Wake up Washington!

by Caroline Glick
May 5, 2005 

One of the first concrete acts that the Bush administration took 
in the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks was 
to outlaw the Holy Land Fund for Relief and Development and 
freeze its financial assets. The HLF was one of the principal 
funding arms of Hamas. Israel had tracked its financial activities 
for over a decade, and had repeatedly requested that the US take 
action against it, but the requests came to nothing until after 9/11. 

In an article in National Review from December 2002, terrorism 
investigators Ritz Katz and James Mitre documented that HLF, 
like several other US-registered non-profits that since September 11 
have been closed down or placed under federal investigation, 
was funding arms not only for Hamas but also for al-Qaida. 
The Saudi-headquartered International Islamic Relief Organization; 
Benevolence International Foundation; and terror financier 
Yassin al-Qadi, to name just a few, were all funneling millions to 
both Hamas and al-Qaida. 

Hamas and al-Qaida share more than financial networks. 
They share the same ideological roots. Hamas is the Palestinian 
branch of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaida is an 
offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. 

In his column in The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday, Daniel Pipes 
noted that in February, FBI Director Robert Mueller testified before 
the Senate's Intelligence Committee that Hamas's "US network is 
theoretically capable of facilitating acts of terrorism in the US." 
As well, a senior US counterterrorism official was quoted stating 
that Hamas is merging with elements of al-Qaida's "all inclusive 
military arm that will carry out military strikes" against the US. 

So, a cursory glance at the wealth of documentation regarding 
Islamic terror organizations shows that Hamas and al-Qaida 
are linked financially, ideologically and operationally. This, 
at the same time as the know-it-alls from Washington to 
London to Riyadh insist that the Palestinian terror war against 
Israel has no connection to the global jihad being launched by 
the likes of "real" terrorists, such as Osama bin Laden and 
(Palestinian) Abu Musab Zarkawi. 

The terror attacks in Madrid in March 2004 brought about the 
fall of the pro-American Spanish government of Jose Maria Anzar. 
Bush supporters were quick to condemn Spain's new leader, 
the leftist Jose Luis Zapatero, for his decision to immediately 
pull the Spanish military contingent out of Iraq to appease the 
terrorists who struck Madrid. The newly elected Spanish 
government, it was argued, was telling the terrorists that 
terrorism pays, thereby increasing the likelihood of attacks 
throughout the world. 

Since the September 11 attacks, there has been continuous 
pressure exerted on the Bush administration from within and 
without to refuse to accept that the war against Israel has anything 
to do with the war against the US and the rest of the non-Islamist 
world. And President Bush's embrace of Sharon's plan to withdraw 
Israeli forces from Gaza and northern Samaria, while expelling 
thousands of Israelis from their homes and communities - like his 
embrace of the so-called road map to peace - is an indication 
that the pressure has succeeded. 

While Bush and his supporters were quick to see the ruinous 
impact of Spanish appeasement of terrorists on the war efforts, 
in backing Sharon's plan and in showering the Palestinians with 
money and support, the president is showing that as far as 
Israel is concerned, the policy he has adopted is the same one 
the Spanish voters opted for: appeasement. 

In his letter of resignation from the Israeli government, Minister 
Natan Sharansky wrote, "In my view, the disengagement plan is 
a tragic mistake that will exacerbate the conflict with the 
Palestinians, increase terrorism, and dim the prospects of 
forging a genuine peace. Yet what turns this tragic mistake 
into a missed opportunity of historic proportions is the fact that 
as a result of changes in the Palestinian leadership and the firm 
conviction of the leader of the free world that democracy is 
essential to stability and peace... an unprecedented window of 
opportunity has opened." 

Yet the fact of the matter is that as far as Israel is concerned, 
the Americans have shut the window of opportunity. Gone is the 
president's strong rhetoric from three years ago about US support 
for Palestinian statehood being conditional on the transformation 
of Palestinian society into a democratic, liberal, terror-fighting 
society. The Bush administration has been pushing Israel to 
arm the PA security forces in spite of their overt connection with 
terror cells. The Bush administration has refused to back Israel's 
opposition to Hamas participation in the July legislative elections 
despite its links to al-Qaida. The Bush administration has insisted 
that Israel hand over the homes of the Israelis set for expulsion 
to the Palestinians, in spite of the fact that this means Israel 
will be handing their homes to the same terrorists who have been 
shooting and bombing them for the past four-and-a-half years. 

