power. Israel will not unilaterally break the treaty, neither
today, nor in 1982, unless it is very hard pressed economically and politically and Egypt provides Israel
with the excuse to take the Sinai back into our hands for the fourth time in our short h istory. What is left
therefore, is the indirect option. The economic situation in Egypt, the nature of the regime and its pan-
Arab po licy, will bring about a situation after April 1982 in which Israel will be forced to act directly or
indirectly in order to regain control over Sinai as a strategic, economic and energy reserve for the long
run . Egypt does n ot constitute a military strategic problem due to its internal conflicts and it could be
driven back to the post 19 67 war situation in no more than one day. 11
20
The myth of Egypt as the strong leader of the Arab World was demolished back in 1956 and definitely
did no t survive 1967, but our po licy, as in the return of the Sinai, served to turn the myth into "fact." In
reality, however, Egypt's power in proportion both to Israel alone and to the rest of the Arab World has
gone down about 50 p ercent since 1967. Egypt is no longer the leading political power in the Arab
World and is economically on the verge of a crisis. Without foreign assistance the crisis will come
tomorrow. In the short run, due to the return of the Sinai, Egypt will gain several advantages at our 12
expense, but only in the short run until 1982, and that will not change the balance of power to its
benefit, and will possibly bring about its downfall. Egypt, in its present domestic political p icture, is
already a corpse, all the more so if we take into account the growing Moslem-Christian rift. Breaking
Egypt down territorially into distinct geographical regions is the political aim of Israel in the Nineteen
Eighties on its Western front .
21
Egypt is divided and torn apart into many foci of authority. If Egypt falls apart, countries like Libya,
Sudan or even the more distant states will not continue to exist in their p resent form and will join the
downfall and dissolution of Egypt. The vision of a Christian Coptic State in Upper Egypt alongside a
number of weak states with very localized power and without a centralized government a s to date, is the
key to a historical development which was only set back by the peace agreement but which seems
inevitable in the long run . 13
22
The Western front, which on the surface appears more problematic, is in fact less complicated than the
Eastern front, in which most of the events that make the headlines have been taking place recently.
Lebanon's total dissolution into five provinces serves as a precendent for the entire Arab world
including Egypt, Syria, Iraq and the Arabian peninsula and is already following that track. The
dissolution of Syria and Iraq later on into ethnically or religiously unqiue areas such as in Lebanon, is
Israel's primary target on the Eastern fron t in the long run, while the d issolution o f the military power
of th ose sta tes serves as the primary short term target. Syria will fall apart, in acco rdance with its
ethnic and religious structure, into several states such as in present day Lebanon, so that there will be a
Shi'ite Alawi state along its coast, a Sunni state in the Aleppo area, another Sunni state in Damascus
hostile to its northern neighbor, and the Druzes who will set up a state , maybe even in our Golan, and
certainly in the Hauran and in northern Jordan . This state of affairs will be the guarantee for peace and
security in the area in the long run, and that aim is already within our reach today . 14
23
Iraq, rich in oil on the one hand and internally torn on the other, is guaranteed as a candidate for
Israel's targets . Its dissolution is even more important for us than that of Syria. Iraq is stronger than
Syria. In the short run it is Iraqi power which constitutes the greatest threat to Israel. An Iraqi-Iranian
war will tear Iraq apart and cause its downfall at home even before it is able to organize a struggle on a
wide front against us. Every kind of inter-Arab confrontation will assist us in the short run and will
shorten the way to the more important aim of breaking up Iraq into denominations as in Syria and in
Lebanon . In Iraq, a division into provinces along ethnic/religious lines as in Syria during Otto man times
is possible. So, three (or more) states will exist around the three major cities: Basra, Baghdad and
Mosul, and Shi'ite areas in the south will separate from the Sunni and Kurdish north. It is possible that
the present Iranian-Iraqi confrontation will deepen this polarization. 15
24
The entire Arabian peninsula is a natural candidate for dissolution due to internal and external
pressures, and the matter is inevitable especially in Saudi Arabia. Regardless of whether its economic
might based on oil remains intact or whether it is diminished in the long run, the internal rifts and
breakdowns are a clear and natu ral development in light of th e present political structure. 1 6
25
Jordan constitutes an immediate strategic target in the short run but no t in the long run, for it does not
constitute a real threat in the long run after its disso lution , the termination of the lengthy rule of King
Hussein and the transfer of power to the Palestinians in the short run.
26
There is no chance that Jordan will continue to exist in its present structure for a long time, and Israel's
policy, both in war and in peace, ought to be directed at the liquidation of Jordan under the present
regime and the transfer of power to th e Palestin ian majority. Changing the regime east of the river will
also cause the termina tion of the problem of the territories densely populated with Arabs west of the
Jordan. Whether in war or under cond itions of peace, emigrationfrom the territories and economic
demographic freeze in them, are the guarantees for the coming change on both banks of the river, and
we ought to be active in order to accelerate this process in the nearest future . The autonomy plan ought
also to be rejected, as well as any compromise or division of the territories for, given the plans of the
PLO and th ose of the Israeli Arabs themselves, the Shefa'amr plan of September 1980, it is not possible
to go on living in this country in the present situation without separating the two nations, the Arabs to
Jordan and the Jews to the areas west of the river . Genuine coexistence and peace will reign over the
land only when the Arabs understand that without Jewish rule between the Jordan and the sea they will
have neither existence nor security. A nation of their own and security will be theirs only in Jordan. 17
27
Within Israel the distinction between the areas of '67 and the territories beyond them, those of '48, has
always been meaningless for Arabs and nowadays no longer has any significance for us. The problem
should be seen in its entirety without any divisions as of '67. It should be clear, under any future
political situation or mifitary constellation, that the solution o f the problem of the indigenous Arabs will
come only when they recognize the existence of Israel in secure borders up to the Jordan river and
beyond it, as our existential need in this difficult epoch, the nuclear epoch which we shall soon enter. It
is no longer possible to live with three fourths of the Jewish population on the dense shoreline which is
so dangerous in a nuclear epoch.
28
Dispersal of the population is therefore a domestic strategic aim of the highest order; otherwise, we
shall cease to exist within any borders. Judea, Samaria and the Galilee are our sole guarantee for
national existence, and if we do not become the majority in the mountain areas, we shall not rule in the
country and we shall be like the Crusaders, who lost this country which was not theirs anyhow, and in
which they were foreigners to begin with. Reb alancing the country demographically, strategically and
economically is the highest and most central aim today. Taking hold of the mountain watershed from
Beersheba to the Upper Galilee is the national aim g enerated by th e major strategic co nsideration which
is settling the mountainous part of the country that is empty of Jews today . l8
29
Realizing our aims on th e Eastern front depends first on the realization of this internal strategic
objective. The transformation of the p olitical and economic structure, so as to enable the realization of
these strategic aims, is the key to achieving the entire change. We need to change from a centralized
economy in which the government is extensively involved, to an open and free market as well as to
switch from depending upon the U.S. taxpayer to developing, with our own hands, of a genuine
productive economic infrastructure. If we are not able to make this change freely and voluntarily, we
shall be forced into it by world developments, especially in the areas of economics, energy, an d politics,
and by our own growing isolation. l 9
30
From a military and strategic po int of view, the West led by the U.S. is unable to withstand the global
pressures of the USSR throughout the world, and Israel must therefore stand alone in the Eighties,
without any foreign assistance, military o r economic, and this is within our capacities today, with no
compromises. Rapid changes in the world will also bring about a change in the condition of world 20
Jewry to which Israel will become not only a last resort but the only existential option. We cannot
assume that U.S. Jews, and the communities of Europe and Latin America will continue to exist in the
present form in the future . 21
31
Our existence in this country itself is certain , and there is no force that could remove us from here either
forcefully or by treachery (Sadat's method). Despite the difficulties of the mistaken "peace" policy and
the problem of the Israeli Arabs and those of the territories, we can effectively deal with these problems
in the foreseeable future.
Conclusion
1
Three imp ortant points have to be clarified in order to be able to understand the significant possibilities
of realization of this Zionist plan for the Middle East, and also why it had to be published.
2
The Military Background of The Plan
The military conditions of this plan have not been mentioned above, but on the many occasions where
something very like it is being "explained" in closed meetings to members of the Israeli Establishment,
this point is clarified. It is assumed that the Israeli military forces, in all their branches, are insufficient
for th e actual work of occupation of such wide territories as discussed above. In fact, even in times of
intense Palestinian "unrest" on the West Bank, the forces of the Israeli Army are stretched out too much.
The answer to that is the method of ruling by means of "Haddad forces" or of "Village Associations"
(also kn own as "Village Leagues"): local forces under "leaders" completely dissociated from the
population, not having even any feudal or party structure (such as the Phalangists have, for example).
