jcdurbant

Reconnaissance de Jérusalem/Trump: Quand la condamnation est unanime (From Lincoln to Ike, Reagan or Bush, almost all GOP presidents have been stereotyped as not very bright and guess who got to have the last laugh in the end ?)

jcdurbant

Lorsqu’un Sanhédrin s’est déclaré unanime pour condamner, l’accusé sera acquitté. Le Talmud
George Orwell disait,  je crois dans 1984, que dans les temps de tromperie généralisée, dire la vérité est un acte révolutionnaire. David Hoffmann
Le langage politique est destiné à rendre vraisemblables les mensonges, respectables les meurtres, et à donner l’apparence de la solidité à ce qui n’est que vent. George Orwell
Tout racisme est un essentialisme et le racisme de l’intelligence est la forme de sociodicée caractéristique d’une classe dominante dont le pouvoir repose en partie sur la possession de titres qui, comme les titres scolaires, sont censés être des garanties d’intelligence et qui ont pris la place, dans beaucoup de sociétés, et pour l’accès même aux positions de pouvoir économique, des titres anciens comme les titres de propriété et les titres de noblesse. Pierre Bourdieu
Reagan, je l’ai trouvé comme il est : habité de certitudes. Américain typique, il n’est pas très exportable. Mitterrand (sommet d’Ottawa, 1981)
Son étroitesse d’esprit est évidente. Cet homme n’a que quelques disques qui tournent et retournent dans sa tête. Mitterrand (sommet de Williamsburg, 1983)
Il est temps de tuer le président. Monisha Rajesh
Trump c’est le candidat qui redonne aux Américains l’espoir, l’espoir qu’il soit assassiné avant son investiture. Pablo Mira (France Inter)
This is a message to Trump the idiot. You idiot, your promise to Israel will not be successful. You idiot, Jerusalem is the capital of Palestine for all eternity. Idriss
The Palestinians could have issued a low-key response, saying simply that no one, not even Trump, could decide the future of Jerusalem without their agreement. They could have kept their channels to the United States open and waited to see if anything would come of the much-vaunted Trump peace proposal. Instead, they declared “days of rage” that quickly fizzled, and then effectively severed ties with the Americans by announcing they would be boycotting any scheduled meetings with administration officials. This is idle talk based on wishful thinking. No other country has the resources, the skilled and experienced diplomatic corps, the investment in the region and the credibility to become the brokers of the process. The European Union is mired in a near-existential crisis, with Brexit cutting off one of its major members; its unofficial leader, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, is struggling to build a coalition at home; and its unofficial leader-in-waiting, French President Emmanuel Macron, lacks the experience and attention span to devote himself properly. Russia has ulterior motives and does not really wish to help bring peace, just enhance its influence. China, which launched a Mideast conference this past week, is too far away – physically and mentally – to be much more than a bystander. And, most important, Israel can and will veto any other partner besides the Americans. Haaretz
Securing national borders seems pretty orthodox. In an age of anti-Western terrorism, placing temporary holds on would-be immigrants from war-torn zones until they can be vetted is hardly radical. Expecting “sanctuary cities” to follow federal laws rather than embrace the nullification strategies of the secessionist Old Confederacy is a return to the laws of the Constitution. Using the term “radical Islamic terror” in place of “workplace violence” or “man-caused disasters” is sensible, not subversive. Insisting that NATO members meet their long-ignored defense-spending obligations is not provocative but overdue. Assuming that both the European Union and the United Nations are imploding is empirical, not unhinged. Questioning the secret side agreements of the Iran deal or failed Russian reset is facing reality. Making the Environmental Protection Agency follow laws rather than make laws is the way it always was supposed to be. Unapologetically siding with Israel, the only free and democratic country in the Middle East, used to be standard U.S. policy until Obama was elected. (…) Expecting the media to report the news rather than massage it to fit progressive agendas makes sense. In the past, proclaiming Obama a “sort of god” or the smartest man ever to enter the presidency was not normal journalistic practice. (…) Half the country is having a hard time adjusting to Trumpism, confusing Trump’s often unorthodox and grating style with his otherwise practical and mostly centrist agenda. In sum, Trump seems a revolutionary, but that is only because he is loudly undoing a revolution. Victor Davis Hanson
Donald Trump is on course to win re-election in 2020, senior British diplomats believe, as he approaches his first full year in office. They think that despite a string of negative headlines the US president has largely kept his support base onside since entering White House. Possible Democratic contenders are seen as either too old – such as Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden – or lacking in the name recognition needed to defeat Mr Trump. There is also a belief the US president has curbed some of his most radical policy instincts since taking office, such as ignoring Nato or pulling out of Afghanistan. The Telegraph
Nearly a year into his presidency, Mr. Trump remains an erratic, idiosyncratic leader on the global stage, an insurgent who attacks allies the United States has nurtured since World War II and who can seem more at home with America’s adversaries… He has assiduously cultivated President Xi Jinping of China and avoided criticizing President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia — leaders of the two countries that his own national security strategy calls the greatest geopolitical threats to America. NYT
A website archiving all of Donald Trump’s tweets calculated that he “stupid-tweeted” 183 times since Oct. 7, 2011. That’s a whole lot of stupid. It’s over 30 stupids per year for the past 6 years, not to mention his oral stupids. In fact, calling people stupid is probably Donald Trump’s crowning example of staying on message. And I suspect he’ll continue to use this art form for as long as his mouth works and his fingers – or even just his middle ones – can gesticulate. But stupid-speak does not stupid make. In fact, his stupid strategy can be called insightful, crafty, and productive. His bullying paid off. He has earned the title America’s stupid-caller-in-chief. Stupid people can’t do that. But what’s impeccably good for the goose is not necessarily good for those of us who would love a gander at his impeachment. And the principal difference between him calling us stupid and us returning the favor is that he is in power. (…) Speaking from experience, no single political party or their voters has a lock on stupid. (…) While it may be good for a chuckle, calling or even thinking someone else stupid is virtually guaranteed to give them the last laugh. Jason Lorber (Vermont Democrat)
