Diana West

An Unquiet World

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 13:09:00 GMT

We have to wait until 6pm or thereabouts to find out if the Republic as we thought we knew it will be lost to medical-collectivization, which is not for nothing a riff on Soviet-style Kulak-collectivization. All eyes on the Congress.

That, of course, doesn't mean there is nothing else to see out there. And if Barack Obama is the engine driving the "health care reform" massacre Stateside, he is also the engine driving umma-wide eruption over the "Judaization" of ... Jerusalem. If the Obama administration had not come down like a hammer on Israel for -- I still can't get over this -- building housing in its own capital, these ugly demonstrations would not be happening. Meanwhile, it's worth noting that housing alone doesn't seem adequate to gin up the Muslim mobs. There is an added fake filip to the protests -- a supposed Israeli threat to Al Aqsa mosque. (This is reminiscent of the use of forged Danish Motoons to whip up anti-Danish Muslim mobs.) Enjoy the pictures.

From Ynet: "Turks protest Israeli housing"

Hundreds of Turkish protesters torched Israeli flags in protest against plans to build new housing in east Jerusalem.

After Friday prayers a large group in Istanbul began chanting anti-Israeli slogans in support of Palestinians. Some protesters were carrying a big balloon in the shape of the Al-Aqsa mosque. Dozens of others gathered outside the Israeli Embassy in Ankara.

The protests have been fueled by the plans for more Jewish housing in east Jerusalem and unsubstantiated rumors that Jewish extremists are planning to seize the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, Islam's third-holiest shrine. ...

From Almasryalyoum: "Anti Israel protests continue across Egypt"

Angry demonstrations against Israeli actions in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank erupted throughout Egypt after Friday prayers this weekend. The protests follow a week of similar demonstrations across universities and professional syndicates last week.

Cairo witnessed a demonstration at Al-Azhar mosque, in which protesters denounced Arab and Muslim passivity towards recent events, demanding that Arab rulers sanction jihad, take a firm stand against the Judaiziation of Jerusalem, and sever relations with the Jewish state. Security forces cordoned off the mosque, searched worshippers and prevented demonstrators from taking their protests to the streets....

In Beni Suef, hundreds of worshippers, including Hamdi Zahran, a member of the People’s Assembly from the Muslim Brotherhood, marched after prayer chanting anti-Israeli slogans. Surrounded by a heavy security presence, the demonstrators also decried Israeli attempts to make Jerusalem Jewish. ...

Press TV reports: "Indonesians hold anti-Israel

Indonesia witnesses thousands-strong demonstration against an Israeli project that poses danger to the al-Aqsa Mosque in the occupied East Jerusalem (al-Quds).

The Saturday protests, attended by the supporters of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), a member of the ruling coalition, exploded onto the streets of the capital, Jakarta, Jakarta Post reported.

The demonstrators condemned the destructive move, which sees Israel digging a tunnel that will damage the foundation of the mosque.

“We will prove Indonesian people are ready to support any movement to protect al-Aqsa, the third-holiest mosque in the world,” chairman of the party's Jakarta chapter Tri Wisaksana told the audience.

Defying torrential rain, the demonstrators raised up banners emblazoned with “Save al-Aqsa Mosque from Zionist Israel” and “One man one dollar to save Palestine.”...

From the AP: "Construction in Jerusalem illegal: Ban-Ki Moon"

...

On Saturday, Ban rejected Israel's distinction between East Jerusalem and the West Bank, noting that both are occupied lands. “The world has condemned Israel's settlement plans in East Jerusalem,” Ban told a news conference after his brief tour. “Let us be clear. All settlement activity is illegal anywhere in occupied territory and must be stopped.”

The UN chief reassured his Palestinian hosts that the international community supports the establishment of a Palestinian state, and also expressed concern about what he said was a worsening humanitarian situation in blockaded Hamas-ruled Gaza.

Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama’s Mideast envoy George Mitchell is returning to the region over the weekend and is planning to brief Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on US efforts to revive peace negotiations. Abbas has said he will not negotiate with Israel directly unless it freezes all settlement construction, including in East Jerusalem.

