From Barbara Ginsberg’s Desktop
“KAHANE” MAGAZINE September 1976
Israel, US and the Stinking Fish
Rabbi Meir
Kahane
Many times I
have spoken of the Talmudic parable of the king, his servant, and the
fish. Never was it more apt. [Events of today between Bibi and Obama.]
Once there was
a king who sent his servant to buy a fish.
The servant returned with a fish that stank. In fury the king gave the servant a choice of
three punishments: “Eat the fish, get whipped for the fish, or pay for the
fish.” In common with most people, the
servant chose not to reach into his pocket and he decided to eat the stinking
fish but after two bites the stench made him give up and he decided to get
whipped for it. The pain of the lashes,
however, made him stop that, too, and he cried out, “I will pay for the fish!”
And so the fool
ate the fish, got whipped for the fish and, in the end, had to pay for it,
anyhow. Those in Israel and without, who
refuse to understand that nothing will deter America from demanding that Israel
make the maximum concessions, play the same fool. Those who do not understand that there is
nothing that Israel can possible do, that there are no compromises it can make,
that there is nothing short of full retreat to the 1967 borders that will
satisfy the United States-are the same fools as the servant who ate, got
whipped and in the end had to pay anyhow,
Their refusal
to make the difficult choice of telling the Americans “no”, now, at this
moment, will see them making the retreats they hope will avert American anger;
it will see this effort fail even as the frontier moves from its present lines
within the Arab heartland to new ones close to the Jewish cities; and most
important, the Americans will make the same demands they always have envisioned
since the days of the Roger Plan-total Israeli withdrawal. And since this is a thing that not even the
most dovish of Israelis will agree to, the result will be an ultimate Israeli
firm “no”, an ultimate American anger of the kind all men of “new
initiative” propose to avert today by compromise, and exactly the same
conditions of confrontation that would come anyhow if the Israelis said their “no”
today. There would be one great
difference, however, a “no” today will bring the crisis while Israel
stands poised near the Arab capitols. A “no”
tomorrow, after all the hapless and confused compromises and “initiatives,”
will bring the same crisis near Tel Aviv, Beersheva and Netanya.
This is what
happens when foolish and confused Israelis, by refusing to pay the price of
saying “no” to the stinking fish of pressure, attempt to eat it, submit
to getting beaten over it and then learn to their dismay that there is no
escape from the difficult decision that they should have made in the first
place.
Let the Israeli
government, its men of “new initiative” and the Jewish leaders in America
understand several basic axioms:
1) America is
committed to the Roger Plan and the world’s interpretation
of Security
Council Resolution 242, i.e. Israeli withdrawal from all (but insignificant)
parts of the lands of 1967. This
includes the Golan Heights, Gaza, the entire West bank and the entire Sinai as
well as changing Jerusalem’s present Jewish sovereignty status.
2) American
interests lie, in the minds of most officials in Washington, with
Arab oil, the huge potential Arab market and
with supplanting Soviet influence with American. This means, at best, an “even-handed” policy
rather than a pro-Israeli one.
3) America is
moving steadily to recognition of the “Palestinians” as a people
and of whomever
they decide to have as their leaders. Those leaders are clearly the PLO and
already the move to “moderate” the PLO, “public-relations-wise” is underway so
that Washington can more easily pressure Israel into recognizing them.
4) The
Ford-Kissinger administration is determined to prevent stagnation and
will pressure Israel into concession after
concession.
5) No
administration will got o war for Israel and no administration will continue
the present aid level no matter what Israel
does or concedes. The frantic search for human allies will end as
unsuccessfully as those Jews in the past who forgot what faith in the Jewish
G-d was and who turned to Egypt or Assyria or other “allies” for help, only to
learn to their dismay that the allies betrayed them.
Stinking fish
are not made to be eaten or to get whipped or.
One must have the courage to look at the truth and pay the bitter price
of honesty. America is tired of the
Israeli nuisance and wishes it would eat the fish already. The time to loudly proclaim “no” is
now.
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