Wednesday, July 31, 2013

The Illusion of Peace Negotiations


The Illusion of Peace Negotiations

By Joseph Klein 

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators are in Washington this week to meet face to face under State Department auspices. Although the talks are focusing initially on procedural issues rather than any substantive matters, Secretary of State John Kerry hailed their resumption as a major accomplishment.

In announcing the appointment of Martin Indyk, former U.S. Ambassador to Israel, as the U.S. Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations during a press briefing Monday morning, Kerry praised “the courageous leadership of Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas” and “their willingness to make difficult decisions.”

The Monday evening “negotiation” session, hosted by Kerry, was attended by Israel’s justice minister, Tzipi Livni, Prime Minister Binjamin Netanyahu’s envoy Yitzhak Molcho, the Palestinian chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, and Fatah official Muhammad Shtayyeh. They met over an Iftar dinner at the State Department, flanked by the American, Israeli and Palestinian flags. Before the dinner began, Kerry met with the Israelis and Palestinians separately.

After one more session on Tuesday, the negotiators head home, where further talks will be held at some undisclosed location in the Middle East.

Although details of what was said at the dinner have not yet been disclosed, Kerry was reportedly set to read a statement specifying the pre-1967 lines as the basis for negotiation on Palestinian statehood, with minor one-to-one land swaps. This is the Arab League-Obama administration proposal for a two-state solution, which ignores Israel’s legitimate security concerns. It also asks for no concessions from the Palestinians, who continue to insist on the right to re-locate millions of Palestinian refugees within pre-1967 Israel.

When Kerry visited the United Nations last week, he referred to both Israel and the Palestinians as two “countries” preparing to put into place procedures for resumed talks. He used the term “countries” again in referring to Israel and the Palestinian territories during his Monday morning remarks. In return for the Palestinians’ “difficult” decision to enter into procedural talks with Israel, has Kerry offered the Palestinians some sort of private assurance of tacit support for their quest for statehood recognition at the UN and elsewhere, as his repeated references to two “countries” would seem to suggest?

What exactly are the “difficult decisions” made by both sides to kick start the negotiations? The truth is that only Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu actually made a difficult decision.  Against some opposition in his own party and over protests by families of victims of Palestinian terrorist attacks, Netanyahu has decided to release in stages as many as 104 Palestinian prisoners, many of whom have served prison terms of two decades or more for murdering Israelis in cold blood.

“This moment is not easy for me,” Netanyahu said. “It is not easy especially for the families, the bereaved families, whose heart I understand. But there are moments in which tough decisions must be made for the good of the country, and this is one of those moments.”

What tough decision did Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas make other than temporarily putting aside all of his preconditions that would have prejudged the final outcome of any meaningful final status negotiations? He merely promised, according to reports, to put off for a few months seeking expanded membership status at the United Nations and pursuing bogus legal action against Israel in the International Criminal Court.

Back in 2008, Abbas demonstrated his lack of interest in a negotiated peace fair to both sides when he rejected a peace proposal from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that would have given the Palestinians approximately 94% of the West Bank. The Palestinians rejected Israel’s offer because they did not get 100% of what they wanted, including the full “right of return” and every stone of East Jerusalem under Palestinian rule.

Here is what Saƫb Erakat, the chief Palestinian negotiator then and now, himself said about the rejected offer during a television appearance in March 2009, as transcribed by MEMRI:

Abu Mazen [Palestinian President Abbas] could have accepted a proposal that talked about Jerusalem and almost 100% of the West Bank, but it is not our goal to score points against one another here. Our strategic goal, when we strive for peace, is not to do so at any price. We strive for peace on the basis of an Israeli withdrawal to the June 4, 1967 borders, the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and with the West Bank and the Gaza Strip geographically connected… There will be no peace whatsoever unless East Jerusalem – with every single stone in it – becomes the capital of Palestine[.]