The "states" proposed by Yinon are "Haddadland" and "Village Associations," and their armed forces
will be, no doubt, quite similar. In addition, Israeli military superiority in such a situation will be much
greater than it is even now, so that any movement of revolt will be "punished" either by mass
humiliation as in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, or by bombardment and obliteration of cities, as in
Lebanon now (June 1982), or by both. In order to ensure this, the plan , as explained orally, calls for the
establishment of Israeli garrisons in focal places between the mini states, equipped with the necessary
mobile destructive forces. In fact, we have seen something like this in Haddadland and we will almost
certainly soon see the first example of this system functioning either in South Lebanon or in all
Lebanon.
3
It is obvious that the above military assumptions, and the whole plan too, depend also on the Arabs
continuing to be even more divided than they are now, and on the lack of any truly progressive mass
movement among them. It may be that those two conditions will be removed only when the plan will be
well advanced, with consequences which can not be foreseen.
4
Why it is necessary to publish this in Israel?
The reason for publication is the dual nature of the Israeli-Jewish society: A very great measure of
freedom and democracy, specially for Jews, combined with expansionism and racist discrimination. In
such a situation the Israeli-Jewish elite (for the masses follow the TV and Begin's speeches) has to be
persuaded . The first steps in the process of persuasion are oral, as indicated above, but a time comes in
which it becomes inconvenient. Written material must be produced for the benefit of the more stupid
"persuaders" and "explainers" (for example medium-rank officers, who are, usually, remarkably stupid).
They then "learn it," more or less, and preach to others. It should be remarked that Israel, and even the
Yishuv from the Twenties, has always functioned in this way. I myself well remember how (before I
was "in opposition") the necessity of war with was explained to me and others a year before the 1956
war, and the necessity of conq uering "the rest of Western Palestine when we will have the opportunity"
was explained in the years 1965-67.
5
Why is it assumed that there is no special risk from the outside in the publication of such plans?
Such risks can come from two sources, so long as the principled opposition inside Israel is very weak (a
situation which may change as a consequence of the war on Lebanon) : The Arab World, including the
Palestin ians, and the United States. The Arab World has shown itself so far quite incapable of a detailed
and rational analysis of Israeli-Jewish society, and the Palestinians have been, on the average, no better
than the rest. In such a situation, even those who are shouting about the dangers of Israeli expansionism
(which are real enough) are doing this not because of factual and detailed knowledge, but because of
belief in myth. A good example is the very persistent belief in the non-existent writing on the wall of
the Knesset of the Biblical verse about the Nile and the Euphrates. Another example is the persistent,
and completely false declarations, which were made by some of the most important Arab leaders, that
the two b lue stripes of the Israeli flag symbolize th e Nile and the Euphrates, while in fact they are taken
from the stripes o f the Jewish praying shawl (Talit). The Israeli specialists assume that, on the whole,
the Arabs will pay no attention to th eir serious discussions of the future, and the Lebanon war has
proved them right. So why should they not continue with their old methods of persuading other Israelis?
6
In the United States a very similar situation exists, at least until now. The more or less serious
commentators take their information about Israel, and much of their opinions about it, from two
sources. The first is from articles in the "liberal" American press, written almost totally by Jewish
admirers of Israel who, even if they are critical of some aspects of the Israeli state, practice loyally what
Stalin used to call "th e constructive criticism." (In fact those among them who claim also to be "Anti-
Stalinist" are in reality more Stalinist than Stalin, with Israel being their god which has not yet failed).
In the framework of such critical worship it must be assumed that Israel has always "good intentions"
and only "makes mistakes," and therefore such a plan would not be a matter for discussion--exactly as
the Biblical genocides committed by Jews are not mentioned. The other source of information, The
Jerusalem Post , has similar policies. So long, therefore, as the situation exists in which Israel is really a
"closed society" to the rest of the world, because the world wants to close its eyes , the publication and
even the beginning of the realization of such a plan is realistic and feasible.
Israel Shahak
June 17, 1982
Jerusalem
About the Translator
Israel Shahak is a professor of organic chemistly at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and the chairman
of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights. He published The Shahak Papers , collections of key
articles from the Hebrew press, and is the author of numerous articles and books, among them Non-Jew
in the Jewish State . His latest book is Israel's Global Role: Weapons for Repression , published by the
AAUG in 1982. Israel Shahak: (1933-2001)
Notes
1 . American Universities Field Staff. Report No.33, 1979. According to this research, the population of the world
will be 6 billion in the year 2000. Today's world population can be broken down as follows: China, 958 million;
India, 635 million; USSR, 261 million; U.S., 218 million Indonesia, 140 million; Brazil and Japan, 110 million
each. According to the figures of the U.N. Population Fund for 1980, there will be, in 2000, 50 cities with a
population of over 5 million each. The population ofthp;Third World will then be 80% of the world population.
According to Justin Blackwelder, U.S. Census Office chief, the world population will not reach 6 billion because of
hunger.
2 . Soviet nuclear policy has been well summarized by two American Sovietologists: Joseph D. Douglas and
Amoretta M. Hoeber, Soviet Strategy for Nuclear War , (Stanford, Ca., Hoover Inst. Press, 1979). In the Soviet
Union tens and hundreds of articles and books are published each year which detail the Soviet doctrine for nuclear
war and there is a great deal of documentation translated into English and published by the U.S. Air Force,including
USAF: Marxism-Leninism on War and the Army: The Soviet View , Moscow, 1972; USAF: The Armed Forces of
the Soviet State . Moscow, 1975, by Marshal A. Grechko. The basic Soviet approach to the matter is presented in the
book by Marshal Sokolovski published in 1962 in Moscow: Marshal V. D. Sokolovski, Military Strategy, Soviet
Doctrine and Concepts (New York, Praeger, 1963).
3 . A picture of Soviet intentions in various areas of the world can be drawn from the book by Douglas and Hoeber,
ibid. For additional material see: Michael Morgan, "USSR's Minerals as Strategic Weapon in the Future," Defense
and Foreign Affairs , Washington, D.C., Dec. 1979.
4 . Admiral of the Fleet Sergei Gorshkov, Sea Power and the State , London, 1979. Morgan, loc. cit. General George
S. Brown (USAF) C-JCS, Statement to the Congress on the Defense Posture of the United States For Fiscal Year
1979 , p. 103; National Security Council, Review of Non-Fuel Mineral Policy , (Washington, D.C. 1979,); Drew
Middleton, The New York Times , (9/15/79); Time , 9/21/80.
5 . Elie Kedourie, "The End of the Ottoman Empire," Journal of Contemporary History , Vol. 3, No.4, 1968.
6 . Al-Thawra , Syria 12/20/79, Al-Ahram ,12/30/79, Al Ba'ath , Syria, 5/6/79. 55% of the Arabs are 20 years old and
younger, 70% of the Arabs live in Africa, 55% of the Arabs under 15 are unemployed, 33% live in urban areas,
Oded Yinon, "Egypt's Population Problem," The Jerusalem Quarterly , No. 15, Spring 1980.
7 . E. Kanovsky, "Arab Haves and Have Nots," The Jerusalem Quarterly , No.1, Fall 1976, Al Ba'ath , Syria, 5/6/79.
8 . In his book, former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin said that the Israeli government is in fact responsible for the
design of American policy in the Middle East, after June '67, because of its own indecisiveness as to the future of
the territories and the inconsistency in its positions since it established the background for Resolution 242 and
certainly twelve years later for the Camp David agreements and the peace treaty with Egypt. According to Rabin,
on June 19, 1967, President Johnson sent a letter to Prime Minister Eshkol in which he did not mention anything
about withdrawal from the new territories but exactly on the same day the government resolved to return territories
in exchange for peace. After the Arab resolutions in Khartoum (9/1/67) the government altered its position but
contrary to its decision of June 19, did not notify the U.S. of the alteration and the U.S. continued to support 242 in
the Security Council on the basis of its earlier understanding that Israel is prepared to return territories. At that point
it was already too late to change the U.S. position and Israel's policy. From here the way was opened to peace
agreements on the basis of 242 as was later agreed upon in Camp David. See Yitzhak Rabin. Pinkas Sherut ,
( Ma'ariv 1979) pp. 226-227.
9 . Foreign and Defense Committee Chairman Prof. Moshe Arens argued in an interview ( Ma 'ariv ,10/3/80) that the
Israeli government failed to prepare an economic plan before the Camp David agreements and was itself surprised
by the cost of the agreements, although already during the negotiations it was possible to calculate the heavy price
and the serious error involved in not having prepared the economic grounds for peace.
The former Minister of Treasury, Mr. Yigal Holwitz, stated that if it were not for the withdrawal from the oil fields,
Israel would have a positive balance of payments (9/17/80). That same person said two years earlier that the
government of Israel (from which he withdrew) had placed a noose around his neck. He was referring to the Camp
David agreements ( Ha'aretz , 11/3/78). In the course of the whole peace negotiations neither an expert nor an
economics advisor was consulted, and the Prime Minister himself, who lacks knowledge and expertise in
economics, in a mistaken initiative, asked the U.S. to give us a loan rather than a grant, due to his wish to maintain
our respect and the respect of the U.S. towards us. See Ha'aretz 1/5/79. Jerusalem Post , 9/7/79. Prof Asaf Razin,
formerly a senior consultant in the Treasury, strongly criticized the conduct of the negotiations; Ha'aretz , 5/5/79.
