Just about everyone knows that Avigdor Lieberman is a transferist, someone who believes in transferring (or expelling) Israeli Arabs from Israel and placing them under Palestinian sovereignty. But almost no one knows that Bibi Netanyahu is one as well. To be more concise, Bibi was a transferist as of the time of the following anecdote. But what he believes now is anyone’s guess:
One night at a dinner party in Jerusalem in 1977, I heard a young Israeli talking about the Arabs in terms which chilled my blood. “In the next war,” he said, “we’ve got to get the Palestinians out of the West Bank for good.”
…By a curious quirk, that young Israeli whom I heard enthuse about emptying the West Bank of Arabs was Binyamin Netanyahu, today his country’s prime minister.
Ah, I hear my right-wing readers say: “But this was 1977, a lot can change in a few decades.” Yes, a direct, sincere young right-wing zealot can become a wily, duplicitous politician who knows how to cloak his views well. Certainly, Bibi understands that he could not become prime minister if he explicitly endorsed transfer as stated government policy. So instead, he focuses on tactical matters like improving the economic lives of Palestinians, as if this–even if he was sincere in implementing it (which he clearly is not)–would resolve the conflict. Such tactical manuvering enables him to hold off the day of reckoning as long as possible when Israel will be forced to fish or cut bait with the Palestinians. So transferist? Maybe. Obstructionist? Definitely.
Bibi is but the latest in a long line of Israeli prime minister’s whose primary goal in office seems to be dither in the face of insurmountable evidence that this takes Israel ever farther away from its stated goal, which is a long-term peace with its neighbors. In fact, such premeditated obstructionism, always concealed by a veneer of reasonableness, elevates an obsession with tactics into a strategy in and of itself.
I hope the Obama administration will keep this piece of Bibi’s personal history in the back of their minds as they prepare to meet him for his first White House visit with our new president. It should reinforce the fact that Bibi is a leopard who has essentially never changed his spots from 1977 till now.
H/t to Assaf Oron.
Richard again you need to get your facts right.
The Palestinians are the transferists.
[comment edited for violation of comment rules–you can try to sneak MEMRI, CAMERA & Pipes propaganda in here, but you’ll pay for trying]
All copied verbatim from http://www.tranceaddict.com/forums/showthread/t-154231-p-26.html, but you conveniently left out the sources, many, if not most of them propaganda sites (IRIS, MEMRI, DEBKA, israelinsider.com…nuff said).
For repeated violations of my comment rules and refusal to even read them after I noted you violated them yesterday, you’ve lost yr comment privileges.
I’d love to get your reaction to this piece of propaganda from Elliot Abrams:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124182437320102371.html
RE: “…propaganda from Elliot Abrams…”
MY COMMENT: Elliott Abrams = ‘evil incarnate’
Lieberman supports redrawing the boundaries of the State of Israel and turning over heavily-populated Israeli-Palestinian areas to Palestinian pseduo-sovereignty. For reasons that I needn’t go into here, that’s repellent, but it’s rather misleading to imply he calls for removing Israeli-Palestinians from their homes.
As for the Bibi headline, again – know your enemy. What would you say if someone wrote a headline that said ‘Abu Mazen, Holocaust Denier’, given his notorious thesis that was written since 1977, if I’m not mistaken. You say he hasn’t changed his spots, but then you say he has changed his spots by becoming a wily obstructionist rather than an outright transferist.
Bibi’s bad enough without these absurd leaps of logic.
Lieberman calls for expelling Israeli Arabs from Israel. That’s what I claimed and that is the truth. It matters little that they may or may not be physically forced fr. their homes. They are Israeli citizens and wish to remain so. Expelling them amounts to transfer is not in the least misleading.
As repellant as is the belief that the Holocaust is a myth, it has little to do with the current Israeli Palestinian conflict. It is an argument about history.
The idea that an Israeli prime minister believed at one time in transfer & may still harbor sympathy for it is directly politically relevant to the current situation & therefore far more damaging.
