RUTHFULLY YOURS

It is not clear when a widespread and growing terror campaign becomes officially ‎labeled as a new intifada (the “car intifada” terminology is now being thrown ‎around).

In any case, as they have done many times before, the Palestinians have ‎shown that one area in which they are willing to innovate is to find new ways of ‎killing Jews in Israel. Suicide bombings, rockets from Gaza, tunnels dug into Israel — ‎when Israel responds with countermeasures to one form of terror, others are ‎introduced. Using automobiles to slam into pedestrians has been tried before, but ‎now seems to have become a more popular tactic. Stabbing Israelis does not kill as ‎many people as quickly as suicide bombings, but draws a weaker response from ‎Israel and a far weaker rebuke from the West. ‎

The Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, well into his second unelected four-‎year term of office beyond the one term to which he was elected, is the Palestinian ‎leader that Israel has been waiting for, according to European and American ‎peacemakers. He is, they argue, a “moderate,” unlike Yassar Arafat, and his tenure ‎in office represents a real (and of course, likely final) opportunity to achieve the ‎two-state solution between Israel and “Palestine.” Final of course does not mean ‎final, since when peace talks break down, if they are ever resumed, the likes of John ‎Kerry and Martin Indyk and EU leaders like Catherine Ashton will claim that now, ‎this time, we have really reached that final opportunity, which will disappear if not ‎seized upon. ‎

Abbas, of course, has done everything in his power to stoke the violence, by ‎glorifying the murderers of Jews as martyrs, and honoring them, and calling for the ‎defense of Al-Aqsa and Jerusalem, presumably under threat because some Jews ‎might mouth silent prayers on the Temple Mount. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ‎succumbed on this score, reassuring the Jordanians that Israel has not changed its ‎policy on the Temple Mount.

Once a new wave of violence begins, and it spreads to ‎a much broader area, as it has this week, Abbas may not be in control of how ‎quickly it gets tamped down, assuming he wants it tamped down. Palestinian ‎religious leaders are certainly not in any mood to eliminate or reduce the violence, calling Jerusalem the capital of the ‎global caliphate, and pushing for tens of millions of Muslims to march to the city to ‎protect Al-Aqsa from the infidels. ‎

The U.S. State Department has been nothing if not revealing on whom it really holds ‎to blame for the current round of violence. After the latest car attack and stabbings ‎in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, resulting in two Israeli deaths, Jen Psaki, the State ‎Department’s chief spokeswoman, called for restraint on all sides to protect ‎civilians and end the violence. What exactly does that restraint mean? The victims of the stabbing attacks and car attacks practiced restraint, ‎but their killers did not. Psaki thinks the Israeli response to one of the attacks may ‎not have been sufficiently restrained — since live ammunition was fired atthe ‎attacker. Imagine that. ‎

Jen Psaki: “We strongly condemn the stabbings, uh, the ‎stabbings today, in the West Bank and we deeply regret the loss ‎of life. Our condolences go out to the victim’s family. It is ‎absolutely critical that parties take absolutely every measure to ‎protect civilians and de-escalate tensions. Uh, we are also ‎seeking any additional information surrounding, uh, the incident ‎of the, uh, Israeli Arab who was shot, who was shot uh, as well ‎uh, shot with a uh, uh, a live bullet, uh. We’re looking for ‎information concerning this incident. We’re in touch, close touch, ‎with the Ministry of Justice, and of course we urge all sides to ‎exercise restraint.”

This was not the only outrageous State Department comment ‎this week. Much as Eric Holder’s Justice Department seemed to ‎be freer to propound Barack Obama’s views on race than the ‎president himself, the State Department has now taken it upon ‎itself to become the most critical unit within the administration ‎when it comes to Israel. Of course, unnamed White House officials, always keeping it classy, may call Netanyahu a “chickenshit” for bowing to ‎Obama’s pressure not to strike at Iran in the run-up to the ‎presidential election in 2012. But the official remarks by the ‎State Department spokespeople are public, and out there every ‎day. If you want to know what Obama thinks about ‎Israel, listen to Jen Psaki and Marie Harf when they meet the ‎press. ‎

This week, Psaki felt the need to rebuke Gen. Martin ‎Dempsey, who praised Israel’s defense forces for their ‎remarkable restraint during the latest Gaza war. Restraint is something the administration seeks from ‎Israel when responding to violence, and one might think the top ‎military leader might better judge Israel’s performance than a ‎former Obama campaign worker elevated to a State ‎Department spokesperson role.

But for the State Department, ‎restraint is never adequately applied by Israel, and Israel was ‎routinely condemned by both State Department officials, as ‎well as White House officials during the recent war. Deputy ‎National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes compared American ‎concern for civilians in war favorably to Israel’s concern as seen ‎during Operation Protective Edge: ‎”I think you can always do more. The U.S. military ‎does that in Afghanistan.”‎

Predictably, the State Department lashed out at ‎Dempsey to remind anyone listening that he did not ‎speak for theadministration. They still believe Israel was badly at fault ‎during the Gaza war, and their military activity led to ‎unnecessary civilian casualties. Maybe Israel’s bombs ‎should have been rubber bombs, like the rubber ‎bullets Israel should be firing at terror attackers.

Psaki: “However, we also expressed deep concern and heartbreak for ‎the civilian death toll in Gaza and made clear, as you noted in the ‎statement you pointed to, that we believed that Israel could have ‎done more to prevent civilian casualties, and it was important that ‎they held their selves to a high standard. So that remains our view ‎and position about this summer’s events. … But it remains the broad ‎view of the entire administration that they could have done more ‎and they should have taken more — all feasible precautions to prevent ‎civilian casualties.”‎

In other words, Dempsey is not representing the broad view within ‎the administration on Israel’s culpability. This is probably true. ‎Dempsey after all is a career military man, and that life could not be ‎further removed from the life experience of the community ‎organizer turned president. ‎

The final, and perhaps nastiest attack on Israel, came from White ‎House counsel Donald Verrilli, defending the Obama administration ‎in front of the Supreme Court in the Zivotofsky ‎case, for its refusal to associate a country, namely Israel, with the city ‎of Jerusalem as a birthplace on a U.S. passport. Verrilli compared pairing Israel with ‎Jerusalem as similar to recognizing the seizure of Crimea this year ‎by Russia by listing Crimea, Russia, on a passport. In essence, the ‎administration is now viewing Israel’s participation in the Six-Day ‎War of 1967 — both the causes of and results — with the actions of ‎Russia in its aggression in Crimea. The Six-Day War must by ‎extension also have been a war of aggression, and the results should ‎not be recognized. ‎

The administration is unhappy with Israel. It builds apartments in ‎its capital city for its rapidly expanding population of Jews and ‎Arabs, as well as in communities in Judea and Samaria that all the ‎peacemakers acknowledge will wind up in Israel if there is ever a final ‎peace agreement. Israel defends itself after being attacked from Gaza. ‎Some civilians die (which must be a first in the history of warfare). ‎Israel considers its capital to be part of the country. Israeli police and ‎defense forces respond to terror attacks and at times terrorists are ‎killed (better of course for the State Department if they are captured ‎and imprisoned, and then released as a goodwill gesture so ‎Mahmoud Abbas will agree to talk some more). ‎

It is hard not to get the impression that Israel really bothers the ‎White House and the State Department. There is little it can do that ‎pleases this administration other than turning the other cheek when ‎attacked, showing restraint at all times, or doing what is necessary to ‎get the Palestinians to talk, so that they can proceed to meet and ‎then be pressured to give parts of the country away.