Peace Making Requisites In the Post October 7, 2023 Middle East

There are four different paths to peace that must be pursued simultaneously under the current circumstances. Internal Peace within the borders of Israel, such as between secular and chareidi. Peace with the Palestinian Arabs. Peace with terrorist hosting countries like Yemen. Peace with a rogue state like Iran. In an effort to help any who may feel overwhelmed that true peace may not be possible, I thought to address key points in each sphere of conflict and therefore sphere of potential peacemaking. To make aware of the hope that peace is yet obtainable.

Internal peace

Internal peace, in this case focusing in on the secular and chareidi dialectic on draft of Torah scholars. To understand this matter, one must realize the difference between what is religious and what is political.  As both a rabbi and former adjunct professor of political science, perhaps I am suited to address this. 

The religious law is that if there is a need for more soldiers in a war for national survival, then there is essentially no deferment of a draft possible. But if there is enough soldiers, even during a time of war for national survival, maintaining support lines for the soldiers on the front must remain a priority. From the procurement of uniforms and safety equipment and weapons, to the spiritual support of increased Torah study, all these lines of support are important in a Jewish state within the Holy Land. It was King David who first instituted that the spoils of war should be shared with those who uphold the supply lines. Such is the Jewish way.

If there is a debate amongst the rabbis as to whether there should be a draft or not, it is because either there is reason to believe there is not urgent need for more soldiers, or there is a perception of a reason to believe there is no urgent need for more soldiers. Too often I have found people willing to insult and suspect rabbinical leaders who oppose a draft, rather than attempt to communicate the precarious situation and vital need for a draft. If there is no way to communicate the vital need, that could indicate that there is insufficient need to permit a draft of full time Torah scholars under halachah (Jewish law.) This would make the entire issue a political one, not a religious debate, because the halachah is clear, if communication is there.

I think people should approach this issue as being neither for, nor against a Torah scholar draft in a time of war, but will accept what the religious leadership declares as their redline and the baseline religious law. Only to find more ideas to integrate chareidim in support of communal activities, in ways that do not violate their beliefs. Increase unity without destroying societies. If you try to force your spouse to love you, it is not love on your part.

Previously, when Israel was engaged with fewer opponents at the same time, it was clear that this conflict with the chareidim was more ideological and a political preference than based in a real national need. I wrote about that seven years ago at this link. Perhaps increasing forms of community service by chareidim may be a compromise solution. But people have to want a compromise solution, and not speak from jealousy or spite.

It is upon the secular leadership to improve communications with the religious sector. Rather than insulting all rabbis, try to get some who agree with you and quote them to those who disagree with you. Build consensus and stop blaming the chareidim and maybe they will agree with you more often. Have you already separated from the chareidim in your mind? If so, don't blame them for being separate from you. There is a diplomatic path available for you to fix this, no matter how great or small your Torah knowledge level may be. Investigate, and don't assume. The great rabbis are dedicated to the objective truth, not a political agenda. Assuming otherwise ends the diplomacy before it can begin. We are one people, so please let us act that way. 

Peace with the Palestinian Arabs

The countless Arab citizens within the Green Line, who love Israel, is proof that the terroristic hatred of Israel is superimposed by Arafat, Abbas, Hamas, and those who uphold the PLO legacy, and is not an "Arab thing."  Long ago I called out the concept of allowing schools in the territories to teach revisionist pro terror history and values to the youth. Going forward, this is the most important thing to do. Don't allow free speech when it is a rally for terror.

Freedom to incite terror, is the end of free speech in a society. All who disagree, are at risk of being attacked. 

Neither permit the broadcast of such incitement to violence from within, or even near your borders. Not in a text book, not in an audio or visual broadcast. Allow no incitement to Jew hatred whatsoever.


Peace with terrorist hosting countries like Yemen

Hapless states, or not so hapless states, that allow terrorists to maintain bases on their soil must be held accountable. Offer help to enable them to resist the terrorist forces on their land. If they refuse to get involved, then know that they are enabling the terror bases on their soil. Warn them of increasing consequences, if they persist in hosting terror. Hold such governments accountable, whether financially or otherwise, as the case may be. 


Peace with a rogue state like Iran

The successful destruction of the Iranian nuclear research centers, many terror leaders throughout the Middle East, and missile launchers in Iran, are all solid and immediately beneficial solutions, but not yet a conclusive victory.