Ma'ariv , 9/7/79. As to matters concerning the oil fields and Israel's energy crisis, see the interview with Mr. Eitan
Eisenberg, a government advisor on these matters, Ma'arive Weekly , 12/12/78. The Energy Minister, who
personally signed the Camp David agreements and the evacuation of Sdeh Alma, has since emphasized the
seriousness of our condition from the point of view of oil supplies more than once...see Y ediot Ahronot , 7/20/79.
Energy Minister Modai even admitted that the government did not consult him at all on the subject of oil during the
Camp David and Blair House negotiations. Ha'aretz , 8/22/79.
10 . Many sources report on the growth of the armaments budget in Egypt and on intentions to give the army
preference in a peace epoch budget over domestic needs for which a peace was allegedly obtained. See former
Prime Minister Mamduh Salam in an interview 12/18/77, Treasury Minister Abd El Sayeh in an interview 7/25/78,
and the paper Al Akhbar , 12/2/78 which clearly stressed that the military budget will receive first priority, despite
the peace. This is what former Prime Minister Mustafa Khalil has stated in his cabinet's programmatic document
which was presented to Parliament, 11/25/78. See English translation, ICA, FBIS, Nov. 27. 1978, pp. D 1-10.
According to these sources, Egypt's military budget increased by 10% between fiscal 1977 and 1978, and the
process still goes on. A Saudi source divulged that the Egyptians plan to increase their militmy budget by 100% in
the next two years; Ha'aretz , 2/12/79 and Jerusalem Post , 1/14/79.
11 . Most of the economic estimates threw doubt on Egypt's ability to reconstruct its economy by 1982. See
Economic Intelligence Unit , 1978 Supplement, "The Arab Republic of Egypt"; E. Kanovsky, "Recent Economic
Developments in the Middle East," Occasional Papers , The Shiloah Institution, June 1977; Kanovsky, "The
Egyptian Economy Since the Mid-Sixties, The Micro Sectors," Occasional Papers , June 1978; Robert McNamara,
President of World Bank, as reported in Times , London, 1/24/78.
12 . See the comparison made by the researeh of the Institute for Strategic Studies in London, and research camed
out in the Center for Strategic Studies of Tel Aviv University, as well as the research by the British scientist, Denis
Champlin, Military Review , Nov. 1979, ISS: The Military Balance 1979-1980, CSS; Security Arrangements in
Sinai ...by Brig. Gen. (Res.) A Shalev, No. 3.0 CSS; The Military Balance and the Military Options after the Peace
Treaty with Egypt , by Brig. Gen. (Res.) Y. Raviv, No.4, Dec. 1978, as well as many press reports including El
Hawadeth , London, 3/7/80; El Watan El Arabi , Paris, 12/14/79.
13 . As for religious ferment in Egypt and the relations between Copts and Moslems see the series of articles
published in the Kuwaiti paper, El Qabas , 9/15/80. The English author Irene Beeson reports on the rift between
Moslems and Copts, see: Irene Beeson, Guardian , London, 6/24/80, and Desmond Stewart, Middle East
Internmational , London 6/6/80. For other reports see Pamela Ann Smith, Guardian , London, 12/24/79; The
Christian Science Monitor 12/27/79 as well as Al Dustour , London, 10/15/79; El Kefah El Arabi, 10/15/79.
14 . Arab Press Service , Beirut, 8/6-13/80. The New Republic , 8/16/80, Der Spiegel as cited by Ha'aretz , 3/21/80,
and 4/30-5/5/80; The Economist , 3/22/80; Robert Fisk, Times , London, 3/26/80; Ellsworth Jones, Sunday Times ,
3/30/80.
15 . J.P. Peroncell Hugoz, Le Monde , Paris 4/28/80; Dr. Abbas Kelidar, Middle East Review , Summer 1979;
Conflict Studies , ISS, July 1975; Andreas Kolschitter, Der Zeit , ( Ha'aretz , 9/21/79) Economist Foreign Report ,
10/10/79, Afro-Asian Affairs , London, July 1979.
16 . Arnold Hottinger, "The Rich Arab States in Trouble," The New York Review of Books , 5/15/80; Arab Press
Service , Beirut, 6/25-7/2/80; U.S. News and World Report , 11/5/79 as well as El Ahram , 11/9/79; El Nahar El
Arabi Wal Duwali , Paris 9/7/79; El Hawadeth , 11/9/79; David Hakham, Monthly Review , IDF, Jan.-Feb. 79.
17 . As for Jordan's policies and problems see El Nahar El Arabi Wal Duwali , 4/30/79, 7/2/79; Prof. Elie Kedouri,
Ma'ariv 6/8/79; Prof. Tanter, Davar 7/12/79; A. Safdi, Jerusalem Post , 5/31/79; El Watan El Arabi 11/28/79; El
Qabas , 11/19/79. As for PLO positions see: The resolutions of the Fatah Fourth Congress, Damascus, August 1980.
The Shefa'amr program of the Israeli Arabs was published in Ha'aretz , 9/24/80, and by Arab Press Report 6/18/80.
For facts and figures on immigration of Arabs to Jordan, see Amos Ben Vered, Ha'aretz , 2/16/77; Yossef Zuriel,
Ma'ariv 1/12/80. As to the PLO's position towards Israel see Shlomo Gazit, Monthly Review ; July 1980; Hani El
Hasan in an interview, Al Rai Al'Am , Kuwait 4/15/80; Avi Plaskov, "The Palestinian Problem," Survival , ISS,
London Jan. Feb. 78; David Gutrnann, "The Palestinian Myth," Commentary , Oct. 75; Bernard Lewis, "The
Palestinians and the PLO," Commentary Jan. 75; Monday Morning , Beirut, 8/18-21/80; Journal of Palestine
Studies , Winter 1980.
18 . Prof. Yuval Neeman, "Samaria--The Basis for Israel's Security," Ma'arakhot 272-273, May/June 1980; Ya'akov
Hasdai, "Peace, the Way and the Right to Know," Dvar Hashavua , 2/23/80. Aharon Yariv, "Strategic Depth--An
Israeli Perspective," Ma'arakhot 270-271, October 1979; Yitzhak Rabin, "Israel's Defense Problems in the
Eighties," Ma'arakhot October 1979.
19 . Ezra Zohar, In the Regime's Pliers (Shikmona, 1974); Motti Heinrich, Do We have a Chance Israel, Truth
Versus Legend (Reshafim, 1981).
20 . Henry Kissinger, "The Lessons of the Past," The Washington Review Vol 1, Jan. 1978; Arthur Ross, "OPEC's
Challenge to the West," The Washington Quarterly , Winter, 1980; Walter Levy, "Oil and the Decline of the West,"
Foreign Affairs , Summer 1980; Special Report--"Our Armed Forees-Ready or Not? " U.S. News and World Report
10/10/77; Stanley Hoffman, "Reflections on the Present Danger," The New York Review of Books 3/6/80; Time
4/3/80; Leopold Lavedez "The illusions of SALT" Commentary Sept. 79; Norman Podhoretz, "The Present
Danger," Commentary March 1980; Robert Tucker, "Oil and American Power Six Years Later," Commentary Sept.
1979; Norman Podhoretz, "The Abandonment of Israel," Commentary July 1976; Elie Kedourie, "Misreading the
Middle East," Commentary July 1979.
21 . According to figures published by Ya'akov Karoz, Yediot Ahronot , 10/17/80, the sum total of anti-Semitic
incidents recorded in the world in 1979 was double the amount recorded in 1978. In Germany, France, and Britain
the number of anti-Semitic incidents was many times greater in that year. In the U.S. as well there has been a sharp
increase in anti-Semitic incidents which were reported in that article. For the new anti-Semitism, see L. Talmon,
"The New Anti-Semitism," The New Republic , 9/18/1976; Barbara Tuchman, "They poisoned the Wells,"
Newsweek 2/3/75.
This item is available in PDF format . Click here
Translated and edited by Israel Shahak
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20832.htm
In his Complete Diaries , Vol. II. p. 711, Theodore Herzl, the founder of Zionism, says that the area of the Jewish State stretches: "From the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates."
Rabbi Fischmann, member of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared in his testimony to the U.N. Special Committee of Enquiry on 9 Jul y 1947: "The Promised Land extends from the River of Egypt up to the Euphrates, it includes parts of Syria and Lebanon."
from Oded Yinon's
"A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties"
Published by the
Association of Arab-American University Graduates, Inc.
Belmont, Massachusetts, 1982
Special Document No. 1
(ISBN 0-937694-56-8)
Table of Contents
Publisher's Note
1
The Association of Arab-American University Graduates finds it compelling to inaugurate its new
publication series, Special Documents, with Oded Yinon's article which appeared in Kivunim
(Directions) , the journal of the Department of Information of the World Zionist Organization. Oded
Yinon is an Israeli journalist and was formerly attached to the Foreign Ministry of Israel. To our
knowledge, this document is the most explicit, detailed and unambiguous statement to date of the
Zionist strategy in the Middle East. Furthermore, it stands as an accurate representation of the "vision"
for the entire Middle East of the presently ruling Zionist regime of Begin, Sharon and Eitan. Its
importance, hence, lies not in its historical value but in the nightmare which it presents.
