Weekly Commentary: Wake Up Call: Dumbo Crashes In Gaza

Dr. Aaron Lerner Date: 19 October, 2006

It just doesn't work.

Years of working papers, conferences, arrangements and photo ops have failed
to obviate Israel's need to keep the Gaza Strip and West Bank within the
Jewish State's security envelope. As developments in the Gaza Strip prove
once again, third parties simply cannot be relied upon to take Israel's
place in this critical matter.

Inclusion in the security envelope may not be a sufficient condition for
stability and security - but it certainly is a necessary one.

As reports streamed in today about the massive Palestinian war preparations
taking place in the Gaza Strip - made possible thanks to Israel's retreat
from the Philadelphi Corridor that runs between Egyptian Sinai and Gaza,
recently retired former head of Israel's National Security Council, Maj-Gen
Giora Eiland, patiently defended the move - noting that retreat from Gaza
required also abandoning that border area.

Now it is possible to understand how people leaped from the World Trade
Center to escape the unbearable heat, but Israel's presence in the Gaza
Strip was hardly a situation that required retreat at all costs.

But instead of honestly dealing with this reality, Eiland and the other
retreat supporters hypothesized that a series of international, regional and
local arrangements could somehow effectively take the place of Israeli
control.

Retreat supporters had to embrace this leap of faith because otherwise
retreat was impossible.

But reality is reality. Elephants can't fly and all the photo ops in the
world can't change that.

Dumbo crashed in Gaza but the rhetoric continues about a sovereign
Palestinian state living side by side in peace with Israel.

But a key element of Palestinian sovereignty would be its removal from the
Israeli security envelope.

Retreat and Palestinian sovereignty advocates tend to try to dismiss their
detractors by challenging them to propose an alternative that would achieve
"peace" but it is a hollow argument.

The onus, however, is on the sovereignty advocates to demonstrate that their
leaps of faith won't keep on slamming us into the pavement.

Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
(Mail POB 982 Kfar Sava)
Tel 972-9-7604719/Fax 972-3-7255730
INTERNET ADDRESS: imra@netvision.net.il
Website: http://www.imra.org.il