By Dr. Aaron Lerner
March 7, 2008
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"But we cannot afford a situation in which, on the surface, there may be some quiet days, but simultaneously, the terrorists are acquiring more and more weapons and will decide when to use it..... We cannot afford a terrorist state in Gaza. We cannot afford a failed state as part of the future Palestinian state or an extreme Islamic terrorist state as Gaza seem to be right now. So we need to give an answer both to the missiles coming from Gaza Strip and to the buildup of Hamas, the tunnels, and Egypt."
FM Livni in joint press conference with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice 5 March, 2008
"Israelis don't wake up every morning thinking of how to strike Gaza next.
If we are not attacked, we won't attack either."
PM Olmert in joint press conference with Hungarian President Laszlo Solyom 5 March
It is so incredibly frustrating.
It isn't that the Olmert team isn't aware that of the very cogent arguments that have been made that a hudna does not serve Israel's interests. They embrace them and publicly express these very same arguments themselves.
But it doesn't stop them from also publicly coming out in favor of a hudna.
This isn't just an image problem. It is a policy making problem.
In the absence of a consistent durable policy stand, Israel finds itself reacting to the initiatives of the other actors aimed at satisfying the needs and interests of her neighbors rather than those of the Jewish State.
After all, if Olmert himself says he would accept a hudna, why should Secretary of State Rice push for more than that?
The Olmert team knows that there are concrete activities Egypt can carry out that would dramatically reduce the smuggling from Egypt to Gaza. Activities that do not require increasing the size of the security force it currently has deployed on the border (for example, bulldozing a sterile zone of several kilometers depth from the border).
But, so far, the Olmert team has vacillated between calling on Egypt to do "something" and throwing around some of what might be generously termed "kibitzer solutions" such as huge engineering/environmental operations creating a moat on the border.
And it goes on.
What's the problem?
Do they forget from one minute to the next?
It is so frustrating.
We simply cannot afford a continuation of the Olmert team's "amateur hour."
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