Israel Palestine Infos
Uri Avnery
August 18, 2012
Mad or Crazy?
BINYAMIN NETANYAHU may be crazy, but he is not mad.
Ehud Barak may be mad, but he is not crazy.
Ergo:
I HAVE said so before, and I shall say so again, even after the endless talk
about it. Indeed no war has been talked about so much before it happened. To
quote the classic movie line: “If you have to shoot, shoot. Don’t talk!”
In all Netanyahu’s bluster about the inevitable war, one sentence stands out:
“In the Committee of Inquiry after the war, I shall take upon myself the sole
responsibility, I and I alone!”
A very revealing statement.
First of all, committees of inquiry are appointed only after a military failure.
There was no such committee after the 1948 War of
Second, under Israeli law, the entire Government of
Third, in his statement Netanyahu expresses boundless contempt for his fellow
ministers. They don’t count.
Netanyahu considers himself a modern day Winston Churchill. I don’t seem to
remember Churchill announcing, upon assuming office, “I take responsibility for
the coming defeat.” Even in the desperate situation of that moment, he trusted
in victory. And the word “I” did not figure large in his speech.
IN THE daily brainwashing, the problem is presented in military terms. The
debate, such as it is, concerns military capabilities and dangers.
Israelis are especially, and understandably, worried by the rain of tens of
thousands of missiles expected to fall on all parts of Israel, not only from
Iran, but also from
Ehud Barak has announced that no more than a measly 500 Israelis will be killed
by enemy missiles. I do not aspire to the honor of being one of them, though I
live quite near the Ministry of Defense..
But the military confrontation between
As I have pointed out in the past, far more important is the impact on the world
economy, already steeped in a profound crisis. An Israeli attack will be viewed
by
The Persian Gulf is a bottle, whose neck is the narrow Strait of Hormuz, which
is totally controlled by
A major part of the world’s oil supplies has to pass through this unique
waterway. Even the mere threat of its closure will cause oil prices to shoot
sky-high. Actual hostilities will result in a worldwide economic collapse, with
hundreds of thousands - if not millions – of new unemployed.
Each of these victims will curse
This may be worst in the
THIS WILL have a direct impact on a central calculation of the warmongers.
In private conversations, but not only there, they assert that
The calculation goes like this: Netanyahu and Barak will attack without giving a
damn for American wishes. The Iranian counter-attack will be directed against
American interests. The
But even in the unlikely event that the Iranians act with supreme self-restraint
and do not attack US targets, contrary to their declarations, President Obama
will be compelled to save us, send huge quantities of arms and ammunition,
bolster our anti-missile defenses, fund the war. Otherwise he will be accused of
leaving
This calculation is based on historical experience. All Israeli governments in
the past have exploited American election years for their purposes.
In 1948, when the
In 1956, President Eisenhower was in the middle of his re-election campaign when
Will it work this time? If
WHERE ARE the Israelis in all this?
In spite of the constant brainwashing, polls show that the majority of Israelis
are dead set against an attack. Netanyahu and Barak are seen as two addicts,
many say megalomaniacs, who are beyond rational thinking.
One of the most striking aspects of the situation is that our army chief and the
entire General Staff, as well as the chiefs of the Mossad and the Shin Bet, and
almost all their predecessors, are totally and publicly opposed to the attack.
It is one of the rare occasions when military commanders are more moderate than
their political chiefs, though it has happened in
One of the reasons for this opposition is that the army chiefs know better than
anyone else how totally dependent on the
Also, it seems doubtful whether Netanyahu and Barak have a majority for the
attack even in their own government and inner cabinet. The ministers know that
apart from everything else, the attack would drive investors and tourists away,
causing huge damage to
So why do most Israelis still believe that the attack is imminent?
Israelis, by and large, have been totally convinced by now (a) that
These convictions are based on the utterances of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in which
he declared that he will wipe
But did he really say that? Sure, he has repeatedly expressed his conviction
that the Zionist Entity will disappear from the face of the earth. But it seems
that he never actually said that he – or
That may seem only a small rhetorical difference, but in this context it is very
important.
Also, Ahmadinejad may have a big mouth, but his actual power in
A nuclear-armed
IF NETANYAHU & Co. were really frightened by the Iranian Bomb, they would do one
of two things:
Either agree to the de-nuclearization of the region, giving up our own nuclear
armaments (highly unlikely);
Or make peace with the Palestinians and the entire Arab world, thereby disarming
the ayatollahs’ hostility to
But Netanyahu's actions show that, for him, keeping the
What better proof do we need of the craziness of this whole scare?