Egypt’s Projection of Military Power in the Middle East - Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah

by Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah

Institute for Contemporary Affairs
Founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation

Vol. 15,  No. 16     June 10,  2015

• Egypt has abstained for more than 40 years from projecting its military forces as a component of its foreign policy.

• The Egyptian army lacked experience in fighting against paramilitary armed groups, or fighting inside cities and residential communities.

• Intelligence cooperation between Egypt and Israel was ongoing and enabled a strong challenge to the jihadists in the Sinai Peninsula. For the first time there was a convergence of interests between Israel and Egypt over the situation in the Sinai and in the Gaza Strip.

• After events in Sinai and Libya President Sisi has demonstrated that he advocates the use of force and the projection of force in order to secure vital Egyptian national interests.

• Sisi considers Egypt and its moderate allies to be the victims of a colluded effort from jihadi Islam and as such he advocates a united Arab effort to counter this danger.

Since the death of its legendary leader Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1970, Egypt has been reluctant to use subversive activities and military force, or even the threat of force, as part of its foreign policy even though it maintains a credible offensive military capability. With very few exceptions (participation in the 1990 “Desert Shield” against Iraq), Egypt has abstained for more than 40 years from projecting its military forces as a component of its foreign policy.

One of the main reasons is the fact that the performance of the Egyptian army outside Egypt’s sovereign borders since the end of the monarchy in Egypt in 1945, has been, to say the least, problematic: the Egyptian army suffered large losses and painful defeats during the war against the nascent Israel in 1948 and the Yemen Civil War in the early 1960s.

As a matter of fact, neither the Egyptian army nor its Supreme Command (including President Field-Marshall Abd el-Fattah el-Sisi himself)¹ has taken part in a real war since 1973. Instead, the army has been active in dominating the Egyptian economy — to such an extent that it is assessed that the Egyptian army represents 30 percent or more of the economic activities in Egypt. For more than 40 years, the Egyptian army’s mission as defined by its leaders was limited to protecting Egypt’s borders from outside threats and to serve as the guarantor of the regime. It was the Muslim Brotherhood’s mistake to challenge the Egyptian Army traditional role as the gatekeeper of Egypt that prompted Sisi to move against President Morsi.

The Egyptian army lacked experience in fighting against paramilitary armed groups or fighting inside cities and residential communities.

The Beginning of Change: Dealing Differently with Sinai and Hamas

Since his very first days as ruler of Egypt, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi made it clear that his intention was to engage his army in combat in Sinai to eradicate the jihadists in Sinai, which is of crucial importance to the national security of Egypt. He sought to put an end to terrorist attacks against Egypt and uniform-wearing Egyptians. He himself survived two assassination attempts, and his interior minister had been the target of a suicide car bombing.  From the very beginning, Sisi had to deal with two fronts: Sinai (and Hamas in Gaza by extension) and the chaotic situation in Libya. Sisi was unequivocal: he “meant business.” Unlike his predecessors who allowed the growth of the jihadi threat in Sinai, Sisi pushed for a military confrontation to put an end to the ongoing terrorist attacks against his soldiers and against strategic targets in Sinai and at a minimum to contain the terrorist threat in Sinai.

In order to do so, he had to acquire Israel’s acquiescence to a massive redeployment of Egyptian forces in the Sinai, overruling the terms and conditions set by the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel signed in 1979. Understandably, Israel allowed a redeployment of Egyptian forces in the Sinai well beyond what was agreed upon in the Camp David Accords. Intelligence cooperation between the two countries was ongoing and enabled a strong challenge to the jihadists in the Sinai Peninsula.  For the first time there was a convergence of interests between Israel and Egypt over the situation in the Sinai and in the Gaza Strip.

In a series of unprecedented steps, Sisi closed almost hermetically the border crossing point with Gaza, only opening it from time to time for humanitarian reasons. Next, Egyptian army engineers destroyed almost 2,000 tunnels along the 11-kilometer border between Gaza and Sinai that served to smuggle goods into Gaza as well as terrorists, weapons, and Muslim Brotherhood activists.² Having put an end to (almost) all tunnels, Sisi created a one-mile no-man’s buffer zone between Gaza and Sinai.³ To do so, Sisi ordered the destruction of all houses in the zone and the evacuation of hundreds of families from the Egyptian town of Rafah (cut in half by the Gaza-Egypt border) which were re-located to northern Sinai, steps that no Israeli could have even thought possible to accomplish.

Parallel to these developments, Sisi reorganized the Sinai Command. Historically, Sinai was divided between the Second and the Third armies, which carried the burden to protect Egypt’s eastern borders, including the Suez Canal. It was imperative to create a new Sinai Command that would be devoted solely to enforce security in Sinai while eradicating the terrorists. The new command, headed by Lieutenant-General Rushdi Askar, was given adequate troop and air support; since its creation the command has launched intensive attacks against the jihadists (not always with complete success).⁴

Egypt was very much aware of the bond between the jihadists in Sinai and Hamas. However, unlike the Muslim Brothers who were high on the Sisi administration’s enemy list, Hamas was an item left “on the shelf” to be taken care of at a later stage. The Egyptian Ministry of Justice and courts decided to designate Hamas as a collaborator of the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas was accused of participating in terrorist operations against Egyptian targets inside Egypt and Sinai as well as harboring terrorist groups and Muslim Brotherhood leaders inside the Gaza Strip.  Hamas was designated a terrorist organization, its assets frozen and activities inside Egypt forbidden. The designation was reversed by an Egyptian court on June 6, 2015 but so far Egypt’s security policy appears not to have changed.