2
The plan operates on two essential premises. To survive, Israel must 1) become an imperial regional
power, and 2) must effect the division of the whole area into small states by the dissolution of all
existing Arab states. Sma ll here will depend on the ethnic or sectarian composition of each state.
Consequently, the Zionist hope is that sectarian-based states become Israel's satellites and, ironically, its
source of moral legitimation .
3
This is not a new idea, nor does it surface for the first time in Zionist strategic thinking. Indeed,
fragmenting all Arab states into smaller units has been a recurrent theme. This theme has been
documented on a very modest scale in the AAUG publication,Israel's Sacred Terrorism(1980), by
Livia Rokach. Based on the memoirs of Moshe Sharett, former Prime Minister of Israel, Rokach's study
documen ts, in convincing detail, the Zionist plan as it applies to Lebanon and as it was prepared in th e
mid-fifties.
4
The first massive Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1978 bore this plan out to the minutest detail. The
second and more barbaric and encompassing Israeli invasion of Lebanon on June 6, 1982, aims to effect
certain parts of this plan which hopes to see not only Lebanon, but Syria and Jordan as well, in
fragments. This ought to make mockery of Israeli public claims regarding their desire for a strong and
independent Lebanese central government. More accurately, they want a Lebanese central government
that sanctions their regional imperialist designs by signing a peace treaty with them. They also seek
acquiescence in their designs by the Syrian, Iraqi, Jordanian and other Arab governments as well as by
the Palestinian people. What they want and what they are planning for is not an Arab world, but a world
of Arab fragments that is ready to succumb to Israeli hegemony. Hence, Oded Yinon in his essay, "A
Strategy for Israel in the 1980 's," talks about "far-reaching opportunities for the first time since 1967"
that are created by the "very stormy situation [that] surrounds Israel."
5
The Zionist policy of displacing the Palestinians from Palestine is very much an active policy, but is
pursued more forcefully in times of conflict, such as in the 1947-1948 war and in the 1967 war. An
appendix entitled "Israel Talks of a New Exodus" is included in this publication to demonstrate past
Zionist dispersals of Palestinians from their homeland and to show, besides the main Zionist document
we present, other Zionist planning for the de-Palestinization of Palestine.
6
It is clear from the Kivunim document, published in February, 1982, that the "far-reaching
opportunities" of which Zionist strategists have been thinking are the same "opportunities" of which
they are trying to convince the world and which they claim were generated by their June, 1982 invasion.
It is also clear that the Palestinians were never the sole target of Zionist plans, but the priority target
since their viable and independent presence as a people negates the essence of the Zionist state. Every
Arab state, however, especially those with cohesive and clear nationalist directions, is a real target
sooner or later.
7
Contrasted with the detailed and unambiguous Zionist strategy elucidated in this document, Arab and
Palestinian strategy, unfortunately, suffers from ambiguity and incoherence. There is no indication that
Arab strategists have internalized the Zionist plan in its full ramifications. Instead, they react with
incredulity and shock whenever a new stage of it unfolds. This is apparent in Arab reaction, albeit
muted, to the Israeli siege of Beirut. The sad fact is that as long as the Zionist strategy for th e Middle
East is not taken seriously Arab reaction to any future siege of o ther Arab capitals will be the same.
Khal il Nakhleh
July 23, 1982
Foreward
1
The following essay represents, in my opinion, the accurate and detailed plan of the present Zionist
regime (of Sharon and Eitan) for the Middle East which is based on the division of the whole area into
small states, and the dissolution of all the existing Arab states. I will comment on the military aspect of
this plan in a concluding note. Here I want to draw the attention of the readers to several important
points:
2
1. The idea that all the Arab states should be broken down, by Israel, into small units, occurs again and
again in Israeli strategic thinking. For example, Ze'ev Schiff, the military correspondent of Ha'aretz
(and probably the most knowledgeable in Israel, on this topic) writes about the "best" that can happen
for Israeli interests in Iraq: "The dissolution of Iraq into a Shi'ite state, a Sunni state and the separation
of the Kurdish part" ( Ha'aretz 6/2/1982). Actually, this aspect of the plan is very old.
3
2. The strong connection with Neo-Conservative thought in the USA is very prominent, especially in
the author's notes. But, while lip service is paid to the idea of the "defense of the West" from Soviet
power, the real aim of the author, and of the present Israeli establishment is clear: To make an Imperial
Israel into a world power. In other words, the aim of Sharon is to deceive the Americans after he has
deceived all the rest.
4
3. It is obvious that much of the relevant data, both in the notes and in the text, is garbled or omitted,
such as the financial help of the U.S. to Israel . Much of it is pure fantasy. But , the plan is not to be
regarded as not influential, or as not capable of realization for a short time. The plan follows faithfully
the geopolitical ideas current in Germany of 1890-1933 , which were swallowed whole by Hitler and the
Nazi movement, and determined their aims for East Europe . Those aims, especially the division of the
existing states, were carried out in 1939-1941, and only an alliance on the global scale prevented their
consolidation for a period of time.
5
The notes by the author follow the text. To avoid confusion, I did not add any notes of my own, but
have put the substance of them into this foreward and the conclusion at the end. I have, however,
emphasized some portions of the text.
Israel Shahak
June 13, 1982
A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties
by Oded Yinon
This essay originally appeared in Hebrew in KIVUNIM (Directions) , A Journal for Judaism and
Zionism; Issue No, 14--Winter, 5742, February 1982, Editor: Yoram Beck. Editorial Committee: Eli
Eyal, Yoram Beck, Amnon Hadari, Yohanan Manor, Elieser Schweid. Published by the Department of
Publicity/The World Zionist Organization , Jerusalem.
1
At the outset of the nineteen eighties the State of Israel is in need of a new perspective as to its place, its
aims and national targets, at home and abroad. This need has become even more vital due to a number
of central processes which the country, the region and the world are undergoing. We are living today in
the early stages of a new epoch in human history which is not at all similar to its predecessor, and its
characteristics are totally different from what we have hitherto known. That is why we need an
understanding of the central processes which typify this historical epoch on the one hand, and on the
other hand we need a world outlook and an operational strategy in accordance with the new conditions.
The existence, prosperity and steadfastness of the Jewish state will depend upon its ability to adopt a
new framework for its domestic and foreign affairs.
2
This epoch is characterized by several traits which we can already diagnose, and which symbolize a
genuine revolution in our present lifestyle. The dominant process is the breakdown of the rationalist,
humanist outlook as the major cornerstone supporting the life and achievements of Western civilization
since the Renaissance. The political, social and economic views which have emanated from this
foundation have been based on several "truths" which are presently disappearing--for example, the view
that man as an individual is the center of the universe and everything exists in order to fulfill his basic
material needs. This position is being invalidated in the present when it has become clear that the
amount of resources in the cosmos does not meet Man's requirements, his economic needs or his
demographic constraints. In a world in which there are four billion human beings and economic and
energy resources which do not grow proportionally to meet the needs of mankind, it is unrealistic to
expect to fulfill the main requirement of Western Society, i.e., the wish and aspiration for boundless 1
consumption. The view that ethics plays no part in determining the direction Man takes, but rather his
material needs do--that view is becoming prevalent today as we see a world in which nearly all values
are disappearing. We are losing the ability to assess the simplest things, especially when they concern
the simple question of what is Good and what is Evil.
3
The vision of man's limitless aspirations and abilities shrinks in the face of the sad facts of life, when we
witness the break-up of world order around us. The view which promises liberty and freedom to
mankind seems absurd in light of the sad fact that three fourths of the human race lives under
totalitarian regimes. The views concerning equality and social justice have been transformed by
socialism and especially by Communism into a laughing stock. There is no argument as to the truth of
these two ideas, but it is clear that they have not been put into practice properly and the majority of
mankind has lost the liberty, the freedom and the opportunity for equality and justice. In this nuclear
world in which we are (still) living in relative peace for thirty years, the concept of peace and
coexistence among nations has no meaning when a superpower like the USSR holds a military and
political doctrine of the sort it has: that not only is a nuclear war possible and necessary in order to
achieve the ends of Marxism, but that it is possible to survive after it, not to speak of the fact that one
can be victorious in it. 2
4
The essential concepts of human society, especially those of the West, are undergoing a change due to
political, military and economic transformations. Thus, the nuclear and conventional might of the USSR
has transformed the epoch that has just ended into the last respite before the great saga that will
demolish a large part of our world in a multi-dimensional global war, in comparison with which the past
world wars will have been mere child's play. The power of nu clear as well as of conventional weapons,
their quantity, their precision and quality will turn most of our world upside down within a few years,
and we must align ourselves so as to face that in Israel. That is, then, the main threat to our existence
and that of the Western world. The war over resources in the world, the Arab monopoly on oil, and the 3
need of the West to import most of its raw materials from the Third World, are transforming the world
we know, given that one of the major aims of the USSR is to defeat the West by gaining control over
the g igantic resources in the Persian Gulf and in the southern part of Africa, in which the majority of
world minerals are located. We can imagine the dimensions of the global confrontation which will face
us in the future.
