Remember who our friends are

by Rossputin | 6:24 am, February 25, 2011 | Comments Off

I was reminded by Tuesday’s insightful comment by “The Freak” about sticking with our friends (and interests) of an interview I heard almost two weeks ago on BBC News.  I’ve been trying to find it on their web site and sent the BBC an e-mail which has gone unanswered asking if the interview was available online.  I’ll do my best to describe it since I can’t find the actual source material for you.

The interview was of two young Lebanese adults, one being Elie Hajj whose father, General Francois Hajj, was assassinated in 2007, and the other being one of the two daughters of Sammir Qassir, a Christian journalist who was best known for his anti-Syrian views.

The discussion was ostensibly about two different Lebanese views about the UN’s Special Tribunal for Lebanon, with Mr. Hajj saying that his skepticism of the tribunal’s accuracy and effectiveness is too strong to change and Ms. Qassir saying that the tribunal remains the best hope for justice for her father and Mr. Hajj’s.

What began as a rational sounding discussion soon degenerated into something else with Mr. Hajj saying that Hezbollah is innocent of the murder and that he’s seen evidence about certain cell phones which tie his father’s murder to Israel.

Ms. Qassir then went on a mini-rant about how everyone knows that Israel is the enemy and that it’s so obviously and permanently true that Mr. Hajj need not keep repeating it.  She said that the Lebanese would fight Israel when it could, and forever until the last drop of blood, but that the focus should temporarily be on getting justice for their parents and stabilizing the government of Lebanon.  As sexist as this might sound, her hateful and paranoid rhetoric was that much more disturbing coming from a woman.

It was a stunning interview to hear – two relatively upper-class, well educated, young adult Lebanese whose hatred for Israel is permanently etched on their psyches.  These are people who can never and will never be turned into friends or even into neutral parties when it comes to Israel, and it’s hard to imagine that the rest of the country feels any less beligerence not least when the most aggressive rhetoric in the interview came from a Christian daughter of a journalist.

Both General Hajj’s murder and that of Mr. Qassir would seem to be tied to Syria. But Syria always responds by blaming Israel and minds addled by years of being indoctrinated with hatred are susceptible to such lunacy as thinking that Israel would want to kill an anti-Syrian journalist or even an army general who had fought Israel, given that Lebanese instability would likely lead to greater influence by Hezbollah.  (This article at the time of Hajj’s assassination quotes many people offering theories of why Hajj would have been targeted, and none of them has to do with Israel but rather with fomenting instability and a power vacuum in Lebanon, something that Israel’s enemies would want.)

Overall, my reaction to the interview was a stunned sense of fatalism and recognition that Israel is and will for a long time be surrounded by true mortal enemies, even among the educated elite, and that these enemies will only be kept at bay by fear of overwhelming military defeat should conflict arise.

The interview also reinforced my view that Barack Obama is not just a foreign affairs idiot, but that his idiocy is extremely dangerous.  From his “apology tour” to his administration’s recent reprehensible near-abandonment of Israel at the UN, this is a man living in a foreign affairs 1984 where friends are the problem and bloodthirsty enemies just need a rhetorical (or maybe actual) hug. Obama projects naïveté and weakness, emboldening our enemies to do things like Iran’s running warships through the Suez Canal (and Egypt’s allowing that passage), a move which can only harm America’s friends and interests in the Middle East.  Just like the capture and release of the hostages in Iran, one has to wonder whether this provocation would have happened had George Bush (or Ronald Reagan) been president.

But I digress…

The BBC interview was a stark reminder that Israel can never relax and that the US should remain equally vigilant in support of its only true friend and ally in one of the world’s most strategically important regions.  Israel’s enemies are intractable and hateful. Just as with Hitler’s overt hatred of Jews, I take these Arabs at their word: they hate Israel and want it destroyed.  This must not be permitted; indeed the perception of the possibility of that outcome must not be permitted, even if it means a pre-emptive attack by Israel on the most serious imminent threates.  It’s an attack that must have aggressive US support, both in its operation and in public statements.

Temporary good behavior by one’s enemies does not make them friends.  Just ask Neville Chamberlain, a man who offered one of the most important and obvious lessons in history. Unfortunately, our president is too stupid, cloistered, and anti-Semitic to learn that lesson.  If the Mideast survives without major conflagration until we have a president with the sense and courage to rein in Israel’s enemies, with unsubtle threats if necessary, it will be good luck, not skill, and in spite of rather than because of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and our other leading incompetents.

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