The Israeli Labor Party has been having problems resolving which person should head it up, ever since Ehud Barak went to the lemming retirement grounds.

The party held a primary election in which Avram Burg, an Ed Sullivan look-alike with a yarmulka the size of a quarter who thinks Ehud Barak was far too moderate, stole the election by a slim margin away from Benjamin "Fuad" Ben-Eliezer, through fraud and ballot rigging among the Druse party members with whom Burg had a dirty deal. Ben-Eliezer’s groupies have challenged the fraud, and there is expected to be a new primary soon in which Burg will lose. My kids refer to Burg as Harry’s Potty.

To try to rescue his career nevertheless, Burg has decided to try to pull a Barak, trying to win on the basis of support from Arabs, by posturing ever further to the Left. (When Barak tried it, he lost to Sharon by the country’s largest landslide.) That is why Burg has now dramatically announced that as elected head of the Party, he would "conduct negotiations with the PLO under fire" (Haaretz Dec 16, 01.). Yes, folks, the would-be head of the party of Ben-Gurion now says he wishes to renew appeasements and concessions to the PLO EVEN if the PLO continues its campaign of terrorist atrocities!! He sees no reason to insist that the PLO comply with its original deal with Rabin in which it committed itself to refrain from terror and resolve problems without violence, the same empty promise for which Peres and Netanyahu repeated paid Arafat off again and again, with never a day without atrocities and terror. Burg does not even want to ASK Arafat to pretend to comply with those past "accords" because he is so certain that Arafat will comply with any future accord he signs with Avram....

Now this new move by Avram Burg has gotten us thinking. And after donning our thinking streimel and intensive research, we have accumulated a series of positions that will be adopted by various Israeli political leaders once the PLO, together with its Arab and European backers, actually sets up the very first concentration camp in which it will place Jews.

1. Avram Burg will announce that he is willing to hold dialogue and negotiations with the PLO even while it is putting Jews in gas chambers.

2. Ariel Sharon will demand seven full days in which Jews are NOT being placed in gas chambers before negotiations are resumed, but meanwhile is willing to send his son Omri to meet with Arafat. He will then lower the period to days, and Shimon Peres will announce that serious efforts NOT to put Jews in gas chambers should be enough. Yossi Beilin will insist that 100% efforts not to gas Jews is to much to expect and so 7-% should suffice.

3. Avraham Poraz of Shinui will insist that talks with the PLO be conditioned on all dogs and cats in the vicinity of the concentration camps being treated in a humane manner.

4. Yael Dayan will insist that men and women must be represented in the crews that operate the gas chambers and among those being brought in on cattle cars in equal proportions.

5. Tommy Lapid will insist that inmates in the concentration camps be allowed to eat non-kosher foods.

6. Michael Lerner and Arthur Waskow will start a fund to finance marijuana donations to the residents of the concentration camps.

7. Baruch Kimmerling will go on a hunger strike outside the gates of the concentration camp and demand that the Arabs speed up the execution of Jews. Yigal Arens and Uri Avnery will insist that Kimmerling is too moderate.

8. Amir Peretz will try to organize the camp guards into a trade union.

9. Haaretz will issue a special camp edition in which it explains how Jewish obstinacy is preventing a peaceful resolution of the conflict with the Arabs.

10. The American Reform movement will insist that homosexual marriages be performed for all interested camp inmates.

11. Peace Now will put up posters in front of the camps that read, "Better the tribulations of this peace than the sufferings of war." Betselem and Women in Black will put up their own posters that read "Work shall make us free."

12. Israeli New Historian professors will write a series of articles and Op-Eds in which they prove that the camps containing Jews do not really exist.

13. Meretz will organize a campaign in which it demands that all people claiming the PLO is operating a concentration camp be arrested for incitement.

14. The Nobel Committee will give the PLO a Nobel Peace Prize for resolving the Middle East conflict. Kofi Anan will be seen wearing a "Final Solution at Last" sweatshirt.

15. Bill Clinton will have a cheeseburger. So will Bibi Netanyahu.

Steven Plaut

Copyright © 2001 by Steven Plaut.
All Rights Reserved.

-Published with permission