The ongoing Arab aggression and IDF counter-terrorist operations in and around Gaza have sparked a revolt of sorts within Israel’s Kadima Party against the unilateral withdrawal policies of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Continue reading »

As the international community makes its expected shift from initially supporting Israel’s right to a military response to last week’s abductions and rocket attacks to shrieking in dismay that said response is causing a “humanitarian crisis,” Prime Minister Ehud Olmert insists on a little perspective.

Rightly does Olmert point out that the “Palestinians” are shooting to kill any Jewish man, women or child they can manage to hit. Israel is simply making life temporarily uncomfortable for the terrorist hordes and the population that harbors and to large degree supports them (as evidenced by Hamas’ sweeping electoral victories).

Senior members of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s Kadima Party seem to waking up to the realities surrounding Olmert’s intended withdrawal from Judea and Samaria, namely that a realignment along the lines of major settlement blocs and an effort to set permanent borders - as Olmert promised in his election campaign - is not going to meet with world approval.

Continue reading »

Do Israel’s leaders - and for that matter, American and European officials - really believe that PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas is an opponent of anti-Jewish terrorism? Continue reading »

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s “convergence” plan - or whatever he is calling it this week - was originally billed as a unilateral step taken from a position of strength and in consideration, first and foremost, of Israel’s best interests.

But every time Olmert opens his mouth on the subject his plan is further unmasked as an act of surrender aimed at appeasing Israel’s Arab and Western antagonists. Continue reading »

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s claim to have a clear mandate from the people to implement his “convergence” plan is very debatable.

But let’s say for the sake of argument that his intention to surrender almost all of Israel’s biblical heartland does enjoy majority support.

Does that necessarily make it a good idea? There is not one shred of evidence suggesting that after Israel withdraws from over 90 percent of Judea and Samaria, the world will not continue to back Arab demands to surrender the rest, including the eastern half of Jerusalem.

In fact, recent comments from Washington, from where Olmert is hoping to gain recognition for Israel’s new borders, suggest the exact opposite.

You see, while the American people in general may be Israel’s unconditional friend, the powers that be in Washington will not risk further ruffling Europe’s or the Arab world’s feathers in order to back what its allies in Jerusalem say is best for the Jewish state.

Washington will, however, support the division of this land. Not because Olmert says such a move is necessary, but because Europe and the Arabs demand it.

And that is where US government support for Olmert’s policies will stop - where they cease to coincide with the demands of Israel’s enemies.

It could not be any more plain that the end result of Olmert’s “convergence” will be that Israel divests itself of its most valuable bargaining chips before final status negotiations even begin.

And when the day comes - 5, 10, 15 years from now - when the world forces Israel to again sit down with the “Palestinians” and hammer out a final peace deal, what will Israel have left with which to negotiate? Pretty much nothing, and the Arabs have consistently proven they will not offer “peace” in return for nothing.

Ehud Olmert has come clean about what will be the true outcome of his “convergence” plan, and it doesn’t look promising for Israel in the long term.

Now remember, all during the election campaign Olmert vowed he would unilaterally set Israel’s FINAL borders by 2010, and that by doing so in the way he intended those borders would be set according to the best interests of the Jewish state.

Like Sharon before him, it seems Olmert was just full of empty promises.

In an interview with Time Magazine this week, the fill-in leader appeared to be creating a political escape hatch before even trying to implement his stated policies or fulfill his promises.

The borders Olmert draws “will be very very close to what may be the final borderlines… the lines I want to draw are very close to the lines that I believe will become the political borders.

A far cry from his previous emphatic statements that Israel would, through him, take its destiny in its own hands and do what is best for its citizens.

Anyone with any amount of sense knows that not one single nation involved in the “peace” process is going to endorse Olmert’s borders if the “Palestinians” don’t first. And no one with any sense expects that they will.

The only borders the US and Europe - the major power brokers behind negotiations - would even think about backing even without Arab consent would be the pre-1967 borders. A full Israeli withdrawal from all Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem.

All Olmert’s plan is going to accomplish is to divest Israel of any leverage it currently possesses before final negotiations even begin, and, more dangerously, signal a clear lack of conviction in the Jews’ biblical, historical and legal rights to any of this land.