On the eve of Israel’s “Operation Protective Edge” against Hamas in July 2014 Egypt was exasperated by Hamas and its regional sponsors.⁵ Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza did not alter President Sisi’s tough approach, even though he allowed open and harsh criticism of Israel.  This tension between Sisi’s adverse attitude and punitive approach towards Hamas on the one hand, and his need to satisfy the pro-Palestinian Egyptian public opinion on the other, has been evident in the gap between Egypt’s policy and its pronouncements.⁶

The Libyan Issue

Egypt’s relations with Libya have been tumultuous in the course of the last 45 years. At one time they were united in the short-lived model of the Syrian-Egyptian Union of 1958, and in times of crisis they exchanged fire across the 700-mile common border. Sadat, who considered for a short time Qaddafi to be an adopted son, was at times exacerbated not only by his unpredictable behavior, but mainly by his irrational initiatives such as ordering an Egyptian submarine to sink the Queen Elizabeth ocean liner. His erratic moods and his violent unleashed verbal attacks against Egypt and its leaders resulted at the end of day in creating a situation in which Egyptian leaders ignored Qaddafi. However, as long as Qaddafi ruled Libya, the border between the two countries was relatively calm and controlled.

With Qaddafi’s ousting, Libya entered a chaotic phase which prevails until today. With the disintegration of the Libyan state and the formation of two distinct and rival governments in Tobruk and Tripoli, the rise of jihadi organizations, and the emergence of the Islamic State, the threats on Egypt’s western flank became concrete. The border is now North Africa’s point of origin for weapons stolen from Qaddafi’s arsenals, fighters, illegal migrants, and illicit goods flowing into the Levant, with profoundly destabilizing effects on the Sinai, Gaza, and Syria.^{7, 8}

Egypt and Libya have exchanged regular delegations to discuss security cooperation. In July 2014, Libyan intelligence chief Salem Abdel Salam, Foreign Minister Mohamed Abdulaziz, and then army Chief of Staff Abdessalam Jadallah Al-Salihin met with their Egyptian counterparts in Cairo to discuss border security coordination and Libya’s security situation. More recently, the prime ministers of the two countries met in Washington, D.C. for security discussions. But the implementation of any agreements has been minor so far.⁹

Egyptian government officials have warned Libya about the dangerous implications of its failure to control the Libyan Islamist groups in the east. Pursuant to his activist political approach, in the course of 2013 President Sisi decided to assist General Khalifa Haftar, a former Qaddafi-era officer who had created a coalition of disaffected military units, tribes in eastern Libya, and federalist militias to attack Islamist forces in and around the cities of Benghazi and Darna in late May 2014. Khalifa Haftar had led Libyan forces during a disastrous war with Chad in the south. After his defeat by Chadian forces in 1987, he was taken captive for almost five years, refusing to return to Libya out of fear Qaddafi would “punish” him for his defeat. Later, the CIA succeeded in whisking him out of Chad together with 300 of his men to Virginia where he underwent special training by the CIA. After living in exile in the U.S. for 20 years, he returned to Libya and led ground forces to help oust Qaddafi in 2011.¹⁰

Haftar tried to align himself early on with Egypt’s military regime, fighting its own Islamists in Egypt. After Haftar’s campaign began, reports surfaced of more direct Egyptian military involvement in Libya.

However, a meaningful obstacle stood in the way of Egypt. Since events in Libya in 2011, almost 1.8 million Egyptian workers left Libya to return to Egypt. The number of workers who remain is estimated today to be around 200,000.¹¹  Egyptian workers in Libya have been a source for bilateral tensions and visa restrictions, and border closings by both sides have become regular occurrences. Kidnappings of Egyptian migrant workers are commonplace in Libya. In mid-October 2013 the leader of a Libyan militia abducted several dozen Egyptian truck drivers and held them hostage in the Libyan town of Ajdabya, demanding that Egyptian authorities release his relatives who were detained in Egypt on charges of weapons smuggling. The Egyptian authorities responded by closing Egypt’s side of the Musaid-Salloum border crossing  for a few days.¹²

The Beheading of 21 Copts by IS as a Catalyst

Sisi would have accepted the status quo on the common border with Libya even though it worsened recently, since his main effort was focused on Egypt’s domestic scene and Sinai. However, events turned otherwise: On February 15, 2015, an armed group calling itself the “Tripoli Province of the Islamic State” and claiming affiliation with Daesh (the Islamic State or IS) in Libya posted a video on the Internet showing the beheading of 21 Egyptian Copts.