Violent protests have erupted several times in the past week in East Jerusalem, where residents are angry over both the new Jewish housing plans and rumors that Jewish extremists are plotting to take over an Old City religious site. ...

Barbarians at all the gates.

Stephen Walt: Channeling Petraeus?

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 00:37:00 GMT

First, it sounded as if Gen. Petraeus were channeling Walt (if not Mearshimer) in his Senate testimony when he invoked the Arabist narrative regarding the "conflict" between Israelis and Palestinians: namely, that Israel is the font of all Islamic violence in the world that the US has to deal with (although how Israel has anything to do with, for example, Muslim massacres in Nigeria, Thailand, India, Pakistan, etc., is never explained). It was just poisoned icing on the cake that Walt was one of Petraeus' thesis advisors back at Princeton in 1987.

But now, in Sunday's Washington Post. Stephen Walt is quoting Gen. Petraeus -- referring back to that same Petraeus Senate testimony (the part about "Arab anger").

Cosy for them, but where does it leave the serious political crushes so many on the Right have on Petraeus?

Stranger Than "24"

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:23:00 GMT

George Ford writes in:

Your blog on Petraeus makes me wish it's all a "24" episode and I'll grab the remote and delete the story out of existence.

But first, the plot:

The quiet hero-general of the Iraq war gets promoted to regional responsibilities amid talk of a possible presidential bid. His unfairly maligned patron/President/Commander-in Chief leaves office, replaced with a flamboyant Leftist who starts gutting the military and replacing Ollie North look-alikes with Janet Napolitano look-alikes. Just when you think the gutting and compromising with jihad can't get any worse, it cuts to a Pentagon meeting with the Joint Chiefs where the totally compromised Arab lackey Michael Mullen is saying, "So, gentlemen, it's time we move on Israel ...."

Cut to Mullen in the back of a limo saying into his cell phone: "It went well, General."

Cut to a close-up on Petraeus as he puts down his cell. A lady's hand extends into frame holding a Scotch in expensive crystal. Pull back to reveal Samantha Powers. Petraeus loosens his tie. Powers: "It's falling into place, just as we planned...."

Delete?

COIN Is Always Having to Say You're Sorry, Cont'd.

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 12:31:00 GMT

Photo: Islamic Republic of Afghanistan flag over Marjah

From the AP:

MARJAH, Afghanistan — Crouched on packed earth at a barricaded Marine encampment, the village elders issued their complaint: U.S. troops had killed an innocent 14-year-old boy. Secretly, the Marines didn’t believe them. No matter. They apologized, called the death a tragedy and promised to offer a condolence payment to the boy’s family.

Here we see the act of assuaging "Arab anger" -- something of primary concern to Gen. Petraeus and the Obama administration -- in its wider Islamic context: Apologize for no reason and pay up. Or, in Islamic terms, prostrate one's self as befits an infidel and offer jizya-style protection money. Call it the COIN/sharia twofer.

It’s all part of a strategy that sometimes involves swallowing their pride in an effort to persuade wavering Afghans to turn away from the Taliban.

Brilliant, isn't it? Show systemic weakness of character, self-loathing and gullibility and win "the people" over.

Since U.S., Afghan and NATO forces wrested Marjah from the Taliban, they’ve been going to extraordinary lengths to cultivate townspeople who had lived under insurgent control for years.

Cultivate -- as in "buy."

That’s a tall order in a place where many Taliban fighters still hiding here are from Marjah — supported or at least tolerated by the surrounding communities.

Winning over the population, including former Taliban fighters, is considered more important than hunting down insurgents. The strategy is expected to serve as a model for a bigger operation planned for later this year around Kandahar, the largest city in the south.

Madness.

In order to make the locals happy, the Marines use money everywhere it seems like it can buy a little goodwill. Shopkeepers are paid for locks broken in the fighting and farmers for damage to their fields when helicopters land.

Marines have disbursed more than a quarter million dollars in battle-damage payments in central Marjah alone, said Maj. David Fennell, head of a group of civil affairs Marines handling the disbursements.

They’re also trying to be careful about where they tread.