5
The Gorshkov doctrine calls for Soviet control of the oceans and mineral rich areas of the Third World.
That together with the present Soviet nuclear doctrine which holds that it is possible to manage, win and
survive a nuclear war, in the course of which the West's military might well be destroyed and its
inhabitants made slaves in the service of Marxism-Leninism, is the main danger to world peace and to
our own existence. Since 1967, the Soviets have transformed Clausewitz' dictum into "War is the
continuation of policy in nuclear means," and made it the motto which guides all their policies. Already
today they are busy carrying out their aims in our region and throughout the world, and the need to face
them becomes the major element in our country's security policy and of course that of the rest of the
Free World. That is our major foreign challenge. 4
6
The Arab Moslem world, therefore, is not the major strategic problem which we shall face in the
Eighties, despite the fact that it carries the main threat against Israel, due to its growing military might.
This world, with its ethnic minorities, its factions and internal crises, which is astonishingly self-
destructive, as we can see in Lebanon, in non-Arab Iran and now also in Syria, is unable to deal
successfully with its fundamental problems and does not therefore constitute a real threat against the
State of Israel in the long run, but only in the short run where its immediate military power has great
import. In the long run, this world will be unable to exist within its present framework in the areas
around us without having to go through genuine revolutionary changes. The Moslem Arab World is
built like a temporary house of cards put together by foreign ers (France and Britain in the Nineteen
Twenties), without the wishes and desires of the inhabitants having been taken into account. It was
arbitrarily divided into 19 states, all made of combinations of minorites and ethnic groups which are
hostile to one anoth er, so that every Arab Moslem state nowadays faces ethnic so cial destruction from
within, and in some a civil war is already raging. Most of th e Arabs, 118 million out of 170 millio n, 5
live in Africa, mostly in Egypt (45 million today).
7
Apart from Egypt, all the Maghreb states are made up of a mixture of Arabs and non-Arab Berbers. In
Algeria there is already a civil war raging in the Kabile mountains between the two nations in the
country. Morocco and Algeria are at war with each other over Spanish Sahara, in addition to the internal
struggle in each of them. Militant Islam endangers the integrity of Tunisia and Qaddafi organizes wars
which are destructive from the Arab point of view, from a country which is sparsely populated and
which cannot become a powerful nation. That is why he has been attempting unifications in the past
with states that are more genuine, like Egypt and Syria. Sudan, the most torn apart state in the Arab
Moslem world today is built upon four groups hostile to each other, an Arab Moslem Sunni minority
which rules over a majority of non-Arab Africans, Pagans, and Christians. In Egypt there is a Sunni
Moslem majority facing a large minority of Christians which is dominant in upper Egypt: some 7
million of them, so that even Sadat, in his speech on May 8, expressed the fear that they will want a
state of their own, something like a "second" Christian Lebanon in Egypt.
8
All the Arab States east of Israel are torn apart, broken up and riddled with inner conflict even more
than those of the Maghreb. Syria is fundamentally no different from Lebanon except in the strong
military regime which rules it. But the real civil war taking place nowadays between the Sunni majority
and the Shi'ite Alawi ruling minority (a mere 12% of the population) testifies to th e severity of the
domestic trouble.
9
Iraq is, once again, no different in essence from its neighbors, although its majority is Shi'ite and the
ruling minority Sunni. Sixty-fiv e percent of the population has no say in politics, in which an elite of 20
percent holds the power. In addition there is a large Kurdish minority in the north, and if it weren't for
the strength of the ruling regime, the army and the oil revenues, Iraq's future state would be no different
than that of Lebanon in th e past or of Syria today. The seed s of inner conflict and civil war are apparent
today already, especially after the rise of Khomeini to power in Iran, a leader wh om the Shi'ites in Iraq
view as th eir natural leader.
10
All the Gulf principalities and Saudi Arabia are built upon a d elicate house of sand in which there is
only o il. In Kuwait, the Kuwaitis co nstitute only a quarter of the population. In Bahrain, the Shi'ites are
the majority but are deprived of power. In the UAE, Shi'ites are once again the majority but the Sunnis
are in power. The same is true of Oman and North Yemen. Even in the Marx ist South Yemen there is a
sizable Shi'ite minority. In Saudi Arabia half the population is foreign, Egyptian and Yemenite, but a
Saudi minority holds power.
11
Jordan is in reality Palestinian, ruled by a Trans-Jordanian Bedouin minority, but most of the army and
certainly the bureaucracy is now Palestin ian. As a matter of fact Amman is as Palestinian as Nab lus. All
of these countries have powerful armies, relatively speaking. But there is a problem there too. The
Syrian army today is mostly Sunni with an Alawi officer corps, th e Iraqi army Shi'ite with Sunni
commanders. This has great significance in the long run, and that is wh y it will not be possible to retain
the loyalty of the army for a long time except where it comes to the only common denominator: The
hostility towards Israel, and today even th at is insufficient.
12
Alongside the Arabs, split as they are, the other Mo slem states share a similar predicament. Half of
Iran's population is comprised of a Persian speaking group and the other half of an ethnically Turkish
group. Turkey's population comprises a Turkish Sunni Moslem majority, some 50%, and two large
minorities, 12 million Shi'ite Alawis and 6 million Sunni Kurds. In Afgh anistan there are 5 million
Shi'ites who constitute one third of the population. In Sunni Pakistan there are 15 million Shi'ites who
endanger the existence of that state.
13
This national ethnic minority picture extending from Morocco to India and from Somalia to Turkey
points to the absence of stability and a rapid degeneration in the entire region. When this picture is
added to the economic one, we see how the entire region is built like a house of cards, unable to
withstand its severe problems.
14
In this giant and fractured world there are a few wealthy groups and a huge mass of poor people. Most
of the Arabs have an average yearly income of 30 0 dollars. That is the situation in Egypt, in mo st of the
Maghreb countries except for Libya, and in Iraq. Lebanon is torn apart and its economy is falling to
pieces. It is a state in which there is no centralized power, but only 5 de facto sovereign authorities
(Christian in the north, supported by the Syrians and under the rule of the Franjieh clan, in the East an
area of direct Syrian conquest, in the center a Phalangist controlled Christian enclave, in the south and
up to the Litani river a mostly Palestinian region controlled by the PLO and Major Haddad's state of
Christians and half a million Shi'ites). Syria is in an even graver situation and even the assistance she
will obtain in the future after the unification with Libya will not be sufficient for dealing with the basic
problems of existence and the maintenance of a large army. Egypt is in the worst situation: Millions are
on the verge of hunger, half the labor force is unemployed, and housing is scarce in this most densely
populated area of the world. Except for the army, there is not a single department operating efficiently
and the state is in a permanent state of bankruptcy and depends entirely on American foreign assistance
granted since the peace. 6
15
In the Gulf states, Saudi Arabia, Libya and Egypt there is the largest accumulation of money and oil in
the world, bu t those enjoying it are tiny elites who lack a wide base of support and self-confidence,
something that no army can guarantee. The Saudi army with all its equipment cannot defend the regime 7
from real dangers at home or abroad, and what took place in Mecca in 1980 is only an example. A sad
and very stormy situation surrounds Israel and creates challenges for it, problems, risks but also far-
reaching opportunities for the first time since 1967 . Chances are that opportunities missed at that time
will become achievab le in the Eighties to an extent and along dimensions which we cannot even
imagine today.
16
The "peace" policy and the return of territories, through a dependence upon the US, precludes the
realization of the new option created for us. Since 1967, all the governments of Israel have tied our
national aims down to narrow political needs, on the one hand, and on th e other to destructive opinions
at home which neutralized our capacities both at ho me and abroad. Failing to take steps towards the
Arab population in the new territories, acquired in the course of a war forced upon us, is the major
strategic error committed by Israel on the morning after the Six Day War. We could have saved
ourselves all the bitter and dangerous conflict since then if we had given Jord an to the Palestinians who
live west of the Jordan river. By doing that we would have neutralized the Palestinian problem which
we nowadays face, and to which we have found solutions that are really no solutions at all, such as
territorial compromise or autonomy which amount, in fact, to the same thing. Today, we suddenly face 8
immense opportunities for transforming the situation thoroughly and this we must do in the coming
decade, otherwise we shall not survive as a state.
17
In the course of the Nineteen Eighties, the State of Israel will have to go through far-reaching changes
in its political and economic regime domestically, along with radical changes in its foreign policy, in
order to stand up to the global and regional challenges of this new epoch. The loss of the Suez Canal oil
fields, of the immense potential of the oil, gas and other natural resources in the Sinai peninsula which
is geomorphologically identical to the rich oil-producing countries in the region, will result in an energy
drain in the near future and will destroy our domestic economy: one quarter of our present GNP as well
as one third of the budget is used for the purchase of oil. The search for raw materials in the Negev and 9
on the coast will not, in the near future, serve to alter that state of affairs.
