1. Chen said:

Just a case of damage control for Bush. Pipes obviously is now more interested in boosting the guy who gave him his coveted position then telling the truth.

Bottom line:

Even those we think are immune to political agendas....ARE NOT. Who does Pipes think he is fooling anyway?

2. Ted Belman said:

Omri

I tip my hat to you. It takes courage to come on Israpundit and go againsat the flow. I respect you for that. You also exhibit a great deal of knowledge as to the facts and reality and as we both know that takes a lot of time. I am with you in seeing Sharon in a more positive light then many of our cohorts on the right do. To my mind, Sharon knows more then anyone about the reality of the Palestinians and of the US/Israeli relations. He elected to make a bold move not because he thinks it bad for Israel but because he thinks it will be good for Israel. Sharon is a man of action. He calculated the situation and came to a conclusion that many don't like. I don't like attacking his motives or interity. The Disengagement Plan must be viewed on its merits. In that regard we know that a person's disposition often determines their decisions. That's why the US Senate is so careful who they appoint to the SC. Although most people on this site, myself included, don't like the decision and think it is the wrong thing to do. But the fact remains that Sharon knows more than we do and may turn out top be right. I hope he is right.

3. Jeff Benson said:

"desperate gamble?!?" An old "warrior" pushing 80, elected on a platform precisely opposed to taking "desperate gambles" with Israel's security, finds out that things "look different" from the plush PM's chair, and "changes his mind." So, arrogantly, full of hubris, and leading his lapdog fellow-traveler pseudo-Likudniks in expressing contempt for the people who put him in this office -- because he knows best how to save Israel -- Sharon is taking a "desperate gamble?!" with Israel's security???

This is not a leader. If Sharon is too old and tired to fight the battle (Good God, he's parroting the Europeans and State department talking about how the palestinian arabs have no 'hope'!) he should stop bulldozing and destroying and retire to his ranch.

His campaign slogan began "Only Sharon..." Anyone who thinks he's the only one with the answer is a gambler who's going to lose -- lose big.

4. Cosmic X said:

I think that Pipes is correct. "Disengagement" (Orwellian for the destruction of the Jewish communittees in the Gaza Strip) is a boost for terrorists the world over. Israel which was once a beackon to the world in its refusal to negotiate with terrorists, has become the world's leading encourager of terror through this current unconditional surrender to terror.

5. Felix Quigley said:

I disagree with Ted completely on the above when he writes:

"To my mind, Sharon knows more then anyone about the reality of the Palestinians and of the US/Israeli relations. He elected to make a bold move not because he thinks it bad for Israel but because he thinks it will be good for Israel. Sharon is a man of action. He calculated the situation and came to a conclusion that many don't like. I don't like attacking his motives or interity."

I think it is absolutely vital to attack his integrity, his motives and to attack this man from every possible angle.

The issue with Sharon, to my mind, is that he is a man of silence, and wiith that silence he is a liar and indeed as I state below a traitor to the Jews. This may come a bit brash coming from an Irishman who is non-Jewish, in fact an atheist, definitely no right-wing either. But I have learned that this is an issue for all people on this earth.

I am amazed that people like Ted do not condemn this man. You really have to stand all the way with the Jewish people of Gaza. You have to stand completely with the youth who face Sharons picked police and soldiers.

I think that Sharon really is a traitor of the worst kind. Part of this treachery is that he is a liar of the worst type. A man who campaigns in an election on a definite programme, then afterwards refuses to resign when he loses the support of his party, then expels cabinet members for opposing him, then forms a coalition with the Peres enemy (note Peres is NOT left wing, he is the remanants of Stalinist Mapai´), then threatens settlers that they lose every material possession if they remain, then comes on TV yesterday appearing all sympathetic to the settlers...this is a man of extreme evil.

I have just written the following to a website in Ireland and every word I have written below will be attacked by anti-Israelites in our wonderful Emerald Isle, so not going with the flow here. I think it applies in this discussion:

"...Now to a Judenfrei Gaza, then to a Palestine state campaigned for by Bush and Blair of the British "Labour" Party.

Will this "Palestinian" state live in peace with a truncated Israel? As I keep repeating the answer is there for all to read - in the constitutions of the Fatah and Hamas organisations.

