Who is Really Good For Israel? By Tsvi Bisk

First Place - Harry Truman: for supporting the creation of the State of Israel (the most transcendent event of the past 2,000 years of Jewish history) against the wishes of his own State Department and the open threats of General George Marshall.

And so why isn't Harry Truman a bad guy? Afterall such a move would have been thought to supporting Hitler to remove the Jews from Europe. Truman asserted this authority only after he detonated the atomic bomb targeting innocent Japanese Civilians...and if the rest of the world did not agree with Trumans decision to make Israel a state.....they know what the answer is!  Seems to me tikun....this is nothing but threats and extortion to acquire Statehood. It was forced upon the world. Hitler is said to have started it, and Truman went along.

Second Place - Jimmy Carter: for putting all his energy into achieving the peace with Egypt - the second most important modern Jewish event after the creation of the state.  His smarmy self-righteous preaching at Israel is a trivial annoyance in comparison to the removal the most powerful Arab army from the circle of hostility around Israel. Whether he likes us or not should be a matter of indifference.....It is not a matter whether we like you or not...it is a matter of stopping the violence. I think Americans have a lot to say about Israel after all we give billions in aid to Israel all the time.......and if we don't we are anti-semitic...as you slide the knife under our throat.

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Third Place - George Bush I: For unleashing his attack dog James Baker (he of that immortal line: “F**K the Jews - they don’t vote for us anyway”) and forcing the Madrid Conference which led to the unjustly maligned Oslo agreements. Without the Madrid/Oslo process Israel would have no formal contact with the Palestinians, no peace treaty with Jordon, no diplomatic relations with Mauritania, no extensive de facto economic relations with the Gulf States and Morocco. But most important- Israel would not have normalized relations with India and China, the 21st century economic superpowers and Israel’s fastest growing trading partners......Well I see you see the light of GW Bush...and his collossal blunders. Congratulations.

Reagan, Clinton and Bush II are not even in the running.  What did any of them accomplish that was really good for Israel?......nothing! Drink Champagne, shake hands, and back to the bombings.

So which candidate will be “good for the Jews” — Obama or McCain?    Simple - the one who has the most doable energy policy - a policy that effectively impacts on the liquid fuel crisis. Given the constraints of modern geo-politics and the globalized economy the only area in which the next president can be transformational is energy...

And so you suggest the liquid fuel crisis is the trouble. Yes all those new farms need petro to keep Israel going. But what about global warming? I would think Obama would be the better choice this go around....maybe have to start thinking more alternative energy, sun, electric, Solar, wind, grow switch grass in the desert for ethanol, hydrogen fuel.

Petrodollars are the biggest threat to the West, the United States and the Jews. They finance Iran’s nuclear program, anti-Semitic and anti-western literature and activity, terror organizations such as Hamas, Hezbollah and El Qaeda and most recently the neo-Stalinist bullying of Mr. Putin.       American Jews can therefore be super-patriotic to America while serving their own “parochial” concerns.......They are not a concern to all Americans...what you describe is the facist type corporations that dominiate the American landscape.

What is not good for Israel is the mindless reaffirmation of support for a United Jerusalem without considering the consequences of what this means. Jerusalem has three parts: West (Jewish); East (Arab) and the Old (Walled) City (divided into 4 quarters - Jewish; Moslem, Christian and Armenian). It is the Old City that is culturally and politically problematic - certainly not East Jerusalem which is actually a loose collection of slums and rundown villages......And so such thinking is paramount to describing rich LA to the slums of New York.....while all Americans don't consider it as one enterprise? Never mind Chicago and the MidWest, or Louisiana where they literally gave no aid to Hurricane Katrina victims. It is not mindless when we seek a joint union of supporting committments. There is the issue of responsibility, we all have. It's not always making a buck that counts.

Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem should be viewed as a valiant attempt to disprove the racist canard that Jews are smarter than other people. Israel incorporated 300,000 hostile Arabs and provided them with blue Israeli ID Cards. The recent Yeshiva massacre and the two attacks with construction equipment were perpetrated by East Jerusalemites carrying Israeli IDs. Impoverished East Jerusalemites, possessing Israeli IDs, qualify for Israeli welfare.  They receive over a billion shekels a year in benefits. This is roughly equivalent to the entire yearly contribution of the United Jewish Communities to Israel...

Well that's nice you gave them jobs, but did you include them in the political process? No! and there is the problem.

Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem has been a catastrophe, so YES! DIVIDE IT AGAIN!!!. The West to the Jews; the East to the Arabs with the Old City having some kind of special status.  If the United Nations was not a moral and intellectual brothel one might conceive of UNESCO coordinating a joint government.  But one must admit this is a sticking point......Getting heated over this is also trouble. Threats solve no issue. It only makes things worse. It takes cool heads and determination to not use violence in response to violence. People need to see the trust and truth factor..

So who will be good for Israel?  Presidents who declare the standard clichés about standing shoulder to shoulder with our ally, the only democracy in the Middle East, while acceding to a policy that is both undemocratic and the greatest danger to Israelis survival as a Jewish State? Or Presidents who see a commonality of genuine Grand Strategic interests between Israel and the West and recognize that weak responses to the undemocratic behavior of the settlers serve neither? I would say education is the real issue here. Weak response means to you is doing Nonviolence.....but to me that is the strong response.....and when people realize that killing more does not stop killing, then we can achieve winners for us all.

In conclusion, in anticipation of inevitable attacks from American Jewish “chicken hawks” - anxious to prove their manhood at the expense of the last drop of Israeli blood - I feel compelled to demonstrate my non-leftist, non-dovish bona fides. I classify myself as a “Ben Gurionist” - a combination of territorial minimalism and security activism....I declare myself a Nonviolent supporter engaged to make people see some sensibility to our actions.

For example the only objections I have to Israel’s security barrier are that it is not finished, is not higher and deeper and does not have a hundred meter “death zone” on each side of it. I believe the Palestinians have forfeited their right to a State because of their behavior after the 2000 Camp David discussions and after Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza. I believe that Israel has the absolute right under international law to respond massively to the point of fire of Kassam rockets, even if fired within civilian areas, and should have the moral fortitude to face down criticism about collective punishment.....Well I agree Palestine should not be a state, but for different reasons...I also think stopping the violence needs to begin with both sides.

I believe the best solution for Israel would be to for Egypt to reoccupy Gaza and Jordan to reoccupy the West Bank.  The second best solution would be the creation of a Palestinian State.  The worst “solution” would be to continue the occupation on the other side of the barrier..,,,I believe that Egypt and Jordan should get together and help the Palestinians see they have more benefits to not being a State. They need to get Palestine to see the good to being Nonviolent, and to not have an army....Peace and friendship is not when my gun is in the corner. When I have absolute bonafide trust in stopping the violence with the sincere hope my enemy becomes my friend.....mucu good comes from it. We need to forget revenge, and justice....and seek to be members of our lives to each other in support of the body, and spirit.

Nice visiting you here Tikun...Nice picture too. Maybe you should run for President. The reason I don't show my face or tell where I am is because I want to be like God. We never see his face, or know where he is....but we know he is good and he is out there...

Rev. Jermano  God Bless.