Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of IMRA, Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict. imra@netvision.net.il
Palestinian state undercuts "capability to subdue the enemy swiftly"
By Dr. Aaron Lerner
December 14, 2007 Bookmark to del.icio.us
"You cannot defeat a terror organization without eventually taking control of the territory. The only reason we have been successful in Judea and Samaria is because we control the area."
Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi 12 December 2007
"There is no substitute for the capability to subdue the enemy swiftly."
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert 11 December 2007
When Mr. Olmert spoke of the need to be able "to subdue the enemy swiftly" at the Institute for National Security Studies Conference it was within the context of the question of how to allocate the budget between reinforcing the home front and enhancing Israel's offensive capabilities.
A lean defense budget isn't the only thing that can impair Israel's "capability to subdue the enemy swiftly."
The creation of a terror state in the West Bank to complement the one well along the way in the Gaza Strip could have a dramatic impact on Israel's "capability to subdue the enemy swiftly."
All the talk about a peaceful demilitarized Palestinian state is just that.
Talk.
The best lawyers in the world can write the most "iron clad" agreement backed by the most impressive unprecedented international guarantees and the most moving signing ceremony in modern history on the White House lawn but at the end of the day it is inevitable that a sovereign Palestinian state will be neither "peaceful" nor truly "demilitarized".
Instead Israel will find itself facing a Palestinian entity strategically located in its very heart that is armed to the teeth, fortified with bunkers, tunnel networks and other military structures - all embedded within a civilian population -- so that subduing them in a conflict that might include the participation of various third parties would take a tremendous amount of time.
"There is no substitute for the capability to subdue the enemy swiftly."
Indeed.
And we simply cannot afford to severely impair that capability with the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state in Israel's heartland.
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