I hate to break it to Centcom, but what the AP is about to describe sounds like nothing less than a variation on the rules imposed to dominate and humiliate dhimmi populations living in thrall to Islamic law, as catalogued in such works as Bat Ye'or's The Dhimmi.

The Marines moved a new battalion base out of an abandoned high school when residents complained they were living in a building that they should be for students.

Then they decided to shrink the new base to accommodate locals who were worried about its walls cutting off a footpath. When residents decided they wanted enough room for a vehicle to get through, they agreed to reduce the size of the base some more.

And sometimes the strategy involves accepting the word of village elders, some of whom may be Taliban sympathizers themselves, to keep the peace.

That’s what unfolded Monday night as three Marine snipers hid knee-deep in water in a ditch, watching for militants at a spot where they’d found two bombs in the past week. The snipers saw people moving around a building believed to be an insurgent hideout. Then someone released dogs that charged them.

In the middle of this, the snipers saw a male with a shovel and a yellow jug — the type insurgents use for bombs — on the roadside. They shot and killed him, then started taking rifle fire from a nearby building. The Marines rushed out of the area and made it back to their base.

Tuesday morning the elders arrived to complain. They identified the person who was shot as a boy trying to collect water for his mother.

Anything for mother.

Officers of Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, apologized, describing the death as a tragedy and offering a condolence payment to the boy’s family.

Not that they believed the elders.

“The kid looked taller than me. He appeared, not to be a kid,” said Sgt. Ben Parker, a 24-year-old from Atlanta who was one of the three snipers and stands at 5-foot-8.

Lt. Shawn Miller, the executive officer of Alpha Company, met Wednesday with town elders, who raised the issue of the boy’s death again.

Miller apologized but pointed out that bullets were being fired and his Marines were being chased by dogs. Miller said he could see the shots from where he was at the nearby base.

“If you could see the bullets, why couldn’t you see he was a child?” one of the elders asked.

“This was a tragedy,” Miller said, again, to the group of about 10 assembled bearded men. “Because of a very sad misinterpretation, an innocent person was hurt.”

He also said, for the second day in a row, that the Marines would pay his family.

During Wednesday’s meeting, the Afghan army commander attached to Alpha Company passed no public judgment on the boy’s innocence, but berated the elders for not watching over their children better.

Our pals.

“Why did someone send him out at night to get water? Why are you letting your children out like that?” Capt. Iqbal Khan asked.

After the meeting, Khan said he would not say that the men were lying, but that the evidence was not in their favor.

“First, 8 p.m. is not a proper time to go out and get water for the household. Second, the boy must have been older because parents wouldn’t send such a young boy out like that,” Khan said.

Most suspicious: Though Miller has offered condolence payments to the boy’s family, no one has come forward to claim them.

Perhaps it's not enough yet.

“The father is the only one who hasn’t shown up,” Miller said.

Parker says he doesn’t mind his commanders going out and apologizing for a shooting. He and the officers are sure they killed an insurgent.

“We haven’t had any bombs in that spot since,” Parker said.

Victory.

Gen. Petraeus: Channeling Walt (If Not Mearshimer)?

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 03:04:00 GMT

There is an intensifying debate over how exactly Gen. David Petraeus regards Israel. (I have written about it here, here and here.) On the one hand are the general's words -- first, as related in a blog posted at Foreign Policy, and, later, in the general's own written statement recently submitted to the US Senate Armed Services Committee. On the other hand are his supporters, who don't believe his words, either as reported in Foreign Policy (which they don't believe, either) or even as presented to the Senate.

Max Boot writing at Contentions is leading the Petraeus-is-pro-Israel defense (or at least that it is "a lie" that he is "anti-Israel"). Boot claims, first, that the Foreign Policy report -- the essence being that Petraeus sent staffers to brief Joint Chiefs Chairman Mullen in January to the effect that Israel is an obstacle to American interests because Arab leaders in the Arab nations of Centcom regard Israel as an obstacle to American interests -- was debunked when only secondary, even minor aspects of the Foreign Policy report were later disupted (e.g., Mullen said in follow-up story that he wasn't "stunned") or simply corrected -- specifically that Petraeus did not, as initially reported, petition the White House to put "the Palestinian territories" under his command, but rather asked the Joint Chiefs.

