And while we're talking about slime

The fact that the New York Times regards Michael Tarazi as just another op-ed contributor demontrates all the more the need to expose this filth for what he is (Never mind the Times itself). I've been doing so for the last few days, and I want to add more by pointing to this great FrontPageMag article by David Meir-Levi. A point that has been made many, many times before (including by me), but that needs to be made many, many times more is the following:

Then there is the question of “Palestinian land”. As a legal adviser to the PLO, Tarazi must know that none of the West Bank and Gaza Strip has ever been “Palestinian Land”. Before Israel’s, the last legal sovereignty over these territories was that of the Ottoman Empire. The British Mandate was a temporary care-taker control established by the League of Nations. And from 1948 to 1967, the West bank was illegally occupied and annexed by Jordan, and the Gaza Strip by Egypt -- both in stark defiance of international law, Fourth Geneva Convention, and UN resolutions 181 and 194 (which declared that there should be a state of Palestine on that part of partitioned Cis-Jordan that was not given to the state of Israel). Israel conquered these territories in a defensive war (June 5-10, 1967) and then offered to return them to their illegal occupiers (Jordan and Egypt) in exchange for peace. Stunned and confused by this offer, the Arab world convened at Khartoum, Sudan, in August, 1967 and formulated their response: the now infamous three Khartoum “NO”s: No recognition, no negotiations, no peace. International law is clear. In the case of a defending country’s occupation of an aggressor’s territory, the disposition of this territory must await a peace treaty between the belligerents. In the absence of a peace treaty, the defending country’s continued sovereignty over the territory is completely legal. So, until a legal Palestinian government concludes a peace treaty with Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip are Israeli land. Individual Palestinians may own personal title to some of it; but that title is under the legal sovereignty of Israel. There is no “Palestinian land”.[Emphasis mine - ed]

There simply is no disagreement possible about this point. If there was, hired scum like tarazi would make an issue out of it, instead of glossing over it and referring to 'illegal occupation' and 'stolen land', repeating it over and over until even they themselves start to believe it.

I also loved this summation:

In 1937 the Arabs could have had 85% of Palestine west of the Jordan, but they rejected the UK’s offer (the Peel partition plan) in favor of a revolt that Britain quelled at the cost of thousands of Arab lives. In 1947 they could have had c. 50% of the land, but again they went to war and, much to their surprise, were defeated by Israel. In 1949 they could have had a treaty with Israel that would have returned to them most of the land that they lost in the 1948 war, but instead they chose to maintain their belligerency and declared an eternal state of war. That is why the Rhodes conference was an armistice conference and not a peace conference.

In June, 1967 they could have gotten back the land they lost in the 6-day war, in exchange for peace (which Anwar es-Saddat did in 1979 – peace in exchange for Sinai at Camp David 1); but the Arab world could not deal with the reality of the need to make a deal with Israel. So Israel kept the land. Never has Israel coveted Arab land. Quite the opposite. Dragged into unwanted wars of survival, Israel has consistently offered to return conquered land in exchange for peace. It is only because of Arab obduracy and psychotic Jew-hatred that Israel today holds legal sovereignty over what was supposed to have been the Arab State of Palestine.

Really, this is all that needs to be said. Everyone should really just shut up after this. Well, the Arabs won't of course, just like children who play marbles, cheat, lose all the same, and then whine about their losses. And just like indifferent parents, the UN and the world at large insist that the truth must be 'somewhere in the middle' and that Israel should give the marbles back. Not just once, but time and time again. No matter how bad the cheating, or how often. A trait of the UN the Arabs are counting and relying on. No need to guess, they KNOW where the world stands on this issue.
And the future?

For 125 years, Palestinian leadership has been preaching "death to the Jews". For 55 years Arab nations have been engaged in a series of wars whose goal was the annihilation of Israel. For 35 years Arafat has led a relentless terror war whose goal was the destruction of Israel and the genocide of its Jews. And for the past four years, Arafat and his terrorist minions have made a last-ditch, desperate effort to prevail via endless terrorism, violence, murder, and intimidation.

And they all failed.

No one can predict the future, but past behavior is statistically the best indicator of future behavior.

So how did Arafat and his terror army behave in Jordan from June 1967 to September 1970? - so badly that King Hussein had to drive them out with a full-scale war (black September, 1970) that took the lives of c. 10,000 Palestinians.

How did Arafat and the PLO behave in Lebanon from October, 1970 to August, 1982? - they terrorized the Lebanese, created a civil war, killed tens of thousands of Christian Lebanese, drove hundreds of thousands from their homes, and threatened to bring down the entire Lebanese government.

It is not by chance that no Arab state was willing to offer safe harbor to Arafat and his minions when he was cornered by Sharon in Beirut in 1982.

And how has Arafat behaved since Oslo? - 18,000 terror attacks against Israel, 1700 Israeli dead and almost 7,000 wounded since 9/13/1993 (when Arafat declared on the White House lawn his unshakable commitment to peace), and Arafat continues to cheer on his terrorists, call them his heroes and martyrs, and dub his female homicide bombers his “army of roses”.

Palestinian national aspirations are unique in the world and throughout history. Their sole defining paradigm has been terrorism, their unabashed self-expression has been the diatribe of genocide, and their unequivocal aim has been the destruction of a sovereign state and the annihilation of its population.

There is no society in the world that would want to share its sovereignty with the world's arch terrorists. No government could rationally be expected to share its power with those who have left in their wake an abysmal travesty of murder and extortion, intimidation, torture, terror and destruction.

Why would anyone expect that Israel would want to?

They KNOW Israel doesn't want to, just as they wouldn't. But they DO want ISRAEL to keep bleeding and suffering.

This is great reading. So read it all.