Nothing has changed on the Palestinian side. We have essentially the same cast of characters espousing the same take-it-or-leave it position that would undermine Israel’s future as a Jewish state. Moreover, Abbas is as incapable now, as he was in 2008, of delivering a unified Palestinian proposal for peace. Hamas, which controls Gaza, declared that it “considers the Palestinian Authority’s return to negotiations with the occupation to be at odds with the national consensus.” As if to prove Hamas to be right, hundreds of Palestinians marched on Sunday in the West Bank city of Ramallah to protest the resumption of talks.

Even if a deal could somehow be reached between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, the Palestinian Authority sees negotiations as a mere tactic on the way to reaching their eventual goal of eliminating the Jewish state from the river to sea.

On July 19, 2013, the Palestinian Authority Minister of Religious Affairs, Mahmoud Al-Habbash, invoked the actions of Prophet Mohammed as justification for breaking a treaty. He said in a sermon in front of Mahmoud Abbas on Palestinian Authority TV that reaching an agreement with Israel was “exactly like the Prophet [Muhammad] did in the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, even though some opposed it.”  Mohammed entered into this treaty with the Quraish Tribe of Mecca, but broke it two years later when his forces attacked and conquered Mecca.

“This is the example, this is the model,” the Palestinian Authority Minister of Religious Affairs proclaimed.

In September 2011, on Al-Jazeera TV, Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki was even more explicit on the Palestinians’  true intentions:

The agreement is based on the borders of June 4 [1967]. While the agreement is on the borders of June 4, the President [Mahmoud Abbas] understands, we understand, and everyone knows that it is impossible to realize the inspiring idea, or the great goal in one stroke. If Israel withdraws from Jerusalem, if Israel uproots the settlements, 650,000 settlers, if Israel removes the (security) fence – what will be with Israel? Israel will come to an end. If I say that I want to remove it from existence, this will be great, great, [but] it is hard. This is not a [stated] policy. You can’t say it to the world. You can say it to yourself.

The only possible good sign in all of this is Kerry’s appointment of former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk as his Special Envoy to manage U.S. interests in further talks. At least he will bring an understanding of Israel’s hot button issues while at the same time having some credibility with Palestinian negotiators.  However, without a president who can tell the difference between our only true ally in the Middle East and a deceptive Palestinian negotiating team that is not committed to a genuine peace and that does not speak for all Palestinians in any case, these talks will only move forward to a conclusion if Israel is forced to sacrifice its security and future as a Jewish state. Barack Obama is not that president.

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/joseph-klein/the-illusion-of-peace-negotiations/

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Harming terror victims yet again


Harming terror victims yet again

Ron Kerman

From the moment the hollow victory bell sounded with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's announcement that the Israelis and Palestinians will start talking again for the umpteenth time, the "pre-Olso killers" began counting down the days until their release. While Israeli politicians are trying to exude how uncompromising they are, all intelligent people know this is a false front and that the path has been predetermined.

Once again, terror victims have been hurt, this time on the altar of opportunism for all of the involved parties. The U.S. government, which has yet to solve the many internal and global crises it faces, is pressuring the weak link, Israel, in order to breathe wind into its own sails. Meanwhile, Israeli politicians are continuing to make a mockery of their country's citizens. Among these politicians are faded fighters of terrorism, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who served as a commando when he was young and three decades ago authored the definitive book on how to combat terrorism. Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, who dismantled and set up political parties just to stay in office, is a partner in this phony dance. On the other side, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is receiving the prostitute's fee that he's been seeking -- the release of "pre-Oslo killers."

After releasing 22 female terrorists for a videotape of Gilad Schalit and later another 1,027 murderers for his release, freeing just 103 "pre-Oslo killers" must seem like an achievement for the Israeli government. That number of prisoners to be released in this "deal" is a mere 10 percent of the number released in exchange for Schalit (although the Palestinians are already calling for the release of 350 more prisoners at the end of the current round). Although Livni, who is in charge of negotiations with the Palestinians, wrote on her Facebook page that she'll preserve Israel's security interests, I fear that she won't deviate from past behavior and will release murderers who haven't finished the prison terms they were sentenced to by the justice system that she now leads. If she does this, the security interests for all of us will suffer.

