Dual Rejectionism: Cause and Effect

With all the noise and smoke connected to the increasingly rancorous debate over the War in Iraq here at home you may have missed what is being labeled a "political earthquake" in Israel: the defeat of long time Labor leader Shimon Peres at the hands of insurgent labor leader Amir Peretz for the leadership of the Labor Party. Peretz' victory forced the hand of Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon, who has agreed to new elections expected to take place around late February. Adding to the uncertainty, Sharon is facing a revolt led by Benjamin Netanyahu within his own Likud Party over the issue of the Gaza withdrawal, meaning that Sharon may be running for office come February as an independent.

The rise of Peretz has occasioned much comment, both in Israel and in Europe, since it is widely seen as a re-energizing moment for the dovish Israeli left, which for a while lost its credibility as the architects of the failed Oslo peace process and the assumptions that went hand-in-glove with that process. As the Jewish bodies and the fact of Palestinian rejectionism forced the Israeli public to look those assumptions squarely in the eye, they began to lose their luster. The result was the rise of a new kind of hawkishness, the disengagement and security fence plan of the current government.

However, it appears that hope springs eternal. The simple fact of proven murderous intent and Arab intransigence does little to slate the conscience and the yearning of the Jewish people for peace. Year after year, the memory of Barak, Arafat and Clinton at Camp David dims, the searing pain of international condemnation begins to take on a frantic quality and the Israeli people have, quietly, begun to look for answers once more.

To many, Peretz fits the bill. A plain spoken man of the people, the Moroccan-born Peretz is a veteran of dovish left-wing causes, from shutting down the settlements in favor of more welfare spending to calling for the immediate re-launching of direct negotiations with what he sees as a new Palestinian leadership. Peretz' election represents the re-engagement of a sector of the Israeli left that has been shut out, voluntarily, of the political process for some time now.

It seems to me that such a re-engagement is entirely natural. The Left, in Israel no less than elsewhere in the world, never lets facts or reality get in the way of the essential goodness and good will it wants so badly to share with the world, if only the (stupid) people would just listen. Despite the fact that their platform was given free and complete rein, despite the fact that their plan to solve the problems of the Israel-Palestine conflict was fully implemented, with the backing of a solidly liberal American administration no less, and met with abject failure, there remains a core belief that their way is the only way, the only right way forward.

Reaction to Peretz' rise has been unanimous: at last, the sighs of relief go, we have an alternative to the monster/idiot/war criminal Sharon! Typical of the genre is an op-ed regarding Peretz in today's Financial Times written by Henry Siegman, a senior fellow on the Middle East at the Council on Foreign Relations and a former executive head of the American Jewish Congress. Siegman writes that Peretz' rise could not come at a more auspicious moment, because, as it happens, right now Palestinian opinion is shifting in ways that make peace a goal that is just around the corner. Siegman notes:

According to the most recent survey by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in Ramallah, most Palestinians now feel that improving their daily lives is their first priority. Until now, ending the occupation was their top goal. That has slipped to second place by a margin of 15 per cent. The poll also found that the majority of Palestinians supported a permanent ceasefire, even though they remained convinced that the Gaza pull-out was due to violent "resistance." And for the first time, a majority favours the collection of arms from militants in Gaza.

This "remarkable shift in Palestinian opinion" must be seized upon, argues Seigman. The problem now facing Israel is that : "[f]ar from encouraging the new Palestinian optimism, Mr. Sharon has refused to resume political negotiations." Only new leadership in Israel can shepherd the new-found "optimism" in the Palestinian ranks into lasting peace. Presumably, the rise of Peretz offers an opportunity for just that.

The stunning naivete of Seigman's reading of the poll results he cites a proof of his position falls apart upon the most cursory of glances. For example, even if one accepts the results cited at face value, it is far from clear what the Palestinians mean by "improving their daily lives." One suspects that the answer to the question "would the complete and utter eradication of Israel improve your daily life" would probably be an unqualified "yes." Even in the numbers he cites there is wide-spread approval for "resistance" (meaning, the killing of Jews) and the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza has been wrongly, and depressingly, misconstrued by Palestinian observers, much like that of the Lebanon withdrawal before it.

The central fact of the Arab-Israeli conflict that one needs to understand in order to predict both parties' likely response to events and to the peace process is one that is little understood or remarked upon. This is the fact of dual rejectionism.