Bibi’s becoming an obstructionist does not necessarily prove that he no longer believes in transfer. Politicians sometimes harbor sympathy for policies & ideas which they know cannot be implemented because the political climate is not (yet) ripe. Who knows whether conditions might at some time change & conditions become ripe??
Also – if Hamas leaders are capable of evolving their thought (as you so frequently remind us with reference to their apparently irrelevant charter and their commitment to a two-state solution), why isn’t Bibi?
something overheard at a party 32 years ago is not evidence worthy of citation. using it weakens your case.
On the contrary, Tzvee, with a politician as slick and impenetrable as Bibi is – especially when it comes to the Israel-Palestine issue – this is probably the only way you’ll ever find out his real views.
It is certainly legitimate material, and the person quoting Bibi is a senior British journalist who says he heard him directly.
Bibi was 28 years old at the time, and already beginning to launch his political career on the back of his fallen hero brother.
Asking him in a news conference, whether he has changed his views since then, will be quite a legit and interesting question.
I beg your pardon. A quotation from a future prime minister of Israel made to a professional journalist 32 years ago is certainly worthy of citation, esp. when the subject is of great import today.
How does it weaken my case to claim that Bibi believed in transfer earlier in his life & may still harbor sympathies for the idea?? You simply don’t make sense.
RE: “In the next war,” he said, “we’ve got to get the Palestinians out of the West Bank for good.” – Netanyahu, 1977
MY COMMENT: In 1977, he must have been “just off the boat” from America with his MIT degree in architecture!
RE: “In the next war,” he [Netanyahu] said, “we’ve got to get the Palestinians out of the West Bank for good.” – 1977
MY COMMENT – “Like father, like son”
NETANYAHU’S ÜBER RACIST FATHER: “The Bible finds no worse image than this of the man from the desert. And why? Because he has no respect for any law. Because in the desert he can do as he pleases.” …..
….”The two states solution doesn’t exist. There are no two people here. There is a Jewish people and an Arab population… there is no Palestinian people, so you don’t create a state for an imaginary nation… they only call themselves a people in order to fight the Jews.” – Ben Zion Netanyahu
SOURCE OF NETANYAHU’S FATHER’S WORDS – https://www.richardsilverstein.com/2009/04/04/bibis-fathers-answer-to-the-arab-problem-hang-em-in-the-town-square/
Richard, I have a friend who went to Middle school with King Abdullah II (Eaglebrook in Massachusetts). He told me the Abdullah II used to brag that if he were King the Jewish state would be annihilated.
Also, there is no chance that Netanyahu referred to the Arabs of the West Bank as Palestinians back in 1977, so I doubt this story is true.
Amy Johnson is the type of Zionist who cries antisemitism while butchering Arabs.
Wait, that’s every Zionist.
While I have little use for Amy Johnson, that generalization is terribly unfair.
Re. Abu Mazen, I would say that Holocaust denial has a lot of contemporary political relevance although that’s another issue. If the Hamas charter of 1988 is irrelevant, why are Bibi’s comments from 30 years any more relevant?
Because the Hamas charter was not written by Ismail Haniye, Khaled Meshal or any other senior Hamas leader & doesn’t represent the current views of anyone in the movement.
Aside from the fact that leading Hamas figures and media organs regularly express the kind of views found in the charter. Again, just because it’s in the Daily Telegraph doesn’t mean it’s not true. Once again, a clear double standard. For all his sins, there is no evidence today whatsoever that Bibi’s a transferist.
I’ve done a Dershowitz & challenged any reader to provide evidence that any senior Hamas leader has expressed any of the objectionable views found in the Charter. Funny thing is none have taken up the challenge. If you’d care to do so, then come up w. the goods. If you can’t, then don’t make such a claim.
You mean aside from the fact that he’s appointed a transferist as his foreign minister??
Well a reader gave a whole host of examples but your comment rules don’t allow MEMRI (see the Daily Telegraph comment).
As for Lieberman as foreign minister, I’ve patiently explained the difference between his positions and those that you have quoted Bibi as holding 30 years ago. If you don’t want to acknowledge those differences that’s your prerogative. Imagine it was Ahmadinejad saying it, then I’m sure you’d have no problem seeing the difference.
