Jerusalem of Gold

"National Security in the Middle East."

Talk given at Gerald Halbert Park and Observation Point, opposite the Hebrew University,   Jerusalem, May 2015.

"I spent seventeen years in the IDF in the Israeli Specialist Unit. Then I held the position of National Security Advisor to two prime ministers; Sharon and Rabin.

Back in 2002, I was in a conversation with Sharon. Now Sharon and I didn't get on very well. And  he said:   "What does demography have to do with National Security?" And I replied, "It has everything to do with demography! Why are we here in Israel?", I asked him. "We are here to build a democratic Jewish state." Sharon didn't get it and he repeated, "What does demography have to do with it?!" I said, "We have to maintain a Jewish majority, or by 2020 it will be only 50% Jewish."

But also security is not just demographic but borders. We need to keep the no right of return (for so-called 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation Palestinian "refugees"), so that the demography is not tilted. He (Sharon) didn't like my National Security strategy of disengagement demographically from the Palestinians. It's not easy to have twenty years in negotiations (with the Palestinians) and it doesn't work.

We are in the midst of regional war, with 300,000 killed and millions displaced. We are in a historic  framework many don't understand. (The Middle East is) very unstable, many have no national state. There are only  four real countries i.e.: a shared  people, land and cultural shared history. These are Iran, Turkey, Israel and Egypt. The others, as Churchill put it, are "tribes with a flag." The  Kurds are a people but they currently don't have a land. "

(Referring to the UN's view of  Israel) "My Grandma despised experts. She said, "Always remember the ark was built by a novice and the Titanic was built by a bunch of experts."

(At this point, as he  talked in the midday sun, gun shots were heard to our left, behind Hebrew University. One of our small group, alarmed, asked  him, "What is that?" He replied, with  relaxed Israeli gallows-humour, "Just somebody killing somebody.  There is a war here, mainly made by the Muslim brotherhood, although they are not a "brotherhood!"

He then discussed the borders. "We need defensive borders, which is not the same as  secure boundaries. Resolution  242 says, "Israel should withdraw to 1967 lines." We disagree because, for national security, we need:

Strategic depth

Defensive borders

A demilitarised Palestinian area.

Since 9/11, there have been  50,000 terrorism attacks in Israel.  This derails peace and policy.  Lebanon and Gaza both fell, now there is the deal with Iran.

To the UN he comments, "If you not sending troops we understand, but please don't interrupt us when we need to do something. It is a kind of new order that is being shaped now. The new dividing line is countries who support, or oppose, terrorism, and it is becoming more and more Islamic. Let's pray Jordan will save the King (Abdullah II). It's very important for us. We want Israel, Jordan, Egypt, the Saudis on the one side."

Uzi Dayan is a distinguished visiting fellow at The Washington Institute. From their website: "Dayan's long military career began in 1966 with service in an elite unit that would fight heroically in the Six Day War. He held impressive commands in all of Israel's major post-1967 engagements and was appointed head of the I.D.F.'s Planning Branch in 1993, a position in which he led the security committee of Israel's delegation to peace talks with the Jordanians, Palestinians, and Syrians. Dayan's military career culminated with his appointment as Head of Central Command (1996), Deputy Chief of Staff (2000), and National Security Advisor to Prime Ministers Barak and Sharon (2000–2002)."

Comments: While with us,  Dayan's humour and casual dress belied his highly astute understanding of the Middle East. While at the Observation Point, over-looking the Dead Sea out to Jordan,   my usually adept iPad Air 2 gave me a message that has occurred only this once, and that was to allow it to cool down! Therefore, these notes are  short and, Apple may need to refine the use of iPad's to Middle East climates. If you would enjoy further research, please watch this  eight minute video-interview given  by Dayan on "Hamas, Hezbollah and the Iran Deal" to the Jerusalem Post. In addition, here is a  recent article in Tablet Magazine, which  states: "Dayan’s firmly held perspective - that the Oslo peace process is dead and that any solution to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis will be a unilateral one - may come as a surprise to Secretary of State John Kerry, and to most people in the West, who read daily newspaper stories about the ups and downs of something called “the peace process.”

I was highly aware of the privileged opportunity to meet and listen to Dayan, who opened up a deeper, and yet simultaneously realistic, understanding of the increasingly volatile situation in Israel, her Middle East neighbours and the "tribes with a flag" who surround her.

If you are part of  a church group which prayers for Israel, please lift up Israel's current security and  Dayan and his colleagues in National Security; for their expertise to be heard, and acted upon.