Continue to back rebel forces that seek to restore democracy to Iran. It's not clear that there is an option for peace with Iran with anything short of regime change from their currently terror addicted leadership. And it is best to support the aspirations of the Iranian people, than attempt to control their capitol from abroad.

The current regime of Iran is at constant risk of attempting to secretly develop, and or purchase from an Eastern ally, dangerous materials. Only when Iran knows liberty from their current totalitarian leadership, is it wise to assume that the threat of a nuclear Iran is completely ended. In the meantime, reports from the Iranian opposition conference in Munich are a cause for more hope.


Peace is obtainable

A seven front war is tough to deal with, not just militarily, but psychologically as well. Yet peace is obtainable. It is the most natural state of humans. Indeed, it is guaranteed by Heaven. May it soon be so, B'Ezras HaShem Yisborach, by the grace of God.

International Law on Gaza & the Trump Plan

Ethnic Cleansing is not genocide, and the Trump Plan is not even Ethnic Cleansing. The current legal status of the Gaza Strip allows for the USA to get involved like this. President Trump is attempting to do a favor for all concerned, and to do so within the parameters of International Law.

There are some leftists in the media who equate Ethnic Cleansing with genocide by other means. Not just intentional ethnocide, but any mass moving of an ethnicity they wrongly label as ethnic cleansing. But these two concepts are not the same. It's the difference between being caught in a fire, and being allowed to escape it. Live to reestablish society on another day. Ethically speaking, genocide is much worse. Ethnic cleansing is bad. Whereas relocating people to preserve the peace, and save lives can be a good thing.

On the PBS Newshour website, in October 2017, Layla Quran, simplified an explanation of the legal standing of ethnic cleansing:

"To qualify as genocide, the actions must be done with intent to eliminate an entire group of people. Without provable intent, a group or individual can still be guilty of “crimes against humanity” or “ethnic cleansing” but not genocide.
"...Ethnic cleansing has not been defined and is not recognized as a crime under international law, according to the U.N. And in reality, the lines between ethnic cleansing and genocide are often blurred."

We illustrated last month in this blog that displacing criminals is not ethnic cleansing, further terrorists are not protected by the Geneva Conventions which their behavior rejects. Therefore to determine legality of the Trump plan, we need only consider what is President Trump's intention to the non terrorists among the Arabs of Gaza? 

What President Trump's plan calls for and explicitly is intended to do is to save and protect the Palestinian Arab population of the Gaza Strip from all the dangers and health hazards inherent in residing in ruins filled with shrapnel and the like. There is no intention of ethnocide whatsoever. Therefore it cannot be truthfully categorized as any kind of ethnocide.

The crime would be to attempt to stop the salvation of the Arabs who huddle in the ruins of Gaza. Only someone who cynically used the plight of the Palestinian Arabs as a tool to strike at Israel with, would have any grounds to object to what is best for the Palestinian Arabs. They had many chances for a more ideal peace plan, but now this is the best option that is viable under the circumstances. If indeed it results in a new Riviera of the Middle East, as Donald J. Trump dreams of, it can even become an ideal solution.

The left wing rewriting of these vital legal terms is astoundingly bad for International peacemaking; to make the legal seem illegal. German scholar, Prof. Meghan Garrity, wrote the following in her essay, 'Ethnic Cleansing’: An Analysis of Conceptual and Empirical Ambiguity':

“I recommend social scientists abandon the term (ethnic cleansing) because of five critical areas of conceptual confusion..."

After describing how this harms the efficacy of social scientists to help improve the situation, she then suggests four alternative and more accurate descriptors of these kinds of issues,

"Massacre (with the intent to annihilate)
Mass expulsion (with the intent to remove)
Coercive assimilation (with the intent to eliminate a unique cultural identity)
Control (with the intent to subjugate)"

Therefore from the Garrity perspective, entering a discussion of the Trump Plan for Gaza begins with acknowledging it is an evaluation of the intent of a mass expulsion. Just being able to use the correct terminology is half the battle to find common ground in the debate. But a classic conception of mass expulsion is one that has no hope of return, such as the Spanish Expulsion of the Jews in 1492. But here, Trump plans to invite Palestinian Arabs to return when it is safe.

Just to describe the mechanics of the legal status of the Gaza Strip today in more layman terms. The disputed territories are Israeli property that it has been trying to give away to the Palestinian Authority, but not to Hamas. Before the peace deal could be concluded by the transfer in stages program of the Oslo Accords, once called "Jericho First," Hamas' violent takeover of Gaza occurred. Without a peace deal that solidified the land transfer, Israel is empowered to select a new governor to keep the peace in the territory today. For more on this, study the International Laws on Session and Succession.

