{"id":87117,"date":"2021-06-22T17:05:13","date_gmt":"2021-06-22T15:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=87117"},"modified":"2021-06-22T06:14:47","modified_gmt":"2021-06-22T04:14:47","slug":"02-05-65","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=87117","title":{"rendered":"CAROLINE GLICK: THE GREAT UNRAVELING"},"content":{"rendered":"<h5 style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.israelunwired.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"center alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.israelunwired.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/IsraelUnwired_logo_transparent-300x51-simple.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"35%\"><\/a><span style=\"text-decoration: underline; color: #000080;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #000080; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.israelunwired.com\/great-unraveling\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">CAROLINE GLICK: THE GREAT UNRAVELING<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Caroline Glick<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<hr style=\"height: 15px; background: #d0e6fa; width: 100%;\">\n<h4 style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #808080;\"><strong>Israel may soon abandon its diplomatic achievements because Yair Lapid and most of his partners in the new coalition want to erase the achievements of Benjamin Netanyahu.<\/strong><\/span><br \/>\n.<\/h4>\n<div id=\"content\" class=\"content-alignment\">\n<div id=\"watch-description\" class=\"yt-uix-button-panel\">\n<div id=\"watch-description-text\" style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/cv2oY92sRg4\" width=\"680\" height=\"400\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">.<br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000080;\">Over the past decade, for the first time in its history, Israel developed a strong diplomatic posture in the region and worldwide. Israel developed strategic ties with Arab states, and the states of the eastern Mediterranean. It has built close ties with the E.U.\u2019s Visegr\u00e1d Group of central European states, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, as well as Austria and Italy. Israel upgraded its diplomatic and trade relations with states in Africa and Central and South America, as well as with India, Japan and South Korea.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Unfortunately, it is likely that all Israel achieved through painstaking effort may be lost after the new governing coalition led by Yair Lapid takes power. This is the case for three reasons.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">First, Benjamin Netanyahu is the author of Israel\u2019s diplomatic triumphs. They are predicated on his foreign-policy vision that diplomatic ties are built on common interests even more than ideology and that Israel has much to offer the nations of the world. There are many things that divide the members of the incoming governing coalition, but they agree on one thing\u2014they all hate Netanyahu. So, the first reason Israel may soon abandon its diplomatic achievements is because Lapid and most of his partners in the coalition want to erase Netanyahu\u2019s accomplishments.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The second reason Israel\u2019s diplomatic position is likely to soon crash is that Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz along with most of their partners do not share Netanyahu\u2019s diplomatic vision. Lapid is set to become foreign minister. Lapid, Gantz and the rest of the members of the incoming coalition are members of Israel\u2019s elite class.Subscribe to The JNS Daily Syndicate by email and never miss our top stories<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Israel\u2019s elite encompasses the political left, the media, the senior brass of the security establishment and the senior leadership of the foreign and justice ministries, and right-wingers who prefer their company and plaudits to those of members of their own camp. Israel\u2019s elites, almost to a man, believe Israel\u2019s diplomatic position is exclusively a function of its relations with the Beltway establishment. The closer Israel is to the American ruling class, the stronger it is internationally. The weaker Israel\u2019s relations with the American elite, the weaker its international posture.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The third reason Israel\u2019s decade of diplomatic achievements is likely to end in short order is that as America-obsessed elitists, Lapid, Gantz and their ilk don\u2019t understand the importance or potential of what Netanyahu has accomplished. They will not dedicate the necessary resources to maintain the ties he forged with the likes of Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz or Brazil\u2019s President Javier Bolsonaro, because they don\u2019t value those ties. So the ties will wither.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">This then brings us to Washington, the only place that matters for the incoming cabinet ministers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">On Monday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken testified before House and Senate committees. His remarks showed that just as Lapid and his colleagues are set to tear down Netanyahu\u2019s legacy, President Joe Biden, Blinken and their advisers have taken an industrial-sized eraser to Donald Trump\u2019s policies and achievements in the Middle East.