Wisdom from the chicken coop
By Sarah Honig

(January 18) Members of the partridge, quail and pheasant 
family, chickens evolved from an Asian jungle fowl, whom 
man began domesticating as many as 5,000 years ago. Hundreds 
of varieties have been developed within more than 50 standard 
breeds, grouped into 12 main classes. Some poultrymen 
specialize in raising pullets for commercial egg farmers. 
Others grow the birds for their meat, and it's their age 
rather than size which determines how they're cooked. 

Four to six-month-olds are defined as roasters. Old, tough hens 
are sold for stewing. At nine to 12 weeks they're marketed as 
fryers or broilers. Some weigh nearly two kilos at that tender 
age and some farms can produce as many as five broiler "crops" 
a year. 

Why are we going into all this? 

Because Bill Clinton - president until Saturday - hails from 
a state whose greatest claim to fame is the fact that it's 
America's top broiler raiser. It's also a leading egg producer. 

Therefore, it only stands to reason that as an Arkansas native 
son and former governor, Clinton ought to know his chickens. 
This should enable him to fully fathom, if not actually 
appreciate Ariel Sharon's homespun story about the chickens he 
observed in his childhood on his family's farm in Kfar Malal. 

Young Arik noted that the hens clucked harmoniously most of 
the time. But if one of them took ill, the fellow members of 
its flock suddenly and ferociously turned on it, pecking, 
scratching and clawing their victim to death. It was then 
that the future general concluded that weakness encourages 
aggression. 

Those who can't defend themselves are terminated viciously. 
Those who don't deter invite their own destruction. That's how 
it is in nature, in the barnyard and in the Middle East. 
It's improbable that Clinton hadn't been exposed to similar 
chicken sense back in Arkansas. He knows how things are and 
yet had no compunction about turning Israel into the enfeebled 
chicken of this savage region. 

He insisted Israel take risks for peace - i.e. become weak - to 
earn him the Nobel Peace Prize. 

But if Israel is rendered more vulnerable, will he indeed go 
down in history as a peacemaker? More than he's likely to redeem 
his legacy, he's likely to be ultimately remembered as the 
relentless meddler whose obsession ignited bloody war. 

Even literally on the eve of his departure from office, he won't 
call it quits. Word now is that Clinton may soon visit us or 
otherwise influence our domestic democratic process. He pulled 
out all stops to insure Ehud Barak's 1999 campaign victory and 
now unabashedly seeks to do the same again, by urging Israelis 
to opt for peace - after he endorsed his protege as the promoter 
of Pax Clintonia. 

We have become his vehicle to an honorable mention in the 
history books and the consequences (to us) be damned. 

Clinton's maddening tenacity was portrayed as evidence of 
devoted friendship and Barak cautioned us that we'd be doomed 
if we spurn the hand of said friendship. 

There are, however, plenty of Israeli precedents for resisting 
American pressure. Ben-Gurion declared independence despite a 
US arms embargo on an empty-handed nation facing massive 
life-threatening invasions. Had he caved in to administration 
dictates, this county would've ended up a UN protectorate and 
the Bernadotte plan to turn Jerusalem and the Negev over to 
the Arabs would've been in force. There would've been no Jewish 
state here, probably no Jews either. 

Despite his immodest pretensions to emulate B-G, Barak has 
agreed to give up half of Jerusalem and the first slice of 
the Negev, at Halutza. 

Even a cursory review of our recent history ought to show 
Barak that the more we disobeyed Washington the more we were 
thought of there as a strategic ally. The Six-Day War, the 
bombing of the Iraqi nuclear reactor and other defiant 
escapades enhanced our image as a vital security asset. 

The US signed strategic agreements with Israel during the 
Lebanon War (1983) and during the first intifada (1988). 
Criticism didn't reduce respect for our strength. 

Spineless irresolution and loss of deterrence encourage terror, 
escalate extortionist demands and fast turn Israel into a 
liability. 

Barak doesn't want to diminish Israel's stature, but he and 
Clinton have developed a symbiotic dependency to serve their 
mutual interests and the consequences (to us) be damned. 
Barak exploited Clinton's patronage to boost his political 
prospects by claiming a special relationship with the leader 
of the free world and to convince us that pleasing Clinton is 
worth the steepest of prices - especially when Barak and 
Clinton both staged their desperate last stands. 

Clinton's time to repair his reputation has apparently run out. 
Barak is racing against time to stave off defeat and needs 
anything he can pass off as an achievement. To facilitate even 
a questionable joint declaration he dropped all reservations 
to Clinton's conditions. 

Frenzied suggestions - to be recycled as Clintonian pressure - 
have emanated from Barak himself, like dividing Jerusalem and 
adding the Security Council as yet another ingredient to the 
explosive mess he concocted. 

Though Barak and Clinton have maneuvered us precariously nearer 
the precipice of war than ever, the duo still dares frighten 
local voters that Sharon will spark conflict. 

If for nothing but that, no Israeli should feel the slightest 
twinge of nostalgia for Clinton. We should all delight in 
bidding shalom to this non-haver. It shouldn't be a shalom 
implying "see you" but one which denotes good-bye, good 
riddance, don't come around any time soon, don't pester, 
don't kibbitz, don't offer opinions, don't stick your nose 
into our affairs, butt out - and, most of all - leave us 
alone to undo the damage you wrought under the guise of 
friendship. 

With certain seeming friends, we need no enemies. 

That's what the broiler raisers of Arkansas - as expert as 
Sharon in the existential struggles of the chicken coop - 
stress in many of their folksy snippets of rustic wisdom. 
The most apt one advises us to "avoid a friend who covers 
you with his wings, only to destroy you with his beak."