The reality of the situation is this: Let's ask the question if there is an alternative plan that protects Arab lives and provides them hope for a better tomorrow of good healthcare, prosperity, and peace, more so than the Trump plan? As of today, there is none.

May all who care for peace for Israel, and for peace, health, and wellbeing of the Palestinian Arabs acknowledge this. May it soon be so, by the grace of God.

Institute a Death Penalty for Terrorists With Blood on Their Hands

What a nightmare to watch the injustice of terrorists having freedom while the people they killed are still in the grave. What a perversion that the release of hostages, an otherwise extremely holy act, is used to fuel such evil. The last time Israel gave away so many terrorists to release an Israeli hostage, it included the mastermind of the October 7th massacre. What new risks to the people of Israel has the government of Israel negotiated itself into? If there had been an active death penalty for terrorists with blood on their hands, we would have been celebrating the release of hostages without worry of the new potential dangers that lay in wait. It's high time for such a law to pass through legislation. 

14 years ago I wrote that "When emotions no longer rule policy, lawmakers will face the need to do something to avoid this from ever happening again." & "Repeat after me, "it is wrong to release unrepentant murders out onto the streets for any reason." 

If there were only pro terrorism advocates without blood on their hands in Israeli prisons before the Biden hostage exchange occurred, then there would have been no clear and present danger being sent back to Gaza to attempt to kill our citizens again. Further, the October 7th massacre revealed a new and deeper running cruelty on the street among many Gazans, so that the risk of attempting terror from this group of criminals is greater than from any criminal element ever released before. Among the most basic concepts of criminal profiling is to deliberate over recidivistic tendencies. I am unsatisfied that this was sufficiently considered in this case.

Now quickly misuse heartwarming photos of those hostages being released and only talk about that, so that we can put all this out of our minds long enough to complete this circle of danger!! ...A misappropriation of hasbara for the wrong reasons, I call this.

These matters have long been known. These dangers have long been preventable. Multiple governmental administrations under different Prime Ministers have not fixed this. This is a systemic problem and must be repaired. It will take public outcry to motivate this change. 

If your friend, even your very best friend, likes to drive while drunk, do not give him the keys to the car. Especially if he wants to give you a lift. If he is sober at the moment, but has the same philosophy of driving drunk being some kind of a legitimate option, and he also has a bottle of liquor within his reach, you should still not trust him behind the steering wheel. Similarly we should not put such a temptation upon future governments to have to deal with. Once there is no new supply of murderers sitting in jail for the PLO to potentially upgrade their roster with, there will be no more kidnappings to fuel their release. This nightmare will be over, permanently.

Practically speaking, it's time to admit, the risk of kidnapping is not going away unless and until a real peace solution is fully in place. If a government would consider such legislation as suggested here, the following is a vital point. Include a clause that requires swift fulfillment of orders of execution. Closing potential appeal processes within a matter of days or weeks, not months or years, keeps such a law a practical deterrence of kidnappings. Otherwise there would be a fresh supply of terrorists with blood on their hands potentially motivating more kidnappings. To protect Israel from kidnappings, not a month should pass before the murderers are themselves killed.

If the government will not protect the people (Likud,) and the other government elected will not protect the people (Bennett / Lapid,) then it is time to cry out to Heaven for help. The need is urgent. The intent of government of most parties is to not recognize this as an important value. But God is our King, and He can intervene, and will if we but ask Him to. Despite God's plan of freewill for humanity, God is willing to intervene in such circumstances, to preserve civilization, as it says, "A king's heart is like rivulets of water in the Lord's hand; wherever He wishes, He turns it." (Proverbs 21:1) & "Israel shall be saved by the Lord with an everlasting salvation; you shall neither be ashamed nor disgraced to all eternity. For so said the Lord, the Creator of heaven, Who is God, Who formed the earth and made it, He established it; He did not create it for a waste, He formed it to be inhabited, "I am the Lord and there is no other." (Isaiah 45:17 & 18)

Let's encourage the habitation of the land by those who can come to the Holy Land through a reassurance of safety, and the long life of those who live there by a reassurance of justice.

May the government recognize the need to protect their citizens in such a way, and act accordingly in an appropriate manner. May it soon by so, by the grace of God.

