Israel Election Results Defies Pundits; Indicate Victory For The Center

TIP Press Release: Exit Polls Predict
Reinforced Israeli Center

January 22, 2013 Contact: TIP Press: press@theisraelproject.org Main Office Phone Number:  202-857-6644 Incumbent PM Netanyahu's center-right Likud tops vote Centrist Yesh Atid surges to second place, expected to become coalition partner Center-left Labor party set to lead opposition All three top parties share two-state commitment

New Indications Hezbollah To Be Implicated In Bulgarian Terrorist Attack On Israelis

On Friday I posted about Mixed Signals on Bulgarian Terrorist Report, where Israeli TV reported about a secret visit by the Bulgarian Foreign Minister to share results of its investigation indicating Hezbollah was behind the terrorist attack last July -- while Bulgaria claimed the ministry was visiting to discuss the marking of the upcoming 70th anniversary since the rescuing of the Bulgarian Jews.

Now the Lebanese Daily Star is reporting Bulgaria has evidence linking Hezbollah to Burgas bombing:

Bulgaria has informed European officials of evidence implicating Hezbollah in last year’s attack on an Israeli bus at the Black Sea airport of Burga, Al-Hayat, quoting a source, reported Tuesday.

The paper, quoting what it described as a “European source,” reported that Bulgaria’s interior minister informed his European counterparts during a closed-door meeting last Thursday of evidence collected by authorities indicating Hezbollah’s involvement in the July 18 bomb attack.

Al-Hayat is reporting that a news conference will be held next week, where the Bulgarian minister will discuss the investigation. Ideally, that is when the results of the probe will be made official.

If the results point, as expected, to Hezbollah as being behind the terrorist attack, it would make it difficult for the EU to continue refusing to blacklist Hezbollah as a terrorist group after it had carried out such an attack on European soil.

As it is, the EU is expected to discuss blacklisting Hezbollah next month.

Approving such a move will be one more strike against the Iranian proxy -- and by extension, against Iran as well, especially as it is unlikely Hezbollah would make such a move without the backing and approval of Iran.

Combined with the expected fall of the Assad regime in Syria -- despite the efforts of both Iran and Hezbollah to help with the murderous crackdown -- the pariah status of Hezbollah would be a blow to Iran's attempt to extend its influence.

More will be known after next week's news conference.

Barry Rubin on Israel's Election: A Preliminary Analysis

The following is reposted with permission:

Barry Rubin offers his preliminary analysis on the results of the Israeli Election:

As expected, Israel has once again made Benjamin Netanyahu its prime minister. The results were not as positive for him as they might have been but are good enough to reelect him.

While some might find this paradoxical, the results show that Israelis have a basic consensus and yet have very different ways of expressing their political positions. This isn’t surprising given the fact that 32 parties were on the ballot.

First, though, a myth that has at times become a propaganda campaign should be exposed. There were numerous reports in the Western media that the Israeli electorate was going far to the right, didn’t want peace, and that Israeli democracy was in jeopardy. None of this had any real basis in fact and the election results show these claims to be false.

The main story of the election was supposed to be the rise of the far right Ha-Bayit ha-Yahudi Party. In fact, though, it received only about 10 percent of the vote which is usual for that sector. In comparison, about one-third went to liberal or moderate left parties, and about one-quarter to centrist parties.

According to reports which are not final but are close to the ultimate result, Netanyahu’s Likud-Beitaynu list received 31 of 120 seats. The Labor Party made some comeback with 17 but came in third. Labor’s hope that its showing would make Israel a mainly two-party system clearly failed.

The big winner was Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid with 19 that became the second largest party, while Tsipi Livni’s party obtained 7. The appeal of Lapid and Livni are precisely that nobody really knows what they stand for but it is certainly nothing to either extreme.

In other words, 26 seats went to vaguely reformist somewhat centrist or mildly liberal parties that don’t have any clear or strong stands except to promise better government.

On the far right, Ha-Bayit ha-Yehudi, led by Naftali Bennett, got 12.