Indications of the Sisi regime’s support for the Tobruk government and General Haftar provoked the recurrence of kidnappings and murders of Egyptians in Libya, especially Copts, whose Egyptian Coptic Church had declared its support for the Sisi regime.

The Egyptian press preferred to ignore the fact that the specific group executed at the hands of the Sirte IS militants was kidnapped two months earlier, but there was no evidence that the Egyptian authorities exerted real efforts to communicate with the kidnappers and comply, if at all, to their demands, or even to try to secure the lives of the kidnapped through official or unofficial channels. The video’s publication greatly embarrassed the Egyptian regime, both because it had done so little to secure the release of the kidnapped, and because the event targeted Egyptian Copts at a time when the Egyptian Church had become the strongest supporter of the Sisi regime.¹³

That same evening, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi delivered an emotional speech in which he condemned the incident and reserved the right to respond. He also convened the Supreme Defense Council in a meeting to discuss ways of retaliation. On the following day, and for the second time since the air intervention in 2014 meant to assist Haftar forces, four Egyptian Air Force F-16s carried out two consecutive raids on targets in the city of Darna, justifying the attacks by claiming Darna was in the hands of IS.

Since then, the press and social media are packed with reports about Egyptian preparations to launch a full scale military operation in east Libya. They imply a cynical use of the massive incident in order to justify such a military intervention in Libya, with the excuse of resolving the ongoing conflict in its oil-rich neighbor while in reality Sisi would be intervening in order to allow his local allies (Khalifa Haftar) to take control of the whole of Cyrenaica, thus eliminating a potential jihadi threat on Egypt.

President Sisi has many reasons against intervening militarily in Libya; the most important one is linked to the fate of the hundreds of thousands of Egyptians living and working in Libya. For these reasons, it appears that a major ground incursion remains unlikely. On the other hand, Egypt may consider the beheadings as an opportunity to pursue its regional policy, targeting existing concentrations of Islamist and Jihadist groups in North Africa without running the risk of being subjected to international condemnation.

Cairo’s growing concern over the Libyan situation, the inability of Haftar’s forces to achieve tangible progress, and the reluctance of Egypt to engage its forces in Libya raise another possibility: a collective Arab combined and coordinated intervention.

The Saudi Precedent in Yemen

For the first time since 1948 the so-called moderate Arab states led by Saudi Arabia have succeeded in creating a military coalition aimed at an Arab state and not linked to the Arab-Israeli conflict. While some Arab armies joined the military coalition in the first Gulf War and of late against IS in Iraq and Syria, that coalition was led in both cases by the United States and was built around the American and international forces that took part in both campaigns. The Arab forces served more as a fig leaf and a justification for the use of force against an Arab entity.¹⁴

In the Yemeni case, however, moderate Arab countries headed by Saudi Arabia have come to the conclusion that they must fight for the survival of their own regimes and that terrorism identified with Sunni jihadists and the extremist ideology of Salafi Islam is the main factor for instability.   Islamic organizations classified by the different regimes as terrorist groups have become the prime target of the moderate regimes.

This is the concept at the core of the pan-Arab force to be created as an intervention force to back Arab regimes under attack. President Sisi was among the first leaders to express his readiness to participate in the campaign led by the Saudis. At the same time, some pointed to Libya as being the next target for an Arab military intervention.

Similar to the events in Yemen, an Arab intervention in Libya, which would be preferential from Sisi’s point of view to acting solo, requires an Arab League resolution and wide Arab support. After the Yemeni precedent, Sisi can expect total backing from Saudi Arabia and its allies regarding any future venture in Libya.

Conclusion

President Sisi has demonstrated since the first days of his tenure that he advocates the use of force and the projection of force in order to secure vital Egyptian national interests. Unlike his predecessors, Sisi considers the use of force justified as long as it serves to fight enemies of the regime internally or externally as in the Libyan case. Moreover, Sisi considers Egypt and its moderate allies to be the victims of a colluded effort from jihadi Islam — be it Al-Qaeda inspired or IS or any other extremist offshoot — and as such he advocates a united Arab effort to counter this danger. Acting together with other Arab armies provides the needed legitimacy domestically for such actions against an Arab state or organization.

Sisi’s effort to create an Arab intervention force is but another expression of the deep change that has occurred since the ousting of Mubarak in the Egyptian leadership perception of Egypt’s strategic positioning in its immediate and regional environment and vis-a-vis the western powers policing the area.

* * *

Notes

1 http://jcpa.org/article/egyptian-field-marshal-abd-el-fattah-el-sisi-profile

2 http://www.thenational.ae/world/palestinian-territories/egyptian-military-says-it-destroyed-1-370-gaza-smuggling-tunnels

3 http://www.i24news.tv/en/news/international/middle-east/57129-150108-egypt-to-completely-destroy-city-of-rafah

4 http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/egypt-forms-unified-command-fight-terrorism-sinai-1503822722

5 http://jcpa.org/egypt-israel-hamas-impossible-equation

6 ibid.

7 http://www.madamasr.com/sections/politics/pursuit-bread-why-egyptian-workers-are-willing-risk-their-lives-libya

8 Frederic Wehrey, David Bishop, Ala’ Alrababa’h, Backdrop to an Intervention: Sources of Egyptian-Libyan Border Tension , Article August 27, 2014

9 ibid.

