Spengler notes that the readings from the Torah this past week included the story of the 12 spies sent by Moses to scout out the Promised Land. Joshua and Caleb argued that an invasion by the Israelites would succeed. The other ten outvoted them, which resulted in another 40 years of wandering in the desert.
Whether such cowardice infects Israel’s current leadership, its timidity in handling events leading up to the flotilla raid certainly made matters worse.
If Israel had denounced the matter as a provocation and withdrawn its ambassador from Turkey, warning that the object of the exercise was to provoke violence and open the way for weapons deliveries to Hamas, the outcome might have been quite different.
But Israel seems to have been confused. Its denunciation of the attempt to deliver weapons to Gaza under the guise of humanitarian aid lacked teeth. Gaza is a launching pad for missiles aimed at Israeli citizens. It does not need humanitarian aid according to the United Nations Middle East envoy.
Israel then apparently downplayed the threat, sending too few troops insufficiently armed to intercept the flotilla.
In short, the Gaza flotilla caper was the invention of an organization with deep ties to terrorist financing of Hamas to ameliorate a humanitarian problem that doesn’t exist while refusing an Israeli offer to deliver its aid to Gaza. We know the outcome: Israeli naval commandos carrying paintball guns encountered armed resistance and suffered injuries, and ultimately used their weapons to defend themselves. Israeli authorities say nine were killed, while activist groups said 19 were unaccounted for.
The absence of decisive action resulted in incremental escalation – a phenomenon that repeats itself with boring regularity.
The Islamist government of Turkey is now firmly allied with Iran. Europe is engaged in its customary anti-Israel rhetoric, and Obama’s America has noisily forsworn any notion of using force. Israel has few options remaining:
Whether Israel has the wherewithal to set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions for a number of years is a matter of debate; it almost certain could do so with tactical nuclear weapons launched from its submarines now in the Persian Gulf. It would have to combine an air attack on Iran with a ground assault on Hezbollah’s forces in southern Lebanon. In the best of cases a decisive victory against Hezbollah might cost the lives of perhaps 3,000 infantrymen, not to mention the lives of civilians caught in a rocket bombardment. It would have to have sufficient resources to frighten Syria away from intervening, or, if necessary, to reduce Syria’s armed forces. If the war plan went awry, casualties might be far greater.
As America abandons allies and retreats into the sophistry that the world can be made safer by softer rhetoric and a lack of resolve, others more ruthless are sure to fill the void. And someone, if not everyone, is going to pay a terrible price.
Carolyn Glick adds a useful analysis of the information war being fought against Israel.
In view of all of this, it is clear that the information strategy for contending with the flotilla was ill-conceived. Rather than attack Turkey for its facilitation of terrorism, and openly prepare charge sheets against the flotilla’s organizers, crew and passengers for their facilitation of terrorism in breach of both domestic law and international law, the information efforts were largely concentrated on irrelevancies. Officials detailed all the humanitarian assistance Israel has provided Hamas-controlled Gaza. They spoke of the navy’s commitment to use nonlethal force to take over the ships.
And now, in the aftermath of the lethal takeover of the flotilla, Israel’s leaders stammer. Rather than demand an apology from the Turkish government for its support for these terrorists, Defense Minister Ehud Barak called his Turkish counterpart to talk over what happened. Rather than demand restitution for the terrorist assault against IDF troops, Israel has defended its troops’ training in nonviolent crowd control.
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