This time one year ago, the assumption dominating political coverage was that the only people more stupid than Donald Trump were the deplorables who elected him. Since then, of course, President-elect Trump has become President Trump. Over his 11 months in office, he has put Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court and four times as many judges on the appellate courts as Barack Obama did his first year; recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel; withdrawn from the Paris climate accord; adopted a more resolute policy on Afghanistan than the one he’d campaigned on; rolled back the mandate forcing Catholic nuns, among others, to provide employees with contraception and abortifacients; signed legislation to open up drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; initiated a bold, deregulatory assault on the administrative state—and topped it all off with the first major overhaul of the tax code in more than 30 years. And yet that Mr. Trump is a very stupid man remains the assumption dominating his press coverage. Add to this the sorry experience America had recently had with men, also outside conventional politics, who ran successfully for governorships: former pro wrestler and Navy SEAL Jesse Ventura in Minnesota and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California. Their respective administrations each began with high enthusiasm but ended in defeat and disillusionment. What would make anyone think Mr. Trump would do better? In one sense he is not unique: Almost all GOP presidents are stereotyped as not very bright. Ask Ike, or George W. Bush, or even Lincoln. Nor is it uncommon, in the headiness of a White House, for even the lowliest staffer to come to regard himself as the intellectual superior of the president he works for. In Mr. Trump’s case, critics equate lowbrow tastes (e.g., well-done steaks covered in ketchup) as confirmation of a lack of brainpower. It can make for great sport. But starting out with the assumption that the president you are covering is a boob can prove debilitating to clear judgment. Quick show of hands: How many of those in the press who continue to dismiss Mr. Trump as stupid publicly asserted he could never win the 2016 election—or would never get anyone decent to work for him in the unlikely miracle he did get elected? The WSJ
Jérusalem est, évidemment, et depuis toujours, la capitale d’Israël. Et il y a quelque chose, non seulement d’absurde, mais de choquant dans le tollé planétaire qui a suivi la reconnaissance, par les Etats-Unis, de cette évidence. (…) D’où vient, alors, mon malaise ? (…) Et, deux semaines après cette annonce que j’attendais, moi aussi, depuis des années, pourquoi cette inquiétude qui m’étreint ? (…) D’abord Trump. Je sens trop le côté gros malin, acculé par des défaites diverses et consécutives, qui a trouvé là son coup fumant de fin de première année de mandat. Ami des juifs, dit-il ? Protecteur et saint patron d’Israël ? Pardon, mais je n’y crois guère. Je ne pense absolument pas que Donald Trump soit mû par le sentiment d’une union sacrée de l’Amérique et d’Israël ou, comme on disait déjà du temps des Pères pèlerins des Etats-Unis, de la nouvelle et de l’ancienne Jérusalem. Je n’imagine pas l’âme de Trump disponible, de quelque façon que ce soit, à la reconnaissance de la singularité juive, à la célébration des paradoxes de la pensée talmudique ou au goût de l’aventure qui animait la geste ardente, lyrique et héroïque des pionniers laïques du sionisme. Et je ne pense pas davantage que les fameux néo-évangélistes qui forment, paraît-il, ses bataillons d’électeurs les plus solides aient la moindre idée de ce qu’est, en vérité, cet Etat nommé par des poètes, bâti par des rêveurs et poursuivi jusqu’à aujourd’hui, dans le même souffle ou presque, par un peuple dont le roman national est semé de miracles rationnels, d’espérances sous les étoiles et de ferveurs logiques. Eh bien ? Eh bien l’Histoire nous apprend qu’un geste d’amitié abstrait, insincère, délié de l’Idée et de la Vérité, amputé de cette connaissance et de cet amour profonds qu’on appelle, en hébreu, l’Ahavat Israël, ne vaut, finalement, pas grand-chose – ou, pire, elle nous enseigne comment, en vertu d’une mauvaise chimie des fièvres politiques dont le peuple juif n’a eu que trop souvent à endurer l’épreuve et les foudres, il y a tous les risques que ce geste, un jour, se retourne en son contraire. (…) M. Trump a-t-il pensé à tout cela quand il a mis ses petites mains dans le dossier «Jérusalem» ? Bernard-Henri Lévy
Je partage l’attachement à Israël, de tous les juifs, mais d’un autre côté, la décision de Trump me paraît catastrophique parce qu’elle risque d’embraser la région, parce qu’elle risque d’empêcher la reprise des négociations entre les Palestiens et les Israéliens. Les Américains auraient dû procéder tout autrement. Benyamin Netanyahu ne propose rien aux Palestiniens. Il les pousse au désespoir et à l’extrémisme. Alain Finkielkraut
Sur Jérusalem, Trump met fin à des décennies de déni diplomatique, de novlangue, d’antisémitisme implicite et explicite – ou de schizophrénie pure et simple. Une « révolution copernicienne » dans laquelle une partie du monde arabe, et non la moindre, est prête à s’engager elle aussi. Michel Gurfinkiel
BHL n’a pas besoin des éditoriaux du Monde, ni même de ceux de Ha’aretz, car il sait déjà. Il sait ce qui est bon pour Israël et ce qui ne l’est pas. Il sait que Jérusalem est la capitale d’Israël, mais il sait aussi que Trump ne peut pas faire quelque chose de bon pour les Juifs. Ainsi BHL peut écrire dans son dernier éditorial que “Jérusalem est, évidemment, et depuis toujours, la capitale d’Israël” et qu’il “y a quelque chose, non seulement d’absurde, mais de choquant dans le tollé planétaire qui a suivi la reconnaissance, par les Etats-Unis, de cette évidence”. Mais dans la même foulée, il va convoquer A. B. Yehoshua, Amos Oz et même le rav Steinman z.l. pour nous expliquer doctement pourquoi la reconnaissance de la capitale d’Israël par les Etats-Unis n’est pas bonne pour les Juifs. (…) Dans son envolée lyrique sur tout ce que “l’âme de Trump” est incapable de saisir des subtilités du judaïsme, BHL commet une double erreur. La première est d’opposer de manière caricaturale la grandeur d’Israël et des Juifs et les basses motivations qu’il attribue (sans aucune preuve) à Donald Trump. En cela, il rejoint les pires adeptes du “Trump bashing”, qu’il prétend ne pas imiter. La seconde, plus grave encore, est de croire qu’en politique – et en politique internationale surtout – les intentions priment sur les actes. Or rien n’est plus faux. Car en réalité, peu nous importe ce que pense Trump, en son for intérieur, des Juifs. Après tout, l’histoire récente est pleine d’exemples de dirigeants politiques qui appréciaient les Juifs et le fameux “génie juif” célébré par BHL, et qui ont été les pires adversaires de l’Etat d’Israël. Ce qui compte ce sont les actes envers Israël, Etat et peuple. A cet égard, la reconnaissance de