Digest 41: Naftali Bennett, return Prime Minister of Israel?
What happens next in the Middle East is surely the biggest question right now for global security. The following interview of Naftali Bennett, by Bret Stephens in the New York Times, shows an interesting new potential direction at the helm of Israel…
Bennett left the prime minister’s office [in June 2022] vowing to stay away from politics for at least a decade. He left me [in this interview] with little doubt that he’s on the verge of getting back in, with the aim of toppling the ruling coalition through parliamentary maneuvers this year and going for elections. He pledged a thorough housecleaning that could help unite Israelis once again.
“All the senior leadership of Israel, political and military, needs to be replaced,” he said. To defeat one regime, another one must first be beaten.
Strong words indeed.
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There’s a graph linked in the piece I thought remarkable:
Consider it in the context of Trump’s first term in office. The NYT notes:
Thanks to [Biden] administration waivers, Iran today exports nearly four times as much oil as it did four years ago.
This is the New York Times (not exactly Trump admiring) publishing this, and encouraging “a resumption of serious economic sanctions”.
When Trump says in interviews that “October 7th would never have happened if I had been President”, I’d always thought he was being hyperbolic in the extent to which he said he’d pressured Iran. But this graph suggests if anything he’s underplaying his effect. (He should add it to his collection of life-saving graphs.)
As a reminder: Naftali Bennett is the former Israeli Prime Minister who took personal initiative in March 2022 to attempt to mediate an immediate end to the Ukraine conflict, liaising directly between Putin and Zelensky. It was one of the most significant attempts at diplomacy this century, but British and American media refused almost entirely to cover it.
With polls showing Bennett drawing even with or beating Netanyahu as the person Israelis want as their prime minister, his views matter.
Trump in 1987
A fascinating 80-second clip, from an interview with CNN 37 years ago:
https://x.com/EdwardMDruce/status/1825266161321189797
“If you look at the payments that we’re making to NATO, they’re totally disproportionate with everybody else’s, and it’s ridiculous.
As far as other causes that are near and dear, this is the cause because if we can solve this then we’re able to take care of something that I consider of ultimate importance, and that is the homeless situation, that is the farmers, that is the sick.
We don’t have any money. This country is busted. And it’s busted because we’re doing things that we shouldn’t be doing. If we had business ability in this country, we would be making lots of profit – so-called surplus. And that profit could be going to defend – and I literally mean defend – our homeless and our poor and our sick and our farmers – and that’s where we ought to be spending the money.
Not giving it to countries that don’t give a damn for us to start off with.”
Whatever you think, it’s quite some intellectual consistency.
Trump’s been making the same argument on NATO since before Steph Curry (3-pointer star of the US basketball team/Golden State Warriors who, aged 36, just won Gold in the Olympics) was born.
What would the combination of a second-term Trump Presidency, and a second-term Naftali Bennett Prime Ministership, bring to global stability?
Kursk
It’s of course hard to tell what the net effect of this is in the immediate fog of war. But some bullet-point thoughts:
I think this is very likely a short-term PR victory for Ukraine, in exchange for a medium-term weakening of their military position
They have succeeded in making Putin extremely angry
They have undoubtedly vexed Chinese leadership – who were seriously wanting to mediate, and who met with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister two weeks ago (who was then suggesting Ukraine was looking to come around to peace talks)
A further precedent has been breached, in Ukraine using American/British/German-supplied tanks, arms and munitions to actually wage war inside Russia – creating the very strong perception in Russia this is a direct attack by NATO:
There’s little doubt that a significant section of the Russian public has been persuaded by propagandists like Solovyov that the Kursk raid represents a significant escalation by Nato – and that, in turn, demands more violence and a renewed push to finally destroy Zelensky’s regime.
Thus, the incursion might actually undermine the chance of negotiations (which I personally think Ukraine desperately needs), not “give it extra bargaining chips” as Western media at large has attempted to suggest.
Reuters (which again, does actually cover reality):
He [Putin] questioned what negotiations there could be with an enemy he accused of firing indiscriminately at Russian civilians and nuclear facilities.
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For the past several months, I’ve been arguing Zelensky should emulate President Rhee of South Korea and settle by way of a Korean-style armistice. Since writing this, figures much smarter than me such as Samo Burja and Sir Niall Ferguson have come out saying the same.