On the far left, Meretz obtained 7, better than it expected, while the Communists got 3, the Islamists 3, and the Arab nationalists 2. The last three parties depend mostly on Arab votes and it was a poor showing for that deeply divided sector.

Finally, in the Jewish religious sector, Shas, representing Mizrahi (Middle East-origin and especially Moroccan-origin) Jews received 12 and the Askenazic (European-origin Jews) Yahadut ha-Torah party received 6. While socially conservative, these parties do not have strong stances on issues other than gaining government support for their communities.

The bottom line is, then, that those mainstream forces that aren’t supporting Netanyahu (I’ll explain this point in a moment) hold 43 seats, more than he does. But their inability to unite and different orientations prevent them from emerging as a bloc.

Israeli politics cannot be understood by analogy with those of other countries. Neither class and economic nor even peace process issues are fundamental in Israeli politics. At present, the critical issue is who will or won’t form a coalition with Netanyahu’s party. Many voted for Lapid with the idea that he would go into a government with Netanyahu and be a moderate influence pushing for more attention to improving domestic infrastructure.

The idea of Netanyahu as a rightist is outdated. It is precisely because he moved Likud to the center--albeit with a significant right-wing faction remaining--is the secret of his success in gaining two consecutive election victories. The failure of the peace process, the second intifada, the rise of Islamism, and the Palestinian abandonment of negotiations with Israel all have made his broad analysis of the situation acceptable to most Israelis. His opponents focus mainly on stressing dovish credentials rather than offering specific alternatives.

Attention now turns to the question of how Netanyahu can put together a coalition that will hold 61 seats, a majority needed to form a government. Netanyahu was disappointed at only getting 31 seats rather than up to 35 or so. He will have to give more to coalition partners but he can work with the results.

There are several possibilities. Netanyahu never wanted a right-wing government with Bennett. Even if he did, a combination with that party would only get him up to 43 and he would be hard-put to find partners who would join such a combination. In theory, pulling in the two religious parties would let him reach 61 but he knows that this is a situation that would both cause big international problems and create a situation in which he could be daily blackmailed by threats of his partners to walk out of the coalition.

A coalition with Lapid would be far more attractive and bring him quickly to 50 seats. The problem is that Lapid doesn’t mix with the religious parties, especially Shas. While his party is less explicitly anti-Haredi (what is usually, but wrongly, called Ultra-Orthodox”) than his late father's similar party he still wouldn’t be eager for such a combination.

Since the far left is clearly not a coalition partner and both Labor and Livni have said they would not go into a coalition with him, unless they change that decision, Netanyahu has a problem. The irony is that if Netanyahu would ever be forced to go with Bennett it was because Labor and Livni left him no alternative.

The easiest way out would be to persuade Lapid—who is an unknown quantity—to sit with the religious parties. At any rate, tough weeks of negotiations lie ahead to create a coalition after President Shimon Peres designates Netanyahu as having the first option to form a government. He will then have three weeks to do so. One of Netanyahu's main arguments would be: Join me or I'll have to depend on the far right and you don't want that to happen.

Note: This article is a work-in-progress trying to serve as a quick analysis of the election. The numbers cited above are not final results and even a small shift would be significant in coalition calculations.

Advanced course:

If you are really interested here are some details.

A. Netanyahu's decision to combine with Avigdor Lieberman's party was probably a mistake, driving moderate liberal voters to Lapid.

B. On the right of Netanyahu's party, he lost probably to Bennett among those who wanted to express their harder-line views or believed that Bennett would pull Netanyahu to the right in a coalition. That might have amounted to 3-5 seats Netanyahu might otherwise have obtained. Still, the much-exaggerated rise of the right-wing failed to materialize, especially when one adds that Bennett's party is the only one that might be said to directly represent the Dati (Modern Orthodox) sector. In the 2000 elections, the two small far-right parties got 9 seats, comparable to Bennett's 12.

C. In the center-left, voters had to calculate whether to vote for Livni, Lapid, or Lapid's old party Kadima (which didn't win any seats). The fact that Lapid is an attractive candidate, seems like a nice guy, and has no record to turn people against him helped his cause. In contrast, Livni is not personally popular and has failed on several occasions.