10 http://jcpa.org/article/the-libyan-quagmire/

11 http://www.madamasr.com/sections/politics/pursuit-bread-why-egyptian-workers-are-willing-risk-their-lives-libya

12 Wehrey, op.cit

13 Al Jazeera Center for Studies , Risks of Egypt’s Military Intervention in Libya, Monday 23 February 2015

14 http://jcpa.org/article/saudi-military-intervention-yemen/

Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah

Source: http://jcpa.org/article/egypts-projection-of-military-power-in-the-middle-east/

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Noura Erakat Wages Lawfare on Israel - Cinnamon Stillwell

by Cinnamon Stillwell

Despite Erakat's pose as a disinterested observer of human rights and international law, her animus towards Israel and sympathy for Palestinian irredentism was obvious.

Noura Erakat

Since the 2014 Gaza war, proponents of lawfare have sought to use the International Criminal Court to punish Israel for daring to respond militarily to Hamas's unrelenting aggression. Noura Erakat, an assistant professor in legal and international studies at George Mason University and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, presented her case in a recent talk at Stanford University titled, "War on Gaza in the Age of Human Rights: Prospects for Accountability."

The niece of Palestinian Authority (P.A.) chief negotiator Saeb Erakat, Erakat's tone was calm and measured, her demeanor pleasant, and her partisanship unmistakable, even when couched in the dispassionate language of international human rights law.

Seated in a conference room before an audience of approximately forty, many of them fellow academics, Erakat began by noting that because this was "not a legal audience," she would depart from her planned presentation and instead focus on "setting the framework for the lead-up" to the war and on providing "the legal and political context" for the situation in Gaza.

Referencing a recent report from Breaking the Silence, an NGO that presents the anonymous "testimonies" of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers who ostensibly oppose their government's military policies, Erakat promised that it would "illuminate the rules of engagement in Gaza" and "help us comment on whether Israel is the most moral army in the world, as it insists." Her next statement answered her rhetorical question: "Israel's engagement with the laws of war made it possible to kill as many civilians and destroy as much civilian infrastructure as it did." Hewing to this approach, she added:

Israel insisted it was within the bounds of law, let's examine . . . the legal context to help explain the high humanitarian register of death and destruction, which was unprecedented, even if the campaign wasn't.

Claiming that, "since 1993, Israel has been keen on separating Gaza from the rest of the conflict," Erakat distorted the nature of Gaza's terrorist rulers:

[They] say that Gaza is, for all intents and purposes, different because of the presence of what I would describe as a political party with an irregular combat force and [what] Israel would describe as a terrorist organization: Hamas.

Instead, she proposed that "Israel would be in a much better position . . . were it to deal with Gaza as it does the West Bank." Since Gazans fire rockets indiscriminately into Israel and dig tunnels that enable kidnappings and terrorist attacks—and Hamas's charter calls for the destruction of Israel—her recommendation was either disingenuous or naïve.

Erakat extended her antipathy towards the U.S., lamenting that Israel's "powerful military has the unequivocal support of the world's superpower, which we are all beneficiaries of. We're all the beneficiaries of our empire." In an act of naked scapegoating, she complained that the Obama administration's proposal that Israel retreat to the indefensible pre-1967 borders was stymied "because of the response from the Israel lobby."

She summed up the Gaza war as an Israeli "killing campaign" to which the "Palestinian population" had been "arbitrarily submitted." Although she acknowledged the IDF's unprecedented policy of providing warnings before bombing targets where civilians might be present, she downplayed them by asking, "Were the warnings adequate?" Citing the number of UNWRA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) shelters targeted, she failed to note that Hamas routinely uses these sites for launching rockets and storing weapons in order to avoid retaliation. Nor did she acknowledge Hamas's frequent use of civilians as human shields, instead lamenting the "collapse of who is a civilian" according to Israel's interpretation of the Geneva Conventions' Principle of Distinction between Civilians and Combatants. That Hamas makes no pretense of adhering to the Geneva Conventions, while the P.A. merely pretends to do so, counted for nothing; the burdens of international law rest upon Israel alone.

Erakat concluded that along with a "deliberate policy of impoverishment," Israel's goals in the Gaza strip were always the "annexation" and "acquisition of land." She dismissed Israel's disengagement from Gaza in 2005 because, she alleged, it "didn't change its status as occupied territory." Moreover, she claimed, "Israel was interested in putting boots back on the ground in the Gaza strip," as if nonstop aggression following voluntary withdrawal had no bearing on Israel's actions.

Maintaining that, "Israel's campaign against Gaza is not Gaza-specific, it's Palestinian-specific," Erakat declared that, compared to the "success of colonialism" in the U.S. and Canada, the war "showed the weakness of Israel's hegemonic project," although for the Palestinians, "it was a show of resistance." Yet, she added, unless "political pressure" is applied by the U.S., "Gaza will become unlivable in 2020. They're going to die while everyone's watching or while no one's watching." Apparently the vaunted international sphere isn't watching for, as she earlier conceded, "Not a single home [in Gaza] has been rebuilt despite pledges from international community."

