The Week In Ridiculousness

November 9, 2012 § 1 Comment

I thought I’d use today’s post to highlight a couple of things going on this week that are so absurd that I had resolved to ignore them at all costs, but since they are burning a hole in my brain I am giving in. And no, I will still not be commenting on anything that Jennifer Rubin has written (which should be the new textbook definition of ridiculous) since I am hoping that if nobody pays any attention to her she will, like my 5 month old son, eventually cry herself to sleep and we will no longer have to listen to her.

Topic number one that I had resolved to ignore is the Kafkaesque exercise in propaganda trial of Israeli military officers, including former chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi, taking place right now in Turkey. The four IDF commanders are being tried in absentia for the deaths of nine Turkish citizens aboard the Mavi Marmara, and in case you are wondering if this trial is a genuine attempt to exercise justice or a political theater of the absurd, all you need to know is that the prosecution is asking for individual sentences of 18,000 years apiece. It might also interest you to hear that the government IHH (ed.. that was a sloppy mistake on my part), which sent the flotilla in 2010, has decided to run advertisements for the trial that are plastered around Istanbul, so you would not be mistaken in thinking that this is closer to a reality show than it is to an impartial judicial hearing. Despite the Turkish government’s best attempts to entice people to come out for its intricately planned modern day gladiator spectacle, the plaza in front of Çağlayan court house has been sparsely populated with only a couple of hundred people who have been competing for attention with Turkish pro-choice activists. The timing of the trial and the government’s efforts to use it to stir up nationalist sentiment are no doubt related to the fact that the AKP and Prime Minister Erdoğan himself are at the shakiest point in their decade-long rule, between the Syrian morass and intra-party tension between Erdoğan and President Gül. Rallying around the flag is the oldest trick in the book and this is a nakedly transparent move in that direction, but it remains to be seen whether it will work. There should be no doubt at all though that this is not a serious effort to get Israel to compromise, will have absolutely zero positive effect on Turkey’s campaign for an Israeli apology and compensation, and is purely and simply about domestic political gain. It is a political temper tantrum, beneath Turkey or any country that purports to take itself seriously. If Ankara were actually interested in a resolution to the dispute with Israel, rather than stage a show trial it would drop its demand for Israel to end the Gaza blockade – which it knows Israel will never agree to and which has nothing to do with Turkey anyway – and work out language on an apology and specific compensation, both of which Jerusalem has indicated it is open to accepting under the right circumstances. It might be too late now that Avigdor Lieberman’s power has been enhanced, but at least a good faith effort would put the ball in Israel’s court. What is going on now, however, is nothing short of an embarrassing and disgraceful spectacle.

Topic number two is the figurative self-immolation of Eric Dondero. For those unfamiliar with his work, Dondero is a former Ron Paul aide who is so upset at President Obama’s reelection that he has decided to personally boycott all Democrats for the rest of his life. What does this mean in practice, you might ask. The answer, in Dondero’s own oh so eloquent words:

All family and friends, even close family and friends, who I know to be Democrats are hereby dead to me. I vow never to speak to them again for the rest of my life, or have any communications with them. They are in short, the enemies of liberty. They deserve nothing less than hatred and utter contempt.

I strongly urge all other libertarians to do the same. Are you married to someone who voted for Obama, have a girlfriend who voted ‘O’. Divorce them. Break up with them without haste. Vow not to attend family functions, Thanksgiving dinner or Christmas for example, if there will be any family members in attendance who are Democrats.

Do you work for someone who voted for Obama? Quit your job. Co-workers who voted for Obama. Simply don’t talk to them in the workplace, unless your boss instructs you too for work-related only purposes. Have clients who voted Democrat? Call them up this morning and tell them to take their business elsewhere.