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Take the Golan Heights. In 2019, Trump recognized Israel\u2019s sovereignty over the strategic enclave along its borders with Syria and Jordan. When asked whether the Biden administration also recognizes Israel\u2019s sovereignty, Blinken responded, \u201cAs a practical matter, Israel has control of the Golan Heights, irrespective of its legal status, and that will have to remain unless and until things get to a point where Syria and everything operating out of Syria no longer poses a threat to Israel, and we are not anywhere near that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Or the shorter answer: No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Then there\u2019s Iran. Democrat senators on Monday joined their Republican colleagues in demanding clarifications about the administration\u2019s nuclear diplomacy with Iran. The 2015 nuclear deal, to which the administration is committed, placed temporary restrictions on Iran\u2019s nuclear activities and in exchange, gave Iran an open road to a military nuclear capability by 2030 and $150 billion in sanctions relief. Trump abandoned the deal in 2018 because Iran was breaching the deal\u2019s restrictions on its nuclear actions and reinstated U.S. economic sanctions that the Obama administration lifted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Democrat and Republican lawmakers asked how canceling U.S. economic sanctions on Iran would achieve the goal of limiting Iran\u2019s nuclear activities given that Tehran had been breaching the deal\u2019s limitations on its nuclear activities all along. They wanted to understand why Iran would agree to longer and stronger restrictions on its nuclear work in the future, as Blinken promises, if the 2015 deal gives them an open path to the bomb. And they wanted to know if Blinken could guarantee that money from sanctions relief wouldn\u2019t end up in the coffers of Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guard Corps.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Blinken responded to all of the questions with a non-sequitur.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">\u201cIts [Iran\u2019s nuclear] program is galloping forward. \u2026 The longer this goes on, the more the breakout time gets down. \u2026 It\u2019s now down, by public reports, to a few months at best. And if this continues, it will get down to a matter of weeks,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Blinken\u2019s alarmist view wasn\u2019t a preamble to a call for military strikes against Iran\u2019s nuclear installations or even for an announcement of a new strategy of maximum economic pressure aimed at collapsing the regime.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">To the contrary, Blinken said that in light of the dimensions and urgency of the threat, the United States needs to immediately return to the 2015 deal, that is, give Iran billions of dollars in sanctions relief, to \u201cput the nuclear problem in a box.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">In plain English, Blinken said that the senators\u2019 concerns were irrelevant. The administration\u2019s policy goal is not to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power and a regional hegemon. The administration\u2019s goal is to be Iran\u2019s friend.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Just days before Blinken renounced U.S. recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and said the goal of U.S. policy towards Iran is to be the ayatollahs\u2019 friend even if that means letting Iran become a nuclear-armed regional hegemon, he met his \u201cfriend\u201d Benny Gantz at the State Department. Clearly, the meeting made no impression on Blinken. If Gantz had hoped that \u201cgood chemistry\u201d with the Biden crowd would make it possible for him to influence them, he was doubtlessly disappointed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Sometime in 2014, Netanyahu realized that then-president Barack Obama and his team\u2014which is now Biden\u2019s team\u2014had no intention of preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed hegemonic power. He reacted to this realization by spending the last eight years developing an interest-based alliance with the Arab Gulf states who are also threatened by Iran.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The Trump administration welcomed this alliance. The Biden administration is so hostile to it that Biden opened an offensive against Saudi Arabia immediately after he entered office. The administration refuses to call the Abraham Accords by their name. And during Hamas\u2019s recent mini-war against Israel, the administration reportedly pressured Abraham Accords member states the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco to condemn Israel\u2019s efforts to destroy Hamas\u2019s missile capabilities. There is no doubt that Netanyahu spent long hours working to ensure that no such condemnations were made.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Facing the administration\u2019s visceral hostility to Israel\u2019s ties with the Sunni Arab states, Lapid, Gantz and their colleagues will be far less likely to move heaven and earth to maintain them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Then there\u2019s Jerusalem. Last Monday, 16 Republican senators signed a letter to Biden expressing their opposition to the administration\u2019s plan to open a consulate in Jerusalem for the Palestinian Authority and to reopen the PLO\u2019s representative office in Washington. They explained that Trump closed the consulate as required by the Jerusalem Embassy Act. He closed the PLO office in D.C. because it operated in breach of the Promoting Justice and Security for Victims of Terrorism Act, otherwise known as the Taylor Force Act. Opening a consulate in Jerusalem and reopening the PLO office in Washington would both be contrary to U.S. law, they noted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">While the senators were doubtlessly right, the administration is committed to following through on its plan. The only way Biden and his advisers may feel compelled to change course is if their efforts are met with trenchant opposition.