D. On the left, people had to decide whether they wanted to cast anti-Bibi votes with Labor or Meretz. A Meretz slogan, sniping at Labor, described the party as "your real voice against Bibi." Wanting to show a tougher opposition stance, a number of people voted for Meretz thus hurting Labor. (One might calculate that as involving two to four seats.) If Labor became the opposition leader, as seems likely, it cannot depend on the close, consistent cooperation of any other party.

E. Short-lived centrist parties like Lapid's and Livni's have been a feature of Israeli politics since 1977. Every such party has ultimately failed after a promising start, with the latest example being Kadima itself which went from a government party to oblivion in less than a decade. Lapid's own father also headed such a party which fell apart without ever accomplishing anything.

F. Arab voting was down and while this may express some dissatisfaction with Israel's existence, it also means that Arabs have little leeway to affect policies. This is a key reason why Arabs are about 20 percent of the population but only won about 7 percent of the seats, though another is that a lot vote for Zionist parties for various reasons. Arab disunity has also prevented them from becoming more of a political factor. In 2000, with a smaller proportion of the population, the Arab parties elected 12 parliamentarians as opposed to only 8 today.

Rumors About Hamas Creating A Palestinian State -- But Not In Gaza

Khaled Abu Toameh writes about a report recommending Allow Gaza population to expand into Sinai:

A study published Monday by a Palestinian engineer recommends solving the Gaza Strip’s “population explosion” by allowing the enclave to expand into the Sinai Peninsula.

The study also recommends transferring some of the Gaza Strip’s residents to the West Bank and setting rules for birth control as a way of solving the problem.

...He also suggested vertical construction and filling parts of the sea as possible methods to solve the problems facing the residents of the Gaza Strip.

The study, prepared by an engineer
and published in al-Quds, for the most part suggests ways for Gazans to resolve their problems independently.

However, there are rumors that Hamas is thinking of taking the idea of using the Sinai one step further: settling Palestinian Arabs there and declaring a state.

Perhaps that makes sense considering that Hamas itself is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and assumes it can count on their support.

Maybe so, but apparently Hamas would not get the support of the Egyptians themselves, who have come out strongly against such a move:

Writing in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram Weekly last October, columnist Ahmad Naguib Roushdy said: “Even if they are only rumors, these rumors have roots in Egypt’s
history. Every Egyptian sympathizes with the Palestinian cause, and much Egyptian blood has been shed in defense of it.

But if these rumors are true, the
Palestinians have shown themselves to be ungrateful and could be considered to be Egypt’s enemies.

“The Egyptian government should force any Palestinians in Sinai now to return to where they came from,” he wrote. “I believe that the [Egyptian] revolution did not only
aspire to freedom and dignity, but also to the idea that Egypt is for all Egyptians.

Read the whole thing.

If the rumors are true, perhaps Hamas just wants to show that it can go Abbas one step further and create a real "Palestinian" state.

If so, it appears that Hamas knows as little about what it takes to create a state as Abbas does.

Obama May Find Alinsky Way Better Geared For Demonizing Republicans Than Whitewashing Islamists

Shoshana Bryen writes about Obama's whitewashing of Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. This of course requires ignoring the rather un-democratic measures taken by the Muslim Brotherhood thus far:

o The Brotherhood's lie that it would not run candidates for all the seats in Parliament and would not run a presidential candidate

o Massacres against the Coptic Christian community

o The hasty construction of the constitution

o The dismissal of judges

o The quick-and-dirty "referendum" that claims 63% of the vote without noting that less than 25% of Egyptians voted

o The December protests.

How to run interference for the radical Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood? It's so much easier when all you have to do is blame or demonize -- but in this case what Obama has to do is remake Morsi as a moderate:

The White House stepped gingerly at first. In an interview with Telemundo in September, President Obama hedged: "I don't think that we would consider (Egypt) an ally, but we don't consider them an enemy. They are a new government that's trying to find its way." But by November, Morsi was a star. National Public Radio (NPR) reported, "Analysts say Morsi has proved himself and his organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, to be major political players on the world stage, and if the cease-fire agreement between Hamas and Israel holds, it will be a shining achievement." According to The New York Times, "Mr. Obama told aides he was impressed with the Egyptian leader's pragmatic confidence. He sensed an engineer's precision with surprisingly little ideology."