Bereaved families are again gritting their teeth as they visit the graves of their loved ones. These families will again pay the price. Over the years, we've turned into dust, and dust can be brushed away effortlessly. We, who paid the terrible price, are easily sacrificed and belittled. As if just because the murders happened decades ago, the families have healed from the "bereavement disease."

No, Mr. Prime Minister, we haven't healed. No, Mrs. Justice Minister, we haven't forgiven. We believed that the justice system would preserve the honor of the dead after the security system failed to keep our loved ones alive. And you, Mr. Kerry, when has the U.S. ever released terrorists who were sentenced to life terms?

The blood of the dead who lay beneath our feet was shed by enemies who don't accept the fact that we live here in our country. Even after our withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, our enemies continued to hit us harder and from further away. The leaders of our enemies continue to poison their children on a daily basis, preaching against our existence and yearning for a day in which the region is clean of Jews. The prisoners to be released tried and succeeded in killing us. We're not talking about the release of political prisoners, which is customary in the world.

Releasing the murderers of Israeli children and adults undermines all standards of justice and morality. Peace must be based on those lofty values. But that is not the situation in our region.

Ron Kerman is the father of Tal Kerman, who was killed at the age of 17 in the Bus 37 bombing in Haifa in 2003.

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=5095

Why are 104 Palestinian Terrorists Being Released? No Good Reason


Why are 104 Palestinian Terrorists Being Released? No Good Reason

By Barry Rubin

What is truly puzzling about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposing to release more than 100 of the worst Palestinian terrorists to have ever murdered Israelis is that it is so impossible to figure out any reason to do so.  It is not just that one might oppose this plan, it is that I cannot think of a single reason for supporting it.

Let’s go very carefully through the arguments and try to find one.

It is true, of course, that Israel has released prisoners before. Yet this was under different circumstances.
In one case,  prisoners, sometimes in very large  numbers, were released in exchange for Israeli soldiers. This could be controversial but also one could make a case for it. The prisoners might have been convicted on less serious charges or they might have been near the end of their imprisonment. There was a nobility in putting the value of Israelis high, keeping the promise of doing everything possible to release them. And while the families of the victims could be considered so were the families of the captives.

A second rationale for such releases is if there is a calculation of diplomatic gain. Perhaps the release of some prisoners will help bring a ceasefire or get serious negotiations going—when we thought that these were possible—or get some valuable gains or material benefits from the West.

 I have supported such past releases, painful and dangerous as they were.But the curiosity here is why Israel is releasing the worst terrorists for no gain, not even good publicity? 

Surely it isn’t to win domestic popularity because Israelis hate this decision.

Nor is it related to the previous Netanyahu strategy which has been to humor Obama, play along, keep him happy, make minimal and low-cost concessions, and let the PA show it doesn’t want to make peace.

Nor will it get Israel any good public image in Europe or America. On the contrary, the mass media will not tell the readers and viewers the extent of the crimes perpetrated by these terrorists or what would generate sympathy for the real victims. No. If anything the coverage will emphasize sympathy for the terrorists’ families and leave the impression that the terrorists were political prisoners arrested for no good reasons by the cruel occupation authorities.

Is the PA offering something? No. Any hint that the PA will suspend the demand that all Palestinians can come live in Israel (and subvert it), or that it will recognize Israel as a Jewish state, or that the pre-1970 lines be altered in Israel’s favor are simply not going to happen.

Any concession will be pocketed and then the PA will demand more. We know that. The strategy of unilateral creation of Palestine, without any deal at all, will continue.

Okay, so perhaps some big prize will be given by the United States? Like what? In Egypt and Syria the United States is supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, against Israel’s interests. In Turkey, Obama loves an anti-Israel Turkish government.

Is there some secret American promise? But what is an Obama promise worth? Two examples. Obama has gone back on a pledge to support a frontier change to allow Israel to include large settlement blocs.

And then there was Turkey where President Obama personally mediated a deal with Turkey in which Israel made concessions, than did nothing when Turkey ignored all the provisions and openly broke the agreement.

In fact, remember how Obama asked Israel for a construction freeze on settlements and then gave it no credit when it did so twice!