During the question and answer period, an audience member took her up on her offer to "discuss" various contentious issues following the talk. In the course of responding, Erakat asserted that Hamas is now in favor of the two-state solution, which was news to the questioner. In fact, Hamas had claimed as much, using characteristically slippery language, on a number of occasions leading up to the 2014 conflict, but was predictably disingenuous. Earlier this year, senior Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk did so again in order to secure funding for Gaza from the Middle East Quartet, but still refused to recognize Israel, issued the usual untenable demands in return, and called it a "temporary solution." If this was the source of Erakat's revelation, it's as reliable as a Hamas hudna (temporary truce).

Despite Erakat's pose as a disinterested observer of human rights and international law, her animus towards Israel and sympathy for Palestinian irredentism was obvious. The ranks of Middle East studies are filled with such "moderate" academics who are, in truth, as biased and politicized as any fire-breathing radical. The question is who is more dangerous?
 

Cinnamon Stillwell is the West Coast Representative for Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum. She can be reached at stillwell@meforum.org.

Source: http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/14829

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Former Pres. G.W. Bush: 'My position was: you need to have boots on the ground' - Amos Regev and Boaz Bismuth

by Amos Regev and Boaz Bismuth

Hat tip: Jean-Charles Bensoussan

Former U.S. President George W. Bush tells Israel Hayom in an exclusive interview, "My strategy, the Bush doctrine, was to vigorously pursue those who do us harm and bring them to justice" • "America has been very supportive of Israel," he remarks.

"I admire our military a lot," says former U.S. President George W. Bush, seen here posing with U.S. troops in Iraq in 2008

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Photo credit: Reuters

President Bush in New York shortly after the Sept.11, 2001 terrorist attacks

"I don't think you can lead people if there is self-pity and you keep telling yourself 'oh, this is too hard,'" President Bush said during the interview

President Bush's portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin

"There is only one thing that I really miss about being president, and that's being the commander-in-chief. I admire our military a lot," former U.S. President George W. Bush tells Israel Hayom, his eyes twinkling. "When you are the commander-in-chief, at a time when I was, when you put them into a lot of combat situations, you develop a special bond, not only with the military but with their families."

"I would salute men and women in uniform on a daily basis," he says.

It has been more than six years since Bush left the White House, at the culmination of two terms that have been etched into the collective memory of Americans thanks to the major events that rocked the United States during that time: the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Since his departure, Bush has kept his distance from American politics. He has dedicated his time to cultivating the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Texas, home to the Bush Presidential Library and Museum and the Bush Institute, to globe-spanning projects, to writing two books ("Decision Points," about his own presidency, and "41: A Portrait of My Father," about George H. W. Bush), and most recently he has taken up painting.

In the background, the questions linger: About his legacy, namely in Iraq. He has always said, and in fact signed off his book with the words "ultimately, history will judge." But even now, with the Middle East undergoing massive changes, it appears that Americans are beginning to change their minds about him for the better. In a poll conducted by CNN last week, 52% of respondents said that they view the former president positively. That is a higher approval rating than the current president enjoys.

We met the former president in Las Vegas, in between his many engagements. He was laid back, displayed a sharp sense of humor and demonstrated a lot of emotion, especially on topics like the military, defense and homeland security. We reminded him of an excerpt from his book in which he describes a farewell visit with American troops in Afghanistan. A unit of elite Army Rangers stood before him, saluted and declared that they would extend their service, pledging to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic." Bush was extremely moved.

"I met with a lot of families of the fallen. And I tried to do it out of the press. I didn't want people to think ... that it was just out of self-pity," he says. "I went to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center all the time. You know what they told me most of the time? 'I'd do it again Mr. President. You know, I hope I get well so I can go into combat.'"

The war snuck up on then-President Bush with the al-Qaida attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. In his book he says that the week of the attacks was the key to understanding his entire presidency. He writes that he poured his heart and soul into defending the country, "by any means necessary."

To us he says that no one prepared him for becoming a "two-war president" but reality supplied him with a lot of challenges in the White House. He says he had to make very difficult decisions -- sending boys to defend the homeland with the knowledge that not all of them would return.

Q: I have always wanted to ask you, Mr. President, about the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Can you tell us what your reaction was when you were told about the attack on the World Trade Center?

"I was in a classroom and a child was reading a book to me. I was there for education reform. I was trying to get a piece of legislation passed through Congress: 'No Child Left Behind.' I knew the first airplane had hit the building but I thought it was an accident. There wasn't a lot of time to analyze it because I was heading into a classroom. That initial picture was a little fuzzy.

"I called Condi [then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice] and she didn't know what was happening. I told her to get hold of New York and to make sure the mayor received federal assistance.

"Then I am reading, listening to the child reading, and [Chief of Staff] Andy Card says 'second plane's hit second tower -- America is under attack.' And I believed him.

"It was a startling statement to hear as president. The press corps has crowded inside -- when the leader is out in public the press is always close by. I have been in crises before, and the first step of a crisis is not to panic because the people follow a leader. If the leader panics there is more panic. So I waited for the appropriate moment to leave the classroom.

