Gaza war shows Israel's democratic resilience

After the Second Lebanon War, one former tank commander sighed, "when my kids were teenagers and stumbled, I reassured them that, fortunately, the lessons learned outweighed the damage done: so too with Israel's army." Two and a half years later, forced to confront Hamas's rocket barrages targeting Israeli civilians, Israel fulfilled this prophecy. Great democracies like Israel can transform citizens' grumblings into constructive self-criticism, turning officials' failures into redemptive improvements. 

Ironically, while applying many lessons learned, this war illustrated the Lebanon War's success. Hizbullah's inaction as Israel pummeled another Iranian proxy, Hamas, suggests Israel's message of deterrence worked. Still, despite this gain, the civilian Winograd commission and numerous internal IDF reviews proposed clever solutions to the logistical and strategic problems that plagued the battlefront and the homefront. 

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The two state solution as the only unhappy alternative

Some readers objected to the end of my last column on the lessons of Oslo. Most of the column argued that Arab and particularly Palestinian rejectionism destroyed Oslo yet most Westerners could not fathom Palestinian political culture's destructive and self-destructive addiction to violence. Nevertheless, I concluded, the only solution remains a two-state solution. Critics deemed this claim contradictory.

The two-state solution remains the most logical solution for Israelis and Palestinians because, like the infirmities of old age, it beats the alternative, or in this case, the alternatives. Extremist Palestinians advocate the one-state solution, trusting that masses of Palestinian voters in a secular democratic state would overwhelm Israelis. Across the spectrum, since 1967, many right-wing Israelis have endorsed the status quo, ignoring the psychic, moral, diplomatic, military, political, and economic costs to Israel of controlling millions of hostile non-citizens. A two-state solution can take many forms, including federations with Egypt and Jordan that would mean a three-state or a one and two half-state solution. Somehow, Israel must stop governing millions of Palestinians.

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Remember the terror victims at the Seder

Once again, we will celebrate our joyous holiday of liberation this seder with heavy hearts. Even as we revel in our freedom as Jews today, even as we marvel at Israel's steadiness amid the terrorist onslaught, even as we begin celebrating Israel's 60th anniversary, too many Israeli families are in pain. This year, as we think of three Israeli hostages in a Mitzraim, in dire straits, and think of an entire region, the western Negev, including the city of Sderot, held hostage, we must reclaim our symbols, remember our losses, reaffirm our commitment to Israel, to the Jewish people, and to a true peace.

In the bloody, unnecessary war the Palestinians began by turning away from negotiations toward violence, too many died, too many have been injured, on both sides. And too many seders now have empty chairs - missing husbands, fathers, brothers, sons; missing wives, mothers, sisters, daughters.

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'April Fools' report minimizes Palestinian anti-semitism

I usually don't like playing bash-the-journalist. I try avoiding the ritualistic Tirade against the Times, which keeps pro-Israel New York Times readers' blood flowing. But an April 1, 2008 front-page article was so ridiculous it could have been an April Fools joke. "IN GAZA, HAMAS'S FIERY INSULTS TO JEWS COMPLICATE PEACE EFFORT," the headline ever so delicately proclaimed - as if there was much of a peace effort with Hamas to complicate, and as if the bombs raining down on Sderot or hundreds of cold-blooded murders over the years did not first "complicate" matters. Even the usually hostile International Herald Tribune reprinted the article under a more accurate headline "HAMAS RATCHETS UP ANTI-JEWISH RHETORIC." Equally absurd, the one line the Times website highlighted pronounced:  "While the Palestinian Authority under Fatah has made significant, if imperfect, efforts to end incitement against Jews, Hamas feels no such restraint." Moral obtuseness is one of the great crimes of our times and of the Times.  The editors too easily forgive Fatah's "imperfections" in fighting anti-Semitism.

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This family's answer to the menace of terrorism

Last week was what I am starting to think about as a typically strange week in Israel. Even before the horrific attack on Mercaz Harav here in Jerusalem we were living what I think of as the great Israeli disconnect.

On the one hand, our major focus was on sticking to the shigra, a new word I learned this year - the routine. My wife and I spent much of the week juggling. On Thursday for example, we worked on helping our 10-year-old son with his shishim shana Israel-at-60 school project, getting our seven-year-old son to the stress test he had to take to play in his baseball little league, dropping our five-year-old daughter off at her swimming lesson, and preparing our 12-year-old daughter for her youth movement tiyul - trip.

On the streets of Jerusalem the big headline was that the winter had lifted, spring was in the air. The meteorologists actually warned of sharav, a hot and dry spell, as our friends in Montreal struggled with another storm - this time 18 centimeters of snow mixed with 5 centimeters of ice pellets.

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Want the best president for Israel?

'Super-Duper" Tuesday is looming February 5. Americans will vote in 22 states, including New York, New Jersey and California, all with major Jewish populations. As Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama fight fiercely for the Democratic nomination, many pro-Israel voters are asking, "who is best for Israel"?

Truth is, despite the murmurings about the "Jewish vote" and the "Israel lobby," few American Jews today are such narrow one-issue voters. Amid American Jews' lamentable but growing disinterest in Israel, most American Jews are more multi-dimensional, and frankly, more passionate about other stances such as being pro-choice and anti-Bush. With American support for Israel so widespread and "apple pie," most mainstream candidates make enough pro-Israel noises to satisfy the casually pro-Israel American Jew.

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