Here's the correction Foreign Policy ran:

[UPDATE: A senior military officer denied Sunday that Petraeus sent a paper to the White House.

"CENTCOM did have a team brief the CJCS on concerns revolving around the Palestinian issue, and CENTCOM did propose a UCP change, but to CJCS, not to the WH," the officer said via email. "GEN Petraeus was not certain what might have been conveyed to the WH (if anything) from that brief to CJCS."

(UCP means "unified combatant command," like CENTCOM; CJCS refers to Mullen; and WH is the White House.)]

In other words, the officer has confirmed that the Centcom briefing of Mullen took place as reported, and that substance of the briefing -- "on concerns revolving around the Palestinian issue" -- also took place as reported. It is no leap of logic to conclude that any discussion on "concerns revolving around the Palestinian issue" is a discussion about the "concerns" of the people who frame the Islamic jihad on Israel as "revolving around the Palestinian issue" -- i.e., the concerns of the Arabs. "Israeli intransigence" is, of course, their eternal narrative, which is what Petraeus is reported to have wanted conveyed to Mullen as being an obstacle to US interests.

Boot doesn't see it that way. He writes:

That [the Foreign Policy post] didn’t ring true to me, so I asked a military officer who is familiar with the briefing in question and with Petraeus’s thinking on the issue to clarify matters. He told me that Perry’s [Foreign Policy] item was “incorrect.” In the first place, Petraeus never recommended shifting the Palestinian territories to Centcom’s purview from European Command, as claimed by Perry. [See correction above.] Nor did Petraeus belittle George Mitchell, whom he holds in high regard. [The Perry item doesn't say Petraeus belittled George Mitchell, but rather an anonymous actor.] All that happened, this officer told me, is that there was a “staff-officer briefing … on the situation in the West Bank, because that situation is a concern that Centcom hears in the Arab world all the time. Nothing more than that.”

In one sentence, the essence of the original story! If Centcom is briefing the Joint Chiefs on "the stituation in the West Bank" due to concerns Centcom hears in the Arab world "all the time," it makes sense that Centcom is going to convey those same concerns it is hearing from the Arab world in its briefing -- as, indeed, Foreign Policy reported. Now. Did Petraeus want those Arab concerns known to the Joint Chiefs because he believes they are bunk, or because he takes them as, um, Gospel? So far, there has been no correction of the Foreign Policy point that Petraeus shares the Arab view.

Indeed, there would seem to be a straight line between Arab "concern," as related from Petraeus to the Joint Chiefs in January, to this statement attributed to VP Biden in Israel last week :"This [building housing in Jerusalem] is starting to get dangerous for us. What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan."

In this same context, Petraeus' recent Senate testimony (discussed here), with its talk of "Arab anger" over "the Palestinian question" limiting US effectiveness simply underscores the essence of the Foreign Policy report. Here's the Petraeus Senate statement in question, his first example of what he called "root causes of instability" or "obstacles to security":

Insufficient progress toward a comprehensive Middle East peace. The enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the AOR [Area of Responsibility] Israeli-Palestinian tensions often flare into violence and large-scale armed confrontations. The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the AOR and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support. The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas.

Boot writes:

Actually, that’s not what Petraeus said. Rather, it’s pulled from the 56-page Central Command “Posture Statement” filed by his staff with the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Well, it's from a 56-page written statement, but it's called:

STATEMENT OF GENERAL DAVID H. PETRAEUS, U.S. ARMY
COMMANDER U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND
BEFORE THE SENATE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE ON
THE POSTURE OF U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND
16 MAR 2010

Filed by his staff?

Boot goes on to cite Petraeus' spoken testimony on Israel, pointing out that the general did not read aloud the paragraph concerning Israel-Palestinian hostilities from his prepared statement. You can read the whole except of what Petraeus said here. Here is the money quote:

Again, clearly, the tensions, the issues and so forth have an enormous effect. They set the strategic context within which we operate in the Central Command area of responsibility. ...

