Summary: As much as we all love peace, we need to admit that the current Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations are a probably a sham. Palestinian leadership can’t agree to a real peace settlement that would allow the continued existence of Israel. Instead they have decided to maneuver Israeli leadership into being blamed for breaking off the negotiations, leaving Israel in an isolated and vulnerable position. The Palestinians will then seek, and get, international backing for a Palestinian state that has no peace agreement with Israel. The concessions that should have been the”price of peace” will be forced out of Israel without a peace agreement. That is why Israel must always say “yes” to peace initiatives.
Earlier I discussed the reasons why most Zionists and Israelis support peace, and why Israel‘s long term policy has always supported peace.
My views are those of most Israelis. Nonetheless, anti-Israel writers have assured everyone that Zionists are really nasty warmongers. Anti-Semites tell the world that the Jews are behind every war. Popular magazines declare that Israelis are not interested in peace. These enemies of Israel have been aided by certain self-proclaimed Zionists who insist that the peace process is bad for Israel, and that Israel must turn down peace negotiations.
Those who oppose the continuation of the peace process need to be honest: Are they really afraid of security threats, or are they really opposed to an extension of settlement construction freeze?? Let’s be frank. The settlement construction freeze is a red-herring issue It was devised by the Palestinians to avoid serious negotiations. The Palestinians have negotiated for years while Israel built new housing in settlements.The Americans and the Palestinians did not call a halt to negotiations.
Certainly, if negotiations break down, there will not be less settlement expansion. The moratorium on construction in the settlements continued for ten months. The Palestinians wasted almost the entire period on deliberately inconclusive indirect talks. The peace negotiations are an elaborate charade, but they are a charade with a purpose. We have to understand the purpose of the Palestinian tactics in order to understand what the Israeli response must be..
Realistically, if negotiations continue, the freeze on construction in settlements will probably be extended throughout the Obama administration, despite the current temporary “unfreeze,” courtesy of the U.S. congressional elections.
So what? We waited nine years until the British left and we could bring new immigrants to Israel. We have waited two thousand years to build in Jerusalem. We have waited two thousand years for a Jewish state. Are we going to give it all up for a few “housing units’ in Ariel? If the apartments are not built now, does anyone think Ariel will be given to the Palestinians in a peace deal? But building the apartments now may put the onus for the failure of the peace negotiations on Israel, feeding the delegitimization campaign of the Palestinians and their supporters. Rather than a few settlements or a few apartments being called into question, the whole idea of a Jewish state, even a postage-stamp sized Jewish state, is being jeopardized by the new construction.
A little reflection will show that a negotiated solution that ends in two states for two peoples is the only sane option for supporters of Israel and for the Israeli government, for the reasons given below. It looks like the only game in town for a peace solution. it will probably happen whether extremists want it or not. It is, in fact, the only reasonable option for both peoples. Since this is the Middle East after all, skeptics can point out that the sane and reasonable solution doesn’t stand a chance. Nonetheless, even in the Middle East, it is unlikely that the collective will of the EU, the USA and Russia will be thwarted.
The logic of the anti-peace crowd on both sides has a revolting symmetry. They all want a one-state solution. The Arab extremists want an Arab state, and the Jewish extremists (see Israel-Palestine: The one-state solution returns ) imagine that the single state will be Jewish. As for unfortunate surplus populations, the Arabs imagine, in the best case, that a Jewish minority will live in “Palestine” as “dhimmi” or “Arab Jews” in the same way they lived (or not, as was frequently the case) in Arab countries. In the worst case, the Arab “one state” proponents contemplate massive expulsion or genocide. The Jewish extremists evidently imagine that they can wish the Arabs and Muslims out of existence by fiddling with demographic statistics or sending them to Jordan or other countries that will not have them.
The same strange symmetry is reflected in the way history is viewed. The conflict between Israel and the Arabs did not begin in 1967, with the Israeli conquests of the Six Day War. It is foolish to believe that returning all the territories will end the conflict, no matter what florid and deceptive declarations are made in documents such as the Arab Peace Initiative. Conversely, allow me to point out that Israel existed before 1967, and won a war against tremendous odds. The territories did not make us powerful or grant us security. Israel conquered territories in 1967 because it was more powerful and organized than its enemies. Israeli security was always provided by the Israeli people. Security was never provided by conquest of real-estate.