But I fear Zelensky is now veering towards the fate of Chiang Kai-shek – the Nationalist leader of China, who, given just enough US armaments, refused negotiations in the 1945–49 Chinese Civil War, and went on to get routed by Mao.
From Dan Kurtz-Phelan (now editor of Foreign Affairs)’s excellent book:
The Nationalist offensive had been more successful than he had anticipated—at least in the short term. To his mind, however, an opening burst of success did not change the Nationalists’ basic strategic problem. Claiming cities was not the same as establishing control. Even driven into the hinterlands, the Communists retained “almost unlimited room in which to maneuver,” judged an American military attaché. They were escaping Nationalist assaults with their armies largely intact. And as Mao had long envisioned, and Marshall could see, Nationalist lines were stretching to the point of peril.
This feels apposite.
[George] Marshall [who was attempting to mediate] grasped the dynamic at work. Each side overplayed its hand when momentum seemed to be in its favor and then came back to negotiate when the momentum had shifted, at which point the other side was no longer interested.
No less a figure than George C. Marshall, who rivals Churchill and Lee Kuan Yew as greatest statesman of the 20th century, was unable to rein-in Chiang and get him to see sense. Thus, 2022 Turkish mediators, Naftali Bennett, and most recently Prime Minister Orbán should feel no sense of failure that they haven’t been able to get Zelensky to see sense. History would suggest it is extremely difficult to do – valiant as their attempts have been (and might yet come to pass).
I am open-minded that I might be wrong on Kursk, but Ukraine seems sufficiently short of men and weaponry that I do not think Western commentators are wise to be cheerleading chasing of villages of no military importance – likely following Chiang’s example and stretching Ukraine’s own lines to breaking point.
Science journalism in bad shape
Speaking on missile defence – a convergence of science and geopolitics – Theodore Postol here on his and Richard Garwin’s (one of the most distinguished National Security scientists in the US, who implemented the first hydrogen bomb) three-year trial/tribulation of trying to get reality known. Clip for a minute:
“To make a long story short: we uncovered information that indicated that they had lied about the analyses they had done. This is first-class, big-time, unambiguous scientific misconduct.
Three Presidents of the American Physical Society have been involved in covering up this operation. I cannot find a journalist in the scientific community to cover this story. In spite of the fact that I have hundreds of pages of unambiguous evidence that scientific misconduct has taken place, presenting documents that are misleading to the American public and Congress on missile defense.
The science-journalism community is not interested... What is their job?”
I of course feel the same about British political/geopolitical media. What is their job?
Elon’s endorsement of Trump
I think the most important part of their discussion…
“Here’s to an exciting and inspiring future, that people can look forward to, and be optimistic and excited about. That’s the kind of future I think you will bring as President, and that’s why I endorse you.
I’ve not been very political before, and if you look at my track record, I’ve actually been – I get painted as a far-right guy, which is absurd. I like making electric vehicles and solar panels and batteries that help with the environment. And I supported Obama. I stood in line for six hours to shake Obama’s hand when he was running for President.
I would call myself, historically, a moderate Democrat.
But now I feel that we are really at a critical juncture for the country. I think a lot of people thought the Biden administration would be a moderate administration, but it’s not. And we are just going to see an even further left administration with Kamala – that’s my honest opinion.
We want to have a future that is prosperous. I think we are at a critical juncture, and I think this is a case of America being at a fork in the road.
You [Trump] are the path to prosperity, and I think Kamala is the opposite.
I’m just trying to tell people my honest opinion.
My track record historically has been moderate – if not slightly left. This is to people out there who are in the moderate camp, I think you should support Donald Trump for President.
I think it’s a very important juncture in the road, and we are in deep trouble if it goes the other way.”
What does the name “Abraham Accords” actually mean?
Someone asked me this, this week. I pointed them to one of the first Abraham Accords treaties, normalising relations between the UAE and Israel:
“Recognizing that the Arab and Jewish peoples are descendants of a common ancestor, Abraham, and inspired, in that spirit, to foster in the Middle East a reality in which Muslims, Jews, Christians and peoples of all faiths, denominations, beliefs and nationalities live in, and are committed to, a spirit of coexistence, mutual understanding and mutual respect.”
Beautifully put.
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Thank you for reading.
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