notre capitale Jérusalem est un acte fort et riche de signification, qui n’engage pas seulement le président Trump et les Etats-Unis, mais le reste du monde, qui s’engagera lui aussi sur cette voie, comme c’est déjà le cas. Cette reconnaissance est une décision politique capitale, qui n’obéit pas à un calcul passager et mesquin, comme le prétend BHL, car elle engage les Etats-Unis de manière ferme, et quasiment irréversible. Peu nous importe, dans ces circonstances, de savoir si Trump apprécie la “pensée talmudique” ou l’esprit juif viennois… L’attitude de BHL et d’autres intellectuels juifs vis-à-vis de Trump (et de Nétanyahou) ressemble à celle des rabbins non sionistes (et des Juifs assimilés) à l’égard de Theodor Herzl, qui n’était pas assez “casher” (ou trop Juif) à leurs yeux. Dans son mépris pour Donald Trump et pour l’Amérique qu’il incarne (ces “fameux néo-évangélistes” dont il parle avec dédain), BHL montre qu’il ne comprend rien à ce pays et à l’identification spirituelle et charnelle des chrétiens américains, sionistes ou évangélistes, au peuple et à la terre d’Israël. En réalité, BHL sait très bien que la reconnaissance de notre capitale par le président Trump est une bonne chose pour Israël. Seulement voilà, il éprouve comme il l’avoue un sentiment de “malaise”. Pour la simple et bonne raison que depuis des mois, depuis l’élection de Trump et même avant, BHL explique à qui veut l’entendre que Trump n’est pas un ami des Juifs. Il l’a dit à maintes reprises, sur CNN où il expliquait en février dernier que “Trump a un problème avec les Juifs” et dans le New York Times où il appelait les Juifs à se méfier du président américain. La seconde erreur de BHL est de croire qu’en politique internationale, les intentions priment sur les actes. “Trump, Dioclétien et le gardien de cochons” : sous ce titre quelque peu mystérieux, BHL s’était livré il y a presqu’un an à une attaque au vitriol contre le nouveau président des Etats-Unis, Donald Trump, accusé par avance de trahison envers Israël et de mépris envers les Juifs. Et pour mieux asséner ses coups, BHL conviait en renfort Freud, le Talmud, Kafka, Rachi et Proust… Après avoir pronostiqué pendant des semaines que Trump allait perdre car “l’Amérique de Tocqueville” n’élirait pas un tel homme, BHL annonçait alors l’inéluctable trahison de Trump envers Israël. C’est pourtant le même BHL qui avait, avec une certaine dose de courage intellectuel, et contrairement à d’autres, reconnu le danger de la politique d’Obama envers Israël à l’occasion du vote de la Résolution 2334 au Conseil de Sécurité. (“Mais voir cette administration qui a tant concédé à l’Iran, tant cédé à la Russie… se rattraper en donnant de la voix, in extremis, contre ce mouton noir planétaire, ce pelé, ce galeux, qu’est le Premier ministre d’Israël, quelle misère !” écrivait-il alors.) Entretemps, Trump a été élu, il est devenu le président américain le plus pro-israélien depuis 1948, comme l’ont prouvé non seulement sa dernière décision sur Jérusalem, mais aussi son attitude à l’ONU et face au président de l’Autorité palestinienne (ce sinistre has-been que même les pays arabes ont fini par lâcher et que seule la France continue de soutenir). Trump est en train de promouvoir une véritable “révolution copernicienne” au Moyen-Orient, pour reprendre l’expression de Michel Gurfinkiel, en reléguant au second plan le conflit israélo-arabe et en abandonnant la politique désastreuse du soutien à “l’Etat palestinien” et aux concessions israéliennes. Mais tout cela est trop simple et limpide pour notre amateur de “paradoxes talmudiques”. Aussi BHL s’évertue à démontrer, faisait feu de tout bois, que cela n’est pas bon pour Israël. Peu importe si les faits lui donnent tort, puisque lui-même est persuadé d’avoir raison. Pierre Lurçat
Toute unanimité est suspecte. Le Talmud stipule que si une condamnation est unanime, le tribunal doit gracier l’accusé. (…) Depuis 70 ans Jérusalem est la capitale en activité d’Israël et les Etats qui ont reconnu Israël ont reconnu cette réalité. N’est-ce pas à la résidence du Président à Jérusalem que leurs Ambassadeurs déposent leurs lettres de créance ? N’est-ce pas dans la Knesset à Jérusalem que Nicolas Sarkozy et François Hollande ont prononcé leurs importants discours ? Jérusalem est pour les diplomates le sein que l’hypocrite Tartuffe ne saurait voir. Déterminer sa capitale est un acte de souveraineté nationale : l’Allemagne réunifiée a choisi Berlin et malgré les souvenirs sinistres, personne n’a protesté. Ne pas admettre Jérusalem capitale d’Israël, c’est sous-entendre que bien que l’Etat d’Israël existe, il n’est pas totalement légitime. C’est ouvrir un boulevard à ceux qui espèrent la destruction du pays. La décision de Trump avait été actée il y a vingt-cinq ans par le Congrès américain et réitérée par l’ensemble des candidats à la Présidence, dont Barack Obama à l’Aipac en juin 2008. Sommes-nous si habitués à ce que les promesses n’engagent que ceux qui y croient, que nous trouvions choquant qu’elles soient respectées ? D’autant que les mots prononcés avec la reconnaissance n’écartent aucune évolution géopolitique ultérieure. Le problème de cette déclaration n’est pas son contenu mais le haro général qu’elle a suscité. Si l’accusé n’a trouvé personne pour le soutenir, disent les commentateurs du traité Sanhedrin, un soupçon pèse sur le travail des juges. Le soupçon est ici celui du panurgisme : montrer qu’on est un partisan de la paix, comme « l’ensemble de la communauté internationale», cette paix que recherchent, c’est un axiome, les dirigeants palestiniens. Ce discours lénifiant a conforté l’ambiguïté et n’a rien apporté à la résolution du conflit. Depuis que l’Unesco a déclaré, dans une résolution qui a bénéficié de beaucoup de lâchetés et de silences, que Jérusalem n’avait historiquement à voir qu’avec l’Islam, les dernières illusions sont tombées sur la validité de ces institutions internationales, perverties par le jeu des majorités automatiques et des pressions qui les accompagnent. Négliger les réalités présentes, discourir sur Jérusalem « capitale de la paix », ce qu’elle n’a malheureusement presque jamais été, voire rêver à un « corpus separatum », probablement défendu par des soldats népalais et bangladais, c’est rêver. La situation aurait été différente si les États arabes n’avaient pas déclenché la guerre en 1947, si les Jordaniens avaient écouté les objurgations israéliennes en juin 1967, et a fortiori si les Israéliens avaient perdu l’un ou l’autre de ces conflits. On ne refait pas le passé. Esquiver la vérité sous prétexte de ne pas heurter les sensibilités des ennemis d’Israël a fait suppurer la plaie qu’est devenu le conflit israélo-palestinien. Craindre de dire la vérité sous prétexte que cela pourrait « entraîner l’enfer sur la terre » (dixit le Hamas), c’est fortifier la menace terroriste. Les marionnettistes qui attisent les braises sont iraniens ou islamistes sunnites et pas américains. Ceux qui l’ignorent regardent le doigt quand le sage désigne la lune. C’est ce que dit non pas la Guemara, mais un proverbe chinois… Richard Prasquier

Rira bien qui rira le dernier !

Insultes, moqueries, appels à l’assassinat, condamnations, imprécations …

A l’heure où se confirme chaque un peu plus…

L’étendue des mensonges  que le précédent leader du Monde libre était prêt à couvrir …

Pour finaliser, avant la déjudaïsation de Jérusalem des derniers jours de son mandat, son tristement fameux accord nucléaire …

Avec, entre trafic de drogue et assassinats politiques, l’Etat terroriste iranien et ses affidés libanais ou argentins …

Et au lendemain d’une reconnaissance de Jérusalem …

Véritable, selon le mot d’un toujours aussi lucide mais bien seul Michel Gurfinkiel, « révolution copernicienne au MoyenOrient » …

Qui a fait à nouveau le plein d’unanimité contre le président Trump …

Y compris – ô combien significativement ! – par ceux-là mêmes …

Qui comme notre BHL national ou même, plus étonnament, notre Finkielkraut l’appelaient depuis longtemps de leurs voeux …

Comment ne pas repenser …

Avec l’un de nos rares dirigeants à avoir sauvé l’honneur, le président du CRIF Richard Pasquier …

Et au-delà du racisme de l’intelligence si caractéristique justement de nos intelligentsias …

Au fameux avertissement du Talmud contre les verdicts trop unanimes …

Mais aussi ne pas déjà entrevoir …

Avec les plus lucides de ses critiques …

Comme les conseillers mêmes de la Première ministre britannique …

Que la plaisanterie pourrait bien un jour se retourner contre eux ?

Johnny, Trump et Jérusalem. Que dit la Guemara ?
Richard Prasquier
CRIF
15/12/2017

Cette semaine, l’actualité impose son contenu. Pour Johnny, respect. Il a rendu service en amortissant par l’impact médiatique de son décès le déchaînement de critiques qui a accueilli la déclaration du Président américain sur Jérusalem. Belle conclusion pour cet homme qui fut un authentique ami d’Israël.

L’unanimité des dithyrambes adressés au rocker français, qui n’avait pourtant pas que des admirateurs, fait pendant à l’unanimité des blâmes adressés au président américain. Toute unanimité est suspecte. Le Talmud stipule que si une condamnation est unanime, le tribunal doit gracier l’accusé. Cette décision saugrenue, je la comprends mieux aujourd’hui.

Laissons les arguments juridiques et historiques qui soulignent que l’illégalité de la décision du président américain n’est pas si flagrante que cela. Ils confortent les convaincus, mais glissent malheureusement sur les autres. Les considérations religieuses et mystiques ne sont pas recevables, laïcité oblige.

Limitons-nous aux faits. Depuis 70 ans Jérusalem est la capitale en activité d’Israël et les Etats qui ont reconnu Israël ont reconnu cette réalité. N’est-ce pas à la résidence du Président à Jérusalem que leurs Ambassadeurs déposent leurs lettres de créance ? N’est-ce pas dans la Knesset à Jérusalem que Nicolas Sarkozy et François Hollande ont prononcé leurs importants discours ?

Jérusalem est pour les diplomates le sein que l’hypocrite Tartuffe ne saurait voir. Déterminer sa capitale est un acte de souveraineté nationale : l’Allemagne réunifiée a choisi Berlin et malgré les souvenirs sinistres, personne n’a protesté. Ne pas admettre Jérusalem capitale d’Israël, c’est sous-entendre que bien que l’Etat d’Israël existe, il n’est pas totalement légitime. C’est ouvrir un boulevard à ceux qui espèrent la destruction du pays.

« Ne pas admettre Jérusalem capitale d’Israël, c’est sous-entendre que bien que l’Etat d’Israël existe, il n’est pas totalement légitime.»

La décision de Trump avait été actée il y a vingt-cinq ans par le Congrès américain et réitérée par l’ensemble des candidats à la Présidence, dont Barack Obama à l’Aipac en juin 2008. Sommes-nous si habitués à ce que les promesses n’engagent que ceux qui y croient, que nous trouvions choquant qu’elles soient respectées ? D’autant que les mots prononcés avec la reconnaissance n’écartent aucune évolution géopolitique ultérieure.

Le problème de cette déclaration n’est pas son contenu mais le haro général qu’elle a suscité. Si l’accusé n’a trouvé personne pour le soutenir, disent les commentateurs du traité Sanhedrin, un soupçon pèse sur le travail des juges. Le soupçon est ici celui du panurgisme : montrer qu’on est un partisan de la paix, comme « l’ensemble de la communauté internationale», cette paix que recherchent, c’est un axiome, les dirigeants palestiniens. Ce discours lénifiant a conforté l’ambiguïté et n’a rien apporté à la résolution du conflit.

Depuis que l’Unesco a déclaré, dans une résolution qui a bénéficié de beaucoup de lâchetés et de silences, que Jérusalem n’avait historiquement à voir qu’avec l’Islam, les dernières illusions sont tombées sur la validité de ces institutions internationales, perverties par le jeu des majorités automatiques et des pressions qui les accompagnent.

Négliger les réalités présentes, discourir sur Jérusalem « capitale de la paix », ce qu’elle n’a malheureusement presque jamais été, voire rêver à un « corpus separatum », probablement défendu par des soldats népalais et bangladais, c’est rêver. La situation aurait été différente si les États arabes n’avaient pas déclenché la guerre en 1947, si les Jordaniens avaient écouté les objurgations israéliennes en juin 1967, et a fortiori si les Israéliens avaient perdu l’un ou l’autre de ces conflits. On ne refait pas le passé.

Esquiver la vérité sous prétexte de ne pas heurter les sensibilités des ennemis d’Israël a fait suppurer la plaie qu’est devenu le conflit israélo-palestinien. Craindre de dire la vérité sous prétexte que cela pourrait « entraîner l’enfer sur la terre » (dixit le Hamas), c’est fortifier la menace terroriste. Les marionnettistes qui attisent les braises sont iraniens ou islamistes sunnites et pas américains. Ceux qui l’ignorent regardent le doigt quand le sage désigne la lune. C’est ce que dit non pas la Guemara, mais un proverbe chinois…

Voir aussi:

The ‘Stupidity’ of Donald Trump

He’s had far more success than Arnold Schwarzenegger or Jesse Ventura

William McGurn

This time one year ago, the assumption dominating political coverage was that the only people more stupid than Donald Trump were the deplorables who elected him.

Since then, of course, President-elect Trump has become President Trump. Over his 11 months in office, he has put Neil Gorsuch on the Supreme Court and four times as many judges on the appellate courts as Barack Obama did his first year; recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel; withdrawn from the Paris climate accord; adopted a more resolute policy on Afghanistan than the one he’d campaigned on; rolled back the mandate forcing Catholic nuns, among others, to provide employees with contraception and abortifacients; signed legislation to open up drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; initiated a bold, deregulatory assault on the administrative state—and topped it all off with the first major overhaul of the tax code in more than 30 years.

And yet that Mr. Trump is a very stupid man remains the assumption dominating his press coverage.

Let this columnist confess: He did not see Mr. Trump’s achievements coming, at least at first. In the worst sense, populism means pandering to public appetites at the expense of sound policy. Too often populists who get themselves elected find either that they cannot implement what they promised, or that when they do, there are disastrous and unexpected consequences.

Add to this the sorry experience America had recently had with men, also outside conventional politics, who ran successfully for governorships: former pro wrestler and Navy SEAL Jesse Ventura in Minnesota and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California. Their respective administrations each began with high enthusiasm but ended in defeat and disillusionment. What would make anyone think Mr. Trump would do better?

Start with Mr. Ventura. His populism, like Mr. Trump’s, featured open ridicule of the press. At one point he issued press cards listing them as “official jackals.” Also like Mr. Trump, he was treated as simple-minded because he was not a professional pol. When David Letterman listed his top 10 campaign slogans for Mr. Ventura, No. 1 was “it’s the stupidity, stupid.”

In his first year Mr. Ventura’s approval rating soared to 73%, and while in office he did manage to push through tax rebates and a property-tax reform. By his last year, however, his vetoes were regularly overridden, spending had shot up, and the magic was gone. In the end, he decided against seeking a second term.

Next came Mr. Schwarzenegger, who in 2003 announced his run for governor on “The Tonight Show.” Mr. Schwarzenegger’s pitch was essentially Mr. Trump’s: The state’s politics had been so corrupted by the political class that Californians needed a strongman from the outside to shake it up.

The Governator did succeed in getting himself re-elected three years later, which is more than Mr. Ventura did. In the end, however, he was defeated by those he’d denounced as the “girlie men” of Sacramento, and his package of reforms went nowhere. The man who entered office promising to cut spending and revive the state’s economy ended up signing a huge tax increase, while debt nearly tripled under his watch.

Now we have President Trump. In one sense he is not unique: Almost all GOP presidents are stereotyped as not very bright. Ask Ike, or George W. Bush, or even Lincoln. Nor is it uncommon, in the headiness of a White House, for even the lowliest staffer to come to regard himself as the intellectual superior of the president he works for.

In Mr. Trump’s case, critics equate lowbrow tastes (e.g., well-done steaks covered in ketchup) as confirmation of a lack of brainpower. It can make for great sport. But starting out with the assumption that the president you are covering is a boob can prove debilitating to clear judgment.

Quick show of hands: How many of those in the press who continue to dismiss Mr. Trump as stupid publicly asserted he could never win the 2016 election—or would never get anyone decent to work for him in the unlikely miracle he did get elected?

The Trump presidency may still go poof for any number of reasons—if the promised economic growth doesn’t materialize, if the public concludes that his inability to ignore slights on Twitter is getting the best of his presidency, or if Democrats manage to leverage his low approval ratings and polarizing personality into a recapture of the House and Senate this coming November. And yes, it’s possible to regard Mr. Trump’s presidency as not worth the price.

But stupid? Perhaps the best advice for anti-Trumpers comes from one of their own, a Vermont Democrat named Jason Lorber. Way back in April, in an article for the Burlington Free Press, the retired state politician wrote that “while it may be good for a chuckle, calling or even thinking someone else stupid is virtually guaranteed to give them the last laugh.”

Is that not what Mr. Trump is now enjoying at the close of his first year?

 Voir également:

Trump, the Insurgent, Breaks With 70 Years of American Foreign Policy
President Trump has transformed the world’s view of the United States from an anchor of the international order into something more inward-looking and unpredictable.
Mark Landler
New York Times
Dec. 28, 2017

WASHINGTON — President Trump was already revved up when he emerged from his limousine to visit NATO’s new headquarters in Brussels last May. He had just met France’s recently elected president, Emmanuel Macron, whom he greeted with a white-knuckle handshake and a complaint that Europeans do not pay their fair share of the alliance’s costs.

On the long walk through the NATO building’s cathedral-like atrium, the president’s anger grew. He looked at the polished floors and shimmering glass walls with a property developer’s eye. (“It’s all glass,” he said later. “One bomb could take it out.”) By the time he reached an outdoor plaza where he was to speak to the other NATO leaders, Mr. Trump was fuming, according to two aides who were with him that day.

He was there to dedicate the building, but instead he took a shot at it.

“I never asked once what the new NATO headquarters cost,” Mr. Trump told the leaders, his voice thick with sarcasm. “I refuse to do that. But it is beautiful.” His visceral reaction to the $1.2 billion building, more than anything else, colored his first encounter with the alliance, aides said.

Nearly a year into his presidency, Mr. Trump remains an erratic, idiosyncratic leader on the global stage, an insurgent who attacks allies the United States has nurtured since World War II and who can seem more at home with America’s adversaries. His Twitter posts, delivered without warning or consultation, often make a mockery of his administration’s policies and subvert the messages his emissaries are trying to deliver abroad.

Mr. Trump has pulled out of trade and climate change agreements and denounced the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. He has broken with decades of American policy in the Middle East by recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. And he has taunted Kim Jong-un of North Korea as “short and fat,” fanning fears of war on the peninsula.

He has assiduously cultivated President Xi Jinping of China and avoided criticizing President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia — leaders of the two countries that his own national security strategy calls the greatest geopolitical threats to America.

Above all, Mr. Trump has transformed the world’s view of the United States from a reliable anchor of the liberal, rules-based international order into something more inward-looking and unpredictable. That is a seminal change from the role the country has played for 70 years, under presidents from both parties, and it has lasting implications for how other countries chart their futures.

Mr. Trump’s unorthodox approach “has moved a lot of us out of our comfort zone, me included,” the national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, said in an interview. A three-star Army general who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and wrote a well-regarded book about the White House’s strategic failure in Vietnam, General McMaster defined Trump foreign policy as “pragmatic realism” rather than isolationism.

“The consensus view has been that engagement overseas is an unmitigated good, regardless of the circumstances,” General McMaster said. “But there are problems that are maybe both intractable and of marginal interest to the American people, that do not justify investments of blood and treasure.”

Mr. Trump’s advisers argue that he has blown the cobwebs off decades of foreign policy doctrine and, as he approaches his first anniversary, that he has learned the realities of the world in which the United States must operate.

They point to gains in the Middle East, where Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is transforming Saudi Arabia; in Asia, where China is doing more to pressure a nuclear-armed North Korea; and even in Europe, where Mr. Trump’s criticism has prodded NATO members to ante up more for their defense.

The president takes credit for eradicating the caliphate built by the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, though he mainly accelerated a battle plan developed by President Barack Obama. His aides say he has reversed Mr. Obama’s passive approach to Iran, in part by disavowing the nuclear deal.

While Mr. Trump has held more than 130 meetings and phone calls with foreign leaders since taking office, he has left the rest of the world still puzzling over how to handle an American president unlike any other. Foreign leaders have tested a variety of techniques to deal with him, from shameless pandering to keeping a studied distance.

“Most foreign leaders are still trying to get a handle on him,” said Richard N. Haass, a top State Department official in the George W. Bush administration who is now the president of the Council on Foreign Relations. “Everywhere I go, I’m still getting asked, ‘Help us understand this president, help us navigate this situation.’

“We’re beginning to see countries take matters into their own hands. They’re hedging against America’s unreliability.”

Few countries have struggled more to adapt to Mr. Trump than Germany, and few leaders seem less personally in sync with him than its leader, Chancellor Angela Merkel, the physicist turned politician. After she won a fourth term, their relationship took on weighty symbolism: the great disrupter versus the last defender of the liberal world order.

In one of their first phone calls, the chancellor explained to the president why Ukraine was a vital part of the trans-Atlantic relationship. Mr. Trump, officials recalled, had little idea of Ukraine’s importance, its history of being bullied by Russia or what the United States and its allies had done to try to push back Mr. Putin.

German officials were alarmed by Mr. Trump’s lack of knowledge, but they got even more rattled when White House aides called to complain afterward that Ms. Merkel had been condescending toward the new president. The Germans were determined not to repeat that diplomatic gaffe when Ms. Merkel met Mr. Trump at the White House in March.
Trump’s Way

At first, things again went badly. Mr. Trump did not shake Ms. Merkel’s hand in the Oval Office, despite the requests of the assembled photographers. (The president said he did not hear them.)

Later, he told Ms. Merkel that he wanted to negotiate a new bilateral trade agreement with Germany. The problem with this idea was that Germany, as a member of the European Union, could not negotiate its own agreement with the United States.

Rather than exposing Mr. Trump’s ignorance, Ms. Merkel said the United States could, of course, negotiate a bilateral agreement, but that it would have to be with Germany and the other 27 members of the union because Brussels conducted such negotiations on behalf of its members.

“So it could be bilateral?” Mr. Trump asked Ms. Merkel, according to several people in the room. The chancellor nodded.

“That’s great,” Mr. Trump replied before turning to his commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, and telling him, “Wilbur, we’ll negotiate a bilateral trade deal with Europe.”

Afterward, German officials expressed relief among themselves that Ms. Merkel had managed to get through the exchange without embarrassing the president or appearing to lecture him. Some White House officials, however, said they found the episode humiliating.

For Ms. Merkel and many other Germans, something elemental has changed across the Atlantic. “We Europeans must really take our destiny into our own hands,” she said in May. “The times in which we can fully count on others — they are somewhat over.”

Mr. Trump gets along better with Mr. Macron, a 40-year-old former investment banker and fellow political insurgent who ran for the French presidency as the anti-Trump. Despite disagreeing with him on trade, immigration and climate change, Mr. Macron figured out early how to appeal to the president: He invited him to a military parade.

But Mr. Macron has discovered that being buddies with Mr. Trump can also be complicated. During the Bastille Day visit, officials recalled, Mr. Trump told Mr. Macron he was rethinking his decision to pull out of the Paris climate accord.

That prompted French diplomats to make a flurry of excited calls to the White House for clarification the following week, only to find out that American policy had not changed. White House officials say that Mr. Trump was merely reiterating that the United States would be open to rejoining the pact on more advantageous terms.

But the exchange captures Mr. Trump’s lack of nuance or detail, which leaves him open to being misunderstood in complex international talks.

There have been fewer misunderstandings with autocrats. Mr. Xi of China and King Salman of Saudi Arabia both won over Mr. Trump by giving him a lavish welcome when he visited. The Saudi monarch projected his image on the side of a hotel; Mr. Xi reopened a long-dormant theater inside the Forbidden City to present Mr. Trump and his wife, Melania, an evening of Chinese opera.

“Did you see the show?” Mr. Trump asked reporters on Air Force One after he left Beijing in November. “They say in the history of people coming to China, there’s been nothing like that. And I believe it.”

Later, chatting with his aides, Mr. Trump continued to marvel at the respect Mr. Xi had shown him. It was a show of respect for the American people, not just for the president, one adviser replied gently.

Then, of course, there is the strange case of Mr. Putin. The president spoke of his warm telephone calls with the Russian president, even as he introduced a national security strategy that acknowledged Russia’s efforts to weaken democracies by meddling in their elections.

Mr. Trump has had a bumpier time with friends. He told off Prime Minister Theresa May on Twitter, after she objected to his exploitation of anti-Muslim propaganda from a far-right group in Britain.

“Statecraft has been singularly absent from the treatment of some of his allies, particularly the U.K.,” said Peter Westmacott, a former British ambassador to the United States.

Mr. Trump’s feuds with Ms. May and other British officials have left him in a strange position: feted in Beijing and Riyadh but barely welcome in London, which Mr. Trump is expected to visit early next year, despite warnings that he will face angry protesters.

Aides to Mr. Trump argue that his outreach to autocrats has been vindicated. When Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited the White House in March, the president lavished attention on him. Since then, they say, Saudi Arabia has reopened cinemas and allowed women to drive.

But critics say Mr. Trump gives more than he gets. By backing the 32-year-old crown prince so wholeheartedly, the president cemented his status as heir to the House of Saud. The crown prince has since jailed his rivals as Saudi Arabia pursued a deadly intervention in Yemen’s civil war.

Mr. Trump granted an enormous concession to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he announced this month that the United States would formally recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. But he did not ask anything of Mr. Netanyahu in return.

That showed another hallmark of Mr. Trump’s foreign policy: how much it is driven by domestic politics. In this case, he was fulfilling a campaign promise to move the American Embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv. While evangelicals and some hard-line, pro-Israel American Jews exulted, the Palestinians seethed — leaving Mr. Trump’s dreams of brokering a peace accord between them and the Israelis in tatters.

With China, Mr. Trump’s cultivation of Mr. Xi probably persuaded him to put more economic pressure on its neighbor North Korea over its provocative behavior. But even the president has acknowledged, as recently as Thursday, that it is not enough. And in return for Mr. Xi’s efforts, Mr. Trump has largely shelved his trade agenda vis-à-vis Beijing.

“It was a big mistake to draw that linkage,” said Robert B. Zoellick, who served as United States trade representative under Mr. Bush. “The Chinese are playing him, and it’s not just the Chinese. The world sees his narcissism and strokes his ego, diverting him from applying disciplined pressure.”

Mr. Trump’s protectionist instincts could prove the most damaging in the long term, Mr. Zoellick said. Trade, unlike security, springs from deeply rooted convictions. Mr. Trump believes that multilateral accords — like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, from which he pulled out in his first week in office — are stacked against America.

“He views trade as zero-sum, win-lose,” Mr. Zoellick said.

For some of Mr. Trump’s advisers, the key to understanding his statecraft is not how he deals with Mr. Xi or Ms. Merkel, but the ideological contest over America’s role that plays out daily between the West Wing and agencies like the State Department and the Pentagon.

“There’s a chasm that can’t be bridged between the globalists and the nationalists,” said Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s former chief strategist and the leader of the nationalist wing, who has kept Mr. Trump’s ear since leaving the White House last summer.

On the globalist side of the debate stand General McMaster; Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis; Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson; and Mr. Trump’s chief economic adviser, Gary D. Cohn. On the nationalist side, in addition to Mr. Bannon, stand Stephen Miller, the president’s top domestic adviser, and Robert Lighthizer, the chief trade negotiator. On many days, the nationalist group includes the commander in chief himself.

The globalists have curbed some of Mr. Trump’s most radical impulses. He has yet to rip up the Iran nuclear deal, though he has refused to recertify it. He has reaffirmed the United States’ support for NATO, despite his objections about those members he believes are freeloading. And he has ordered thousands of additional American troops into Afghanistan, even after promising during the campaign to stay away from nation-building.

This has prompted a few Europeans to hope that “his bark is worse than his bite,” in the words of Mr. Westmacott.

Mr. Trump acknowledges that being in office has changed him. “My original instinct was to pull out,” he said of Afghanistan, “and, historically, I like following my instincts. But all my life I’ve heard that decisions are much different when you sit behind the desk in the Oval Office.”

Yet some things have not changed. Mr. Trump’s advisers have utterly failed to curb his Twitter posts, for example. Some gamely suggest that they create diplomatic openings. Others say they roll with the punches when he labels Mr. Kim of North Korea “Little Rocket Man.” For Mr. Tillerson, however, the tweets have severely tarnished his credibility in foreign capitals.

“All of them know they still can’t control the thunderbolt from on high,” said John D. Negroponte, who served as the director of national intelligence for Mr. Bush.

The tweets highlight that Mr. Trump still holds a radically different view of the United States’ role in the world than most of his predecessors. His advisers point to a revealing meeting at the Pentagon on July 20, when Mr. Mattis, Mr. Tillerson and Mr. Cohn walked the president through the country’s trade and security obligations around the world.