Right-wing opponents of the peace process tell us that it will establish a Hamas-dominated state, which will rain down rockets on Ben-Gurion airport and Tel Aviv from the West Bank. That is probably true. What could be worse than that? The model for such a state, as everyone agrees, is Gaza. An Israeli pullout there resulted in the Hamas takeover and the rain of rockets on the Western Negev. Opponents of Israeli withdrawal insist that only settlements backed by a military presence can keep the peace. They forgot that Gaze rocket fire began before the disengagement, when Israel had both settlements and an armed presence in Gaza. The soldiers guarded the settlements and could do little to stop the rocket fire. They forgot that Israeli helicopters, and aircraft are made in USA, that Israeli-made arms such as the Merkava tank or various unmanned aircraft incorporate parts that are made in USA, France. Germany or the U.K.
What could be worse than a Hamas-dominated state established by a peace agreement?? How about a Hamas-dominated state that has no peace agreement with Israel, that claims all the land of the British Mandate, that claims the “right” of return for Arabs who fled in 1948, and that has the backing of the EU too?? The rocket fire would be legitimized as “resistance.”That would be considerably worse, wouldn’t it?
The EU has pledged itself to back a Palestinian state, no strings attached, by the beginning of 2011. If that happens, Hamas would indeed rain rockets on Ben-Gurion airport, an effort supported by the EU as well as the usual terror groupies, and Israel would be absolutely powerless to stop them.
Fatah-Hamas unity talks that would almost certainly result in a Hamas-dominated state have gotten a big boost in recent weeks, contingent on the fate of the peace talks:
Sides said before the talks began that if the latest round failed, Palestinians would work to earn world support for the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state.
According to a subsequent report:
Officials from the rival movement have said that significant progress has been made following recent talks in Damascus over the ratification of the Egyptian deal, reaching consensus on issues that Hamas said were points of contention, including the structure of the PLO, the Central Elections Committee, and an elections court.
The situation at this moment is fluid. The Arab League has evidently decided not to decide. According to one report, the Arab League has given Abbas the green light to end the direct peace talks. Other reports (e,g. here) insist that the Arab League has given the U.S. more time to broker a deal about settlement construction, while ruling out direct talks as long as construction continues in the settlemnts:
Ambassador Hesham Youssef, a senior aide to the secretary general of the Arab League, said Friday that the Arab ministers were supporting the Palestinian position “not to resume direct negotiations as long as settlement activities are ongoing.”
“This is an Arab and Palestinian position,” he said, speaking by telephone from Sirte, Libya, where the Arab League is meeting. “Not a single Arab country is saying go ahead with the talks.”
But he and other officials said that the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, had raised some additional options that he refused to discuss, but said that the Arab League would meet to discuss them in a month’s time.
Indirect talks will probably go on for now.
Among the appetizing alternatives being discussed by the Arabs are an appeal to the U.N. and an appeal to the U.S. to back a unilaterally declared Palestinian state or a U.N. “mandate for Palestine” in what Palestinians like to call 1967 borders (actually 1949 armistice lines). Then the Palestinians, backed by the oil might of the Arab League, will manipulate the U.S., the EU and the U.N. to impose an unfavorable two-state solution on Israel. They are just waiting for Israel to say “no” to the peace process. If Israel says “no” to peace negotiations, Israelis are walking into a trap.
Abbas can never say “No” to peace negotiations, since the Palestinian Authority government would lose the generous financial backing of the EU and the US, as well as the backing of the Arab League countries, who are anxious for Western help against non-Arab Shia Iran. Abbas can never say “No” to peace negotiations, but he can’t agree to peace either. Admitting the existence of Israel as a Jewish state and giving up the “right” of “return” for Palestinian “refugees” are preconditions of real peace, and they are politically impossible for Abbas at present.