"I kept thinking 'What does this mean?' When I got out, I started getting a full briefing and I realized that the second plane was in fact an airliner. I gave a statement to a classroom full of parents who hadn't got the news and I saw firsthand the shock, the doubt and all the negative impulses that were coursing through our country right there in front of me. People always get nervous when they are around the president, and now the president had walked in and rather than saying 'you have a wonderful reading program' he says, 'you are under attack and we are going to deal with it.'

I didn't know what it meant. I just said we were going to deal with it. To try to convey a sense of confidence. They were shocked and horrified and sad. Every negative thing you can think of. I was in the car rushing to Air Force One.

"Condi calls me and says the planes hit the Pentagon. And I knew we were at war. There was no doubt in my mind that this was a declaration of war against the United States and all at once I became a wartime president. The truth of the matter is that during the debates and the campaign [for president] no one asked me the question, 'How will you conduct yourselves as commander-in-chief during war?' And I vowed to defend our country. I thought a lot about this little girl who was reading. I made a lot of tough decisions, all of them to protect our homeland."

Q: When you first entered the White House, did you entertain the possibility that you would be a wartime leader?

"The first time I ran for president [in 2000] there was no war. That the U.S. would be attacked crossed no one's mind. No one thought that 3000 would die as a result of thugs who are willing to use our own assets to murder people. Therefore once that happened we began to think about what other ways they could hurt us.

"It took us a while to figure out who they were, and where they were, but we were relentless in pursuit. A lot of brave people were on their trail and I told them, 'Let's go.' There was no hesitation whatsoever about bringing them to justice. Initially everyone was united -- 90% of people approved of what we were doing. And of course, over time, as your leaders have learned, war is very difficult; people lose their lives; stories get out. But I felt leaders had to be relentless in a smart way, relentless because it is hard to ask a special ops soldier to take enormous risks if the president himself was not being firm in his resolve. I don't think you can lead people if there is self-pity and you keep telling yourself 'oh, this is too hard.' But it was not in my nature to yield to an enemy that wanted to kill our citizens."

Q: Your book is very interesting because it focuses on the decision-making process. Among other things you wrote that you never got a manual on how to handle a crisis like 9/11. How did you make decisions?

"Decision-making works best when you have a clear strategy. And I laid out a strategy shortly after 9/11, based on my strong belief that we were facing an ideological movement that was willing to murder the innocent to achieve their objectives. And my strategy, called the Bush Doctrine, was as follows: No matter how long it takes, we will vigorously pursue those who do us harm and bring them to justice. Second, if you harbor a terrorist, you are as guilty as the terrorist.

"The United States could no longer afford to analyze threats and hope that they didn't materialize. The 9/11 attacks were a wake-up call for our country because they basically meant that we were vulnerable to an attack no matter how many miles of oceans protected us.

"Another aspect of the strategy was that the only way to defeat an ideology of hate is with an ideology of hope. So all decision-making sprung from that doctrine.

"When I said it I meant it. I was very clear. I thought clearly about it and spoke as plainly as I could to friend and foe alike and then pursued it. So many of the decisions that I made, particularly on homeland security, were based upon that doctrine.

"There was an emotional attachment of course -- when I was told that we were under attack, I was staring at a child who was reading a book. I thought about her often. Because the most important job of a president or a leader is to protect the country and the homeland. The citizens rely on your judgment and your decisions to protect the homeland; and that is what I did almost every day as president. I thought about how best to secure us."

Q: In your book, you quote Abraham Lincoln, who said that "the clash between freedom and tyranny is an issue that can only be tried by war and decided by victory." You added that the war on terror operated on the same principle. Has that war been won?

"No. There will not be a complete victory until ideologies of hate are marginalized. How do you achieve that? I think that by advancing a society in which the population gets to decide the fate of their government as opposed to governments deciding what is going to happen to the population. There are very few countries in the Middle East that do that. Israel is one. Israel is a country where the will of the people determines the fate of the government. Iraq was one. It was a parliamentary system, it still is. Things have changed on the ground there of course. But terror still exists.

"Is it possible to secure and to provide another environment in which the terrorists are less likely to prevail? Yes. It is possible and necessary. Will it be a short-term process? No. It takes time. And so I was labeled a hopeless idealistic guy, but I don't see how you can possibly achieve an objective unless you have a vision. The answer is that this is an enemy that requires constant pressure.

"Now our president has said that we would degrade and defeat ISIS [Islamic State]. And I certainly hope we do. I think it is a noble and necessary goal -- it involves recognizing that there is still a threat. You know I plotted for that goal and I hope that strategy works."

Q: Is the war on terror currently being waged in the proper way?

"I made a decision, as you know, not to criticize my successors, with an s. I am going to be around a little bit longer -- there is going to be more than one successor. The temptation is to try to rewrite history or to make yourself look good by criticizing someone else. I think that is a mistake. I don't think that is what leadership is all about. I know how hard the job is. I didn't like it when former leaders criticized me when I was president. Some did, so I decided not to do the same."