This is the axis on which the Arab narrative turns: that Israeli-Palestinian tensions are the main problem in the world; that all grievances flow from it; that what happens there drives what happens everywhere -- or, as Petraeus says, "they set the context within which we operate in the Central Command area of responsibility." But Boot doesn't see this. His analysis:

So there you have it. General Petraeus obviously doesn’t see the Israeli-Arab “peace process” as a top issue for his command, because he didn’t even raise it in his opening statement. When he was pressed on it, he made a fairly anodyne statement about the need to encourage negotiations to help moderate Arab regimes. That’s it.

That's it?

It is up to Petraeus to refute the Arabist, anti-Israel attitudes now far and widely attributed to him by media now taking his words, written and spoken and reported on, at face value if they are truly incorrect. Personally, I'm not holding my breath. The fact is, assuaging "Arab anger" is, when you think of it, is the very heart of "hearts and minds" current counterinsurgency doctrine (COIN) -- and Petraeus wrote the book.

He also wrote a Ph. D. thesis at Princeton in 1987 called “The American military and the Lessons of Vietnam: A Study of Military Influence and the Use of Force in the Post-Vietnam Era” (available here).

One of his two faculty advisors, it is interesting to note in light of this recent debate was ... Stephen Walt -- of Walt and Mearshimer infamy (hat tip Andrew Bostom). In acknowledgements, Petraeus writes:

Professor Stephen Walt also deserves my gratitude. As my second faculty adviser – replacing Professor Barry Posen during the writing of my dissertation – Professor Walt offered numerous sound suggestions and comments. Like Professor Ullman, he displayed tremendous competence not only as an academic, but as a teacher as well.

Petraeus is delivering the 2010 Irving Kristol Lecture at the American Enterprise Association this spring. Maybe he'll take the opportunity of his lecture to explain what he learned.

"Arab Anger," the Obama Administration & Gen.Petraeus

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:54:00 GMT

This week's column:

Phew. We can breathe easier now that the Obama administration has taken a tough-as-scimitars line with Israel, whose existentially threatening architectural blueprints for new housing, the administration says, pose a dire threat to U.S. troops and interests. Or, as Vice President Joseph Biden put it, referring to a new housing project in Jerusalem, as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth: "This is starting to get dangerous for us. What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan." In other words, maybe it's not the Muslim-made IED planted in the roads of Helmand Province that's the problem; maybe it's the Jewish-built condo in Jerusalem. Such is the babble of the jihad-blackmailed. And the problem with giving in to blackmail is that it never ends.

The effects are as palpable as they are shameful. The same week the Israeli housing project launched diplomatic fireworks and blaring world headlines, the White House and most media ignored the Palestinian Authority's (PA) official commemoration of Dalal Mughrabi, a mass murderess who led an attack killing 38 Israelis in 1978. She now has a PA public square named in her honor (joining two PA girls high schools, two summer camps and other institutions so named). In its silence on this calumny, the U.S. government has acquiesced to the jihadist narrative that Jews building homes in Israel's capital is incitement; and Muslims naming public squares for killers of Jews in the PA is just peace-process-as-usual.

This is the policy of appeasement, Islamic appeasement, and, under the constant drip, drip, drip of oil dependence, it has been eroding our national security posture since long before 9/11, reshaping a world perspective that conforms with that of the Islamic world. This eruption over housing in Jerusalem -- an "insult," an "affront," said White House adviser David Axelrod, strangely using the language of offended Islam -- is just its most vivid political manifestation to date.

Gen. David Petraeus put a military gloss on this same policy in recent testimony before the U.S. Senate. Setting up a discussion of what he called "root causes of instability" or "obstacles to security," he led off with "insufficient progress toward a comprehensive Middle East peace," meaning the open-ended jihad against Israel (not that he put it that way). This, he went on to say, presents "distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the (region)."

Why? "The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel," he said. "Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the (region) ... and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaida and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support."

Subtext: If Israel would shrink into nothingness, everything would be beautiful.