If the peace process really fails because of any Israeli action, Mahmoud Abbas would conveniently be saved from having to make politically unpopular concessions. There are repeated threats that Abbas will resign If Abbas resigns, the way will be open for more extreme elements in Fatah and the PLO, and it is more likely that Palestinians will agree to a Hamas-dominated unity deal.
We can at last understand the purpose of the elaborate melodrama that the “moderate” Palestinians are staging for the benefit of the Americans, which is to have negotiations fail in a way that can be be blamed on Israel. That is why they raised the settlement construction issue as a condition for talks. In this scenario, the peace negotiations will fail, the “moderate” Palestinians of the West Bank will have “no alternative” to a unity government with Hamas. Israeli refusal to continue the talks on Palestinian terms will grant them a license to make the most extreme demands, and the international diplomatic situation will be favorable to the Palestinians, .
Don’t you love it when a nightmare plan comes together??
Of course, none of the above may ever happen, at least not right away. Fateh and Hamas may go on hating each other forever, and the EU might not back a Palestinian state.
The unilateral Palestinian state threat began in1988 with the Palestinian declaration of Independence , remember that? George Bush promised a Palestinian state by 2009, and then by 2008. A measure of healthy skepticism is justified. But the Europeans and president Obama might be more serious about a Palestinian state than President Bush, and Palestinian Prime Minister Salem Fayyad who plans a Palestinian state, may be more serious and methodical than Yasser Arafat.
However remote, the possibility that diplomats really mean what they say cannot be ruled out. There are precedents.
Fateh – Hamas unity has always been just in the offing, but nothing has happened except the short-lived disaster of Palestinian unity, that ended in the Hamas coup in Gaza. That doesn’t mean unity will not happen.
Suppose it all never happens. What then? Israel would still be isolated internationally as an “obstacle to peace.” Our army could defend nothing without the spare parts and ammunition that come from abroad. Our economy could not be sustained without American and European trading partners. Israel would face world-class threats such as Iran without the diplomatic backing of the EU, without any military capability, and possibly without the diplomatic backing of the US. Is that really worth a few trailers in Izhar, or even a new neighborhood in Jerusalem?? Aren’t Iranian missiles a bigger threat than Hamas rockets?
What is the alternative? It’s simple. Let the Palestinians say “no” to peace. The American definition of a reasonable peace settlement is given in the Clinton Bridging Proposals of 2000. These do not include return of Palestinian refugees. It is very unlikely that Mahmoud Abbas would ever agree to this plan, as he explained in 2000.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now offered to resume the settlement freeze if the Palestinians recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people. That puts the focus back on real issue. See The Peace Gap and Netanyahu reveals the real Issue. The Palestinians are unlikely to agree, but those supporters of Israel who are opposed to any peace negotiations would presumably be opposed to accepting a freeze on construction in settlements even in those circumstances. If you rule out any Israeli concessions, you can’t expect any Palestinian concessions.
What if by some miracle, the Palestinians and the Arab states agree to what Americans consider a reasonable solution? What if they agree to recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people? What if against all probability they agree that Jews have at least some rights in east Jerusalem? True, Jerusalem would be divided, and Israel would lose all those potential Palestinian Arab citizens, as well as precious parts of East Jerusalem. But what remains at least would be recognized as ours by the western world.
The Arab agreement will probably not be the real thing. There will always be yet one more claim. They will always be waiting for an opportunity to destroy Israel. At least some Palestinian leaders do not hide the fact that their ultimate goal is the destruction of Israel through peace negotiations, as Abbas Zaki explained.
So what? The Palestinians and the Arabs have been planning the destruction of Israel for over sixty years. Most of the world was indifferent to our fate, as they are indifferent to the fate of Tibetans or Kurds. In the past, only we Israelis have really objected to this plan, and we will not get much sympathy in the future if the EU and the U.S. see us as evil warmongers.
Realistically, the conflict will probably continue with or without a “peace” agreement. The real choice for Israel is between fighting from the moral high ground, with a few allies, or being isolated as a pariah colonialist warmonger state.
No comments:
Post a Comment