18
(Regaining) the Sinai peninsula with its present and potential resources is therefore a political priority
which is obstructed by the Camp David and the peace agreements . The fault for that lies of course with
the present Israeli government and the governments which paved the road to the policy of territorial
compromise, the Alignment governments since 1967. The Egyptians will not need to keep the peace
treaty after the return of the Sinai, and they will d o all th ey can to return to the fold of the Arab world
and to th e USSR in order to gain support and military assistance. American aid is guaranteed only for a
short while, for the terms of the peace and the weakening of the U.S. both at home and abroad will bring
about a reduction in aid. Without oil and the income from it, with the present enormous expenditure, we
will not be able to g et through 1982 under the present conditions and we will have to act in order to
return the situation to the status quo which existed in Sinai prior to Sadat's visit and the mistaken peace
agreement signed with him in March 1979 . 1 0
19
Israel has two major routes through which to realize this purpose, one direct and the other indirect. The
direct option is the less realistic one because of the nature of the regime and government in Israel as
well as the wisdom of Sadat who obtained our withdrawal from Sinai, which was, next to the war of
1973, his major achievement since he took power. Israel will not unilaterally break the treaty, neither
today, nor in 1982, unless it is very hard pressed economically and politically and Egypt provides Israel
with the excuse to take the Sinai back into our hands for the fourth time in our short h istory. What is left
therefore, is the indirect option. The economic situation in Egypt, the nature of the regime and its pan-
Arab po licy, will bring about a situation after April 1982 in which Israel will be forced to act directly or
indirectly in order to regain control over Sinai as a strategic, economic and energy reserve for the long
run . Egypt does n ot constitute a military strategic problem due to its internal conflicts and it could be
driven back to the post 19 67 war situation in no more than one day. 11
20
The myth of Egypt as the strong leader of the Arab World was demolished back in 1956 and definitely
did no t survive 1967, but our po licy, as in the return of the Sinai, served to turn the myth into "fact." In
reality, however, Egypt's power in proportion both to Israel alone and to the rest of the Arab World has
gone down about 50 p ercent since 1967. Egypt is no longer the leading political power in the Arab
World and is economically on the verge of a crisis. Without foreign assistance the crisis will come
tomorrow. In the short run, due to the return of the Sinai, Egypt will gain several advantages at our 12
expense, but only in the short run until 1982, and that will not change the balance of power to its
benefit, and will possibly bring about its downfall. Egypt, in its present domestic political p icture, is
already a corpse, all the more so if we take into account the growing Moslem-Christian rift. Breaking
Egypt down territorially into distinct geographical regions is the political aim of Israel in the Nineteen
Eighties on its Western front .
21
Egypt is divided and torn apart into many foci of authority. If Egypt falls apart, countries like Libya,
Sudan or even the more distant states will not continue to exist in their p resent form and will join the
downfall and dissolution of Egypt. The vision of a Christian Coptic State in Upper Egypt alongside a
number of weak states with very localized power and without a centralized government a s to date, is the
key to a historical development which was only set back by the peace agreement but which seems
inevitable in the long run . 13
22
The Western front, which on the surface appears more problematic, is in fact less complicated than the
Eastern front, in which most of the events that make the headlines have been taking place recently.
Lebanon's total dissolution into five provinces serves as a precendent for the entire Arab world
including Egypt, Syria, Iraq and the Arabian peninsula and is already following that track. The
dissolution of Syria and Iraq later on into ethnically or religiously unqiue areas such as in Lebanon, is
Israel's primary target on the Eastern fron t in the long run, while the d issolution o f the military power
of th ose sta tes serves as the primary short term target. Syria will fall apart, in acco rdance with its
ethnic and religious structure, into several states such as in present day Lebanon, so that there will be a
Shi'ite Alawi state along its coast, a Sunni state in the Aleppo area, another Sunni state in Damascus
hostile to its northern neighbor, and the Druzes who will set up a state , maybe even in our Golan, and
certainly in the Hauran and in northern Jordan . This state of affairs will be the guarantee for peace and
security in the area in the long run, and that aim is already within our reach today . 14
23
Iraq, rich in oil on the one hand and internally torn on the other, is guaranteed as a candidate for
Israel's targets . Its dissolution is even more important for us than that of Syria. Iraq is stronger than
Syria. In the short run it is Iraqi power which constitutes the greatest threat to Israel. An Iraqi-Iranian
war will tear Iraq apart and cause its downfall at home even before it is able to organize a struggle on a
wide front against us. Every kind of inter-Arab confrontation will assist us in the short run and will
shorten the way to the more important aim of breaking up Iraq into denominations as in Syria and in
Lebanon . In Iraq, a division into provinces along ethnic/religious lines as in Syria during Otto man times
is possible. So, three (or more) states will exist around the three major cities: Basra, Baghdad and
Mosul, and Shi'ite areas in the south will separate from the Sunni and Kurdish north. It is possible that
the present Iranian-Iraqi confrontation will deepen this polarization. 15
24
The entire Arabian peninsula is a natural candidate for dissolution due to internal and external
pressures, and the matter is inevitable especially in Saudi Arabia. Regardless of whether its economic
might based on oil remains intact or whether it is diminished in the long run, the internal rifts and
breakdowns are a clear and natu ral development in light of th e present political structure. 1 6
25
Jordan constitutes an immediate strategic target in the short run but no t in the long run, for it does not
constitute a real threat in the long run after its disso lution , the termination of the lengthy rule of King
Hussein and the transfer of power to the Palestinians in the short run.
26
There is no chance that Jordan will continue to exist in its present structure for a long time, and Israel's
policy, both in war and in peace, ought to be directed at the liquidation of Jordan under the present
regime and the transfer of power to th e Palestin ian majority. Changing the regime east of the river will
also cause the termina tion of the problem of the territories densely populated with Arabs west of the
Jordan. Whether in war or under cond itions of peace, emigrationfrom the territories and economic
demographic freeze in them, are the guarantees for the coming change on both banks of the river, and
we ought to be active in order to accelerate this process in the nearest future . The autonomy plan ought
also to be rejected, as well as any compromise or division of the territories for, given the plans of the
PLO and th ose of the Israeli Arabs themselves, the Shefa'amr plan of September 1980, it is not possible
to go on living in this country in the present situation without separating the two nations, the Arabs to
Jordan and the Jews to the areas west of the river . Genuine coexistence and peace will reign over the
land only when the Arabs understand that without Jewish rule between the Jordan and the sea they will
have neither existence nor security. A nation of their own and security will be theirs only in Jordan. 17
27
Within Israel the distinction between the areas of '67 and the territories beyond them, those of '48, has
always been meaningless for Arabs and nowadays no longer has any significance for us. The problem
should be seen in its entirety without any divisions as of '67. It should be clear, under any future
political situation or mifitary constellation, that the solution o f the problem of the indigenous Arabs will
come only when they recognize the existence of Israel in secure borders up to the Jordan river and
beyond it, as our existential need in this difficult epoch, the nuclear epoch which we shall soon enter. It
is no longer possible to live with three fourths of the Jewish population on the dense shoreline which is
so dangerous in a nuclear epoch.
28
Dispersal of the population is therefore a domestic strategic aim of the highest order; otherwise, we
shall cease to exist within any borders. Judea, Samaria and the Galilee are our sole guarantee for
national existence, and if we do not become the majority in the mountain areas, we shall not rule in the
country and we shall be like the Crusaders, who lost this country which was not theirs anyhow, and in
which they were foreigners to begin with. Reb alancing the country demographically, strategically and
economically is the highest and most central aim today. Taking hold of the mountain watershed from
Beersheba to the Upper Galilee is the national aim g enerated by th e major strategic co nsideration which
is settling the mountainous part of the country that is empty of Jews today . l8
29
Realizing our aims on th e Eastern front depends first on the realization of this internal strategic
objective. The transformation of the p olitical and economic structure, so as to enable the realization of
these strategic aims, is the key to achieving the entire change. We need to change from a centralized
economy in which the government is extensively involved, to an open and free market as well as to
switch from depending upon the U.S. taxpayer to developing, with our own hands, of a genuine
productive economic infrastructure. If we are not able to make this change freely and voluntarily, we
shall be forced into it by world developments, especially in the areas of economics, energy, an d politics,
and by our own growing isolation. l 9
30
From a military and strategic po int of view, the West led by the U.S. is unable to withstand the global
pressures of the USSR throughout the world, and Israel must therefore stand alone in the Eighties,
without any foreign assistance, military o r economic, and this is within our capacities today, with no
compromises. Rapid changes in the world will also bring about a change in the condition of world 20
Jewry to which Israel will become not only a last resort but the only existential option. We cannot
assume that U.S. Jews, and the communities of Europe and Latin America will continue to exist in the
present form in the future . 21
31
Our existence in this country itself is certain , and there is no force that could remove us from here either
forcefully or by treachery (Sadat's method). Despite the difficulties of the mistaken "peace" policy and
the problem of the Israeli Arabs and those of the territories, we can effectively deal with these problems
in the foreseeable future.