Petraeus' testimony about "Arab anger" echoes his concerns, as reported by Foreign Policy online this week, about Arab complaints on "the Palestinian issue," as a senior military officer put it to the blog. Petraeus, Foreign Policy writes, believes this anger is "jeopardizing U.S. standing in the region." Indeed, hoping "to be perceived by Arab leaders as engaged," Petraeus sought to place Israel under his command purview. (Request denied.)

Q: Since when is assuaging "Arab anger" and demonstrating "engagement" to Arab leaders the concern of U.S. war planners? A: Since U.S. war planners became U.S. counter-insurgency (COIN) planners -- and Petraeus helped write the book on COIN. Playing to Arab demands, Muslim demands, generally, is the heart of "hearts and minds" in CENTCOM land.

No wonder the general talks about "Arab anger" caused by Arab "perception" over "the Palestinian question" as hindering U.S. objectives. He is using the classic buzz terms for the Arabist slant on the jihad (not "Arab anger") against Israel. This jihad is now picking up a terrifying speed, particularly as the Obama administration, fresh from an apology to Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, "outreach" to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Iran, "population protection" at the expense of force protection in Hamid Karzai's Afghanistan (don't forget President Obama's bow last year to Saudi's King Abdullah), assists by bringing the hammer down on Israel.

What makes the blackmail unbearable is that the hammer is coming down on something all too symbolically close to Israel's very existence: building houses.

Others Are Noticing Fox's Islamic Tilt

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:15:00 GMT

Power clasp: Murdoch and Talal at the Abu Dhabi Media Summit last week.

I know the story of the day about Fox News is Brett Baier's interview with President Obama but this short American Thinker piece by Jed Gladstein shouldn't be missed:

"Is Fox News Tiling Toward the Arabs?" the title asks. The answer is yes -- although I would characterize it more precisely as a tilt toward Islam and its narratives (we have to start thinking macro, people) -- as I have written here, here and here.

Gladstein's piece:

I wondered how long it would take after Saudi money was insinuated into Rupert Murdoch's empire before anti-Semitism hit the Fox News airwaves in the form of tug-at-your-heart, pro-Arab, mini-hit pieces against the State of Israel. It didn't take long.

Did anyone notice Shepard Smith's passionate rant against Israel on behalf of the Palestinian Arabs a few days ago? I always thought Smith was just a smarmy, jock-type teeny-bopper. But he obviously knows which side his bread is buttered on, and he is fully capable of getting all lathered up over something about which he is absolutely ignorant.

Today on Fox News, Amy Kellogg did another hit piece on Israel, using a cute little heart-strings-tugger about the peaceful Syrian civilians who picnic on the Golan Heights in nostalgic longing for the times when it belonged to Syria. Of course, there was no mention of the carnage and slaughter inflicted on peaceful Israeli citizens when the Syrians were in charge of the Golan. Apparently, there's no nostalgia in that.

But, what I am wondering is this: since, by its own definition, Fox News is "fair and balanced," where are all the tug-at-your-heart-strings pieces about dispossessed Middle Eastern Jews and innocent Israeli citizens? What's that? Did someone say there aren't any Saudi Princes bankrolling propaganda pieces about non-Arabs in the Middle East? Well, well, who would ever suspect that the power of petro-dollars would turn Fox News into just another anti-Israel propaganda outlet?

David Petraeus: Neoconservative Hero?

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:11:00 GMT

Here's corroboration of the report indicating a distinctly Arabist outlook on the part of Gen. Petraeus, who seems to view Israel as a root cause of problems, even American problems, in the Islamic world. It comes from the CENTCOM chief's own testimony before the Senate yesterday. Setting up "a number of cross-cutting issues that serve as major drivers of instability, inter-state tensions, and conflict," factors that "can serve as root causes of instability or as obstacles to security," he began with Israel. He said in his prepared statement:

Insufficient progress toward a comprehensive Middle East peace. The enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the AOR.

Does he mean by "enduring hostilities" the fact that the Islamic world wants to eradicate Israel?

Israeli-Palestinian tensions often flare into violence and large-scale armed confrontations.

Isn't it amazing that the Israelis don't just let the "neighbors'" rockets just keep falling?