If the Bush administration had not made the intellectually 
unsupportable decision to refuse to accept that the Palestinian 
war against Israel is a crucial front in the global jihad, the 
president and his advisers would no doubt be asking Sharon 
some very hard questions right now. 

Israel's planned withdrawal from Gaza and northern Samaria 
present a tangible threat to US national security interests from 
both military and psychological warfare perspectives. 

On the military level, one of the core principles of the US 
counter-terror strategy is to deny terrorists sanctuary. 
Yet Gaza and northern Samaria are both poised to become 
new operational bases for global terror organizations. 

During his negotiations with the terror chiefs in Cairo in March, 
in the presence of Syria's foreign minister, PA chairman and 
US favorite Mahmoud Abbas invited the leaders of Hamas, 
Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of 
Palestine-General Command to relocate from Damascus to 
Gaza after Israel withdraws. How does this square with the 
US strategy to bar terrorists from receiving shelter? 

Then there is Egypt's role as a spoiler in all this. This week, 
the Palestinians claimed that Egypt pressured the PA to 
release a Hamas terrorist it had apprehended en route to 
launching rockets at Sderot. This claim is believable given 
that it was Egypt's dictator Hosni Mubarak who pressured 
Yasser Arafat not to accept Israel's peace offer at Camp David 
in July 2000. And yet, in spite of the fact that Mubarak has 
played a central role in fomenting and eternalizing the 
Palestinian war with Israel, in his favored role as broker 
between Israel and the Palestinians and among the Palestinian 
terror groups, he has built a reputation in Washington as the 
irreplaceable peacemaker. 

After Gaza becomes an international terror center in the wake 
of the Israeli pullout, Mubarak will be poised to increase US 
dependence on him. If this occurs, his payback will be 
Washington's shoving its plan to bring democracy to Egypt 
into a circular file in the recesses of the Old Executive Office Building. 

On a psychological level, the images of an Israeli retreat from 
Gaza and northern Samaria will be footage for jihadi recruitment 
videos for years to come. In Iraq, a large proportion of the 
insurgent groups' energies are devoted to producing images that 
portray them as strong and the US forces as weak. Al-Jazeera 
and its clones - along with cameramen employed as stringers by 
Western news networks and agencies - work hand-in-glove with 
the terrorists to produce just such images. The point, of course, 
is that in at least one central respect, Arabs are no different 
from Americans. Both like winners. Videos showing the 
decapitation of hostages are meant to mobilize supporters. 

Yet there can be no doubt that, as attractive as watching helpless 
hostages getting beheaded may be to potential recruits, 
the spectacle of Hamas and Fatah flags being foisted onto 
Israeli homes in Gaza and Samaria is even more alluring. 
And footage of Jews attacking one another as Israel comes 
apart at the seams will also serve the terrorists' purposes 
wonderfully well. 

What will "friendly" Arab states demand from the US in exchange 
for their combating of Islamist forces energized by the footage 
of Israel's withdrawal? Shelving democracy perhaps? 
And will these governments be appreciative of US efforts to 
pressure Israel into destroying its own villages? No, they will 
demand more such destruction. 

What will happen to the Arab democrats from Baghdad to 
Damascus to Beirut to Riyadh when they are force fed footage 
of mosques being built on synagogues in Gush Katif 24/7? 

Will they believe in US promises of support when they see the 
US supporting terrorists in Gaza? 

Will they be willing to stick their necks out when they see how 
America lets Israel, its ally, lose? This week, Fatah leaders sent 
a public birthday greeting to Saddam Hussein. The greeting ended, 
"We wish him long life for the sake of Iraq and to free the 
Arab nation from the enslavement of foreign imperialism. 
Oh, the glory of victory, with the help of Allah." 

The Bush administration, like the Israeli government, wants 
Fatah to win the elections because it is considered "moderate." 

Friends of Israel in Washington, like former CIA director James 
Woolsey, say of Sharon's planned withdrawal from Gaza that 
they cannot second guess the Israeli leadership about what is 
best for Israel's national security. This is a true and honorable 
statement. But the US can discuss the impact that Israel's 
decisions will have on its own security interests. 

Unless one ignores reality, it is impossible to sustain an argument 
that as presently constituted, Israel's withdrawal from Gaza will do 
anything other than strengthen the cause of global jihad and 
Arab authoritarianism. Unfortunately, until the US abandons the 
contrived belief that what happens to Israel has no connection 
to what happens to the US, it will be unable to see - and thus thwart -
the dangers that await it.