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Dismantling the Illegal Settlements

Yesterday President Bush stated publicly his stand that the Israelis must end the occupation of Palestinian territory when the borders were altered in 1967 as a result of the Six-Day War. He did not say "before 1967," and so it is apparent that he is prepared to recognize the post-war borders after the Israelis took much land.

This policy is primarily directed at the "illegal settlements," as he put it. Of course, the term "illegal" has a different meaning to different nations. To the Israelis, "illegal settlements" are the tiny outposts that zealous Jews have grabbed in Palestine on hilltops to make a political point that they claim ALL of Palestine. These are outposts that do not have permits from the Israeli government, hence they are "illegal" to the Israelis themselves.

From an international standpoint (and the U.N. itself), all of the Israeli settlements inside Palestinian territory are illegal. This includes those that the Israeli government itself has authorized and continue to expand at will, grabbing ever more Palestinian land as the settlement populations increase.

This whole issue lays bare the fundamental double standard being used by our government in the enforcement of U.N. resolutions. We attacked Iraq twice on the grounds that they had flaunted U.N. resolutions. But by those standards, we should have attacked the Israelis for decades. It is obvious that we hypocritically take up the U.N. causes that we agree with, and we ignore those causes that we disagree with.

The President's Jerusalem announcement is being touted as nothing new. What is certainly different, however, is that he has come out publicly with what was previously a back-room negotiating position. It will be interesting to see the reaction. If the past is any clue to the future, we should see the following:

1. The evangelical community in America will be whipped up by Israeli agents to push the President into abandoning his position. It will be harder to do this in Congress and the Senate, because most of the Democrats have already held this position for years, and the Republicans will be hesitant to go against a President from their own party.

2. An "incident" will occur in Israel, manufactured or allowed by the Israeli security forces, which will serve to kill some Jews and thereby whip up political sentiment against the Palestinians. This will make it "impossible" for the Israeli government to comply with President Bush's plan. Such things have been done since November 25, 1940, when the Jewish Agency in Palestine decided to blow up the S.S. Patria in Haifa harbor, killing 276 Jewish immigrant passengers. This was exposed by David Flinker, Israeli correspondent of the Jewish Morning Journal, and also by ex-Prime Minister Menachem Begin in his book, The Revolt. Begin wrote on page 35 of his book, "The Patria never sailed. Jewish 'terrorists' placed a bomb to prevent its departure. The bomb exploded and more than two hundred Jews were killed or drowned. The British authorities noted the fact that this was not an Irgun Zvai Leumi operation; it was the Haganah which had placed the bomb."

Begin was careful to write that even though he was the number one terrorist of that time (as head of the Irgun), this murder of Jewish immigrants was the operation of the official Jewish Agency and the Haganah, their military wing. This murder took place while Ben-Gurion was head of the Jewish Agency.

So history shows that these unscrupulous Jewish leaders have been known to sacrifice the lives of hundreds of "insignificant" Jews for the "greater cause" of creating sympathy around the world.

So history shows that these unscrupulous Jewish leaders have been known to sacrifice the lives of hundreds of "insignificant" Jews for the "greater cause" of creating sympathy around the world. In their minds, the end justifies the means.

I find it uncanny how often a "Palestinian suicide bomber" is able to penetrate the borders and blow up innocent Jews. These events always seem to happen when the Israeli government needs it as an excuse to stop the peace process from moving forward. Certainly, the Israelis have thousands of Palestinians at their disposal to do the dirty work. After all, they have arrested thousands of "militants," and then released them later after torturing them and probably putting chips into them, and certainly after turning them into Manchurian Candidates by brainwashing techniques. It is relatively easy to call upon them, because few people would suspect that an unscrupulous government would actually do such a thing to its own people. And they can always blame America for demanding the release of those "terrorists" in the first place as part of any peace plan.

So the bottom line is this: President Bush's plan, inadequate in itself, is totally unacceptable to the long-term Israeli plan to take over all of Palestine and drive out all remaining Palestinians, except for those who are allowed to be "hewers of wood and drawers of water" as Jewish slaves (Joshua 9:23). They will work behind the scenes to cause the plan to fail. President Bush's optimism is totally misplaced.

Yet I wonder if this new plan itself might signal that the President's eyes are beginning to be opened. Perhaps with the ousting of Rumsfeld, Libby, and others, the White House will soon no longer be Israeli occupied territory. Maybe the dismantling of the "illegal settlements" which the President is demanding includes the White House.