Immediately Gaza will be a breeding ground for Islamic terror and not just directed against Israel, but primarily of course against Israel for these are complete Jew-haters, having been set up in the first place by that notorious Nazi Hajj Amin el Husseini. "Palestinianism" is a recent concoction, coming just at the time that the Arabs attacked in 1967 and were then militarily defeated. The Occupation came about because of Arab invasion in the first place. And what has changed?

So those people on this site who have campaigned in print for a Judenfrei Gaza, then bring on the Palestinian State and watch what happens.

Meanwhile Sharon will go down in Jewish history as the greatest traitor the Jews have ever had. But Sharon really expresses a terrible sickness at the top of Israeli society which can not be easily solved and which will be exploited to the full by Bush and Blair in the months ahead."

That is what I wrote. In a sense the issue is not simply about Israel, the issue is being watched around the world. We all know now and especially after the Yugoslavian experience that we face a media that is made up of liars and distorters.

There is also a kind of relativism in saying that Sharon is NOT responsible, that he is under pressure from the US and Blair. Sharon is a great traitor and if we do not grasp that reality then we will get hopelessly confused.

6. gerog von mecklenburg said:

Ted Belman:

Your "reverse" comments really bother me. For some time now your attitude was definitely against this new deployment against the forced evacuation of the Israeli settlers from Gaza, and now one day into the Aktion you are supporting Sharon. What gives?

Do you honestly think that negotiating with terrorists really works? Do you think that giving money, land and prestige will make these killers " see the light " and put their weapons down and pick up the impliments of peace? What planet do you live on? Have you ever been to Israel? Have you seen the bombed out busses and cafes?

At this point, Sharon should have expelled the million or so Palestinains from Gaza and not the other way around. TransJordan is the Palestine of the Balfour Declaration, that is the land east of the Jordan River. Let the Palestinians live there in peace, not in Israel or in the so called West Bank.

Before you grovel and bow down to your new idol Arial Sharon, take a good hard look at the events since Oslo. Then re-read Sharons background and past. Especially his lifelong admiration for the Israeli Communist/Stalinist left, then draw your own conclusions.

There are many on this forum that are so called right wing...I personally do not think that is the case. There are many who see the reality of this tragic situation. You cannot give away land, money, or even food to an enemy that is hell bent on your destruction. You either educate the poor bastard, or prepare to kill him. You cannot love him with the expectation that he will turn his other cheek. It just will not happen, nor has it ever happened.

7. Laura said:

When I read that article, I didn't buy Pipes' version of how the Gaza withdrawal idea came into being, I'm sure it was pressure from Washington. Pipes of course is a good guy and I enjoy reading his columns, but remember he works for the administration, Bush appointed him to some panel I forget the name of. So his whitewash of the White House role in the Gaza withdrawal should be taken with a grain of salt.

8. t said:

Belman you waffle like a school girl. First against disengagement then for it then against it? First of all you have to stop refering to the Arabs of the land as "Palestinian" next you have to call the territories by their correct names,Judea and Samaria.

9. j pike said:

Dr. Daniel Pipes does not(as Laura wrote)'work for the Bush administration'. On the contrary, an examination of Dr.Pipes writing will show that he does not hesitate to criticise administration policies which he finds mistaken or misguided.

One such example is his article, "Let Iraqis Run Iraq" and states that:"the mission in Iraq will end in failure. I predict that unhappy outcome not due to shortcomings on the American side but by calculating the US motivation for being there versus the Iraqi motivation to remove them..." http://www.danielpipes.org/article/1281

Dr. Pipes is the director of the Middle East Forum, an independent think thank dedicated 'to promoting American interests' and was called "The most authoritive commentator on the Middle East today' by the Wall Street Journal.In the above posting Laura mistakenly referred to a "panel" which Dr.Pipes had been appointed to which she 'forgot the name of'. In 2003 Dr.Pipes was appointed by President Bush to the board of the (semigovernmental) United States Institute of Peace and his term ended in 2004. He also became a whistleblower when the USIP organised an event which was contrary to national security interests entitled,"The USIP Stumbles". http://www.danielpipes.org/article/1659

As for 'whitewashing the White House role in the Gaza withdrawal", just today, Dr.Pipe's wrote in his blog that:"It may be a hard pill for some to swallow- but Israel makes it's own destiny". http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/441