Israel headlines: Kerry demands Sharon’s Gaza peace for Israel

 Have you been reading Israel’s news?  If you have, you know that former Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has died at age 85, after lying in a coma for more than eight years.

You may also have been reading about US Secretary of State John Kerry. He’s been travelling to Israel to get a peace deal done between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA).

Kerry now uses Sharon’s death to promote his peace. Did you notice that?

The Israel headlines below—and commentary—come from the period, January 10 -13, 2014. 

Peace talks

-In tributes to Sharon, a not-so-subtle message for Netanyahu (01/12/14, Times of Israel)

-Kerry: 'Peace Now,' in 2014 (01/13/14, Arutz Sheva)

- Ashton to Israel: Stop settlement building now (01/13/14, Times of Israel)

 - Biden: Israel's Security Depends on Peace with PA (01/13/14, Arutz Sheva)

-Hamas: 'Israel Has Eight Years Left' (01/13/14, Arutz Sheva)

- Hamas: Sharon’s death leaves us ‘confident in victory’ (01/11/14, Times of Israel)

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In 2005, then-Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon surrendered Gaza to Arabs. Israel’s three major dailies of the period— Haaretz, Yedioth Ahronoth, and Maariv — provided almost unequivocal support for Sharon’s plan, both in their editorials and through their coverage (see, “Disengaged: A Letter from Tel Aviv”, Gal Beckerman, Columbia Journalism Review, September/October 2005). Israel’s Leftists were delighted. The Disengagement was “the life-saving medicine” (ibid) Israel needed to survive and be secure.  

The Left was finally getting leadership decisions it could cheer. It happily believed that Sharon’s ‘brave’ decision would bring peace to Israel.

Now, eight years later, we see that Israel’s southern border has seen neither peace nor security. Thousands of rockets have rained down on Israeli civilians. Thousands of adults have abandoned their homes and jobs. Thousands of Israeli children are considered to suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSS), an ailment we usually associate with soldiers returning from combat—not children.

That’s not peace. It’s the residue of war.

We were reminded of this sad truth during this news cycle because Ariel Sharon was laid to rest on January 13, 2013. US Secretary of State John Kerry (and Israel’s Leftists) now treat Israel with a shocking arrogance. Together, they callously dismiss the suffering of children in Israel’s south in order to exploit Sharon’s death. They want our current Prime Minister to imitate Sharon (“In tributes to Sharon, a not-so-subtle message for Netanyahu”).

Kerry wants Netanyahu to surrender land just as Sharon did because, Kerry said, Sharon made ‘tough decisions for peace’. But we know the truth. We know about our children who live in the Israel’s south. Sharon’s decision did not bring peace or security.

Look at our children in Ashdot and Ashkelon. They have been traumatized by Sharon’s ‘peace.’ Look at the kindergarten and pre-school buildings in those beleaguered cities. They are no longer children’s buildings.  They are reinforced bomb shelters.

The Sharon peace that so excites Kerry (and Israel’s Left) forces our children to live in bomb shelters. That’s the ‘peace’ Kerry wants from Benjamin Netanyahu.

Kerry wants to repeat Sharon’s Gaza ‘peace’. He wants that Gaza peace for all of Israel. Even US Vice president Biden calls for that ‘peace’ (“ Biden: Israel's Security Depends on Peace with PA”).

Do what Sharon did, they say. That’s how you will get security and peace.

Is that what we want? Sharon’s Gaza peace holds a million Israelis hostage in southern Israel. That peace means that when sirens go off in southern Israeli cities, your life suddenly collapses into fifteen-seconds of terror.

Why fifteen seconds? That’s how much time you have to get to a bomb shelter.

During that fifteen seconds, your life stops. You stop thinking about your shopping list. You stop thinking about your work problems. You stop thinking about your child’s sore throat. All you can think about is, run!

That’s Sharon’s Gaza peace. It’s what Kerry and an extremely impatient European Union (EU) now want for all of Israel. In fact, Kerry and the EU are so impatient, they already know what they will do if Netanyahu doesn’t yield to the PA. They will hammer Israel with a European boycott that already terrifies Israel’s Leftists and Left-Centrists.

Kerry and the EU have tunnel vision: bring Sharon’s Gaza peace to all of Israel! Kerry has said as much. But we know the truth: Sharon’s surrender in Gaza did not bring peace.

It’s an insult to Jews to belittle our children’s trauma to suggest otherwise. How can Kerry and the Europeans be so cruel to little children?

Such arrogant dismissal might be more than an oversight. It might be more than an insult. It might suggest that the blood of Jewish children doesn’t matter.

What does that suggest?