I read this yesterday, and assumed it had to be a joke. Nobody takes themselves this seriously, right? Not to mention that this is about as insane as it gets, even for a devoted Ron Paul employee who believes that the government is secretly planning to form a union with Canada and Mexico and probably carries Krugerrands with him to the supermarket to buy groceries. As it turns out based on Dondero’s interview in New York Magazine, not only is he not joking but he is more deranged than I could have ever imagined. Read the whole interview for a wonderful snapshot of the mental fever that has seized some folks in this country, but my two favorites snippets are Dondero’s answer to whether he would tap an unknown Republican to perform a complicated and risky brain surgery over a Democrat ranked as the top neurosurgeon in the country – “Simple: Avoid them both. Go to Mexico for your medical treatment. Avoid all the red tape and bureaucracy – and his demand that a Democratic neighbor drowning in a lake would have to yell “Obama sucks” before Dondero would jump into the water to rescue him. That people like this exist make me laugh until it hurts and curl up in a ball and cry at the same time.

In Which I Sound Like A Broken Record

May 23, 2012 § 1 Comment

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago the news that Turkish indictments were forthcoming against Israeli soldiers over the Mavi Marmara flotilla. Apparently, Turkey has decided to set its sights very high by returning indictments against the top Israeli military leadership – former IDF chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi, Navy head Eliezer Marom, and military and air force intelligence chiefs Amos Yadlin and Avishai Levi. This is not only an exercise in futility, as none of these people stand any chance of ever appearing before a Turkish court, but a symbolic demonstration that makes Turkey look like it is not serious about justice and is rather seeking to prolong its feud with Israel. I have written before that I understand the anger felt by Turks and realize why they do not want to give Israel a free pass over the flotilla incident, but at the same time there is holding people accountable and then there is pure posturing. This falls squarely into the latter category. If Turkey had made a good faith effort to identify the actual IDF soldiers on board the ship it would be one thing, as those are the people with whom they have an actual beef. But to indict Israel’s top military and intelligence leadership? That is not a serious effort but a publicity shot across the bow. It is not designed to accomplish anything tangible or substantive, and in fact makes it that much harder for Turkey and Israel to come to an agreement acceptable to both sides that will amicably settle their differences.

As I wrote just yesterday, I am convinced that there is a power struggle of sorts going on behind the scenes at the upper echelons of Turkish government, with some pushing hard to maintain a muscular Turkish nationalism that widens the rift with Israel and with others looking to dial things back. There are too many conflicting signals being issued at the same time, and I think that there must be back channel efforts to reconcile with the Israelis while other attempts are being made to sabotage any progress that is made. There must be some high ranking Turkish officials beginning to wonder how the constant feuding with Israel is actually benefitting Turkey at this point, and it is obviously a good question for them to ask themselves. As I view things from my limited vantage point, the possible domestic politics advantage is being far outpaced by foreign policy problems that Turkey is creating for itself. Whether it is Davutoğlu or someone else who is continuing to push for a hard and unrelenting line against Israel, it is now crossing over into the absurd. Turkey is no closer to getting an Israeli apology or compensation, and wasn’t that the whole stated point to begin with?

Israeli Politics Blows Up, Part 1

April 30, 2012 § 4 Comments

Lots of big news happened over the weekend with far-reaching consequences, so let’s start with Friday’s Yuval Diskin speech. Diskin, the former head of the Shin Bet, slammed Netanyahu and Barak – and did so in a particularly insulting manner tinged with class-based resentment by referring to them as the “messiahs from Akirov [the expensive high end apartment building in Tel Aviv where Barak resides] and Caesaerea” – as being unfit to lead the government and for presenting Israelis with a false choice on Iran. Diskin said that he does not trust either of them, and that they are wrong to declare that striking Iran will set back its nuclear program when in fact it might accelerate it. He also warned about right wing extremists on both sides of the Green Line and said that something like the Rabin assassination could easily happen again, and charged Netanyahu with not wanting to conduct peace talks with the Palestinians because it would break apart his coalition. Diskin’s broadside launched a round of recriminations, with the pro-Bibi camp charging Diskin of petty score-settling over the fact that he was not appointed head of the Mossad following his time as head of the Shin Bet, and ex-Mossad chief Meir Dagan – himself a strident critic of Netanyahu and Barak over the Iran issue – and ex-IDF chief Gabi Ashkenazi both publicly supporting Diskin.