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">It won\u2019t get any from Lapid\u2019s coalition. Labor leader and incoming transportation minister Merav Michaeli said last week she intends to cancel 1.5 billion shekels ($462 million) now budgeted for improving roads in Judea and Samaria. Ra\u2019am leader Mansour Abbas is ideologically aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood. Not only will he not oppose opening a consulate to the P.A. in Jerusalem, he might attend the opening of a U.S. diplomatic mission in Israel\u2019s capital that is dedicated to serving Israel\u2019s Palestinian enemies.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">One of Israel\u2019s greatest diplomatic assets in recent years has been the close ties it cultivated with E.U. member states led by nationalist leaders. Time after time, these leaders blocked efforts by the E.U. leadership in Brussels to condemn Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The leader who has done the most to block E.U. condemnations of Israel has been Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">The most outspoken critic of ties between Jerusalem and Budapest has been Lapid. When Orb\u00e1n came to Israel on an official visit, Lapid referred to the event as a \u201cnational disgrace,\u201d because Orb\u00e1n has expressed admiration for Hungary\u2019s wartime leader and Nazi collaborator Admiral Horthy. Like the heads of the U.S. Jewish community with whom he is closely allied, Lapid is deeply hostile to European nationalist leaders despite their enthusiastic support for Israel. As foreign minister, Lapid is likely to harpoon Israel\u2019s ties to the Visegr\u00e1d Group and so destroy Israel\u2019s ability to prevent E.U. condemnations of Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">What about Naftali Bennett? Where will the prime minister-designate be in all of this? Even in the unlikely event that Bennett will want to maintain Netanyahu\u2019s policies, he won\u2019t have the power to do so. Although in theory the government is supposed to give equal weight to its right and left-wing members, it is hard to see how this will manifest itself in practice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Avigdor Lieberman\u2019s Yisrael Beiteinu party is still considered a right-wing party, but Lieberman has adopted the left\u2019s positions on nearly every issue. It is hard to imagine that he would side with Bennett on anything controversial, particularly if it involves maintaining Netanyahu\u2019s legacy. And even if Lieberman sides with Bennett, they won\u2019t have the power to force Lapid to do anything he doesn\u2019t want to do. At best, they will be able to block him from doing some things that they don\u2019t want him to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">If Bennett decides to act independently as prime minister on behalf of Jerusalem, or the Golan Heights, or blocking Iran from getting the bomb, or anything at all that Lapid and the left oppose, he will find himself raked over the coals by his coalition partners and the media. Without a political base, Bennett\u2014like his fellow right-winger New Hope Party leader Gideon Sa\u2019ar\u2014will quickly be presented with two options. He can either adopt the ideological positions of the left, as Ehud Olmert, Tzipi Livni and Ariel Sharon did before him, or he can bring down the government and leave public life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">It has taken the Biden administration less than six months to unravel Trump\u2019s achievements in Israel and the wider Middle East. We can expect the incoming government to unravel Israel\u2019s diplomatic position on their first day in power.<\/span><\/p>\n<hr>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #808080;\"><em>This article first appeared in<strong> Israel Hayom<\/strong>.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<hr style=\"height: 15px; background: #d0e6fa; width: 100%;\">\n<div id=\"content\" class=\"content-alignment\">\n<div id=\"watch-description\" class=\"yt-uix-button-panel\">\n<div id=\"watch-description-text\" style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<p><em>Zawarto\u015b\u0107 publikowanych artyku\u0142\u00f3w i materia\u0142\u00f3w nie reprezentuje pogl\u0105d\u00f3w ani opinii Reunion&#8217;68,<\/em><em><br \/>\nani te\u017c webmastera Blogu Reunion&#8217;68, chyba ze jest to wyra\u017anie zaznaczone.<br \/>\nTwoje uwagi, linki, w\u0142asne artyku\u0142y lub wiadomo\u015bci prze\u015blij na adres:<br \/>\n<\/em><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong><em><a style=\"color: #000080;\" href=\"mailto:webmaster@reunion68.com\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">webmaster@reunion68.com<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<hr style=\"width: 100%;\">\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CAROLINE GLICK: THE GREAT UNRAVELING Caroline Glick Israel may soon abandon its diplomatic achievements because Yair Lapid and most of his partners in the new coalition want to erase the achievements of Benjamin Netanyahu. . . Over the past decade, for the first time in its history, Israel developed a strong diplomatic posture in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87117"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=87117"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87126,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87117\/revisions\/87126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=87117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=87117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=87117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}