The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel.

Funny, last time I looked the US was allies with Israel ...

Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the AOR and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world.

As in: Darn it, Uncle Sam, that country is still there! Can't you do something about that? The umma is restive. Thought outside the box: Maybe those "partners" just aren't on our side.

Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support.

Anger, anger -- has this man never, ever heard of jihad -- and specifically, the jihad against Israel, a once dhimmi nation subjugated by Muslim invaders that has since been restored to sovreignty?

The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas.

Goodbye, Israel, goodbye problem with Iran? Hmm. Maybe that's why the past two administrations have seemed so unconcerned about Iranian nukes.

Wonder if Gen. Petraeus will elaborate on this perception of the world through umma-eyes when, later this spring, he delivers the Irving Kristol Lecture for 2010 at the American Enterprise Institute.

Dear Mayor of Monschau

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:35:00 GMT

Dear Mayor Margareta Ritter (margareta.ritter@stadt.monschau.de),

I have had the pleasure of visiting your exquisitely beautiful German town, the second member of my family to do so. The first was my dad, who, as a member of the 102nd Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron in Gen. Bradley's Army, had, with time out to recuperate from wounds incurred at the Battle of St Lo, fought across nothern Europe from D-Day plus 2 until reaching Monschau by the end of 1944.

I only bring this up because I read this morning that you have declared Geert Wilders, who recently weekended in your town, "not welcome" in Monschau. "People who, just like Mr Wilders, encumber the Dutch integration debate with right-wing populism and who want to ban the Qur'an, comparing it to Mein Kampf, are not welcome in Monschau," you are quoted as having said.

I protest. First of all, it is not "right-wing populism" with which Wilders "encumbers" the integration debate. It is with facts about sharia (Islamic law), a totalitarian and supremacist legal and religious system. He takes these facts to the public arena, a place where fears of Islamic retribution have to date silenced this essential, civilizational conversation. Another fact he brings, however discomforting to multicultists such as you appear to be, is the similarity between Mein Kampf and the Koran. You may declare Wilders -- and all of his thousands of Dutch supporters -- persona non grata in Monschau; that won't make sharia or those Koran-Kampf similarities go away.

But maybe you don't care. Maybe you have now found a new totalitarianism to submit to. But I protest your decision to make Monschau off limits to Wilders, a defender of liberty against totalitarianism -- the same liberty my dad was in and around Monschau to defend long ago against a similarly supremacist totalitarianism. I have a strong hunch he would say that, so long as you are in office, liberation wasn't worth the effort.

Sincerely,

Diana West, USA

Is Petraeus an Islamic Tool? Part 2

rbuscher@haleymiranda.com — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:36:00 GMT

Last June, I noted Gen. David Petraeus's MoveOn.org-like take on Guantanamo Bay -- close it because it causes us problems and violates (unspecified) Geneva Conventions -- and his willingness to attribute to the Palestinian war on Israel "justifications" for the existence of Hezbollah.

Now this from Foreign Policy (via Judeosphere):

On Jan. 16, two days after a killer earthquake hit Haiti, a team of senior military officers from the U.S. Central Command (responsible for overseeing American security interests in the Middle East), arrived at the Pentagon to brief Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The team had been dispatched by CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus to underline his growing worries at the lack of progress in resolving the issue.

Read: further Israeli concessions.

The 33-slide, 45-minute PowerPoint briefing stunned Mullen. The briefers reported that there was a growing perception among Arab leaders that the U.S. was incapable of standing up to Israel, that CENTCOM's mostly Arab constituency was losing faith in American promises, that Israeli intransigence on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was jeopardizing U.S. standing in the region, and that Mitchell himself was (as a senior Pentagon officer later bluntly described it) "too old, too slow ... and too late."

Mind, this was supposes to be a military briefing, not an OIC event.

