Last week Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen was caught without his pants, figuratively speaking of course. You can find my and other bloggers commentary on that piece here. I was optimistic that during the past week he might have changed his mind but I don’t see too much evidence of that.
I very much disagree with the comments below which follow his conclusion that the exodus Lebanon and Gaza were Israeli retreats. To be clear, I cannot fault his calling the withdrawal from both locations to be retreats because it is clear that is how our Arab brethren interpreted them.
No, what I disagree with is his analysis regarding the West Bank.
“The government of then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon concluded that Israel was incapable of controlling a densely populated area full of people who hated the occupation. Israel will in due course reach the same conclusion when it comes to the West Bank, although the present war has almost certainly set back that timetable. The fact remains that for Israel to survive, it must withdraw to boundaries that are easily defensible and hard to breach.”
I took issue with that in my commentary about the initial post.
“In short Cohen agrees that the critics of the withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza were correct and that these moves were seen as weakness by Hezbollah, Hamas and company. Cohen also admits that UN peacekeeping troops are not the answer.
His solution is to withdraw again to what he calls defensible borders. Isn’t the definition of insanity continuing to do the same thing over and over again with the hope that it will yield different results.”
Unless I missed something I do not believe that Cohen is a military expert. I don’t recall his having a degree in military strategy, guerrilla warfare or anything similar. And that leads me right back to what I said above. The definition of insanity is to continue engaging in the same action repeatedly while expecting different results. What makes him think that another withdrawal will do anything but incite the terrorists further.
Cohen even addresses this concern here:
“It’s clear now that those boundaries — a wall, a fence, a whatever — are immaterial when it comes to missiles. Hezbollah, with the aid of Iran and Syria, has shown that it is no longer necessary to send a dazed suicide bomber over the border.”
If we agree with this we have to ask ourselves why he thinks shrinking the country is going to make it any safer. I just don’t see it.
But I do agree with this point:
“…it’s either stupid or mean for anyone to call for proportionality. The only way to ensure that babies don’t die in their cribs and old people in the streets is to make the Lebanese or the Palestinians understand that if they, no matter how reluctantly, host those rockets, they will pay a very, very steep price.”
Absolutely.
It saddens me to agree with this, but it is a necessary evil. The populace must understand that unless they help police themselves they will continue to pay a very harsh and severe penalty. People will die. The strong, the weak and infirm will all perish.
They must help themselves. Israel cannot afford to give up any more land. The time for doing that has come and gone. No more unilateral withdrawals. No more one sided negotiations. This is just how it has to be for now and we can hope and pray that the day will come when we see an opportunity to send out the doves again.
Yawp.
FWIW, here are links to some other bloggers who have written about this as well:
