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Defending "Red Lines" and Defensible Borders

(Jerusalem Post) Dan Diker - Several hours after the Israel Air Force reportedly destroyed advanced Iranian Fatah 110 long-range missiles parked in Syria and headed for Hizbullah in Lebanon, former IDF military intelligence chief Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Yadlin said that "Iran is testing Israel's and the U.S.'s determination to uphold "red lines." Israel's determination to enforce its red lines and "defend itself by itself" also extends to the West Bank and Israel's eastern front. Israel's defense of its security "red lines" in the West Bank are particularly salient in view of Iran's increasing destabilization of Iraq, intensifying security challenges to Jordan, Palestinian jihadi groups in the West Bank, and the risks Israel will be asked to assume in line with American efforts to help restart a diplomatic process with the Palestinian Authority. Israeli leaders have assessed that an Israeli territorial withdrawal to the June 4, 1967, "Green Line" would render Israel indefensible against a range of threats including terror group infiltrations, conventional army attack, and ballistic missile and rocket fire that could cut Israel in half at nine-mile-wide borders. They insist that Israel maintain defensible borders in the West Bank, particularly retaining territory in the Jordan Valley, where a 3,000-foot mountain ridge serves as a natural wall protecting Israel's major population centers, while simultaneously helping protect Jordan from subversive action by radical Islamic groups. The writer, a foreign policy fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, served as secretary-general of the World Jewish Congress.
2013-05-10 00:00:00
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