Conclusion
1
Three imp ortant points have to be clarified in order to be able to understand the significant possibilities
of realization of this Zionist plan for the Middle East, and also why it had to be published.
2
The Military Background of The Plan
The military conditions of this plan have not been mentioned above, but on the many occasions where
something very like it is being "explained" in closed meetings to members of the Israeli Establishment,
this point is clarified. It is assumed that the Israeli military forces, in all their branches, are insufficient
for th e actual work of occupation of such wide territories as discussed above. In fact, even in times of
intense Palestinian "unrest" on the West Bank, the forces of the Israeli Army are stretched out too much.
The answer to that is the method of ruling by means of "Haddad forces" or of "Village Associations"
(also kn own as "Village Leagues"): local forces under "leaders" completely dissociated from the
population, not having even any feudal or party structure (such as the Phalangists have, for example).
The "states" proposed by Yinon are "Haddadland" and "Village Associations," and their armed forces
will be, no doubt, quite similar. In addition, Israeli military superiority in such a situation will be much
greater than it is even now, so that any movement of revolt will be "punished" either by mass
humiliation as in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, or by bombardment and obliteration of cities, as in
Lebanon now (June 1982), or by both. In order to ensure this, the plan , as explained orally, calls for the
establishment of Israeli garrisons in focal places between the mini states, equipped with the necessary
mobile destructive forces. In fact, we have seen something like this in Haddadland and we will almost
certainly soon see the first example of this system functioning either in South Lebanon or in all
Lebanon.
3
It is obvious that the above military assumptions, and the whole plan too, depend also on the Arabs
continuing to be even more divided than they are now, and on the lack of any truly progressive mass
movement among them. It may be that those two conditions will be removed only when the plan will be
well advanced, with consequences which can not be foreseen.
4
Why it is necessary to publish this in Israel?
The reason for publication is the dual nature of the Israeli-Jewish society: A very great measure of
freedom and democracy, specially for Jews, combined with expansionism and racist discrimination. In
such a situation the Israeli-Jewish elite (for the masses follow the TV and Begin's speeches) has to be
persuaded . The first steps in the process of persuasion are oral, as indicated above, but a time comes in
which it becomes inconvenient. Written material must be produced for the benefit of the more stupid
"persuaders" and "explainers" (for example medium-rank officers, who are, usually, remarkably stupid).
They then "learn it," more or less, and preach to others. It should be remarked that Israel, and even the
Yishuv from the Twenties, has always functioned in this way. I myself well remember how (before I
was "in opposition") the necessity of war with was explained to me and others a year before the 1956
war, and the necessity of conq uering "the rest of Western Palestine when we will have the opportunity"
was explained in the years 1965-67.
5
Why is it assumed that there is no special risk from the outside in the publication of such plans?
Such risks can come from two sources, so long as the principled opposition inside Israel is very weak (a
situation which may change as a consequence of the war on Lebanon) : The Arab World, including the
Palestin ians, and the United States. The Arab World has shown itself so far quite incapable of a detailed
and rational analysis of Israeli-Jewish society, and the Palestinians have been, on the average, no better
than the rest. In such a situation, even those who are shouting about the dangers of Israeli expansionism
(which are real enough) are doing this not because of factual and detailed knowledge, but because of
belief in myth. A good example is the very persistent belief in the non-existent writing on the wall of
the Knesset of the Biblical verse about the Nile and the Euphrates. Another example is the persistent,
and completely false declarations, which were made by some of the most important Arab leaders, that
the two b lue stripes of the Israeli flag symbolize th e Nile and the Euphrates, while in fact they are taken
from the stripes o f the Jewish praying shawl (Talit). The Israeli specialists assume that, on the whole,
the Arabs will pay no attention to th eir serious discussions of the future, and the Lebanon war has
proved them right. So why should they not continue with their old methods of persuading other Israelis?
6
In the United States a very similar situation exists, at least until now. The more or less serious
commentators take their information about Israel, and much of their opinions about it, from two
sources. The first is from articles in the "liberal" American press, written almost totally by Jewish
admirers of Israel who, even if they are critical of some aspects of the Israeli state, practice loyally what
Stalin used to call "th e constructive criticism." (In fact those among them who claim also to be "Anti-
Stalinist" are in reality more Stalinist than Stalin, with Israel being their god which has not yet failed).
In the framework of such critical worship it must be assumed that Israel has always "good intentions"
and only "makes mistakes," and therefore such a plan would not be a matter for discussion--exactly as
the Biblical genocides committed by Jews are not mentioned. The other source of information, The
Jerusalem Post , has similar policies. So long, therefore, as the situation exists in which Israel is really a
"closed society" to the rest of the world, because the world wants to close its eyes , the publication and
even the beginning of the realization of such a plan is realistic and feasible.
Israel Shahak
June 17, 1982
Jerusalem
About the Translator
Israel Shahak is a professor of organic chemistly at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and the chairman
of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights. He published The Shahak Papers , collections of key
articles from the Hebrew press, and is the author of numerous articles and books, among them Non-Jew
in the Jewish State . His latest book is Israel's Global Role: Weapons for Repression , published by the
AAUG in 1982. Israel Shahak: (1933-2001)
Notes
1 . American Universities Field Staff. Report No.33, 1979. According to this research, the population of the world
will be 6 billion in the year 2000. Today's world population can be broken down as follows: China, 958 million;
India, 635 million; USSR, 261 million; U.S., 218 million Indonesia, 140 million; Brazil and Japan, 110 million
each. According to the figures of the U.N. Population Fund for 1980, there will be, in 2000, 50 cities with a
population of over 5 million each. The population ofthp;Third World will then be 80% of the world population.
According to Justin Blackwelder, U.S. Census Office chief, the world population will not reach 6 billion because of
hunger.
2 . Soviet nuclear policy has been well summarized by two American Sovietologists: Joseph D. Douglas and
Amoretta M. Hoeber, Soviet Strategy for Nuclear War , (Stanford, Ca., Hoover Inst. Press, 1979). In the Soviet
Union tens and hundreds of articles and books are published each year which detail the Soviet doctrine for nuclear
war and there is a great deal of documentation translated into English and published by the U.S. Air Force,including
USAF: Marxism-Leninism on War and the Army: The Soviet View , Moscow, 1972; USAF: The Armed Forces of
the Soviet State . Moscow, 1975, by Marshal A. Grechko. The basic Soviet approach to the matter is presented in the
book by Marshal Sokolovski published in 1962 in Moscow: Marshal V. D. Sokolovski, Military Strategy, Soviet
Doctrine and Concepts (New York, Praeger, 1963).
3 . A picture of Soviet intentions in various areas of the world can be drawn from the book by Douglas and Hoeber,
ibid. For additional material see: Michael Morgan, "USSR's Minerals as Strategic Weapon in the Future," Defense
and Foreign Affairs , Washington, D.C., Dec. 1979.
4 . Admiral of the Fleet Sergei Gorshkov, Sea Power and the State , London, 1979. Morgan, loc. cit. General George
S. Brown (USAF) C-JCS, Statement to the Congress on the Defense Posture of the United States For Fiscal Year
1979 , p. 103; National Security Council, Review of Non-Fuel Mineral Policy , (Washington, D.C. 1979,); Drew
Middleton, The New York Times , (9/15/79); Time , 9/21/80.
5 . Elie Kedourie, "The End of the Ottoman Empire," Journal of Contemporary History , Vol. 3, No.4, 1968.
6 . Al-Thawra , Syria 12/20/79, Al-Ahram ,12/30/79, Al Ba'ath , Syria, 5/6/79. 55% of the Arabs are 20 years old and
younger, 70% of the Arabs live in Africa, 55% of the Arabs under 15 are unemployed, 33% live in urban areas,
Oded Yinon, "Egypt's Population Problem," The Jerusalem Quarterly , No. 15, Spring 1980.
7 . E. Kanovsky, "Arab Haves and Have Nots," The Jerusalem Quarterly , No.1, Fall 1976, Al Ba'ath , Syria, 5/6/79.
8 . In his book, former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin said that the Israeli government is in fact responsible for the
design of American policy in the Middle East, after June '67, because of its own indecisiveness as to the future of
the territories and the inconsistency in its positions since it established the background for Resolution 242 and
certainly twelve years later for the Camp David agreements and the peace treaty with Egypt. According to Rabin,
on June 19, 1967, President Johnson sent a letter to Prime Minister Eshkol in which he did not mention anything
about withdrawal from the new territories but exactly on the same day the government resolved to return territories
in exchange for peace. After the Arab resolutions in Khartoum (9/1/67) the government altered its position but
contrary to its decision of June 19, did not notify the U.S. of the alteration and the U.S. continued to support 242 in
the Security Council on the basis of its earlier understanding that Israel is prepared to return territories. At that point
it was already too late to change the U.S. position and Israel's policy. From here the way was opened to peace
agreements on the basis of 242 as was later agreed upon in Camp David. See Yitzhak Rabin. Pinkas Sherut ,
( Ma'ariv 1979) pp. 226-227.