The first rejectionism is the complete and total Arab/Muslim rejection of the existence of the State of Israel. Complex arguments regarding the establishment of the State of Israel or the wars that followed its establishment simply do not matter nor do they register as relevant to the vast majority of the world's Muslim peoples. Simply put, the State of Israel is a foreign, enemy entity imposed on the Muslim world by unjust and anti-Muslim Western states and its continued existence is an insult to the Muslim world that honor demands be wiped from the face of the Earth and all living memory as soon as possible.

It is in this context that the vast majority of the Islamic people support terrorism; so long as it is directed at the Jews of Israel or their enablers (variously the United States, the U.K, the U.N., etc.) it is a worthy example of the necessary struggle for Israel's non-existence.

The fact of this first type of rejectionism is so lavishly and easily proved that the fact that it remains largely unspoken in Western responses is telling. This gives rise to the second rejectionism, which is the West's rejection of the Muslim rejectionist stance.

The Muslim rejectionist stance is so uncompromising, so all-encompassing, so prevalent and so unanswerable that it has given rise to a mindset in the West, including in sectors of Israeli public opinion that men like Mr. Peretz represent, that simply cannot accept the fact of Muslim rejectionism. This Western rejectionism therefore is continually seeking and seizing upon the smallest proof that would give the lie to a theory of Muslim rejectionism. For example, it holds up the occasional moderate Muslim or hopeful statement as signs of hope and fetishizes discussion, dialogue and negotiation all out of proportion to their possible usefulness.

The reasons for this are not hard to guess. The mental outlook and cultural assumptions behind Muslim rejectionism are so foreign to the Western mind that the Western mind literally reels when confronted with it. Surely, say our Clintons, our Blairs, our Prodis, there must be an answer somewhere, some way of splitting the difference, some way of getting to our goal of two states living side-by-side in peace and freedom?

In a sense, I have a great deal of sympathy for those afflicted by this rejectionism in the West. They are reasonable, hopeful men who are seeking solutions. However, they are not seeking those solutions in good faith. So long as the dominant Western outlook continues to fool itself about the nature of the Muslim stance on Israel, no progress is possible.

So, what is to be done?

To begin with, we need a new approach to Arab-Israeli affairs that is firmly grounded in a realistic appraisal of the situation. The Arabs and the wider Muslim world will never accept that Israel exists. Our response to this rejectionism needs to be clear-headed. We either need to decide that we will have to live with that hostility and proceed with eyes wide open or we need to decide, with our Israeli friends, that the threat to world peace and stability that this rejectionism breeds has effectively doomed the Zionist project. It would behoove American foreign policy greatly if the U.S. would sit down with the world's nations and ask for a solid, public judgment from each on this issue. I have no doubt where the U.S. would come down on such a debate, but let us by all means stop pretending the world is something other than what it seems.

Once Muslim rejectionism is identified, and our rejection of that rejection is codified and agreed-upon, concrete measures along the Sharon government's lines of disengagement need to be taken. The two sides need to be literally kept from each other. Internationally-agreed upon courses of action should one side threaten the other need to be worked out in advance.

Perhaps, over time, Muslim rejectionism will moderate. Experience says, however, that this in unlikely to happen. But to continue to wallow in our unconscious rejection of the reality of Muslim rejectionism is to allow a dangerous status quo to fester, to the betterment of neither side.

In the meantime, illusions grow, unreality flows and yet another "peace process" will condemn us to endless war.

One does not look forward to the depressing news conferences, scheduled to take place in seven years' time, where Prime Minister Peretz explains that the negotiations have broken down. Again.

Get With It McGill!

Once the Muslim demands start rolling in, they never stop. They're simply a nice hudna-like pause before the next round of demands come in. Apparently, the administration at McGill University in Montreal hasn't gotten the memo on how these things work yet. Maclean's reports:

There is no intifada brewing on McGill University's campus -- yet. But an ongoing dispute between a group of Muslim students and the management of the secular Montreal university shows the traditional firewalls Canadians have built between public and private life are under attack, by new Canadians formulating new demands. A group of devout Muslims claim they have been forced to pray outdoors or in crowded hallways since they were "rudely shut out" of their dedicated prayer room last spring when that space, on the cramped downtown campus, was used to build an archaeology lab.

