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Panel Discusses Israel's 60th Anniversary

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD CHENEY, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: This anniversary of Israel's founding is an occasion for deep admiration and respect. What started as a tiny struggling country is still tiny, but has seen six decades of unceasing accomplishments.

Israel has never had a better friend in the White House than the 43rd president of the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BAIER: That was Vice President Dick Cheney last night talking about the 60th anniversary of the founding of Israel. President Bush will head to Israel to mark the celebration next week for a three-day conference hosted by Israel's President Shimon Peres. What about the State of Israel and the challenges it faces ahead? Some analytical observations from Fred Barnes, executive editor of the "Weekly Standard," Mort Kondracke, executive editor of "Roll Call" and syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, Fox News contributors all.

Charles, let's start with you. The celebrations this week in Israel and obviously this three-day conference next week that the president will attend.

CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: Well, it's an opportunity to stand back and reflect the vice president spoke about admiration and respect. We forget how miraculous the establishment of Israel is. It is the first time ever people have returned to their homeland after two millennia and established independence and sovereignty. Israel is the only place on earth where you have people living in the same land, worshipping the same God, and speaking the same language as they did 3,000 years ago. That just hasn't happened anywhere else.

And it is not just the restoration of sovereignty. For example, Israel revived Hebrew, which had been a dead language, like Latin, read and studied but not spoken. It's now the everyday language with a rich literature and poetry of 6 million people and thousands and millions around the world.

All of this has been accomplished by -- in 60 years. People, of course, they speak about the challenges and the clouds and the violence. Let's remember one fact. Sixty years ago, Israel declared independence and was invaded by five Arab states who sought to extinguish it and failed. Six months earlier, the UN had decided that the only fair way to end the British Mandate in Palestine was establishing an Arab state and Jewish state. The Jews accepted it and Arabs rejected it. That remains the central fact of this conflict. The Jews accepted it and the Arabs have rejected. Sixty years later, it remains the central issue. It's not about occupation or settlements or checkpoints. It's about will the Arabs ever accept a Jewish state, and if they do, peace is possible. In the absence of that, we're going to have only war and terror and bloodshed.

BAIER: Mort, President Bush is heading to this conference. What can he hope out of this? What should the White House prepare for? You wrote an article about this.

MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL": Well, exactly what's going to happen there, I don't know. I suspect that there is going to be a lot of maneuvering about the Mid-East peace process to get the Palestinians and Israelis to get together and there may be minor moves. The Israelis would like the president to give -- to start a research project, which is a good idea on, like, laser pulses and such things to knock down Katyusha rockets but that's miles and miles away.

My idea -- it's not my idea. Actually it's Mark Kirk of Illinois and Jane Harman got 65 of the bipartisan members of Congress together to propose that the Israelis be put completely within the U.S. missile defense system as a counter to the Iranian nuclear threat, which is, you know, imminent, and the idea would be that we would put X band radar, the same kind we have got in Japan and scheduled for Poland and the Czech Republic in Israel, and it would quintuple the warning time of a missile heading toward Israel, be able to knock it down with Arrow missiles that already exist in Israel, over maybe Iranian territory and not over Israeli territory. That would be a really birthday present to the Israelis. I don't know whether the president is going to do that or not.

BAIER: Fred, this three-day conference, the Israelis invited Arab representation but there is no sign there will be serious Arab representation. But so far there is no sign that there'll be any serious Arab representation.

FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": Well, there's no reason to be surprised by that. As Charles pointed out, they have not yet accepted the existence of Israel. You know, there are a number of things that have happened. One, even with its survival under a threat of 60 years, Israel has advanced as an amazingly successful and innovative economically stronger country now and it's done that, as I say, with being threatened all the time. It has attracted millions of immigrants, millions of tourists. I've been there twice, and then look at the Palestinians who have chosen to live in squalor and rage rather than move on as a society and accept Israel and accept an Arab state and see the other Arab other countries have really, while they pretend to back the Palestinians they have never done anything to help them, to support them, and the most discouraging thing is when you see Europeans and one of my daughters lived in Europe recently and discovered there is a great hatred of Israel among a lot of Europeans. I think it's completely irrational, but it can only be based in one thing, and that's anti-Semitism.

BAIER: Quickly down the line. Will there be significant movement before this president leaves office on the Mid-East peace process?

KONDRACKE: I don't think so. I think the Israeli government is too weak, and the Palestinian government is too weak.

KRAUTHAMMER: Absolutely not.

BARNES: Same.

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