Q: You mentioned ISIS, you spoke about defeating terror. Is it possible to defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq without boots on the ground?

"The president will have to make that determination. My position was that you need to have boots on the ground. As you know, I made a very difficult decision. A fair number of people in our country were saying that it was impossible to defeat al-Qaida -- which is ISIS as far as I am concerned. They said I must get out of Iraq. But I chose the opposite -- I sent 30,000 more troops as opposed to 30,000 fewer. I think history will show that al-Qaida in Iraq was defeated. And so I chose the path of boots on the ground. We will see whether or not our government adjusts to the realities on the ground."

Q: During your presidency, the nation was ready to persist in the war on terror for as long as it took. In your book you describe an incident at ground zero where people called on you to pursue the terrorists and eliminate them, whatever it took. Are the American people still willing to make that sacrifice?

"One of my big concerns is about the tendencies in United States to be isolationist. That has happened throughout our history. I mean World War II is a classic example where the 'America First' policy basically said 'who cares what happens in Europe.' As a result, there were terrible times.

"Isolation, and a certain fatigue, could come along with protectionist sentiments. The president is trying to pass a trade bill, and you see protectionist tendencies trying to fight off the trade bill, and there is a nativist element too. In the 1920s there was a period when we were isolationists. It was said we had too many Jews and too many Italians. Therefore we decided against immigration. And you begin to see the reverberations of history in 2015. Do they all relate to each other? I happen to think they do. I think it requires leadership to explain to the American people why our involvement overseas is important. Which is one of the real lessons of 9/11 -- that human conditions elsewhere matter to our security."

Q: Nowadays, the over-arching issue for Israel is Iran. You talk about Iran in your book and you write that you had three options: an agreement, aggressive diplomacy or attack. So what do you think should be done with Iran?

"This is a very delicate subject which I am not going to comment on. Every comment I make on this would be interpreted as undermining the president's decision. Therefore I am going to let this issue rest."

Q: But the Iranian regime is so contrarian in its values to American values. Can it be trusted? 

"That is a judgment that people have to make. When somebody says something, do they mean it? Every president, every prime minister, every person has to make those kinds of judgments. Do they believe what they say? When I was president sometimes people would tell me one thing and mean another. It happens often in politics. You have to adjust to that. You have to be realistic on whether you can trust a person's word. The president is going to have to make this judgment call."

Q: During your presidency, you decided together with Tony Blair that action must be taken in Iraq. The reason was that Saddam Hussein's regime did not comply with Security Council resolutions. Can you explain your rationale?

"As we analyzed threats around the world, the biggest threat to our homeland at the time was, and probably still is, the use of chemical or biological weapons or dirty bombs provided by somebody to the network that had just struck us. So we started analyzing and asking ourselves who. Every intelligence agency in the world said this guy had chemical weapons. He was a bad enemy of the U.S. and so I went to the U.N. -- not easy for a West Texas boy to do -- and got a resolution passed unanimously, that said 'disclose, disarm or face serious consequences.'

"And I meant it. These weren't just idle words. It is the third leg of the Bush Doctrine -- we have to take threats seriously before they fully materialize. As you know from the book I tried diplomacy, but he defied the resolutions. A lot of people forget that the drumbeat in the United States was significant. 'When are you going to move?' There was great impatience to my decision-making.

"Well-known politicians today gave speeches on the floor of the Senate demanding action. Secretaries of state of the recent administration said 'you got to get him.' But nobody commits troops except for the president. And once those troops are committed, terrible things can happen to American families. And so I was deliberate in my judgment and thought we may be able to solve this out in the open, in order to determine whether our fears were justified.

"But this was a man who said 'no inspections.' He used chemical weapons, the world thought he had chemical weapons, he refused to let inspectors in and we gave him a chance."

Q: You went to war in Iraq because Saddam Hussein did not comply with a resolution requiring inspection. How can anybody make a deal with Iran when its leader has vowed not to allow inspections?

"Look, the president will have to make the best decision he can make."

Q: As a former president, is it getting easier or more difficult to defend Israel in the international arena?

"I think America is still very pro-Israel. A lot of people say my pro-Israel position is based upon my faith, my Christianity. No. While Israel is important for faith and the whole Bible is based upon Israel, my support is because Israel is a longtime ally and a democracy. Remember, I am an advocate of democracy as a means for peace. And therefore it is important to defend a democracy.

"Our countries have something in common: We have both experienced terrorist attacks. Therefore there was a commonality of purpose. I think there are a lot of religious people in this country who believe Israel is the homeland of their religion and therefore needs to be defended. Others say that it is a functioning democracy and democracies are our allies. Others still cite historical reasons.

"For whatever reason, I do believe there is strong support for Israel in America. I know that in certain parts in our country there are divestiture programs. A lot of them happen to be on college campuses and stuff like that. I don't spend too much time there. My part of the world, the people I deal with, they are very strongly for Israel."

Q: Israel is the only country in the Middle East where the U.S. is always popular, even when the incumbent president is unpopular.

