Israel and the Bin Laden
assassination By Victor Kotsev
TEL AVIV - Much was written about the
Osama bin Laden assassination in the past week.
The larger-than-life arch-terrorist sparked the
imaginations of many, and each in a different way.
To the West he was a monster, even a bit of a
Frankenstein who turned against his former patrons
(lest we call them creators) of the United States
Central Intelligence Agency and spread a radical
ideology of hatred and violence with bone-chilling
success. To many Arabs - including the
Palestinian militant movement Hamas - he was a
"martyr" and a "holy warrior". To some, such as
his former bodyguards, he was a charismatic
Arsenal fan who quoted Charles de Gaulle and had a
passion for natural remedies. [1] To others, for
example to certain Iranian politicians, he was a
"Zionist stooge". [2]
Similarly to most
Americans, most Israelis on the street greeted the
news of Bin Laden's death with sincere joy. After
all, the late
al-Qaeda leader was one of
the bitterest enemies of the Jewish state. A
laconic "Finally!" was among the most common
reactions. On a political level, the event is far
more ambiguous, as it could herald a showdown
between newly-empowered United States President
Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu; nevertheless, no Israeli politician
could afford to be seen as regretting it.
"The state of Israel shares the American
nation's joy on this historic day," Netanyahu
reportedly told Obama right after the operation.
"This is a ringing victory for justice, freedom
and the values shared by all democratic nations
fighting determinedly shoulder to shoulder against
terrorism."
Netanyahu certainly gained an
argument once Obama pulled out the six-shooter.
The Israeli prime minister was preaching against
terrorism before any American administration
became fully aware of its dangers; back in 1995,
he even wrote a book
on how to combat it. When he arrives in Washington
in less than two weeks' time, we should look for
"I told you so" undertones in his rhetoric. Before
the raid on Bin Laden's Pakistan hideout, the
American president, dubbed by some "no-drama
Obama", was widely perceived as soft and
conciliatory vis-a-vis terrorists and their state
patrons.
The Pakistan raid speaks
particularly poignantly to the policy of targeted
assassinations against Palestinian militants that
Israel has intermittently pursued for over a
decade (indeed all the way since the 1972 Munich
massacre by Black September terrorists). During
the second intifada (Palestinian uprising), in
particular, Israel killed hundreds of Palestinian
terrorists and leaders in this way, drawing
significant international condemnation (a case
that stands out is the assassination of
wheelchair-confined Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin in
2004, which also killed a number of bystanders).
Prominent American pro-Israeli commentator
and lawyer Alan Dershowitz argues that the Bin
Laden killing "vindicated" Israel's own targeted
assassinations program. [3] An Israeli right-wing
academic, Professor Rafi Israeli, even suggests a
new strategy to the country's leaders:
When we are accused, smeared and
slandered, we should dare to complain, openly
compare our actions with those of others
fighting terror, and initiate debates in the UN
general assembly, Security Council, and Human
Rights Council, even if we don't achieve
immediately success. If we bombard them with our
arguments and present evidence to all,
ultimately something will be grasped by global
public opinion, where we are used to retreat,
apologize and defend ourselves.
The
argument that the killing will bring Israel's
position closer to the US's is bolstered by other
circumstances such as the effects of the Arab
uprisings in general, and the intra-Palestinian
reconciliation in particular. Israeli analysts
have long argued that after a number of "friendly"
dictators were exposed as unpopular tyrants, and,
what is worse geopolitically, unstable partners,
the American administration would have no choice
but to recognize Israel as its only firm ally in
the region.
After the Fatah-Hamas
reconciliation accord, moreover, the White House
has come under increasing pressure from the US
Congress to cut aid to the Palestinian Authority
and, in effect, to show stronger support for
Israel. [4]
However, all this is only half
the story. An ultimate nightmare scenario for
mainstream Israeli observers involves the
possibility of Obama winning a second term. With
the wave of domestic excitement that the Bin Laden
operation generated, that possibility just became
a whole lot more possible.
While the
president is in the middle of an election
campaign, this narrative goes, and especially if
he is perceived as losing, we cannot expect him to
put sufficient pressure on Israel to make critical
concessions to the Palestinians. If he gets
re-elected, however, and can no longer seek
another term, this is another story.
