The global economic crisis has revealed the folly of large U.S. budget and trade deficits, as well as of the strong dollar that makes them possible. If it is serious about recovery, the United States must balance the budget, stimulate private saving, and embrace a declining dollar.
Comments
Re: Misreading the Map
I respectfully submit that Mr. Hadar is incorrect in several of his facts and in quite a few of his assumptions. Although the Soviet Union certainly did favor partition in 1947, they never directly supported Israel with military aid; for that matter neither did the United States until the 1960’s under the auspice of the Kennedy Administration. Given that Czechoslovakia with acquiescence from Moscow did sell weapons to the nascent Jewish State, the author can be somewhat forgiven an historical distortion, however, his advertence to “Israel's creeping annexation of the West Bank” without referencing Jordan’s illegal annexation of this land subsequent to 1948 depicts a degree of bias. To truly examine the facts of this conflict, one has to wonder why Palestinian statehood became such an acute issue following Israel’s successful War of Independence or its consequent victory in the Six Day War but not during Ottoman rule in the late 19th and early 20th century. To be certain, there was Arab dismay over Jewish immigration during this period of time but no movement toward a sovereign Palestinian state then or during British stewardship following World War I. With this said, it’s not the point of my rebuttal to rehash the origins of this conflict, which I dare say go back a lot further than the 19th century; instead, my main thrust is the erroneous linkage that Mr. Hadar ascribes to the Palestinian conflict and the other conflagrations in the Middle East.
Sooner or later, perhaps not in this generation or the next, this country will have to recognize that if Israel is to exist as a homeland of the Jewish people, it will always be at odds with the Muslim world. It’s not a pleasant fact but Islamic deity as outlined in the Qur’an, Hadith, and Sunnah clearly professes that other religions can exist on “Holy Islamic land” but only under the supremacy of Islam; “the true belief.” Taken in conjunction with Palestinian insistence upon the right of return and Jerusalem as the capital of their proposed state; there really is no wiggle room, the melding of religious, secular, and historic enmity is far too great to be reconciled under conditions short of all out war and a fight to the finish. President Obama negotiating peace talks with Hamas vanquished Mahmoud Abbas is ludicrous. It would be analogous to the Western nations holding peace talks with a German government in exile in the spring of 1939.
In the midst of this irreconcilable conflict which the world is so engrossed in: Iran, with its less than stable leadership is in the midst developing a nuclear weapon and the means to deliver it; Iraq, having nothing to do with Israel and dominated by Shiites, is on the verge of once again succumbing to sectarian violence; and the Taliban is threatening a Pakistani government that is at best sending out mixed signals. These are present day imminent dangers that require separate and immediate consideration as opposed to linkage to an age old problem with no solution in site. Does anyone truly believe that if the headlines in tomorrow’s papers proclaimed a Palestinian State, the dire problems just outlined and the hatred of the United States and western ideas would go away?
Unforgiven...
It's nice to know that I've been "forgiven" by the writer re Soviet assistance to Israel. I'm not so forgiving. My guess is that he/she would not hesitate to describe the Egyptian-Czech arms deal of 1955 as a form of Soviet military assistance to Egypt. So, please, there is no need to forgive me for applying the same historical logic to the Czech=Soviet military assistance to Israel in 1948. The fact is that "Truman's government placed an arms embargo on Israel. All of Israel's arms and munitions came for the Soviet bloc, especially the newly Communist Czechoslovakia. The Czechs even attempted to send an international brigade similar to the that dispatched to the Spanish Civil War; it was not particularly effective since the Israelis immediately split it among Israeli army units" (George Dallas, 1945: The War that Never Ended (Yale University Press). Moreover, the Soviets -- not the Americans -- led the campaign in support of the partition of Palestine; the Americans were opposed to that (see also, Uri Bialer, Between East and the West: Israel's Foreign Policy Orientation 1948-1956 (Cambridge University Press).
"Misreading the map"
I fully agree with the author.
The target of the present israeli governement is to destroy the "Oslo spirit" as a reference to solve the conflict.
As they cannot say that they do not want to negociate, they raise another problem, now Iran, and pretend that it must be addressed first.
Misreading the Map
Abolutely agree - Israel doesn't want to negotiate.
RE: Misreading the M/E map...Obama's direction
Many thanks to Mr.Hadar for a well balanced presentation of the issues at stake and the varying weights that must be counter-balanced as the US under the Obama presidency works to untangle the post Iraq Bush Cheney disasters and the damage done to American honor and justice these last 8 yrs and more.. the only thing I take issue with however is his reference towards the end of the article about Israel being being both Jewish and democratic..It is not a Jewish democracy since that is oxymoronic. That state has a multicultural population and like the United States, we can no more countenance the US being called a Christian nation or a white nation and remain democratic. Approximately 20% of the Israeli population is Palestinian as well as numerous other communities like Druze, Beduoin, Christian and others. What might make Israel 'democratic' has not yet happened which would be to insure that ALL its citizens are treated as first class human beings rather than maintaining a caste system of ethnicity and religions.However, the rest of Hadar's excellent article was much on target.
Correction of a fact
Israel never legally annexed the West Bank, or Gaza for that matter. The author should correct the article accordingly.
?
I don't need to correct something that I didn't write. I did mention Israel's "creeping annexation" of the West, a process under which Israel (formally) annexed parts of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and established Jewish settlemets and military bases on other parts of that area. I didn't write that Israel "legally annexed the West Bank."
Israel
I think the reason Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not support a two stae solution is because he does not want to share the land with anybody but Jews. He feels isreal belongs to the Jews by "Divine Right" and anybody else must be removed by any means neccessary. Additionally , Israle will never comply with the United Nations Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338. because they feel no one can make them.
Occupation or Blockade?
Israel pulled out of Gaza several years ago, did it not? I respectfully submit that to describe the present blockade of Gaza as an "occupation" is a mischaracterization. Some Americans may find the security crisis Israel confronts with her radicalized neighbor to be the result of Israel's own policies, but certainly a scholarly author such as yourself is able to discern the relevant minutia between occupation and an at least reasonably justifiable security blockade.
Occupation.
Blockade? Neighbor? Which sovereign nation is Israel blockading? By what name is this sovereign neighbor recognized? Let's not get silly, Harrison R.
The Futility of Further Negotiations
Hadar's otherwise sensible piece ends with a definite non starter.
His conclusion that :
" Washington cannot make a deal for the Israelis and the Palestinians, but it can and should help them do so themselves. "
is the nth time repetition of an old advise/proposal that did NOT in the past, nor will ever, in the future, lead to a resolution of the conflict.
Time and again both parties have failed to successfully conclude any meaningful agreement; as is only expected considering their respective fundamental ly divergent and contradictory outlooks.
AS a matterof historical record the only time they presumably did, at Oslo, they only managed to further obfuscate and complicate the issue .
The world should know by now, as Washington certainly does, that their conflict is totally irresovable if left to them.
A call for further negotiations is a call for the continuation of the conflict particularly at this junction with the evident progressive radicalization of both parties attitudes and aspirations.
The only way out is a UNSC IMPOSED and UNSC IMPLEMENTED resolution that both parties will have to go along with whether they like it or NOT as , surely, they will NOT, but still both parties can present to their respective constituencis as inescapable "International will"!