Perhaps the secret promise pertains to Iran and its nuclear weapons drive. But what would that be? Is the Obama Administration going to attack Iran or cooperate with Israel in doing so? Of course not. And even if such a promise was made does anyone believe this?

Merely to continue past presidencies’ policies toward Israel would not be sufficient to get such continued concessions in exchange for nothing new.

Or was there a credible threat against Israel, that Obama would do something terrible or apply pressure if he didn’t get his way? Yet as the saying goes in Hebrew, yesh gavul, there’s a limit.

As for the nominal reason for the Netanyahu policy, the prime minister has said that perhaps there is some real chance for peace this time. He just doesn’t believe that.

What is the real effect of this policy?

--To undermine Israel credibility.

--To increase the risk from terrorism to Israeli citizens.

--To build confidence in Palestinian intransigence.

--To encourage Palestinians to commit terrorism believing there will be no or a reduced price.

--To convince the PA’s belief that it can get something for nothing.

--To persuade Europeans and Americans that they can endlessly pressure Israelis into concessions.  (Would America release al-Qaida terrorists from Guantanamo Bay prison in the belief that this would lead them to make pace?)

I just don’t get it and there is simply no proper motive for following—or needing to pursue—such a terrible policy.

http://rubinreports.blogspot.co.il/2013/07/why-are-104-palestinian-terrorists.html

A Response to Your Letter, Prime Minister Netanyahu



A Response to Your Letter, Prime Minister Netanyahu

When the Palestinians want peace, we won't have to buy it and so long as we are willing to pay a price such as this, they will win. The blood on their hands remains.
From Paula R. Stern
Thank you, Prime Minister Netanyahu, for your letter to the Israeli people. As an Israeli, please allow me to respond. I know that, unlike you, I was not elected. And therefore, I can speak only for myself and perhaps, for those who wish to agree. Those who think releasing murderers to bribe unwilling participants to negotiations is folly at its best. I read your letter – several times in fact. Your words are in black, mine in red….you began by writing…

"Prime ministers are occasionally required to make decisions that are contrary to public opinion, when the matter is one of importance to the state.

I agree - and that is indeed why you were elected. There are difficult decisions that have to be made and we have to trust the Prime Minister and his government to make those decisions in the best interests of the country (not his political standing or his place in history; not because he bowed to the United States and doesn't want to be seen as intransigent).

"There is no need for prime ministers, in order to make decisions that enjoy the support of public opinion.


It's been 37 years since your brother fell - but he fell in a mission to save others.

"At this time, I believe it is very important for the state of Israel to enter a diplomatic process. This is important for fully exhausting the chances for ending the conflict with the Palestinians, and also for solidifying Israel's status in the complex international reality that surrounds us.

I agree that it is important for Israel to - wait, did you say ENTER the political process? What have we been doing or trying to do for the last 65 years? ENTER? No, sorry - we have been fully engaged in attempting to get the Palestinians to ENTER the talks.  But the bigger concern here is the last part of your sentence. We are to release murderers and once again endanger our current and future security to solidify "Israel's status in the complex international reality that surrounds us." Honestly, do you think this will ever be solidified? Do you really believe they will ever accept us? Come on, be honest - at least with us. Tell the US whatever you want, but if you are writing to us, and not the United States, let's talk truth. For the last 65 years, the Arabs have denied our right to exist - releasing 104 prisoners just convinces them all the more that we are too stupid and too weak to stick around much longer.

"The huge changes in our region – in Egypt, Syria and Iran – pose new challenges before the state of Israel, but they also present considerable opportunities before us.

So releasing 104 prisoners, that is where you're going this this nonsense, right? So releasing 104 Palestinians is going to change this, address these new challenges? Have you noticed that the Egyptians, Syrians and Iranians don't much like the Palestinians either? Guess not...

"For these reasons, I believe that it is important that Israel enter a diplomatic process that will last at least nine months – in order to examine if an agreement can be reached with the Palestinians within that time.

"But with all the importance that I attach to a diplomatic process, I was not willing to accept the Palestinian demands for retreats and [building] freezes as preconditions for entering into negotiations.