There
is a long tradition of American presidents leaving
more controversial policies for their second
mandates - Jimmy Carter, for example, plotted to
open up to Cuba and even to seek a comprehensive
Middle East settlement in the second term that
never materialized. Then-Israeli prime minister
Menachem Begin narrowly managed to deflect the
massive pressure during Carter's first term, by
agreeing to withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula and
signing a separatist peace treaty with Egypt.
Obama has often been compared to Carter,
and his current stint in office similarly involved
a series of skirmishes with the Israeli prime
minister (see my article US-Israeli
spat plants seeds of crisis, Asia Times
Online, March 23, 2010). Ultimately, he backed off
(more specifically, he stopped insisting publicly
on a full Israeli settlement construction halt),
but should he win another term, this will most
likely prove only a tactical retreat.
It
is unclear if a single bold stroke, such as the
Bin Laden operation, will be enough to reverse the
quagmire in which the US finds itself in in the
Middle East. With the new popularity come also
greater expectations, and Obama has not been
handling the Arab revolutions - let alone the wars
in Afghanistan and Iraq - in a very coherent way
so far. In a particularly lucid analysis in
Israeli daily Ha'aretz, Ari Shavit predicts that
Egypt will implode before the year is over, and
outlines four major challenges facing Obama in the
Middle East.
"The summer of 2011 is the
summer of Barack Hussein Obama," Shavit concludes.
"If he does not stabilize the Middle East this
summer, a regional avalanche will take place by
summer's end. Obama will bear personal
responsibility if the Arab spring turns into a
cold and bleak winter." [5]
Things look a
bit murky right now, even as American voters have
been known to re-elect widely unpopular presidents
who make major foreign policy blunders (what
better proof of that than George W Bush's
re-election in 2004). In any case, Obama enjoys at
least a temporary position of strength, and some
prominent analysts speculate that renewed American
pressure on Netanyahu will already start to
manifest itself during the latter's upcoming trip
to Washington. In what can be interpreted as an
early evasive maneuver, the Israeli prime minister
recently announced that he might even support a
Palestinian state "under the right conditions".
[6]
"During his visit to Washington in
less than three weeks, Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu will meet an American administration
which is credited by the free world with the
killing of the arch terrorist Osama bin Laden," a
recent Ha'aretz editorial reads. "... In his
address before congress, after congratulating
President Obama on his important achievement
against terrorism, Netanyahu must present a
serious and credible Israeli peace initiative."
Another, seemingly less-related front that
is silently heating up in the region is the
standoff with Iran. It is unclear that Bin Laden's
assassination means much to the Israeli-Iranian
confrontation in particular, even though Netanyahu
attempted to ride that wave by announcing that
following the terrorist's demise, Iranian supreme
leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was "the biggest
threat to peace in the world". [7] Moreover, as
David Goldman of Asia Times Online has argued, the
assassination probably has a strong bearing on the
Iranian-Saudi Arabian front. [8]
There has
been some renewed, if muted, debate about a
possible Israeli attack on Iran recently, even
though most analysts don't see it as a realistic
possibility. On Friday, influential former Mossad
chief Meir Dagan came out publicly against such a
strike, calling it "the stupidest thing I have
ever heard". [9]
Another influential
Israeli official, Defense Minister Ehud Barak,
also made recent comments to the effect that he
did not believe Iran would ever drop a nuclear
bomb on Israel. Prior to these comments, Barak was
perceived as an ardent hawk on Iran.
Despite the apparent lack of appetite of
the Israeli leadership for military action against
the Islamic Republic, and despite the staggering
logistical challenges such an operation would
pose, some analysts contend that practically all
daring Israeli operations in the past have been
preceded by campaigns of mixed messages and
disinformation. Against the background of
deepening political strife inside Iran, [10] it
would make sense for any foreign power that wishes
to intervene to at least wait a while;
nevertheless, it is important to at least consider
the possibility that the Bin Laden's assassination
is a marker of a broader American policy change,
perhaps including in some way Iran.
Overall, the much-publicized American
commando raid in Pakistan will most likely
contribute significantly to the overall impact of
the Arab revolts on Israeli foreign policy. Its
impact, however, will be mixed, and carries
dangers as well as opportunities. For now,
Netanyahu is keeping his cards close to his chest,
and the earliest certain clue that we can expect
will come during his speech before the US Congress
on May 20.
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