The group convened in the secure conference room of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, a storied inner sanctum known as the tank. Mr. Mattis led off the session by declaring that “the greatest thing the ‘greatest generation’ left us was the rules-based postwar international order,” according to a person who was in the room.

After listening for about 50 minutes, this person said, Mr. Trump had heard enough. He began peppering Mr. Mattis and Mr. Tillerson with questions about who pays for NATO and the terms of the free trade agreements with South Korea and other countries.

The postwar international order, the president of the United States declared, is “not working at all.”

Voir enfin:

Analysis The Palestinians Just Gave Netanyahu What He Always Wanted for Christmas

If there is one goal the Israeli premier has devoted his entire career to, it is trying to sever ties between the Americans and the Palestinians – and Abbas has handed it to him wrapped with a bow
Anshel Pfeffer

Haaretz

Dec 27, 2017

Ever since President Donald Trump announced the United States’ decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the focus has been almost entirely on the global chorus of condemnation, the overwhelming votes against Trump’s proclamation in the UN Security Council and General Assembly, and the – so far – tiny handful of countries supporting the move.

But while attention has largely been on these symbolic moves, something that escaped notice is that, in the aftermath of the recognition gesture, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accomplished one of his most cherished policy goals: Finally driving a massive wedge between the United States and the Palestinians.

When last Friday Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas published his Christmas message, announcing that the Palestinians “will not accept the U.S. as the mediator in the peace process, nor are we going to accept any plan from the U.S. side,” he could not have come up with a better Christmas present for Netanyahu.
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If there is one goal Netanyahu has devoted his career to – from the days when he was a Zionist student activist at MIT in the early 1970s – it is trying to sever ties between the Americans and the Palestinians. And Abbas gave it to him, just like that.

The battle against the U.S. administration recognizing the PLO and entering official talks with it dominated Israeli foreign policy throughout the 1980s, when Netanyahu was a diplomat in Washington and at the UN.

Thirty years ago, when leaving the diplomatic service to enter politics full-time with the Likud party, Netanyahu timed his resignation to follow a meeting between then-Secretary of State George P. Shultz and PLO-affiliated Palestinian academics, to portray it as an act of protest against the talks. Between 1988 and 1991, as deputy foreign minister his brief was mainly devoted to appearing in the American media, advocating against U.S.-PLO ties.

As prime minister (initially from 1996-1999 and then from 2009), Netanyahu had to contend with the new realities of the post-Oslo era – and, of course, with the administrations of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, which openly supported a Palestinian state. But every engagement of his with the Palestinians was slow, grudging and through gritted teeth.

He has never given up on his stated intent to convince the world – and when Netanyahu thinks of the world, it will always be the world as it looks from the Oval Office – that the Palestinian issue is a sideshow and its leadership does not deserve an equal place at the table.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, May 23, 2017.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, May 23, 2017.Stephen Crowley/NYT

Netanyahu has never really cared about Jerusalem, beyond its symbolic significance. His government has not made any real efforts to solve the everyday problems of Israel’s poorest city. And even the much-beloved canard of moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem was never that high on his priority list. But the support for recognizing Jerusalem among Trump’s evangelical base, and the fact the U.S. president was willing to go ahead with the recognition as a low-cost (from his perspective) way of signaling he was keeping his election promises and showing how different he was from Obama, was a wonderful opportunity for Netanyahu.

He didn’t expect the world to suddenly fall in line with the U.S. president’s proclamation. Quite the opposite. He saw how much anger and opposition it would provoke, and therefore stoked Trump’s ego with encouragement and praise.

Netanyahu played the cards dealt to him brilliantly. The bigger the hoopla around Trump’s empty gesture, the bigger the insult to the Palestinians – an insult not delivered by Israel, but directly by the White House.

Trump himself made it clear the recognition of Jerusalem was not meant to prejudice the outcome of future negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. He even emphasized that the United States was not recognizing any specific borders of Israel’s capital. The United States hasn’t even changed its policy on not writing “Israel” in the passports of U.S. citizens born in Jerusalem, much less made any concrete steps for actually moving the embassy. But Netanyahu still declared that Trump’s announcement was an event of great historical importance, on a par with the Balfour Declaration and King Cyrus’ decree to rebuild the Jewish temple in Jerusalem.

The Palestinians could have issued a low-key response, saying simply that no one, not even Trump, could decide the future of Jerusalem without their agreement. They could have kept their channels to the United States open and waited to see if anything would come of the much-vaunted Trump peace proposal.

Instead, they declared “days of rage” that quickly fizzled, and then effectively severed ties with the Americans by announcing they would be boycotting any scheduled meetings with administration officials.

No one has any illusions that this a favorable presidency as far as they are concerned. But, let’s face it, every single U.S. presidency has always been much more pro-Israel than pro-Palestinian. The “honest broker” label has always been a myth. The only reason the United States has been mediating between the two sides for so long is that it’s the world’s sole superpower and has been invested in the region for so many years.

There is always talk of another government stepping in as a potential mediator between Israel and the Palestinians. This is idle talk based on wishful thinking. No other country has the resources, the skilled and experienced diplomatic corps, the investment in the region and the credibility to become the brokers of the process.

The European Union is mired in a near-existential crisis, with Brexit cutting off one of its major members; its unofficial leader, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, is struggling to build a coalition at home; and its unofficial leader-in-waiting, French President Emmanuel Macron, lacks the experience and attention span to devote himself properly. Russia has ulterior motives and does not really wish to help bring peace, just enhance its influence. China, which launched a Mideast conference this past week, is too far away – physically and mentally – to be much more than a bystander. And, most important, Israel can and will veto any other partner besides the Americans.

All of this may change in the future if successive administrations follow Obama and Trump’s example by retreating from America’s traditional role in the region. But it will take decades for a new player to grow into the role of ultimate patron of the diplomatic process. By the time that happens, Abbas and Netanyahu will no longer be on the stage themselves.

It is much more likely that a new U.S. administration will reassert itself within a few years. When that happens, the Palestinians will have to rebuild their relationship with Washington and, depending on the views of that administration, it may be a better one than they had in the past. But for now at least, they have given Netanyahu what he’s always wanted for Christmas.
read more: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.831169