Now that's laying it on a bit thick.

Describing a member of the Muslim Brotherhood as having "surprisingly little ideology" is more than a reach -- akin to calling Morsi's reference to Jews as bloodsuckers a mere slur.

Perhaps by "engineer's precision," Obama was referring to Morsi's attempt to grab dictatorial power for himself?

In any case, Obama made clear his intent, by announcing the delivery of F-16's to Egypt during the huge public backlash against Morsi's grab for power.

In 2009, when asked to grade himself, Obama gave himself a B-plus. It is not surprising he would grade Morsi likewise.

The Obama Administration Will Make Syria Into A Replay of Egypt

After predicting that Egypt would be the big story in 2011 and the Muslim Brotherhood in 2012, Barry Rubin asks Won't Syria Be Obama's Main Middle East Crisis in 2013?

In several months the rebels will be eating away at Damascus. If and when the day comes that most of Damascus is captured, the rebels will set up a government. That new regime will quickly be recognized by the UN, Europe, and the United States. Regional states will be more diverse in their response, with Islamist-ruled Egypt, Tunisia, and Turkey along with pro-Islamist Qatar will be enthusiastic; Saudi Arabia and other anti-Islamist Arabs reluctant; the pro-Assad, Islamist-dominated Lebanese government and Iran rejecting this option.

Of course, a critical question will be: Who will lead on the rebel side?The negotiations will be very complex and quarrelsome but, with American help, the Muslim Brotherhood will probably emerge with a disproportionately strong showing.

Here is a good point to ridicule the idea that the United States has little influence. Of course, America isn’t going to decide everything or control events. But for the Brotherhood and other Islamists, having U.S. backing will make them a lot stronger than if they faced U.S. opposition. And remember the context will be shaped by all those arms and money the United States (through Qatar, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey) gave the Islamist side. The moderates certainly view the United States as pro-Islamist and while they themselves have a lot of weaknesses, being demoralized by this fact adds another one to the fatal mix.

Read the whole thing.

The Obama administration, for its part, will continue to give groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood its blessing as 'moderate' groups, while reserving condemnation for the bad boys of Islamism, such as al Qaeda.

This is why once the rebels win and they start to consolidate their rule, the same Islamist repression,persecution of Christians, and reduction of women’s status that we saw in Egypt will occur -- and again be dutifully ignored by the US.

But this time it will happen with the trio of Hagel, Kerry and Brennan singing sweet nothings in the background.

Will Latest al Qaeda Attack Wake Up US To The Islamist War Against The West?

Writing about the latest attack by al-Qaeda where their hostages were killed during counter attack by the Algerian authorities, Melanie Phillips writes Until we learn to be as single-minded as the fanatics - at home and abroad - we're ALL hostages:

Only a display of uncompromising strength — including, most importantly, strength of resolve — has any chance of being a deterrent. The Algerians understand this very well. The West does not — instead
assuming that everyone on the planet thinks like it does and is thus similarly governed by self-interest.

But in dealing with Islamist fanatics who regard themselves as the army of God, and for whom death is the highest calling, this is a catastrophic mistake.

The most devastating consequence has been the West’s refusal to acknowledge that it is not fighting a series of brush fires based on local political grievances, but a war of religion being conducted against the
free world in order to destroy it.

Among the mistakes made so far:

o Because of the overly generous supply of arms to anyone labeled as being in opposition to Gaddafi, advanced weapons are now in the hands of terrorists in Mali and elsewhere.

o After the US and Great Britain helped oust Mubarak, he was replaced by Morsi, whose Muslim Brotherhood opposes the US as well as Israel -- and has designs beyond Egypt.

o The West continues to allow Iran to lead it by the nose as it gets ever closer to building a nuclear bomb.