Let’s sort this all out. What precisely is going on here? To begin with, there is no doubt that personality issues are part of this very public feud. Diskin’s strikingly sneering personal tone is unusual for a critique solely based on the merits, and he is clearly still upset about not getting the Mossad job. It is also well known that the trio of Diskin, Dagan, and Askenazi were all pushed aside and replaced by Netanyahu partially to clear the way for a strike on Iran since all three of them were opposed to such a move, and this is coming back to haunt Bibi as they are now getting their revenge. That does not mean, however, that they are wrong, although Diskin is the least qualified to register such a strong objection given that his portfolio had him dealing mainly with Palestinian issues and not with Iran.

It’s tough to say why Diskin decided to speak up now and do it so harshly, but it definitely fuels speculation that he wants to enter politics and that this was his opening salvo. I also wonder, given his area of expertise and the fact that he was critical on a host of topics, if he meant for the Iran issue to be front and center or if he instead expected his criticisms of Netanyahu’s stance toward the Palestinians to be the headline in the weekend papers. Diskin holding forth on Iran is unusual because it would be analogous to the FBI director attacking the White House over drone policy in Pakistan – he certainly knows more about it than most people, but it falls far outside his portfolio. More appropriately, Diskin went after Bibi pretty hard on the Palestinian front, essentially accusing him of negotiating in bad faith and insisting that Netanyahu rather than Abbas was the person responsible for the lack of progress due to his having no interest in altering the existing status quo. Diskin also stressed his bona fides on the topic by pointing out that he knows what is going on from being up close to the Palestinian issue and dealing with it personally, and that the West Bank is primed to explode in frustration over the lack of progress toward a Palestinian state. The news has a way of spiraling out of people’s control, and I’ll bet that Diskin did not necessarily expect his Iran comments to be the ones dominating the airwaves.

It is also interesting to see who spoke up in defense of Netanyahu and Barak and who did not. Likud ministers went after Diskin, including Yuval Steinitz (Finance), Limor Livnat (Culture and Sport), and Yisrael Katz (Transportation), but there were some mixed signals from people who actually matter when it comes to Iran. Avigdor Lieberman criticized Diskin for serving out his full Shin Bet term if he had such major issues with Netanyahu and Barak, but in the same sentence praised Diskin as an excellent Shin Bet head and stressed that the entire security cabinet and not just Bibi and Barak would be making decisions on Iran. Silvan Shalom, who is the vice PM, also praised Diskin’s tenure at the Shin Bet and stressed that the decision to strike Iran is not Netanyahu and Barak’s alone to make. Most importantly (and ominously for Netanyahu), the silence from Moshe Yaalon, Dan Meridor, Benny Begin, and Eli Yishai was deafening. These four, as faithful readers of this blog may recall, are the members of the Shminiya believed to be opposed to attacking Iran, and they did not come out swinging in Netanyahu or Barak’s defense. Combined with the fact that current IDF head Benny Gantz is evidently bearish on the idea as well, and that Netanyahu is historically an extremely cautious political actor, it signals that Bibi is still fighting an uphill battle and confirms my longstanding belief that a strike is nowhere near imminent.

At the end of the day, no matter what Diskin’s motives or his credibility level, his speaking out is not a good development for Netanyahu and Barak’s freedom of action on Iran. Israel has great respect for its military, security, and intelligence leaders, many of whom later enter politics with great success, including current Cabinet members Barak and Yaalon and Kadima head Shaul Mofaz and Kadima MK Avi Dichter. The current and previous four IDF chiefs (Gantz, Ashkenazi, Dan Halutz, Yaalon, and Mofaz) are all on record as opposing a strike or are believed to oppose a strike at this point in time, and while Mofaz clearly has political reasons for being opposed given his status as opposition leader, the other four do not. All of this carries weight with Israelis, and it should carry weight with Netanyahu and Barak as well. This Yediot article quotes a bunch of anonymous state and defense officials trashing Diskin, including one “senior minister who has a close relationship with Netanyahu” saying that Diskin fits into a legacy of “moronic Shin Bet chiefs,” but it cannot escape notice that not one of the people questioning Diskin’s intelligence or abilities was willing to go on record. The fact that the security and military officials who matter primarily appear to view attacking Iran right now as a bad idea is not a small problem that Netanyahu and Barak can wave away. In the grand scheme of things, Yuval Diskin’s opinion might not matter, but he stands as a proxy for a larger group of people whose opinion does.

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