Soccer Dad

For Israel; Against Kerry and For Bush

Surely one of the key issues is the campaign for president is foreign policy. One of the main areas of concern within foreign policy is the Middle East. Specifically, the Arab Israeli conflict. I have blogged about this several times. This is meant simply as a summation. I'm going to try to limit my comments and let the experts make their cases.
Where does Kerry stand on the Middle East? Lawrence Kaplan was one of the earliest questioners. In "Hebrew Lesson" Kaplan notes that though Sen Kerry has a typically pro-Israel voting record, he hasn't usually taken the lead on Israel related issues:

Despite his record--which, excellent though it may be, hardly distinguishes him from his fellow senators in the northeast corridor--he rarely, if ever, took the lead on Israel-related issues in the Senate, and, even according to his supporters, remains something of a novice on the subject. "Kerry is not one of the handful of those in the Senate who follows Israel issues minutely," says Ira Forman, executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council.

Filling the void during the early days of his campaign were advisers who share a very particular view of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Among these was Alan Solomont, who, as well as being a longtime Kerry confidante and top fund-raiser, serves as a member of the executive committee of the left-leaning Israel Policy Forum (IPF) and is an outspoken Geneva proponent with close ties to Beilin. Another voice dispensing wisdom to Kerry on Israel has been Clinton national security adviser Sandy Berger, an animating force behind the failed negotiations at Camp David and Taba, who insists that Geneva dispelled the "myth" that "there is no constituency among Palestinians for a peace settlement that recognizes Israel's right to exist." And, though a Kerry adviser denies that Beilin himself has been in touch with the Kerry team, reached by telephone in Israel, the Geneva architect says he discussed Middle East policy with Kerry prior to the campaign, adding, "Yes, I am in contact with Kerry's camp--I have met with and I speak with Alan Solomont and Sandy Berger."

Kaplan mostly demonstrates that Kerry, well, waffles a lot when it comes to the Middle East concluding:

The more intriguing question concerns what sort of approach a candidate who, in Israel's case, genuinely has straddled the fence would enshrine in official policy. The answer may lie with the last person who whispers in his ear.

That's not exactly a vote of confidence.
The editor of the New Republic Martin Peretz (where Kaplan's article appeared), echoed much of Kaplan's arguments in "Kerry the Clueless" (also available here). This is particularly powerful as I can't tell if Peretz intends to vote for Bush or Kerry. His magazine TNR endorsed Kerry. But though the Middle East is often an area of concern for TNR, the issue did not come up at all in the endorsement. This makes me wonder: Did Peretz go outside of his own magazine to dissent with the endorsement? Or simply to point out a significant weakness of Kerry (though he goes along with the endorsement.)?
In particular:

I’ve searched to find one time when Kerry — even candidate Kerry — criticized a U.N. action or statement against Israel. I’ve come up empty-handed. Nor has he defended Israel against the European Union’s continuous hectoring.

Another thing that bothers me about Kerry is the deus ex machina he has up his sleeve: the appointment of a presidential envoy. It’s hard to count how many special emissaries have been dispatched from Washington to the Middle East to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict. What’s easy to see is that none of them has gotten to “yes.”

Again this seems to echo Kaplan's feeling that Kerry has nothing new to offer and what he does have, has been tried and failed.

Charles Krauthammer sharpened the point in his recent "Sacrificing Israel."

John Kerry says he wants to "rejoin the community of nations." There is no issue on which the United States more consistently fails the global test of international consensus than Israel. In July, the U.N. General Assembly declared Israel's defensive fence illegal by a vote of 150 to 6. In defending Israel, America stood almost alone.

You want to appease the "international community"? Sacrifice Israel. Gradually, of course, and always under the guise of "peace." Apply relentless pressure on Israel to make concessions to a Palestinian leadership that has proved (at Camp David in 2000) it will never make peace.

The allies will appreciate that. Then turn around and say to them: We're doing our part (against Israel), now you do yours (in Iraq). If Kerry is elected, the pressure on Israel will begin on day one.

Krauthammer doesn't just see Kerry pursuing an obsolete agenda in the Middle East, but an agenda that is inimical to Israel. And he sees this as a priority for Kerry.

In order to say that President Bush will be a better president regarding Israel, it's not enough simply to show that John Kerry's approach to the Middle East is wrong or dangerous. We must show that President Bush's approach is good.