"I hope so. America has been very supportive of Israel. I went to Yale with guys who were very much involved with the Jewish youth movements, and I did an Israel Bonds event the other day and a number of people who came up to me told me 'my kid is now in an exchange program in Israel.'

"Europe seems to have a tendency not to be very supportive of Israel. I don't know if it has gotten worse or not. It appears to be from afar. I don't know. If foreign policy is an issue, the subject of Israel will of course come up and it will force candidates to commit one way or another to the defense of Israel, which is in Israel's best interest."

Q: In Israel, you were a popular president. You still are.

"Well, [laughs] that is not the reason to be in office however."

Q: Let's talk about art and leadership. Some have compared your paintings to [20th century Jewish painter] Chaim Soutine's portraits. 

"The questions that everyone needs to ask themselves is whether they are going to live life to its fullest or not. Are you going to take advantage of things that you never thought you would do? In my post-presidency I have written a book, and that has helped a lot. I wrote another book. It is brand new. It is about an extraordinary man -- my father. It will be a very historical document because never has a son of a president written about the president. So the paintings are along these lines.

"I read Winston Churchill's essay 'Painting as a Pastime,' and it is a really interesting essay. I started looking at Churchill's paintings and I said 'wow, I can do this.' I had no interest in art. I took no art history courses. You could name artists -- take Claude Monet: I heard of him but I had no clue what his paintings looked like; museums were not among my biggest interests.

"Three years ago I said I was going to try something that nobody thinks I can do -- and I hired an instructor and started painting. These paintings came about because my instructor's instructor at Southern Methodist University came to my house and said 'I have confidence in your painting abilities. Why don't you paint the leaders with whom you served?'

"That was a very interesting suggestion because it really meant that it would deflect the techniques; they wouldn't be nearly as important as what people said: 'Bush likes so and so; he thinks this about somebody.' 

"We put them up in the Bush Library in the context of personal diplomacy because you cannot make tough decisions and build a coalition unless you really understand the people you are dealing with."

Bush has already painted the portraits of 24 world leaders. The portraits do indeed reflect his personal feelings toward his subjects. He especially likes the portrait he painted of his father. The painting is full of love; it almost radiates from it. 

On the other hand, his portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin reflects stiffness. There is not a lot of love there. Bush once recounted that when he hosted Putin at the White House, the Russian leader scoffed at Bush's dog -- a small Scottish Terrier. "You call that a dog?" he said. Later, when Bush visited the Kremlin, Putin boasted that his huge black Labrador was "bigger, stronger and faster than your dog." 

"I thought to myself 'wow, anyone who says that their dog is bigger than someone else's dog must be an interesting personality," Bush recalled. Putin's portrait apparently reflects Bush's impression of the man. 

But now, he says, he has shifted from painting portraits to painting cactuses. "Cactuses provide very interesting shapes and colors," he says. 

Q: Who are you going to support in the 2016 presidential election? 

"I am out of politics and I am not going to political rallies, but if my older brother Jeb seeks my help, I will give it to him. I love him dearly. I think he will be a great president. But my brother is somewhat complicating my staying out of politics because I am strongly for him, but I won't be very active publicly.

"You can say that I am for my brother. You can write this down. I am for my brother. My brother would be a very good president. Sometimes the name helps. But not always.

"The way I put it: When I ran I inherited half my father's friends and all his enemies. And so Jeb has good executive experience; he is very smart; he has a very good record and he is a leader."

Q: In your book you talk about the day after the presidency. How you returned to Texas, took your dog out for walks, and suddenly thought to yourself that yesterday you were the leader of the free world and now you are picking up after your dog. Do you miss being president? 

"No. I don't miss the job. I don't miss it, because I poured my heart into it for eight years. You know, I miss certain aspects of the job. I miss my friends that I served with. I miss being pampered. The White House is very nice as you remember. The food is excellent. Every morning, whenever I wanted coffee, someone would bring it.

"The adjustment is an unusual adjustment. One minute you are the president and upon the oath of office you are not the president. Just like that. Now we were very fortunate in that we knew where we were going -- our home, and our ranch that we love. And so I flew to Crawford and woke up the next morning, and it was a strange feeling because a sense of responsibility that had been ingrained in your system was no longer there. You don't realize. Men kind of adjust to the environment in which they live, and you don't really realize the adjustment process until the environment changes drastically. And in this case it changed a lot."

Q: Iraq has returned to the forefront now, thanks to the movie "American Sniper" among other things. Do you think it is a good movie? 

"I think it is. It's in Texas. The guy is in Texas. It is a little too Hollywood. I doubt he was on the telephone with his wife when he was getting ready to shoot people." 

Q: Does the movie reflect the American spirit? 

"It does. I think people need an explanation on why the mission is important. I will tell you this -- in this coming campaign, foreign policy is going to be an issue. It is generally not an issue in American politics. The economy is usually the issue. Are we growing as well as we should be growing? Are people getting paid better? Are our lives improving? But if foreign policy becomes the main issue, it will mean that the American people are paying attention to it, partly because people are aware of potential threats to the country. People getting their heads cut off. I think Americans are going to pay attention to this issue."

Amos Regev and Boaz Bismuth

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=26127&hp=1

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.