By Jan Willem van der Hoeven

How in the world is it possible that people who claim to possess above average intelligence can be so destructive and so lacking in understanding? Is it their pride and arrogance that keeps them from seeing what should be clear to all:

That once, years ago, they articulated the baseless belief that there was a way out of the conflict via negotiations, and now, after a great many Israeli surrenders and painful sacrifices made in pursuit of a certain accommodation (not to call it peace) with the Palestinians, they find it nearly impossible to reverse their strongly-held opinions lest they be rewarded with “I told you so” by those they scorn as nitwits and crude Israeli patriots?

The psychological element, not the intellectual element, is often the reason Israel’s elites choose to go the way they do. They crave to belong to the “we know better” crowd – the politically correct one.

I despise this arrogance, this lack of moral courage to acknowledge the reality for what it is!

All the facts are crystal clear, and so obvious to those who have eyes with which they dare to see. I will name but a few reasons – enough to make anyone perceive the foolishness of the so-often-repeated mantra: that only through a two state solution can a solution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict be found.

It is not true. It is absolutely not true!

This is why:

1. In today’s situation, a major withdrawal from Judea and Samaria will field the same results as Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, where the Hizbollah and Hamas, respectively, seized control. Far from bringing peace, Israel’s abandonment will turn those areas into a terror-based state.
2. Sixty percent or more of the Palestinians – according to a recently published poll – want not a two state solution but a one state solution whereby, through the so called peace process, the sovereign Jewish State of Israel will be replaced with the State of Palestine.
3. Even were an agreement to be reached with the Palestinian Authority, it would only be to the advantage of Hamas, which already rules over the Gaza Strip – home to half the Palestinian population, and which will do everything in its power to penetrate the new Palestinian State in Judea and Samaria with its people – turning it into a third terrorist sphere on Israel’s doorstep.
4. Considering that the withdrawal from Gush Katif – under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and from Amona – by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert – brought Israel to the verge of a civil war, what would the uprooting of 200,000 plus Israeli men, women and children do to the fabric of the Israeli nation? It would wreak havoc!
5. If, however, the unthinkable were to happen as a result of the pressure brought to bear by the world – and here at home by the Israeli left: who would financially compensate all these Israeli settlers for their beautifully-constructed homes? At more than $200,000 per home times, say, 80,000, this would come to a horrendous $16 billion! Would Israel recompense its own people? Would the already bankrupt USA? Who would reimburse the people for all they would lose? Despite its many promises, Israel’s government has yet to fully compensate the “mere” 9000 Israelis who were driven forcefully out of their Gaza homes. And now we’re talking about nearly a quarter of a million people!
6. Israel’s main sweet water supply, apart from the overused Sea of Galilee, lies under the Samarian and Judean mountains. Should these become part of a future Palestine, the “water price” Israel’s population will have to pay in the coastal plain of Tel Aviv, Ashdod, Ashkelon, etc. will be enormous, to the detriment also of millions of more moderate and peace loving Israelis. Who will supply this, the majority of Israel’s population, with enough water once Israel has left the Samarian mountain range?
7. After all Israel’s concessions since the days of the OSLO accords, and the subsequent painful willingness of Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert to cede more than 93% of the “occupied territories” to the Palestinians, the Arabs’ response has always, only, been refusal. WHAT peace is then possible? Even now PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas remains adamant that he will NEVER accept a Jewish democratic state alongside his Palestine. Nor will Jerusalem, Ariel, Maaleh Adumim or Gush Etzion be able to remain inside Israel. All Palestinian refugees MUST be able to return to their original homes; and his future Palestinian state must be ‘judenrein.’ So what peace is then POSSIBLE, dear Israeli left?
8. With the very close cooperation today between Iran and the Hizbollah in Lebanon, and Iran and the Hamas in Gaza, together with the rapidly changing Muslim environment around Israel, from Turkey to Egypt, and the threatened peace even with Jordan, can we even imagine the danger an Islamic Palestinian State would pose, just 20 miles from Israel’s main population centers of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa? Certainly this would spell the end of any security for Israel. As Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin once said, “A Palestinian state will arise on the ruins of the State of Israel.”
9. Further: Without the mountain range of Judea and Samaria, Israel will be physically indefensible – without any of the strategic depth that is essential for her existence. On top of that, the heights overlooking Ben Gurion International Airport could easily be used to fire even shoulder-launched rockets at incoming airliners, destroying Israel’s essential tourism industry with a single blow.
10. For the more than nine million Jews still living in an increasingly anti-Semitic and dangerous world, there will no longer be enough space or territory to make ALIYAH to. Israel, in a foolish, self-destructive rush for peace at any cost, will have made the most painful concession – giving away the last piece of land where Jews, if they needed it, would be able to find a home and safety! That’s the reward for the self-destructive intellect of those who claim they have it!

And you still say that those who are FOR a Palestinian Muslim state are in their right minds?

Jan Willem van der Hoeven, Director

International Christian Zionist Center