Read the whole thing.

Now, in another mis-judgement of events in the Middle East, Obama is committing the US to major defense reductions. After buying into the myth of the Arab Spring, the Obama administration, led in part by its new appointees will try to convince itself -- and us -- that groups like the Muslim Brotherhood are moderate and that terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas can be talked to.

Unfortunately, the failure of talk so far only whets the US appetite for more.

Obama's Shifting "Red Lines" On Syria Can Only Encourage Iran

We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized.That would change my calculus.That would change my equation.
Obama

In a routine worthy of Bugs Bunny, the Obama administration has been alternatively threatening -- and extending -- warnings of red lines to the Assad regime in Syria.

Josh Rogin's article on Secret State
Department cable: Chemical
weapons used in Syria outlines Obama's shifting red lines:

The White House's threats to react to Assad's WMD activity have softened over time. In Obama's Aug. 20 statement, he indicated that "a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around" would trigger U.S.
action.

Obama then shifted his warning to Assad about red lines in December, after intelligence reports stated that the Syrian regime had moved some precursor chemicals out of storage and mixed them, making them easier to deploy. Now, Obama's red line is that the United States will react if Syria uses these weapons.

"The use of chemical weapons is and would be totally unacceptable," Obama said Dec. 3, directing his comments at Assad. "If you make the tragic mistake of using these weapons, there will be consequences and you will be held accountable." That same day, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton added: "we are certainly planning to take action if that eventuality were to occur."

Outside analysts worry that the
administration's red line may have shifted again. "Given the fact you have that in a cable, this indicates that the Obama administration may not simply jump into the conflict because chemical agents are used," said Andrew Tabler, senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "Assad has a much better idea now of what he can do and get away with."

Some say Obama's pick of Hagel as Secretary of Defense may be considered a signal to Iran of Obama's lack of seriousness in preventing them from acquiring nuclear weapons.

If so, surely Obama's inability to back up its threats to prevent the Assad regime from using chemical weapons in the continued slaughter of civilians -- sends Iran a message as well.

It is the message that US allies in the Middle East learned during Obama's first term: the US is not to be relied upon.

Who Was The Real Loser of Operation Pillar Of Defense: Abbas and the Palestinian Authority

Brig.-Gen. (res.) Michael Herzog writes about Operation Pillar of Defense: Objectives and Implications.

First, here is a summary:

• Both in the 2008-2009 Operation Cast Lead and in the 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense, Israel’s government focused its objective on enhancing deterrence  – opting for hitting the terrorists hard enough to give them an interest in a ceasefire for as long as possible – rather than dismantling Gaza’s terror infrastructure or toppling the Hamas government.

Daniel Pipes: It Is Turkey -- Not Iran -- That Is Closest To Leading The Muslim World

The following by Daniel Pipes is reposted here with permission:

Turkey, Closest to Leading the Middle East

by Şenay Yıldız
Akşam
January 7, 2013

http://www.danielpipes.org/12459/turkey-leading-middle-east

Translation of the original text: Ortadoğu liderliğine en yakın ülke Türkiye
Translated by Elif S. Gürbey

N.B.: This translation from Turkish includes numerous changes in the text by Daniel Pipes to improve the presentation and to make it more accurate.

Founder and president of the Middle East Forum, Daniel Pipes is well known for his work on the Middle East and political Islam. Pipes, an award-winning columnist for the National Review and Jerusalem Post, writes commentaries and articles about the Middle East in leading media organizations such as the BBC, Al Jazeera, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. After visiting Turkey last month, Pipes, who has 12 books and numerous articles on Islam, Syria, and the Middle East, published an article in National Review Online titled "Talking Turkey." We talked with him [in mid-December] about his impressions of Turkey and his expectations from the Middle East.

- When were you in Turkey the last time?
I was in Turkey two weeks ago. I visited in 2007 as well. My first visit to Turkey was in 1972. I spent the summer of 1973 trying to learn Turkish while living in Istanbul's Üsküdar quarter … but I was not very successful at it.