As ever, double standards.
Regarding the question of whether the HAMAS charter is of any relevance I have a couple of questions:
(1) Richard, you have stated that no one of importance wrote the Charter. Then who did? If he indeed was of no importance, why would they give the important job of defining the movement’s ideology to someone who was not important?
(2) When people join the HAMAS, particularly its armed wings and they are given ideological lectures, are they told the same things that HAMAS figures say to Western reporters and politicians, or do they quote the charter or say things of the same spirit?
(3) Regarding Richard’s challenge to bring a single quote of a HAMAS leader that reflects what is written in the charter, MEMRI and Palestine Media Watch bring quotes from official Muslim preachers who are formally associated with HAMAS on television that do say these things all the time. I have seen them myself. These may not be the political leadership, but why doesn’t this count?
(4) Suppose I could prove to you, Richard, that the ideas expressed in the HAMAS Charter do reflect the widespread views of the rank and file. Would it make any difference regarding your demand that Israel and the Western countries officially recognize HAMAS, since they were supposedly elected democratically?
You have lots of kindred spirits in the pro-Israel right, why don’t you go to your friends at MEMRI, CAMERA, Pipesville, etc. & ask them if they know.
The charter only “defines the movement’s ideology” for partisans like you and your right wing pro Israel friends. It does nothing of the sort for any Hamas leader today. In 1988, Hamas was a tiny incipient group. Have you ever belonged to a group that had a few members and assigned some shmegege to do something that might seem much more important were the group a far larger, more significant, & powerful force? I guess that’s never happened to you. But I’ve been involved in groups of all sizes including very small ones & know this experience quite well fr. the inside.
Gee, having been confided to by the highest echelons of the movement I can honestly say: “beats me.” What do you take me for? Do you think Khaled Meshal SKypes me every night with the latest scuttlebutt on how things are going for him & the boys in Hamas??
Nah, nah, nah. Not so fast. You read my challenge. I didn’t say comments from the Hamas equivalent of Rev. Jeremiah Wright. I said words directly fr. the mouths of Hamas’ senior leadership. So go back to your propaganda hacks & find me recent statements from Ismail Haniye, Khaled Meshal et al which conform to your claims. And don’t change the rules for yr convenience. You know what I wrote.
A bogus hypothetical. If you spent any time reading actual Palestinian opinion polls as opposed to the pages of scandal sites like MEMRI, et al you’d know that neither Palestinians, nor Hamas rank & file espouse the venom spewed by the Charter.
Alex Stein 3
Richard Silverstein 0
Keep up this stupid snark & you’ll lose yr comment privileges (again). This isn’t a soccer game. If you want to turn it into one you’re welcome to visit the site of your favorite soccer team. This isn’t the place for it.
Have you ever belonged to a group that had a few members and assigned some shmegege to do something that might seem much more important were the group a far larger, more significant, & powerful force? I guess that’s never happened to you. But I’ve been involved in groups of all sizes including very small ones & know this experience quite well fr. the inside.”
This is a very good point. But when a group reaches a certain size, it normally deals with issues that might cause them problems politically. As Hamas continue to refuse to do so, we can only surmise that the charter continues to have ideological significance, even if their political strategy today is a different one.
Who says this is causing Hamas problems? It’s causing you problems, it’s causing Israel problems, it may even cause me problems. But none of us is Hamas’ primary or even secondary constituency. You can surmise whatever you wish about Hamas & its attitude toward the charter. But your conjectures don’t amount to a hill of beans in this world.
“Who says this is causing Hamas problems? It’s causing you problems, it’s causing Israel problems, it may even cause me problems. But none of us is Hamas’ primary or even secondary constituency.”
In other words, the Hamas charter is important to Hamas’ primary constituency.
God, you’re deaf. It has no importance to Hamas’ primary constituency. But they see how much shmendricks like you need them to change it & it delights them to refuse to do it just to stick it up yr you know what. So keep making a big deal out of demanding it & they’ll continue enjoying to refuse you. It’s a wonderful, helpful game both of you are playing.