"I was also unwilling to accept their demand to release Palestinian prisoners before the negotiations begin. I did agree to release 104 Palestinians in measured portions after the beginning of the negotiation and in accordance with its progress.

Forgive me for my ignorance, but usually when someone says "without preconditions - it means - WITHOUT preconditions, like none. Like no, we won't freeze, we won't agree to new borders, and no, we won't release killers. We will come, we will talk. We will assume that peace is to the mutual benefit of both sides. We will assume you want peace. And, we will even assume you want peace almost as much as we do. And we will talk and hopefully agree. And, in THAT agreement, both sides will have to compromise. Maybe it will be land; maybe it will be a building freeze; maybe it will involve releasing prisoners. It will certainly involve mutual recognition. What it won't include is more of the same mistakes of the past, where WE froze, and they fired; where WE withdrew and they took up new positions; where WE released, and they planned additional attacks and kidnappings.

"This is a tremendously difficult decision to make. It hurts the bereaved families, it hurts the entire nation of Israel and it hurts me very much.

I'll have to take your word on how much it hurts you; I have no doubt how much it hurts the families who thought that they had achieved, at the very least, some measure of justice for the tremendous injustice of having their wives, husbands, children, mothers, fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers murdered. I would have thought you understood, but I am not so sure. It's been 37 years since your brother fell - but he fell in a mission to save others. He wasn't a victim of terror, he was a hero and his forces gave as good as they got. He fell in battle for the highest of reasons.

"It collides with an exceedingly important value – the value of justice.

Damned right it does. And if you are going to collide with our values - you should at least do it for something...not some future promise that history has proven never really materializes. You have mocked our justice system, turning it into the revolving door of the Arab "justice system" and caused tremendous pain in the doing.

"It is a clear injustice when evil people are released before the end of their sentences, even if an absolute majority among them have served over 20 years in jail.

"The decision is doubly personally difficult for me, because I and my family know personally the price of bereavement from terror. I know the pain well. I have felt it on a daily basis for the past 37 years.

But again, you don't know the bereavement of a victim or a victim's family. Your brother was chosen and chose to lead a mission of honor that saved hundreds of lives. There is comfort in that. What comfort is there in having your 76 year old grandfather stabbed to death by the killer you want to release? Of having your wife and three children murdered by another killer you want to release? You know the pain of losing a loved one, but not the injustice of having it done in terror and now, the further injustice of having that killer released.

"The fact that Israeli governments that preceded those that I have headed released over 10,000 terrorists, does not make things any easier for me today, and did not make my decision to free Gilad Schalit any easier.

"Bringing Gilad home involved an exceedingly difficult decision for me – the release of terrorists. But I believed that the value of bringing our sons home must supersede that difficulty.

The jury is still out on whether the value of bringing home a beloved son of Israel outweighs the danger of releasing over 1,000 terrorists. Already, Israel has had to recapture several of those terrorists.

"People in positions of leadership must choose between complex options, and sometimes the required decision is particularly difficult when most of the public opposes it.

See, the concept of a democracy is that you implement the dreams and hopes and wishes of the people. In a dictatorship, you can do what YOU want; in a democracy, you are supposed to do what the people want. After 65 years of facing the same enemy, I think we, the people, are also qualified to know that you're leading us down a dead end...again.

"Thus, I decided to end Operation Pillar of Defense after arch terrorist Ahmed Jaabari was liquidated, and after the harsh blows that Hamas and the terror organizations received at the hands of the IDF.

"I made the decision to end the operation although most of the public backed continuing it – something that would have required a ground offensive into Gaza. As prime minister I thought that the goal of deterrence had been largely achieved by the determined actions we took.

But you see, with Operation Pillar of Defense, one could argue that you were privy to information we didn't have - or at least I hope so. For what it is worth, soldiers - like my son...who you called up on a Friday night to join the battle...understood your decision, even if they didn't agree with it. It was, at that point, given what the air force had already accomplished, an issue of weighing what was to come against what was accomplished. That is not the same now. What will be accomplished by releasing 104 killers NOW? Why not begin the negotiation...why not, in fact, end the negotiation and let part of what they demand be these 104. Then, at least, we will get SOMETHING...ANYTHING...in exchange for this injustice. But we won't get anything for it - and once again, if we are required to buy their seat at the table with our blood, we are fools - fools lead by a fool.