On Ethnic Cleansing

The International Law on ethnic cleansing and the Torah law is similar in this case. Displacing civilian population groups solely because of ethnicity is wrong, even if they are allowed to live elsewhere. This is assuming not displacing them brings maximum protection of fundamental rights for all. Whereas if it did not, the displacement would not necessarily be wrong. It's not black and white in this direction or that but depends on the circumstances of each case. Ethnicity based cleansing (for its own sake) is not in the category of acceptable cleansing in this case. To put it in more colloquially familiar terms, the Palestinians Arabs are not a pure example of a modern Amalekite nation. There are too many roses in this thornbush to honestly make such a comparison.

An ideology of criminality within a given ethnicity, removes the shield against ethnic cleansing against said subgroup. For example, a drug cartel, can't seek to find extra protection under the law for reasons of bias against their race or ethnicity despite their crimes. Their criminal ideology and behavior makes them criminals under the law, it is all the other citizenry, not the criminals, who are entitled to protection from the police even if it would eventually lead to loss of many rights of the criminals were they be brought to justice. These matters are rudimentary concepts of criminal justice, yet they have seemed an elusive matter to grasp for some at the United Nations as well as at many World news media outlets.

Those who reject civilization among the Palestinian Arabs are a non ethnic segment, rather they are an ideological segment, and those are the ones to whom it is legal to relocate. Whereas the ancient Amalekites were completely the same in their ethnicity and ideology. They themselves made that distinction with their universal support of violence. If Palestinian Arabic radicalism reached 100 percent on both sides of the Greenline, God forbid, that would be after the Amalekite model, but that does not exist as an accurate monolithic standard in this case. 

In Talmudic terms, let us consider, the great Hillel's golden rule of  "'not to try unto thine fellow, what is hateful to thyself', is the foundation of Judaism." (Shab. 31a) 

There are plenty of Arabs who are proud and grateful to currently be Israeli citizens and many others on the other side of the Greenline who would be too, if given the opportunity. The rationale of Rabbi Meir Kahane on this issue is evidently inaccurate.

Yet if keeping a group of people in a certain location would cause generations of bloodshed, it is morally wrong to assume that moving people in such a case would be ethnic cleansing. In fact not moving people could be dangerous. That part of it Rabbi Kahane got right.

As I mentioned years ago, the more this goes on, the worse the trend to radicalization would become. Violent indoctrination at Palestinian Arabic schools has caused a loss of so many who could have been civilization builders, but who now support terror. But it's not too late to find many innocents among them who can be saved, if offered a safe way out.

Moving masses of peoples is not always ethnic cleansing. If they could move people and divide a neighborhood often against the will of the residents there, to put in a highway, and for people who do not even live in that neighborhood, then why can't they do the same, to protect lives, on both sides of the ethnic divide? Certainly we should not destroy people's neighborhoods for no good reason. It's wrong to hurt the innocent in any way, if at all possible to avoid. But the point is, nations sometimes have done, and continue to do that, if they feel a compelling enough reason, for a sometimes esoteric ideal of "the greater good." 

Ethnic cleansing, is the attempt to create ethnically homogeneous geographic areas through the deportation or forcible displacement of persons belonging to particular ethnic groups. Here, we are suggesting only filtering terrorists out of the populace via ideological markers and values that are too destructive for the common society of all ethnicities to bear in a given state. You can't kick out Jews or Arabs, but you can bring terrorists to justice.

More often than not, too many either foolish or hypocritical, and or antisemitic voices at the United Nations cried "wolf" and "apartheid" and "ethnic cleansing" in an effort to stop Israel from fixing this problem in a way that protects citizens of all ethnicities. How many nations protested that the Jews were being ethnically cleansed from Gush Katif two decades ago? If you don't know offhand, I'll give you a hint: you will not need a calculator to figure this one out...

But times are a changing, and Israel is and should get used to the idea of doing what is best for all their citizens of all ethnicities, without catering to the whims of anti semitic politicians protesting life saving policies at the U.N.

Peace depends upon Israel establishing it's own sense of a legal right to live in safety, and to demand it as a right before the United Nations. Don't be defined as "ethnic cleansers" by those who allowed it to actually occur in Syria for many decades until it laid the foundation for civil war there.

For the sake of the peace of all Israelis of all ethnicities, demand your rights and assert them. Even if ideological targeted relocation of groups of people becomes necessary to an extent.

Then you will be free to do the good in your heart for all your people, of all ethnicities, in the united Israel of tomorrow.

May it soon be so, by the grace of God.