Well it’s causing them problems in the sense that it’s one of the obstacles to them being received in the international community, which is one of the reasons for the continuation of the blockade on Gaza etc etc. If you don’t think that’s a problem, fair enough.
How much does Hamas need to be received into the international community? I don’t think it’s their be-all and end-all. That’s why it’s far more important to you that they change the charter than it is to them to actually change it. They’ve existed for decades in their current predicament & they reckon they can exist this way for a good deal longer if they have to. Though Hamas has changed & will continue to do so, the world will eventually find a way to Hamas’ door with or w/o their current Charter. The world will change its views about Hamas at least as much as Hamas will change itself to suit the needs of the world.
I personally couldn’t care less if they change it, nor do I think it’s a reason not to negotiate with them or perhaps one day come to an agreement with them. But I do think it has a significance to their worldview. I’d also say it’s fascinating that for you it has no significance because it was written twenty years ago and the leaders apparently contradict its tenets all the time, yet an anecdote about Bibi from a dinner-party thirty years ago has all the significance in the world, despite the fact that for all his sins he clearly doesn’t espouse transferist positions today. Once again, double standards.
I’d also note the glee with which you seem to enjoy the spectacle of Hamas winding us ‘schmendricks’ up. That’s very encouraging.
It’s simply amazing that you don’t seem to read my replies to you. Otherwise, you wouldn’t possibly repeat yrself. So here goes again, there’s a huge diff. bet. what an obscure Hamas author wrote in the Charter in 1988 and the sentiments of a future Israeli P.M. It matters very little that Bibi doesn’t ESPOUSE transferist views today, when he clearly sympathizes with them. Otherwise, he would not make common cause with transferists in his cabinet.
I urge you in the strongest terms possible NOT to return to subjects which I’ve already responded to. I can’t tell you how annoying & boring it is to take the time to reply to you only to have you virtually repeat yrself.
“Otherwise, he would not make common cause with transferists in his cabinet.” Come on, we both know that Israeli politics necessitates getting into bed with people you don’t necessarily agree with. Now you and I think a line should be drawn, and that certain deals should never, but never, be made. But that doesn’t mean that having Lieberman in his cabinet means that Bibi sympathises with his idea of giving over heavily populated Israeli-Palestinian areas to Palestinian sovereignty.
“Otherwise, you wouldn’t possibly repeat yrself. So here goes again, there’s a huge diff. bet. what an obscure Hamas author wrote in the Charter in 1988 and the sentiments of a future Israeli P.M.”
I agree: in one case we’re talking about an obscure dinner-party anecdote (if I ever become PM future Richard Silverstein’s would be able to spend hours going over the offensive things I’ve believed in my time), and in the other a founding charter of a movement which is apparently so insigificant that its leadership (who, let’s not forget, had nothing to do with its writing and are absolutely opposed to it), singularly refuses to alter it one iota. But that’s ok, because apparently those of us who see anti-Semitism and Hamas rejectionism as a potential obstacle to peace (although not, I should add, to talking to them) are hasbara schmendricks, and it’s right that Hamas should delight in running rings round us.
Not so fast. Do you really expect us to believe yr intimation that Bibi had no other choices in forming a coalition? Of course you wouldn’t argue that because it isn’t true. So now it appears that he didn’t have to get into bed Lieberman. Yet among his coalition choices he picked this particular one. It must’ve been the most attractive one for him politically. Hence, he’s in bed with a transferist & my criticism stands.
And don’t forget “those of you who refuse to acknowledge that Islamophobia, anti-Arab racism and Israeli rightist rejectionism is a severe obstacle to peace.”
I don’t believe I’ve ever used that term to describe you so I’d ask you to not exagerrate. I disagree with you. But I don’t think you’re a MFA mouthpiece.
Of course it’s not their be-all and end-all, that’s the point, and that’s the reason why they prefer the politics of misery to the politics of reconciliation, which is clear if you’re keeping an eye on the frequent breakdown of intra-Palestinian reconciliation talks.
