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Today's Lecture: The 6 Day War by Rabbi Beryl Wein
Today's Run: http://bit.ly/72OrWH
This was a great history lesson around how the Middle East got into the current situation. A few interesting insights.
In the weeks leading up to the war, Egypt violated the cease fire agreement by going on "maneuvers" in the Sinai - the world did nothing. The closed sea shipping lanes to Israel violating international law - the world did nothing. The kicked the UN force out of the Sinai - the world did nothing. This is when Israel realized that they were alone in the world, and that no one would come to their aid. A notion that still mostly hold true today.
The magnitude of the military victory is truly amazing. Egypt had the latest Soviet military hardware and 25,000 Russian military "advisors" working with them for 2 years to train them in their use and tactics. They had state of the art fighters, radar and defense system. Israel had an array of 3 French air craft, a small jet that other countries used for training (no one else used it in combat), a bomber, and the now famous "mirage". These should have been no match for the state of the art Soviet fleet.
But in the most stunning aerial victory in military history, Israel wiped out the entire Arab airforce in 90 minutes. Flying at supersonic speed as low as 6 feet over the Mediterranean, and destroying 95% of the fleet while they were still on the ground.
Despite Israel's overwhelming victory, they were so ready for peace they were willing to give it all back (maybe not the Old City). Had the Arabs accepted it at the time, we'd have had 40 years of peace.
The most interesting point in the talk was:
The Arabs always negotiate based on the results of the last war. In '48, they refused the partition plan. After their defeat in '67 they were willing to accept the '48 boarders. After their defeat in '73 they were willing to take the '67 boarders... of course by then it's too late. You don't get to start a war, loose, then say "pretend it never happened, lets go back to how it used to be."
Today's Lecture: Obama - Are the USA and Israel on a Collision Course?
Today's Run: http://bit.ly/6QYvu5
I've heard close to a dozen talks by Dr. David Luchins, and they are always fascinating. Asside from being a religious Jew, he's a Washington insider, serving as senior advisor to US senator Pat Moynihan for 20 years. He combines Torah wisdom with behind the scene stories of the political process.
This talk was given this past summer, addressing Obama's stance on Israel. He told lots of great stories, and made lots in interesting points. Here's my favourite story (which I've heard from him before). Golda Meir was traveling to the States during Nixon's term, after the Yom Kippur War. Nixon is about to unveil his peace initiative, so he send the head of the State Department to meet Meir's plane and deliver a message. Nixon wanted Meir to call a press conference and denounce the peace plan in the strongest possible terms. He wanted her to cry, to say Nixon is selling Israel down the river... make a big show of it. The State Department head said he won't do it, you can't ask that of a foreign leader. Nixon whispers something into his ear, and he says, "of course, sir, I'll do it right away."
He flys to meet Meir and makes the request, and Meir is as outraged as he was. But he whispers into Meir's ear, the same thing Nixon whispered into his, and Meir agrees immediately.
What did Nixon whisper? He said "The Arabs will never go for any plan they they think Israel likes."
Remembering this, puts a lot of what we read about US/Israel relations in perspective. Luchins admits that some of the current tension is certainly real, as the 2 leaders have very different world views, but much of is it certainly contrived. Israel wants to make concessions, but if they offer them they will look weak. If their hand is forced by the US, then "save face".
Luchins points to Obama's threats about settlement freezes. He demanded a complete freeze and if Israel refused, he would stop US involvement int he peace process. Not exactly a heavy consequence seeing how the process is halted anyway.
One final story. Luchins helped draft 5 legislations demanding the US move their embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. During debate on the last one, a senior diplomat was being grilled on why the US won't move. He did 2 things a diplomat should never do in public. He lost his temper and told the truth. He said:
The US has 2 sets of friends in the Middle East. Tiny Israel, to whom we give NATO grade weapons, shared intelligence in real time, and billions of dollars in aid. Then their the Arab world, who controls to oil supply and his it's fingers around the throat of the US economy. All we need to give them are occasional symbolic reassurances that the US is not in Israel's back pocket. Would you prefer it were the other way?