In his essay "The same Loyalty" Jonathan Rosenblum doesn't cite his choice for President by name. However from the final 3 paragraphs of essay, it's pretty clear he is for the incumbent:

Only the transformation of failed Moslem societies offers, in the long run, a means of draining the swamps in which the terrorists breed. Creating examples of free civil societies in Iraq and Afghanistan provides the only means of reducing the threat of Islamic terror. Abud Musab al-Zarqawi has explicitly acknowledged that the emergence of democracy in Iraq would spell his doom. Thus the savagery employed to stop it.

Promoting strongmen, in the name of stability, cannot lead to requisite transformations. The great error of Oslo, for instance, was the failure to recognize that a Palestinian dictatorship would always need Israel as an external enemy to distract the population from their downtrodden state. That is why America has correctly recognized Palestinian democracy as a pre-condition for peace between Palestinians and Israelis. Prior to that, a return to the peace process – i.e., further Israeli concessions – is not only pointless but counterproductive.

The candidate who most thoroughly comprehends the nature of the struggle will be the best for the entire free world, not just Israel.

His argument though isn't just that the candidate willing to take the fight to the Jihadists is best for Israel. It's that that candidate - presumably Bush - is doing what is best not only for Israel - or even the United States - but what is best for the whole world.

Rosenblum echoes two other authors in his essay. One is Natan Sharansky who wrote "On Hating the Jews" last year. Sharansky concluded:

Despite the differences between them, however, anti-Americanism in the Islamic world and anti-Americanism in Europe are in fact linked, and both bear an uncanny resemblance to anti-Semitism. It is, after all, with some reason that the United States is loathed and feared by the despots and fundamentalists of the Islamic world as well as by many Europeans. Like Israel, but in a much more powerful way, America embodies a different--a nonconforming--idea of the good, and refuses to abandon its moral clarity about the objective worth of that idea or of the free habits and institutions to which it has given birth. To the contrary, in undertaking their war against the evil of terrorism, the American people have demonstrated their determination not only to fight to preserve the blessings of liberty for themselves and their posterity, but to carry them to regions of the world that have proved most resistant to their benign influence.

Like Rosenblum, Sharansky ties the hatred of Jews to hatred of America. And like Rosenblum, Norman Podhoretz in "Enter the Bush Doctrine" ties the fight against Israel's enemies to the fight against America's enemies. To Podhoretz Israel's fight is a subset of America's fight, and he sees that President Bush has done a good job of identifying and fighting the enemies of both.

In "The Frequent Abstainers Club" Evelyn Gordon pointed to diplomatic progress that the United States in achieving in vetoing any and all UN resolutions that are one sided against Israel.

Yet a survey of the Security Council's voting record over the last 15 years reveals that there has in fact been a slight, but potentially significant, improvement. And that improvement is largely thanks to a new policy adopted by US President George Bush.

For years the US has vetoed resolutions it deemed too biased against Israel. But during the late 1980s and 1990s Washington was unable to sway any other council member to its side: With monotonous regularity such resolutions failed by a vote of 14-1.

Over the last four years, however, there has been a shift. While no country has yet joined the US in voting "no," there have consistently been two to four abstentions - usually from Europe, occasionally from Africa as well.

Since Security Council resolutions need nine votes to pass, this means that the council has been inching toward a situation in which anti-Israel resolutions could be defeated even without an American veto.

Bush achieved this shift by setting a clear, consistent standard for what constitutes bias: Condemnations of Israel are biased unless the resolution also condemns anti-Israel terror.

And, more importantly, vague condemnations of "all violence against civilians" do not qualify. The resolution must explicitly condemn Palestinian perpetrators such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Aksa Martyrs Brigades.

That is such a simple and reasonable demand that some countries have found it impossible to ignore. Yet the Palestinians, and hence the Arab countries that sponsor Security Council resolutions on their behalf, have never once been willing to agree.

Perhaps it's a small thing. But it isn't trivial. If it were the Clinton administration would have done it. The Question is where Kerry would stand. Lawrence Kaplan thought it possible with the correct advisors, Kerry would continue this policy in the UN. On the other hand Charles Krauthammer sees Kerry's desire to rejoin the family of nations as being too strong to avoid sacrificing Israel in the UN in order to gain approval of the EU.

In "The Principled President" Anne Bayefsky lays out many of the particulars of the brief for supporting President Bush on account of his support for Israel. She also makes the case conceptually:

Throughout his tenure, President Bush has been under serious pressure to cede greater control over the Middle East peace process to the European Union and the U.N., and to buy into their familiar refrain that the Israeli occupation is the root cause of Arab and militant Islamic terrorism. The EU and U.N. seek American support for the view that the "Israeli-Palestinian conflict" is the greatest challenge to international order (as British foreign minister Jack Straw told the Labour party's recent annual conference), and American help in pushing Israel into major concessions while under fire.

President Bush has responded by telling the U.N. and EU members that they've got it backwards. The greatest challenge to international order is the absence of democracy, and the breeding grounds for terrorism that result. Moving forward means — in the words of the president's recent U.N. speech — that "we must take a different approach" from that of tolerating and excusing "oppression in the Middle East in the name of stability.... Commitment to democratic reform is essential to resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict. Peace will not be achieved by Palestinian rulers who intimidate opposition, tolerate corruption, and maintain ties to terrorist groups."

Aluf Benn in "Bush's indelible imprint" makes a similar point but with a bit more specificity:

The Bush administration, which appears indifferent, has been far more involved than any previous administrations in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and has courageously presented the two sides with practical objectives and demands, instead of making do with the statement that the U.S. cannot want a peace settlement more than the parties themselves - a statement that has justified past failures. Under Bush, Sharon has adopted a policy that is the reverse of what he believes in, and has accepted severe limitations on his own freedom of action. Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat, who tried to lead the previous administration by the nose, has tried to continue his policy of lies with Bush and has been punished: He is under house arrest and is being blackballed diplomatically.

Despite expressing some reservations about President Bush's approach to the Middle East, Daniel Pipes in "In the Mideast, Bush dared to be different" points to 4 changes that he credits to the Bush administration:

War rather than law enforcement. From the beginning of Islamist violence against Americans in 1979 (including the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, for 444 days), Washington responded by seeing this as a criminal problem and responded by deploying detectives, lawyers, judges and wardens. On Sept. 11, 2001, itself, Bush declared that we are engaged in a "war against terrorism." Note the word war. This meant deploying the military and the intelligence services, in addition to law enforcement. In contrast, Kerry has repeatedly said he would return to the law-enforcement model.

Democracy rather than stability. "Sixty years of Western nations' excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe." This declaration, made by Bush in November 2003, rejected a bipartisan policy focused on stability that had been in place since World War II. Bush has posed a challenge to established ways such as one expects to hear from a university seminar, not from a political leader. In contrast, Kerry prefers the dull, old, discredited model of stability.

Preemption rather than deterrence. In June 2002, Bush brushed aside the long-standing policy of deterrence, replacing it with the more active approach of eliminating enemies before they can strike. U.S. security, he said, "will require all Americans to be forward-looking and resolute, to be ready for preemptive action when necessary to defend our liberty and to defend our lives." This new approach justified the war to remove Saddam Hussein from power before he could attack the United States. In contrast, Kerry waffles on this issue, usually coming out in favor of the old deterrence model.

Leadership rather than reaction in setting the goals for an Arab-Israeli settlement. In June 2003, I dubbed Bush's revamping of U.S. policy to the Arab-Israeli conflict perhaps "the most surprising and daring step of his presidency." Rather than leave it to the parties to decide on their pace, Bush came up with a timetable. Rather than accepting existing leaders, he sidelined Yasir Arafat. Rather than leaving it to the parties to define the final status, he made a Palestinian state the solution. Rather than keep himself out of negotiations until the very end, Bush inserted himself from the start. In contrast, Kerry would go back to the Oslo process and try again the tired and failed effort to win results by having the Israelis negotiate with Arafat.

In the end he expresses his approval of the President's changes and notes that:

It is easy to overlook Bush's radicalism in the Middle East, for in spirit he is a conservative, someone inclined to preserve what is best of the past. A conservative, however, understands that to protect what he cherishes at times requires creative activism and tactical agility.

In contrast, although John Kerry is the liberal, someone ready to discard the old and experiment with the new, when it comes to the Middle East, he has, through his Senate career and in the presidential campaign, shown a preference to stick with the tried and true, even if these are not working.

Here Pipes notes something an irony others, in different contexts (I forget whom) have pointed to. Despite being the incumbent, President Bush is the candidate of change. His opponent is alas arguing for a return to a past that failed miserably.
Crossposted on Israpundit and Soccer Dad.

Posted by SoccerDad at October 25, 2004 4:01 AM