9 . Foreign and Defense Committee Chairman Prof. Moshe Arens argued in an interview ( Ma 'ariv ,10/3/80) that the
Israeli government failed to prepare an economic plan before the Camp David agreements and was itself surprised
by the cost of the agreements, although already during the negotiations it was possible to calculate the heavy price
and the serious error involved in not having prepared the economic grounds for peace.
The former Minister of Treasury, Mr. Yigal Holwitz, stated that if it were not for the withdrawal from the oil fields,
Israel would have a positive balance of payments (9/17/80). That same person said two years earlier that the
government of Israel (from which he withdrew) had placed a noose around his neck. He was referring to the Camp
David agreements ( Ha'aretz , 11/3/78). In the course of the whole peace negotiations neither an expert nor an
economics advisor was consulted, and the Prime Minister himself, who lacks knowledge and expertise in
economics, in a mistaken initiative, asked the U.S. to give us a loan rather than a grant, due to his wish to maintain
our respect and the respect of the U.S. towards us. See Ha'aretz 1/5/79. Jerusalem Post , 9/7/79. Prof Asaf Razin,
formerly a senior consultant in the Treasury, strongly criticized the conduct of the negotiations; Ha'aretz , 5/5/79.
Ma'ariv , 9/7/79. As to matters concerning the oil fields and Israel's energy crisis, see the interview with Mr. Eitan
Eisenberg, a government advisor on these matters, Ma'arive Weekly , 12/12/78. The Energy Minister, who
personally signed the Camp David agreements and the evacuation of Sdeh Alma, has since emphasized the
seriousness of our condition from the point of view of oil supplies more than once...see Y ediot Ahronot , 7/20/79.
Energy Minister Modai even admitted that the government did not consult him at all on the subject of oil during the
Camp David and Blair House negotiations. Ha'aretz , 8/22/79.
10 . Many sources report on the growth of the armaments budget in Egypt and on intentions to give the army
preference in a peace epoch budget over domestic needs for which a peace was allegedly obtained. See former
Prime Minister Mamduh Salam in an interview 12/18/77, Treasury Minister Abd El Sayeh in an interview 7/25/78,
and the paper Al Akhbar , 12/2/78 which clearly stressed that the military budget will receive first priority, despite
the peace. This is what former Prime Minister Mustafa Khalil has stated in his cabinet's programmatic document
which was presented to Parliament, 11/25/78. See English translation, ICA, FBIS, Nov. 27. 1978, pp. D 1-10.
According to these sources, Egypt's military budget increased by 10% between fiscal 1977 and 1978, and the
process still goes on. A Saudi source divulged that the Egyptians plan to increase their militmy budget by 100% in
the next two years; Ha'aretz , 2/12/79 and Jerusalem Post , 1/14/79.
11 . Most of the economic estimates threw doubt on Egypt's ability to reconstruct its economy by 1982. See
Economic Intelligence Unit , 1978 Supplement, "The Arab Republic of Egypt"; E. Kanovsky, "Recent Economic
Developments in the Middle East," Occasional Papers , The Shiloah Institution, June 1977; Kanovsky, "The
Egyptian Economy Since the Mid-Sixties, The Micro Sectors," Occasional Papers , June 1978; Robert McNamara,
President of World Bank, as reported in Times , London, 1/24/78.
12 . See the comparison made by the researeh of the Institute for Strategic Studies in London, and research camed
out in the Center for Strategic Studies of Tel Aviv University, as well as the research by the British scientist, Denis
Champlin, Military Review , Nov. 1979, ISS: The Military Balance 1979-1980, CSS; Security Arrangements in
Sinai ...by Brig. Gen. (Res.) A Shalev, No. 3.0 CSS; The Military Balance and the Military Options after the Peace
Treaty with Egypt , by Brig. Gen. (Res.) Y. Raviv, No.4, Dec. 1978, as well as many press reports including El
Hawadeth , London, 3/7/80; El Watan El Arabi , Paris, 12/14/79.
13 . As for religious ferment in Egypt and the relations between Copts and Moslems see the series of articles
published in the Kuwaiti paper, El Qabas , 9/15/80. The English author Irene Beeson reports on the rift between
Moslems and Copts, see: Irene Beeson, Guardian , London, 6/24/80, and Desmond Stewart, Middle East
Internmational , London 6/6/80. For other reports see Pamela Ann Smith, Guardian , London, 12/24/79; The
Christian Science Monitor 12/27/79 as well as Al Dustour , London, 10/15/79; El Kefah El Arabi, 10/15/79.
14 . Arab Press Service , Beirut, 8/6-13/80. The New Republic , 8/16/80, Der Spiegel as cited by Ha'aretz , 3/21/80,
and 4/30-5/5/80; The Economist , 3/22/80; Robert Fisk, Times , London, 3/26/80; Ellsworth Jones, Sunday Times ,
3/30/80.
15 . J.P. Peroncell Hugoz, Le Monde , Paris 4/28/80; Dr. Abbas Kelidar, Middle East Review , Summer 1979;
Conflict Studies , ISS, July 1975; Andreas Kolschitter, Der Zeit , ( Ha'aretz , 9/21/79) Economist Foreign Report ,
10/10/79, Afro-Asian Affairs , London, July 1979.
16 . Arnold Hottinger, "The Rich Arab States in Trouble," The New York Review of Books , 5/15/80; Arab Press
Service , Beirut, 6/25-7/2/80; U.S. News and World Report , 11/5/79 as well as El Ahram , 11/9/79; El Nahar El
Arabi Wal Duwali , Paris 9/7/79; El Hawadeth , 11/9/79; David Hakham, Monthly Review , IDF, Jan.-Feb. 79.
17 . As for Jordan's policies and problems see El Nahar El Arabi Wal Duwali , 4/30/79, 7/2/79; Prof. Elie Kedouri,
Ma'ariv 6/8/79; Prof. Tanter, Davar 7/12/79; A. Safdi, Jerusalem Post , 5/31/79; El Watan El Arabi 11/28/79; El
Qabas , 11/19/79. As for PLO positions see: The resolutions of the Fatah Fourth Congress, Damascus, August 1980.
The Shefa'amr program of the Israeli Arabs was published in Ha'aretz , 9/24/80, and by Arab Press Report 6/18/80.
For facts and figures on immigration of Arabs to Jordan, see Amos Ben Vered, Ha'aretz , 2/16/77; Yossef Zuriel,
Ma'ariv 1/12/80. As to the PLO's position towards Israel see Shlomo Gazit, Monthly Review ; July 1980; Hani El
Hasan in an interview, Al Rai Al'Am , Kuwait 4/15/80; Avi Plaskov, "The Palestinian Problem," Survival , ISS,
London Jan. Feb. 78; David Gutrnann, "The Palestinian Myth," Commentary , Oct. 75; Bernard Lewis, "The
Palestinians and the PLO," Commentary Jan. 75; Monday Morning , Beirut, 8/18-21/80; Journal of Palestine
Studies , Winter 1980.
18 . Prof. Yuval Neeman, "Samaria--The Basis for Israel's Security," Ma'arakhot 272-273, May/June 1980; Ya'akov
Hasdai, "Peace, the Way and the Right to Know," Dvar Hashavua , 2/23/80. Aharon Yariv, "Strategic Depth--An
Israeli Perspective," Ma'arakhot 270-271, October 1979; Yitzhak Rabin, "Israel's Defense Problems in the
Eighties," Ma'arakhot October 1979.
19 . Ezra Zohar, In the Regime's Pliers (Shikmona, 1974); Motti Heinrich, Do We have a Chance Israel, Truth
Versus Legend (Reshafim, 1981).
20 . Henry Kissinger, "The Lessons of the Past," The Washington Review Vol 1, Jan. 1978; Arthur Ross, "OPEC's
Challenge to the West," The Washington Quarterly , Winter, 1980; Walter Levy, "Oil and the Decline of the West,"
Foreign Affairs , Summer 1980; Special Report--"Our Armed Forees-Ready or Not? " U.S. News and World Report
10/10/77; Stanley Hoffman, "Reflections on the Present Danger," The New York Review of Books 3/6/80; Time
4/3/80; Leopold Lavedez "The illusions of SALT" Commentary Sept. 79; Norman Podhoretz, "The Present
Danger," Commentary March 1980; Robert Tucker, "Oil and American Power Six Years Later," Commentary Sept.
1979; Norman Podhoretz, "The Abandonment of Israel," Commentary July 1976; Elie Kedourie, "Misreading the
Middle East," Commentary July 1979.
21 . According to figures published by Ya'akov Karoz, Yediot Ahronot , 10/17/80, the sum total of anti-Semitic
incidents recorded in the world in 1979 was double the amount recorded in 1978. In Germany, France, and Britain
the number of anti-Semitic incidents was many times greater in that year. In the U.S. as well there has been a sharp
increase in anti-Semitic incidents which were reported in that article. For the new anti-Semitism, see L. Talmon,
"The New Anti-Semitism," The New Republic , 9/18/1976; Barbara Tuchman, "They poisoned the Wells,"
Newsweek 2/3/75.
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