From: AFSI <afsi@rcn.com>
Date: Mon, Feb 15, 2010 at 2:16 PM
Subject: MK DR. ARIEH ELDAD DIAGNOSES THE ISRAELI DISEASE AT AFSI EVENT
To: AFSI <afsi@rcn.com>
1751 Second Ave, New York, NY 10128
Tel: 212-828-2424; Fax: 212-828-1717; afsi@rcn.com; www.afsi.org
Contact: Helen Freedman, Executive Director
February 15, 2010
MK DR. ARIEH ELDAD DIAGNOSES THE ISRAELI DISEASE
Thursday evening, February 11, 2010, at an event sponsored by Americans For a Safe Israel/AFSI, over one hundred people braved the icy streets of NYC to attend a briefing on the situation in Israel delivered by MK Dr. Arieh Eldad.
Drawing on his experience as Chief Medical officer for the IDF, and Director of Plastic Surgery at Hadassah Hospital, MK Dr. Eldad provided some very vivid metaphors. He suggested that if Israel were to be compared to a sick "patient", with the diagnosis of "land for peace" as the cure, this would obviously be a disastrous prescription of the wrong medicine. If administered in continuing doses to the "patient", this would bring about its demise. In this case, the right medicine is recognition that no amount of land, and no degree of concessions can win the peace with the Arabs for which Israelis are so eager. The diagnosis of the illness has to be changed.
The illness has to be recognized as one that is grounded in the Arab Islamic religious belief that Israel has no right to exist. A whole new approach has to be created that requires a stiff spine on the part of Israel's leaders. This approach is being promoted by the new Land of Israel Forum, newly created in the Knesset, which Dr. Eldad co-chair MK Dr. Eldad, a member of the National Union party, appeared to mesmerize the audience at West Side Institutional Synagogue as he reiterated the ideals of the Forum. With MK Ze'ev Elkin from Likud as his co-chair, and representation from seven other parties, the imperative of a "whole Israel" is the focus.
MK Dr. Eldad spoke about the weakness of the Netanyahu leadership which can consider giving away parts of Judea, Samaria, and the Golan, and dividing Yerushalayim. He bemoaned the tragedy of discussing the possibility of a "Palestinian state" and then attempting to retract that statement. He said that once an Israeli Prime Minister concedes the possibility of such a reality, it is difficult for the Knesset and/or the Israeli public to negate it. Therefore, his Land of Israel Forum is essential in asserting that Jews have the right to live everywhere in the Jewish land of Israel and this right is the divine right promised in the Bible. He warned against using the security argument as one of entitlement since generals and politicians have a way of changing their assessments under pressure.
The subject of Iran was addressed, and MK Dr. Eldad cautioned us that Israel would probably have to "go it alone" in defending itself against the Iranian nuclear threat since the Obama administration could not be depended upon to confront the issue. Clearly, sanctions and threat of sanctions would not deter the Ahmadinejad regime to remove its threat to Israel and the world.
It is unfortunate that the snowstorms in Washington, DC prevented the delegation from the Israeli Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, of which MK Dr. Eldad is a member, from scheduled meetings with Senate, House and Petagon members on matters relating to U.S. and Israeli defense issues. Hopefully these meetings will be re-scheduled so that MK Dr. Eldad's voice of sanity can be heard in the halls of the U.S. Congress and State Department.
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