Not so, the college says. Students were warned a full year ahead of time that the space -- loaned to them for free -- would be taken back, and they could use whatever free space available to congregate or pray. The Muslim students reply that, even when empty, most classrooms are inadequate, because chairs and desks are bolted to the floor, and can't be moved to make space for prayer. "We have to pray five times a day, at set intervals, and we never know which rooms are free or not," says Sarah Elgazzar, a 24-year-old Ontario-born, hijab-wearing neuropsychology student who graduated in June but remains the spokesperson for McGill's Muslim Students' Association on this issue. "There is no dignity in praying in a hallway, when you hear the remarks of people walking by."

Recognition of us as fellow human beings requires that you build us a private room where we can exercise our religion and exclude all infidel intrusions. Anything less proves you are hopelessly bigoted. We are poor victims. Please build us a nice room somewhere, free for us to use.

Get a job, Sarah.

McGill has gone out of its way to help the students solve their problem by trying to find a place off campus, Robinson says. "For a year now, our legal staff, our real estate experts and senior management have been working closely with these students week after week, but my sense is they prefer to spend their time saying we have the responsibility to provide for them."

Isn't funny how the liberal cant gets thrown out the window once one of them has direct, real-world experience with Mulsim entitlement? This Robinson guy sounds like some crazed Stephen Harper zombie. You do have a responsiblity to provide for them, sir. Read the Liberal Party platform. It's in the section called "social justice." You'll know you're there when you run into words like "inclusion" and "community." Now, open up that chequebook and get busy! Solidarity ain't just gonna happen on its own!

President Complains that MSM and Democrats "Re-Writing History"; In Response, New York Times Re-Writes History To Prove President Wrong Again

The following is a letter to the editor of the NY Times sent by me this morning:

Dear Editor, N.Y. Times -

In response to a growing chorus of criticism that he lied and deliberately inflated the threat posed by the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq, President Bush has been arguing forcefully in recent days that his sense of matters was shared by both Clinton Administration officials and leading Democrats. The President has argued that while it is perfectly acceptable to take issue with him and his conduct of the War in Iraq, it is unacceptable for political leaders to re-write history or to assert things that simply are not true in an attempt to convince the public that they were misled into war. It is Bush's assertion, echoed by many on the political right, that the largely liberal mainstream press and the Democratic Party have themselves lied and misled the public into believing a whole raft of assertions now taken as the gospel truth regarding the decision to war and its conduct.

While the President takes more criticism from the New York Times' editorial board today for daring to defend what is obviously to any good-thinking person indefensible, Carl Hulse, in his lead article "Senate Republicans Pushing for a Plan on Ending the War in Iraq," proves the central truth behind the President's case. In it's first two paragraphs, the article read:

In a sign of increasing unease among Congressional Republicans over the war in Iraq, the Senate is to consider on Tuesday a Republican proposal that calls for Iraqi forces to take the lead next year in securing the nation and for the Bush administration to lay out its strategy for ending the war.

The Senate is also scheduled to vote Tuesday on a compromise, announced Monday night, that would allow terror detainees some access to federal courts. The Senate had voted last week to prohibit those being held from challenging their detentions in federal court, despite a Supreme Court ruling to the contrary.

The U.S. Supreme Court has never ruled that "terror detainees" have a right to challenge their detentions in federal court. In Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507(2004), the court found while the President definitely has the authority to hold those designated by him enemy combatants until at least the cessation of hostilities, the danger of erroneous detention is so high as to implicate a need for some sort of due process review of any given prisoner's designation as an "enemy combatant." In seeking to balance those two competing rights, the court crafted a remedy which it described as follows:

We therefore hold that a citizen-detainee seeking to challenge his classification as an enemy combatant must receive notice of the factual basis for his classification, and a fair opportunity to rebut the Government's factual assertions before a neutral decisionmaker.

