Spring Break
Sharon has blundered
Josh Schellenberg
Issue date: 10/29/04 Section: Commentary
For the United States, the biggest news of the week, perhaps of the year, has absolutely nothing to do with the presidential election. This breaking story involves another vote - a decision made by the Israeli parliament. On Tuesday night, Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, won a vote that approved his plan to remove all Israeli settlements from Gaza in Palestine. After much tension, including 17 hours of impassioned debate over a two-day period, the decision to dismantle all Israeli settlements in Gaza passed with a vote of 67 to 45.
Sharon, a hardened veteran of the appalling, seemingly endless Israeli-Palestinian conflict, called it the most important vote of his political career. If Sharon considers this the most important decision he has ever made, then it will no doubt have a profound impact on the U.S., as we are Israel's closest ally.
It is nearly unbelievable how the U.S. has become burdened by chaos in the Middle East and Islamic extremists because of our relationship with Israel - a nation not even the size of New Jersey. To understand how such a small country can have such a profound geopolitical impact, it is important to understand some key historical events that brought us to this point.
After World War II, the demand for a Jewish state increased because of the atrocities that took place in Europe during the Holocaust against the Jews. To meet those demands, in 1947, the United Nations established a Jewish state in Palestine. The establishment of Israel infuriated the Arab world because the land was siezed and many Palestinians were forced to become refugees. However, at this point in history, the anger was directed mainly toward Britain and France because they were responsible for the U.N. decision and other shortsighted policies in the Middle East.
The U.S. began to inherit the burden of Arab hatred toward the West during the war in Lebanon, a nation to the north of Israel. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon to root out the presence of Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). At this time, Lebanon was in the thick of a civil war between the Christian minority and the Arab majority.
Sharon, a hardened veteran of the appalling, seemingly endless Israeli-Palestinian conflict, called it the most important vote of his political career. If Sharon considers this the most important decision he has ever made, then it will no doubt have a profound impact on the U.S., as we are Israel's closest ally.
It is nearly unbelievable how the U.S. has become burdened by chaos in the Middle East and Islamic extremists because of our relationship with Israel - a nation not even the size of New Jersey. To understand how such a small country can have such a profound geopolitical impact, it is important to understand some key historical events that brought us to this point.
After World War II, the demand for a Jewish state increased because of the atrocities that took place in Europe during the Holocaust against the Jews. To meet those demands, in 1947, the United Nations established a Jewish state in Palestine. The establishment of Israel infuriated the Arab world because the land was siezed and many Palestinians were forced to become refugees. However, at this point in history, the anger was directed mainly toward Britain and France because they were responsible for the U.N. decision and other shortsighted policies in the Middle East.
The U.S. began to inherit the burden of Arab hatred toward the West during the war in Lebanon, a nation to the north of Israel. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon to root out the presence of Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). At this time, Lebanon was in the thick of a civil war between the Christian minority and the Arab majority.