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Why Israel Must Man the Borders with Jordan

(New Republic) Martin Peretz - Here are the realities of Israel today. Everybody understands that the 1967 lines really means 1949. They are silly borders - really, tokens of a fictitious past. In the early days of the Jewish state, its enemies were perceived as armies, with, here and there, a terrorist gang or two. Now, the Palestinians do "asymmetrical warfare," terrorism writ large. If they have sovereignty, they will not repair to armies, at least not in the early stages of "peace." They will, as they have already more than amply shown in Gaza, wage war by rockets and missiles. The prospect of irregular war requires Israel to man the borders with Jordan, where about 50-70% of the population is Palestinian, mostly disloyal to the monarchy, restive, and increasingly drawn by the allure of Hamas. A long time ago, my own ideal of an Israeli politician, Yigal Allon, military hero and social idealist, drew a map that was realistic in that it met all the threats (save the nuclear threat) his country could face. It was called the Allon Plan. The writer is the editor-in-chief of The New Republic.
2010-01-29 08:40:12
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