Inside the Asylum of the State Department<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
By Jan Markell
www.olivetreeviews.org
 
Nearly two years ago I had author and former Undersecretary of State Jed Babbin on air with me. His new book was titled, "Inside the Asylum: Why the State Department is Worse than You Think."  After reading it and watching the antics of that department, one almost has to wonder what's in the air or water over there to twist and distort thinking.  That's not limited to any administration.  It seems no matter who is president, the State Department has a mind of its own and does what is right in their own eyes.
 
One of my most favored women in public life has been Condoleeza Rice, Secretary of State.  Here is a gracious woman, articulate and gracious, now jet setting around the world talking to some of the world's most powerful leaders.  And they listen.  Yet I fear she has come under the spell of State and has thus has lost some common sense.
 
If the State Department had a religion it would be Palestinian statehood.  On its altar, diplomats are eager to sacrifice the security of <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />America's only reliable Middle East ally, Israel, and, ultimately, our own security as well.
 
As media analyst Don Feder writes, "Secretary Rice has become the high priestess of a Palestinian state (which would be) the crowning achievement of American foreign policy . . . "
 
Feder continues, "Her recent address to the American Palestine Task Force was modestly described  as the most pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel speech in memory by a major U.S. administration official."  She stated, "I believe that there could be no greater legacy for America than to help bring into being a Palestinian state for a people who suffer daily humiliation of living under the so-called Israeli occupation."
 
Secretary Rice, you know better than most that the only reason Israel is "occupying" some territory is that she was attacked in 1948, 1967, 1973, and other wars, and seized the territory for defensive purposes.  But she chooses to characterize the nation that has been our steadfast ally and friend for 60 years to demonstrate her devotion, and that of her department, to a people who celebrated the slaughter of 3,000 Americans on 9/11.
 
In comparing George Washington, Adams, and Jefferson to Arafat and Abbas and the mad bombers of Hamas she stretches credulity and weakens her own image and that of America.  Most Americans would never buy into such nonsense.  As Feder states, "Our founding fathers were men of learning, achievement and discernment, not a gang of Allah-intoxicated savages.  They demonstrated their courage by pledging their lives, fortunes and sacred honor, not by turning mothers and children into smoldering lumps of mangled flesh."
 
Yet Rice stated, "The Palestinian people deserve a better life, a life that is rooted in liberty, democracy, uncompromised by violence and terrorism."  So the Israelis are the terrorists?  Then it is the Israelis blowing up busses and restaurants?  It is the Israelis setting off homicide bombers amid innocent women and children?
 
Want real statistics?  In recent polls, 61 percent of Palestinians supported suicide bombings and terrorism, 56 percent favored rocket attacks on civilian targets, 75 percent endorsed the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers, and 97 percent were pro-Hezbollah.
 
The delusion of the last two years is that Mahmoud Abbas, Arafat's successor, is a moderate at heart, working feverishly for democracy and human rights in Jihadistan, as well as for an enduring peace with Israel.  We must not compare Abbas and Fatah with Hamas.  Hamas equals terrrorism; Abbas equals moderation and cooperation, even though Abbas financed the 1972 slaughter of Israeli athletes. His PhD thesis was on why the Holocaust really never happened.  Read the Palestinian Charter, Dr. Rice. It still calls for the complete destruction of Israel.  It doesn't call for a two-state solution.  It calls for a one-state solution: Palestine and only Palestine.  Both Hamas and Abbas are willing to wade through a river of blood to reach that goal.  Tigers do not change their stripes.
 
A year ago when Iranian president Ahmadinejad began raving about wiping Israel off the map, Abbas' party in Gaza distributed flyers proclaiming, "We affirm our support and backing for the position of the Iranian president toward the Zionist state which, by God's will, will cease to exist."
 
Why is it not possible for the fools at "foggy bottom," otherwise known as the State Department, to see what is so obvious?  To be honest, I do not have an answer.  Perhaps there is some end-time apocalyptic purpose in all of this.  In the natural it can make no sense. I do believe I gave a clue earlier when I said that men and women are doing what is right in their own eyes exactly as the Bible predicted.
 
Frankly, "Palestine" makes no sense.  It was conjured up by Yaser Arafat in the 1960s.  To learn more, visit the "Palestine" link at my Web site, here http://www.olivetreeviews.org/topics/palestine.shtml  I strongly encourage you to view the two short media items that have picture and sound.  After viewing them, tell me how any thinking person, let alone the Secretary of State, could believe a Palestinian State is the end-all answer to everything.