"Today, about a year after Operation Pillar of Defense, we are witnessing the most quiet situation in the south in over a decade. Of course, this quiet can fall apart at any moment, but my policy is a clear one on all fronts: as far as possible, we prevent threats in advance, and we respond with force to any attempt to hurt our civilians.

"In the next nine months we will examine if the Palestinian element that faces us wants to truly end the conflict between us, as we do.
We accept the nine month trial period, as we have accepted the 65 years before them. What we do not accept any longer, are the endless gestures we are being asked to make. The US is pressuring us. Perhaps if you feel you are not strong enough to withstand US pressure, you could remind that great nation that Sirhan Sirhan, who killed one man, still sits in jail; Charles Manson, who killed many, still sits in jail. Even Jonathan Pollard, who killed none – sits in jail. What right do they have to demand we release prisoners. If peace is so important to the US and they believe the Palestinians should be paid – perhaps they should release Sirhan Sirhan…and to be balanced, let them release Jonathan Pollard as well.

"This end will only be possible if the security of the citizens of Israel is assured, along with our vital national interests.

"If we reach a peace arrangement of this nature, I will bring it to a public referendum.

"A crucial decision like this must not be made on the cusp of a few votes in the Knesset. Every citizen must be allowed to directly influence our future in such a central question.

"The best response that we give to those base murderers who wanted to defeat us through terror is that in the course of the dozens of years when they sat in jail, we have built a wonderful country and turned it into one of the world's most prosperous, advanced and powerful countries.

Actually, apparently the response you are giving those base murderers who want to defeat us through terror is that they are likely to succeed. Sure, they sat in jail a dozen or more years and yeah, we've built a wonderful country...but they are being free to attempt - chance two - to defeat us, to maim us, to destroy all we have built for ourselves and our children. What value will what we have built be...if in the building, we allow them to kill our future?

"I promise that we will continue to do so.

I promise you that what you release today will try in the near future to destroy us...as they have tried for 65 years. I know...sadly...with more pain and despair than you perhaps can imagine...that things will explode in Israel once again, people will die...because of these 104, because once again you are showing weakness.
The greatest nation can be defeated by the stupidest of decisions. When the Palestinians want peace, we won't have to buy it and so long as we are willing to pay a price such as this, they will win. The blood on their hands remains. Those that took your brother's life are laughing because you are giving them another chance to take hostages and somewhere, sometime, another young Yoni will have to fly into danger, to save his people, as Yoni once did. 

The blood of those victims is on the hands of those you release...the blood of the next victims will be on yours. That is the horrible burden a leader must bear. It is your right to choose this path; and our job to remind you that in weakness and surrender, there is only failure.

"Yours, Binyamin Netanyahu."

Yours...a nation saddened, shocked, and angry.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/13613#.UfdpTyvXgU4

The B-Lister Israel Boycotters


The B-Lister Israel Boycotters

By Bruce Bawer 

It’s ironic. Some of today’s biggest stars have accepted handsome sums to put on shows for tyrants: 50 Cent, Nelly Furtado, Mariah Carey, Beyonce, and Usher all took money from members of Qaddafi’s inner circle; Hilary Swank cashed in royally on a Chechnya visit in 2011; Julio Iglesias performed in a concert produced by the dictatorship of Equatorial Guinea; and Jennifer Lopez has raked in over $10 million for (in the words of the Human Rights Foundation) “serenading crooks and dictators from Eastern Europe and Russia,” among them “corrupt Uzbek industrialist Azam Aslanov,” “Chechen dictator Ramzan Kadyrov,” “Russian oligarch Telman Ismailov,” “the dictatorship of Azerbaijan,” “Alexander Yolkin, a Russian bureaucrat accused of corruption,” and, most recently, the musically named dictator of Turkmenistan, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov.

