In the immediate aftermath of September 11, the United States, in contrast to Israel, appeared to have a coherent policy and message. President Bush promised war on international terror and told the nations of the world they were either with the U.S. or with the terrorists. But it has been downhill ever since. The first sign of trouble came when the administration requested from Congress a five year waiver of laws prohibiting the chief executive from providing military assistance to countries defined as state sponsors of terrorism or with egregious human rights records, including, in the Islamic world, Syria, Iran, Libya, Sudan, and Iraq. In its eagerness to line up Syria for its anti-terror coalition, the administration proposed removing her from the State Department's list of terrorist sponsors, even though Syria holds the dubious record of hosting more terror groups than any other country in the world.

Both Syria and Saudi Arabia have already called for a UN conference to "define" terrorism (it's whatever Israel does).

Such policies put the administration in an awkward position. How can you regard nations that harbor terrorists as hostile regimes and at the same time welcome them into your coalition? These countries are eager to help the U.S. solve the contradiction by redefining terrorism in such a way that the groups they host are no longer terrorists. Both Syria and Saudi Arabia have already called for a UN conference to "define" terrorism (it's whatever Israel does). The U.S. has shown signs of cooperating in this charade. According to State Department spokesman Raymond Boucher: "Essentially, there are, on some planes, two different things. One is that there are violent people trying to destroy societies, ours, many others in the world. The world recognizes that and we are going to stop those people. On the other hand, there are issues and violence and political issues that need to be resolved in the Middle East, Israelis and Palestinians."

The interpenetration of Middle East terror groups makes this foray into obfuscation especially ludicrous: Bin Laden's second in command, reputedly the operational mastermind of his organization, is Egyptian Ayman al-Sawahiri, a leader in Islamic Jihad, now largely integrated into Bin Laden's network and one of the many terror groups also operating against Israel.

Probed on U.S. policies, spokespersons are becoming as entangled in their contradictions as their Israeli counterparts. Seth Lipsky in the Wall Street Journal reports this gem, an exchange between State Department spokesman Phillip Reeker and a reporter, on the subject of Israel's "targeted killing" of the mastermind of the suicide bombing attack that claimed 22 Israeli teenagers at a Tel Aviv discotheque:

Reporter: You were asked about the assassination of the suspected plotter of the disco bombing...And you referred us to your policy on...targeted killings, which of course, is to oppose them. But could you connect that policy to the instant case? In other words, you are disapproving of what Israel is reported to have done, because it's targeting?"

Reeker: Our position on targeted killings is well known....And that is that we oppose a policy of targeted killings.

Reporter: Just to follow on that and to broaden it, can you expand on your opposition...to the Israeli policy of targeted killings vis a vis US. policy to target Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar?

Reeker: I can't really draw a parallel between the two....

Reporter: Why is there no parallel? Would it be provocative to attack Osama bin Laden and kill him? Would you object to that?

Reeker: I don't have anything to add to what the president and the secretary of state and everyone else have said about our campaign against terrorism. That includes Osama bin Laden. That includes now the Taliban, who have given him safe harbor all this time, in contradiction to UN Security Council resolutions, even those that predate the tragic events of Sept. 11.

Reporter: So you're saying any targeting by the U.S. in that regard...would be justified because of the reasons you just stated?

No, the trapped Reeker insisted, I'm not.

To be sure, the incoherence of Israeli policy allows U.S. policy to seem less hypocritical than it is. Called before the House International Relations Committee, Secretary of State Colin Powell was asked: How does what Israel is doing to protect itself differ from what the United States is doing in Afghanistan? Powell could reply with justice: "Israel responds in self-defense, but at the same time it's against individuals and an organization with which you're also trying to get a process started, makes it, I think, a little bit different than what we are doing with respect to the Taliban and al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan."

While it may be convenient in the short term, incoherence ultimately carries a high cost. It prevents Israel from stating its case. Indeed, it prevents Israel from having a case. If Arafat is Osama bin Laden and the Taliban rolled into one (which he is, a terrorist who harbors terrorists), why is Israel prepared to make further territorial concessions which will only strengthen Arafat's ability to launch attacks? And if this is what Israel is prepared to do, why denounce him as a terrorist? For the U.S. in the short term, incoherence is convenient. This country cooperates with terrorist states with access to information and hopes to achieve some legitimacy in the Arab "street" for its actions against the Taliban.

But in the longer term, incoherence is fatal for the United States as well. As the Jerusalem Post points out in an October 2 editorial: "For a nation engaged in a

Outpost               - 4 -               November 2001