The Saber Rattler

The scent of approaching primaries in Kadimah has turned the heads of this party of corruption into saber rattling hawks. Keen politicians sense the fact that the public has turned sharply right. So now they are trying to prove that they are the biggest bullies in the neighborhood. As we know, Israel's politicians have few inhibitions and even less national responsibility if their personal careers are in jeopardy. The most preposterous and dangerous of them all is Shaul Mofaz. Within the space of a week, Mofaz has already bombed the Iranian nuclear installations and gone for an all out war in Gaza. He is preposterous because it is difficult to imagine a more feeble politician then Mofaz. He is dangerous because he used to be a military man and somebody may actually take him seriously.

It was Prime Minister Sharon who brought Mofaz into the Likud as soon as he was finished with his military career. Sharon wanted a political puppet and he made the perfect choice. Mofaz the military expert became the rubber stamp on all of Sharon's dangerous misadventures. Never - not even once - did Mofaz compromise his government position by sticking to his security principles. Besides Sharon himself, Shaul Mofaz, the Defense Minister of the Expulsion, bears the greatest responsibility for the fact that Ashkelon is being hit with Grad missiles. He is the last person who should be pontificating on security issues in general - and on returning to Gaza in particular.

It is hard to forget the good-faith letter that Mofaz sent the Likud members before the primaries two years ago. "I am a Likudnik with every bone in my body," Mofaz wrote to the members. "I will never leave the party." The only problem was that in the few days it took for the letters to arrive in the mail, polls showed that Moshe Feiglin had pulled ahead of Mofaz in the primaries race. When the Likudniks opened their letters, Shaul Mofaz was already on his way to Kadimah.

The letter would be no more than a pitiful memory if not for the fact that Mofaz is now playing with our lives. He is liable to push the IDF into an un-winnable war in Gaza just so that he could win the primaries in Kadimah.

If you have children in the army, you should ask yourselves if you are willing to endanger their lives just to increase Mofaz's chances of winning the Kadimah primaries, or Ehud Barak's chances of winning the Labor primaries.