No, this statement is not the rant of an anti-semite or an Islamic radical who wants to see Israel destroyed. It is the title of a commentary in today's issue of the International Herald Tribune by Henry Siegman, a senior fellow on the Middle East at the Council on Foreign Relations and a former executive head of the American Jewish Congress. In other words, a bona fide Jew who can hardly be accused of either anti-semitism or being a "self-hating Jew," the two primary but completely dishonest epithets that defenders of anything Israel does continually aim at critics of Israeli government actions.

Siegman, who has written a number of incisive commentaries over the past year exposing the intransigence of the current Israeli government, makes a convincing case that the pullout of settlers from Gaza is intended to make it easier to hold onto--and expand--the settlements in the West Bank. Siegman also points out that the laudatory statements over the weekend by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the effect that the Palestinians need to be granted freedom and mobility both within and between the Gaza strip and the West Bank will be nothing more than "rhetorical admonitions" if not backed up with "real action."

In previous posts on the subject of terrorism I have alluded to Israeli treatment of the Palestinians as one of the injustices that fuel terrorism and give young terrorist recruits a strong sense of justification that their misguided actions are correct. The continuing tragedy of Israel-Palestinian relations, and the de facto carte blanche which the United States and all other Western nations have given to the actions of the Israeli government, provide one of the most powerful recruiting points for the Osama ben Ladens of this world.

One question that needs an answer: Why are the settlements there? They certainly are not increasing Israel's security. Moreover, the settler movement has been supported by all Israeli governments since the 1967 war, Labor or Likud. As a Jew from Los Angeles who attended Hebrew school between 1957 and 1960, I can tell you that taking over all of Palestine and either driving out the Palestinians or relegating them to second class status has always been the understood goal of Zionism--indeed, this is what we were explicitly told by our teachers. For further evidence, all one has to do is look at David Ben Gurion's letters and statements to know that the goal of Zionism was always to take over all of Palestine, and everything that has happened in this region over the past 100 years reflects this. For further details about both past and recent history, I refer readers to two books. Both, for understandable reasons, have been viciously attacked by defenders of Israel; I invite readers to make up their own minds:

Ilan Pappe, A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples

and

Tanya Reinhart, Israel/Palestine: How to end the war of 1948

Until Muslims see that the West is willing to put real pressure on Israel to solve this cancerous situation, terrorist recruiters will have a free hand and none of us will ever be safe.