The January Mullen briefing was unprecedented. No previous CENTCOM commander had ever expressed himself on what is essentially a political issue; which is why the briefers were careful to tell Mullen that their conclusions followed from a December 2009 tour of the region where, on Petraeus's instructions, they spoke to senior Arab leaders. "Everywhere they went, the message was pretty humbling," a Pentagon officer familiar with the briefing says. "America was not only viewed as weak, but its military posture in the region was eroding." But Petraeus wasn't finished: two days after the Mullen briefing, Petraeus sent a paper to the White House requesting that the West Bank and Gaza (which, with Israel, is a part of the European Command -- or EUCOM), be made a part of his area of operations.

Imperial General Time.

Petraeus's reason was straightforward: with U.S. troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. military had to be perceived by Arab leaders as engaged in the region's most troublesome conflict.

Q: Since when does the US supreme commander ensure that US military doctrine conforms to Arab perceptions? A: Since now.

The Foreign Policy piece includes an update:

[UPDATE: A senior military officer denied Sunday that Petraeus sent a paper to the White House.

"CENTCOM did have a team brief the CJCS on concerns revolving around the Palestinian issue, and CENTCOM did propose a UCP change, but to CJCS, not to the WH," the officer said via email. "GEN Petraeus was not certain what might have been conveyed to the WH (if anything) from that brief to CJCS."

(UCP means "unified combatant command," like CENTCOM; CJCS refers to Mullen; and WH is the White House.)]

So, Petraeus did propose to put Israel under his purview, but to Mullen, not to the White House. The report goes on:

The Mullen briefing and Petraeus's request hit the White House like a bombshell. While Petraeus's request that CENTCOM be expanded to include the Palestinians was denied ("it was dead on arrival," a Pentagon officer confirms), the Obama administration decided it would redouble its efforts -- pressing Israel once again on the settlements issue, sending Mitchell on a visit to a number of Arab capitals and dispatching Mullen for a carefully arranged meeting with the chief of the Israeli General Staff, Lt. General Gabi Ashkenazi. While the American press speculated that Mullen's trip focused on Iran, the JCS Chairman actually carried a blunt, and tough, message on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: that Israel had to see its conflict with the Palestinians "in a larger, regional, context" -- as having a direct impact on America's status in the region. ... Certainly, it was thought, Israel would get the message....

The dhimmi-hostage message carried by Gen.Petraeus being that Israel building 1,600 apartments in Jerusalem places US troops' lives in danger in the wider region (Iraq and Afghanistan). Such appeasement, this time at the expense of the Israelis, will only embolden all of our jihadist enemies to make more and more outrageous demands. The story continues:

Israel didn't.

Well, thank goodness.

When Vice President Joe Biden was embarrassed by an Israeli announcement that the Netanyahu government was building 1,600 new homes in East Jerusalem,

He should have gone and cut a ribbon on the project

the administration reacted. But no one was more outraged than Biden who, according to the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth, engaged in a private, and angry, exchange with the Israeli Prime Minister. Not surprisingly, what Biden told Netanyahu reflected the importance the administration attached to Petraeus's Mullen briefing: "This is starting to get dangerous for us," Biden reportedly told Netanyahu. "What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us and it endangers regional peace."

Yedioth Ahronoth went on to report: "The vice president told his Israeli hosts that since many people in the Muslim world perceived a connection between Israel's actions and US policy, any decision about construction that undermines Palestinian rights in East Jerusalem could have an impact on the personal safety of American troops fighting against Islamic terrorism." The message couldn't be plainer: Israel's intransigence could cost American lives.

How about Israelis continuing to breathe? Is that okay?

There are important and powerful lobbies in America: the NRA, the American Medical Association, the lawyers -- and the Israeli lobby. But no lobby is as important, or as powerful, as the U.S. military. While commentators and pundits might reflect that Joe Biden's trip to Israel has forever shifted America's relationship with its erstwhile ally in the region, the real break came in January, when David Petraeus sent a briefing team to the Pentagon with a stark warning: America's relationship with Israel is important, but not as important as the lives of America's soldiers. ...

Here's a plan Gen. Petraeus should be able to get behind: A new battle strategy, maybe a Kilcullen special, for him to join forces with Iran to once and for all nuke Israel and its genocidal apartment houses out of existence. That, according to his own lights, is sure to keep American troops safe in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Heck, it would win the war -- or at least the jihad.