Posted on 06/13/2003 3:34:30 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
The premise of the Road Map to Peace imposed on the parties to the Middle East conflict by the United States, Britain, the EU and Russia is that the conflict cannot be solved by military means. As the terrorist attacks of the last few days should make clear to everyone, the premise is wrong. The Middle East conflict can only be solved by military means.
As the president said after the bombing in Jerusalem, "It is clear that there are those in the Middle East who hate peace." We know who they are because they have declared themselves: Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hizbollah and Yasser Arafat's Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade.
There can be no peace with someone who wants to kill you. The terrorist entities on the Palestinian side of the conflict want exactly that. The Road Map powers have put Israel in an impossible position. No government in the world can fail to respond when its civilians are murdered. Since the Palestinian Authority is completely unable (and probably unwilling) to keep its terrorist armies and allies in check, someone else has to do it.
The regrettable statement by the president condemning Israel's wholly justified military response to Hamas' first military attack shows that the Road Map powers do not want Israel to protect itself, nor to disarm the terrorists. Therefore, it is morally incumbent on the Road Map powers to do it themselves. Only that way can real peace negotiations begin.
The president needs to assemble a coalition of the willing once again, insert a military force into the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, hunt down the Palestinian terrorists and bring them to justice. The entire reason for the so-called Israeli “occupation” of the West Bank and Gaza has been to protect Israel's citizens from being attacked.
Israel has failed to accomplish this objective because the rest of the world – and particularly the United States, its chief ally – has prevented Israel from doing what is necessary, specifically from demilitarizing these zones of terror.
Since the Muslim Middle East (with the exception of Jordan and Egypt) is formally at war with Israel – and has been so for 55 years – this is probably impractical in any case. Israel would have to go to war with Iran to close down Hamas and Hizbollah in particular.
However, what Israel cannot do the United States, Britain, the EU and Russia most certainly can. This is what the war on terror is about. It is a war to defend the West against radical Islam. It will not be won until the Islamic regimes that support this war, most particularly in the West Bank and Gaza, in Syria and Iran are changed – by force if necessary.
The Palestine Authority cannot be changed or reformed from within. It is a corrupt terrorist police state. Any challenge to the terrorists who run it will be ruthlessly suppressed. Many Palestinians genuinely interested in peace have been assassinated over the years for that very reason.
It is unconscionable for the United States and other powers to equate Israeli responses to Palestinian terror with the terror itself. Yet that is what the present peace process entails. It is an immoral process and the sooner it is terminated the better – for the sake of humanity and above all for the prospects of peace.
The only peace process that will work is one that disarms and destroys the enemies of peace first.
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