* * *
At the same time, the exigencies of the circumstances may demand that, aside from these core elements, enemy combatant proceedings may be tailored to alleviate their uncommon potential to burden the Executive at a time of ongoing military conflict. Hearsay, for example, may need to be accepted as the most reliable available evidence from the Government in such a proceeding. Likewise, the Constitution would not be offended by a presumption in favor of the Government's evidence, so long as that presumption remained a rebuttable one and fair opportunity for rebuttal were provided. Thus, once the Government puts forth credible evidence that the habeas petitioner meets the enemy-combatant criteria, the onus could shift to the petitioner to rebut that evidence with more persuasive evidence that he falls outside the criteria. A burden-shifting scheme of this sort would meet the goal of ensuring that the errant tourist, embedded journalist, or local aid worker has a chance to prove military error while giving due regard to the Executive once it has put forth meaningful support for its conclusion that the detainee is in fact an enemy combatant. In the words of Mathews, process of this sort would sufficiently address the "risk of erroneous deprivation" of a detainee's liberty interest while eliminating certain procedures that have questionable additional value in light of the burden on the Government.

* * *

There remains the possibility that the standards we have articulated could be met by an appropriately authorized and properly constituted military tribunal. Indeed, it is notable that military regulations already provide for such process in related instances, dictating that tribunals be made available to determine the status of enemy detainees who assert prisoner-of-war status under the Geneva Convention. In the absence of such process, however, a court that receives a petition for a writ of habeas corpus from an alleged enemy combatant must itself ensure that the minimum requirements of due process are achieved. (Emphasis added)

To summarize, the court provided for an Executive Branch-based tribunal to handle the special reviews called for under Hamdi, gave specific instructions for how such tribunals are to be conducted, gave its approval in advance to the use of military tribunals to conduct Hamdi reviews, and specifically noted that only in the absence of such military tribunals meeting the Hamdi requirements is the Federal Judiciary implicated. Hamdi did not, as your article states a given, well-recognized truth, establish a right of detainees to challenge their detention in federal court.

Following the Hamdi decision, the President directed the Department of Defense to establish military tribunals in conformity with the ruling and no federal court has found the Bush Administration's conduct in this regard unconstitutional or even remarkable.

In short, in publishing an outright falsehood as the given truth, the New York Times has continued the practice that has given the President good cause to complain: re-writing history to fit the needs of ideology.

Speaking of Padilla v. Hanft

I enjoyed writing my response to TS below so much that I managed to blow right by my favorite part of this September's Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals opinion (unanimous, three judge panel, one appointed by President G.H.W. Bush, the other two by President W.J. Clinton) in the case of Padilla v. Hanft. Not wanting to slight the matter, I think a restatement of the point is apropos here.

One the one side of the case were the people who say BUSH LIED/PEOPLE DIED and that Chimpy W. Halliburthitler has forever stained the honor of the republic by tearing up the Bill of Rights, the rule of law, international human rights, due process and otherwise generally acted in a terribly unlawful manner. This side included:

-- American Civil Liberties Union
-- National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers
-- People for the American Way
-- The Brennan Center for Justice
-- Janet Reno
-- Democratic Members of Congress
-- Center for National Security Studies

On the other side was our idiot President, who has been saying since day one that his powers and his exercise of them are both warranted and based on long-standing understanding of the President's war-fighting powers.

So, who won this battle of the intellects? Who understood constitutional law better in this clash of titans?

Let the court tell you! (One more time!):

The Congress of the United States, in the Authorization for Use of Military Force Joint Resolution, provided the President all powers necessary and appropriate to protect American citizens from terrorist acts by those who attacked the United States on September 11, 2001. As would be expected, and as the Supreme Court has held, those powers include the power to detain identified and committed enemies such as Padilla, who associated with al Qaeda and the Taliban regime, who took up arms against this Nation in its war against these enemies, and who entered the United States for the avowed purpose of further prosecuting that war by attacking American citizens and targets on our own soil — a power without which, Congress understood, the President could well be unable to protect American citizens from the very kind of savage attack that occurred four years ago almost to the day.

The detention of petitioner being fully authorized by Act of Congress, the judgment of the district court that the detention of petitioner by the President of the United Statesis without support in law is hereby reversed.

None of this has stopped the ACLU from continuing to claim, in obvious bad faith, that the President acted "unconstitutionally" in his handling of the matter.

As matters now stand, the stance of the President has not yet been found wanting by any federal appellate court that has ruled on the matter, all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court.

So, who are you going to believe? Fund-raising leftist "public interest" groups or the federal judiciary?

That's not a very hard call, is it?