Why Israel Hasn't Bombed Iran
Prof. Paul Eidelberg
In September 2006, I published an article on the July 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War in Lebanon. (It was also called the "July War.")
I am resurrecting this article because Hezbollah, undefeated in that war, and having been supplied by Iran with thousands of rockets, may deter an Israeli attack on Tehran.
A. It all began with Israel's disengagement from Gaza. Former Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon admitted that Israel's retreat from Gaza in the south incited Hezbollah to attack Israel in the north and that triggered the Lebanese War. But what led to Israel's retreat?
1. We must first recall that Labor's policy of "unilateral disengagement" from Gaza was the paramount issue of the January 2003 election. The parties that opposed this policy won 84 seats or 70% of the Knesset's 120-membership! The Likud alone won 38 seats, while Labor won only 19 – the lowest ever for that party. Clearly, a vast majority of the public rejected Labor's policy.
2. Nevertheless, Likud Prime Minister Ariel Sharon adopted that policy! He thus betrayed the will of the people unequivocally expressed in the aforementioned January election.
3. However, to implement Labor's policy, the Knesset had to expel 8,000 Jews from their homes in Gaza, and this required the passage of an Evacuation Law. But how could the Knesset pass such a law when (a) 84 MKs, including 38 Likudniks, had opposed disengagement, and (b) Israel's highest military and intelligence officials had testified against disengagement before the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee?
4. Since Sharon had offered no rational defense of disengagement, he had to induce a sufficient number of Likud MKs to vote for the Evacuation Law. This he could only do by means of political bribery, such as the plums of cabinet posts. And so, 23 Likud MKs voted for the law. Hardly any would have done so had they been individually elected by and accountable to the voters in constituency elections – the practice of all genuine democracies, many of which are smaller in size and population than Israel.
5. In Israel, however, its first government in 1948 made the entire country a single electoral district in which parties with fixed lists of candidates compete for Knesset seats on the basis of Proportional Representation. Since no incumbent has to face a rival candidate for his seat in the Knesset, MKs and those who become Cabinet Ministers, can ignore public opinion with impunity. This is exactly what the Sharon Government did when it retreated from Gaza.
6. This perfidious act (which led to the ascendancy of Hamas) was sanctified by the Supreme Court, a self-perpetuating oligarchy that declared Gaza "belligerent occupied territory." This ruling, which actually violated the Court's own precedents as well as objective international law, is another hidden cause of the Lebanese War.
7. It follows from the preceding facts that Israel's undemocratic system of government led to the Lebanese War!
B. The Government's Ineptitude
1. To win a war with an ideological foes, Israel's Government must accurately define the enemy.
a. Hezbollah is not merely a guerrilla organization; it's a Shi'ite terrorist army. A guerrilla organization attacks and retreats; an army stands and resists the attacker. Since Hezbollah was too well-entrenched in Lebanon to be defeated by air power, a ground invasion of appropriate magnitude was required near the outset at the war. None took place.
b. Hezbollah is a proxy of Iran. But with 14 seats in Lebanon's 128-member parliament and two cabinet posts, Hezbollah is also an integral part of the Lebanese government. Contrary to the "Ceder Revolution," however, Lebanon remained a Syrian puppet. This is why Lebanon facilitated Hezbollah's deployment of 13,000 missiles supplied primarily by Iran via Syria. Lebanon is nonetheless responsible for Hezbollah's unprovoked attack on Israel.
2. Hence, it may be argued that Israel should have declared war on Lebanon and bombed certain Syrian targets. Failing to do so made it appear that Israel was merely fighting a terrorist organization. Since Israel could hardly have attacked Iran, it was all the more crucial for the Government to demolish Hezbollah as a fighting force. But this is beyond the mentality of Israel's milquetoast government.
C. The Ideological Dimension of the War
1. The war between Israel and its neighbors is a religious war and not merely a war over territory. Yet no Israeli government has ever told the truth about its enemy. The enemy is totalitarian Islam, an imperialistic creed. Since a large percentage of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims support Islam's Jihadic agenda, Islam is more dangerous than Nazism and Soviet Communism. Armed with weapons of mass murder, Islam could conquer the world and enslave mankind.
2. Israel's debacle in Lebanon did not help the cause of freedom. The winner was Shiite Iran, a regime animated by the fanaticism and world-conquering ambition of the Ayatollah Khomeini.
D. Israel Needs Systemic Change
1. The debacle of the July War prompted many Israelis to demand the resignation of Israel's ruling elites, including the wretched Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the utterly unqualified Defense Minister Amir Peretz, and, for good measure, Chief of General Staff Dan Halutz. Others demanded a national commission of inquiry. Still others called for new elections. However, here is how I perceived the mess into which Israel's dysfunctional government had fallen:
a. If Olmert were to resign, Vice Premier Shimon Peres would step into his shoes and head a caretaker government – hardly a promising option.
b. Any national commission of inquiry would be a protracted affair and leave Olmert in power. If the commission is chaired by Chief Justice Aharon Barak, a cover-up would follow since his ruling regarding Gaza is one of the hidden causes of the war.
c. And new elections would only bring the same fools and scoundrels back to power.
2. Clearly, Israel's system of governance is a disaster. Systemic change is absolutely necessary. The present writer proposes the establishment of a Constituent Assembly to draft a Constitution based on a unique synthesis of Jewish and democratic principles.
a. To democratize the Executive branch, the corruption-infested system of multi-party cabinet government must be replaced by a presidential system.
b. To democratize the Legislature, its members must be individually elected by the voters in distinct constituencies (and legislators must be excluded from the cabinet).
c. To democratize the Judiciary, Supreme Court judges should be nominated by the President and confirmed by the legislature.
d. But to prevent Israel from becoming "a state of its citizens," the Constitution must enshrine Israel's Jewish essence as a paramount law.
E. War and Peace
1. Israel is at war with an implacable foe. We need a government that will prepare our people for war. This will require a wartime budget, a civil defense program, a war-winning strategy, and various economic and scientific programs to make Israel a self-reliant superpower.
2. Israel must destroy the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority. I therefore advocate the annexation of Judea and Samaria, a Land Act to settle 250,000 Jews in these areas; and financial incentives to facilitate Arab emigration.
3. Neither Israel nor the U.S. can tolerate a nuclear Iran. Israel must be prepared to launch a preemptive attack on Iran if the U.S. fails to do so.
4. The time has come for Israel to set a military as well as moral example to mankind.
F. Conclusion. Israel lacks three things:
1. A clear understanding of her enemy, which understanding informs public education and public opinion.
2. A clear sense of what Israel stands for as a nation, which requires a Jewish philosophy rooted in the basic sources of the Jewish people.
3. A tripartite structure of government that separates the Legislature from the Executive, and that has a Judiciary whose members are not only learned in Jewish as well as in secular law, but who understand that the basic purpose of a Supreme Court is to reconcile permanence and change – the genius of the Jewish people.☼