Look, you’re really starting to annoy. You don’t know shit from shinola concerning Hamas. For you to interpose yrself and claim you know what Hamas prefers or what its goals or strategy are is beyond laughable. You sit in yr comfortable home somewhere within Israel, after having made aliyah fr. a comfortable English upbringing, having had virtually no contact with Gazans, let alone Hamasniks & then presume to know what they’re thinking. Spare us.
I’d feel a bit more comfortable with yr pontifications if I knew that you yrself have endured any of the “politics of misery” Hamas supposedly supports.
Once again, there’s no need for the aggressive tone. It’s one thing to disagree with my analysis of the situation, quite another to dismiss it because I have virtually no contact with Gazans. I do the same as you – try and keep up with various sources on the conflict, including Palestinian ones, so I don’t see why your judgements are any more valuable than mine.
But I’m not surprised to see you descend to irritation rather than calmly discussing the issues.
As for my home, it’s a one-bedroom gallery flat in Cerem Hatemanim, Tel Aviv. I have a bed, a wardrobe, a stove, a bathroom, a laptop, speakers, and a lot of books. As a machine for living it suffices.
Frankly, I don’t see any influence or awareness of Palestinian sources in what you write. If you are reading them it certainly doesn’t register. I see lots of evidence of the impact of various Israeli sources, but almost nothing from Palestinian. So what are you reading or watching that provides a Palestinian perspective?
I’m sorry about the crack about your comfortable life. That was overstated. But I do think it’s impossible for someone in yr position with the views you hold to really understand what makes a Palestinian & esp. a Hamas member or leader tick. You’re simply too insulated.
I’ve never demanded Hamas change their charter or recognize Israel. Israel doesn’t need their recognition to keep being a first world, democratic open society with first rate technology and medicine. What I can’t understand is why you cannot see Hamas for what it really is and is so easily persuaded by their propaganda.
How blind you are. Israel NEEDS peace with Hamas otherwise it will never be a NORMAL country. Israel is clearly NOT a first world or democratic or open society though it is all of those things impartially & imperfectly. But a society as imperfect as Israel’s can never be a normal one. And Israel desperately needs to be normal. I don’t expect you to understand that since you live in Israel & have adapted to Israel’s lack of normalcy; besides which you’re hard-right views embrace this lack of normalcy.
Strangely enough I agree with most of what you’re saying in this last comment. Except that Israel needs to achieve a settlement or a resolution of the conflict with the Palestinians. But Hamas, as it is today, is not going to provide the goods. That’s just the sad truth. The faster everyone recognizes that, the more quickly the conflict will be resolved. My second disagreement with you is that I do not hold hard-right views.
I can only base my impression on what you write here as I don’t know you personally. But your views seem quite right wing, though perhaps in the give & take here, the confrontation between opposing political perspectives makes yr views appear more right wing to me than they perhaps are.
Is that based on what I write here or on what I write on my blog?
I’ve never claimed to know what makes Hamas tick; I just try to provide a rational analysis based on what I know. Are you in a better position to know what makes them tick? And what are the ‘views I hold’?
I’m not a Hamas spokesperson & don’t claim to know what makes them tick. But I think, based on what you write here, that I have a lot more awareness, empathy & understanding of them than you. That doesn’t mean I’m not aware of their limitations as well, because I am. But you only seem to see limitations which is an unbalanced perspective.
And don’t forget “those of you who refuse to acknowledge that Islamophobia, anti-Arab racism and Israeli rightist rejectionism is a severe obstacle to peace.”
The point is I’m extremely aware of Israeli rejectionism, particularly that of the current government, as well as the issue of Islamophobia and anti-Arab racism. You’re thankfully aware of these things true. But you seem to downplay Hamas anti-Semitism and rejectionism.
I am less concerned with how remarks made by the PM before I was born than I am with his actions today. It is hard to say if his point of view is the same as it was then any statements that assume it is are just that, assumptions. For an informative story on the Obama Netanyahu summit watch this video: http://www.newsy.com/videos/israel_u_s_summit_don_t_hold_back/