Yet in recent years, while all these top-flight celebs have queued up to have their palms greased by Satan’s little helpers, an even longer parade of showbiz types have made a big to-do of cancelling performances in the only democracy in the Middle East. One of the newest members of this fraternity is Eric Burdon of the 1960s band The Animals, who announced last week that he wouldn’t be going onstage in Israel, as scheduled, on August 1. The reason, according to his manager, was that he was “under increasing pressure, including many threatening emails that we are receiving on a daily basis.”

Burdon isn’t alone. Every reasonably well-known entertainer who plans an appearance in Israel can expect to be targeted by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement – a sprawling assemblage of organizations and individuals that share a systematic dishonesty, an ideological fanaticism, and an intense determination to isolate Israel from the rest of the civilized world. Just the names of these activists and groups – many of which are funded, directly or indirectly, by Western governments and church bodies – could fill pages. Among them: Al-Awda; EuroPalestine; the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organization Network; the Palestinian BDS National Committee; Info Palestine; Addameer; Children of Palestine; Kairos USA; Israeli Apartheid Week. The list goes on and on – and includes something called Who Profits (a project of something called the Coalition of Women for Peace), which supplies other BDS groups with the names of firms it thinks should be targeted with boycotts because of their Israeli connections.

One of the BDS movement’s many effective spokespeople is Anna Baltzer, head of yet another one of these revolting groups, the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. Baltzer, a stylish and attractive young Jewish-American woman, spends much of her time speaking at U.S. churches, telling her earnest listeners outright lies about Israel and trying to convince them that their Christian faith obliges them to boycott the Jewish state. Just to give you an idea of the kind of people we’re talking about here, Baltzer lends an air of legitimacy to her campaign by presenting herself to audiences as the granddaughter of Polish Holocaust survivors; in fact her grandparents, although of Polish background, lived in Belgium and escaped to the U.S. before the Shoah began. The name Baltzer itself is an invention; she started using it years ago to keep her ardently Zionist grandmother (now deceased) in the dark about her poisonous anti-Israel activism. Among the many whoppers Baltzer has told audiences is a story about a pregnant Palestinian woman who allegedly lost her baby because she wasn’t allowed through an Israeli checkpoint – and whose name has miraculously changed from one retelling to the next.

Among those who’ve been pressured by this unsavory crowd to drop gigs in Israel is Paul McCartney, who in 2008 was targeted – and threatened – by several BDS groups. “I got death threats, but I’m coming anyway,” Sir Paul said at the time. “I have no intention of surrendering. I refuse to cancel my performances in Israel.” Yet another BDS group, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, issued a statement at the time saying that Sir Paul’s concert would “convey a message that McCartney either condones or apathetically ignores Israel’s reality as a colonial power and an apartheid state that oppresses the indigenous Palestinians and occupies Arab land.” To his credit, McCartney didn’t allow himself to be swayed by their rhetoric.

Others who have stood up to intimidation include Alicia Keys, Deep Purple, Rihanna, Madonna, Moby, the Pet Shop Boys, Aerosmith, Celine Dion, Lady Gaga, Justin Timberlake, and (yes) Barbra Streisand, who last month sang at Shimon Peres’s 90th birthday party and described Israel as “a shining beacon of hope in the world.” (To be sure, being Barbra Streisand, she also used the visit to criticize Orthodox Jewish attitudes towards women, while remaining silent on Islamic misogyny; but at least she went.) Meanwhile, those who’ve yielded to pressure include Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, Carlos Santana, Jon Bon Jovi, the Yardbirds, Joe Lynn Turner, Meg Ryan, Snoop Dogg, Stevie Wonder, and Elvis Costello. (I think it’s important to spread both these lists far and wide.)

Moby, in an Israeli radio interview, reportedly made the savvy observation “that the intensity of the attacks against him before he came to Israel made him suspect that this wasn’t an objective movement that was concerned with people’s welfare, but with something dark and dubious.” (I couldn’t have said it any better myself.) By contrast, Elvis Costello, after deciding to cancel a 2010 performance, posted on his website a self-congratulatory open letter – which was welcomed by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign – describing his decision as “a matter of instinct and conscience” and expressing his concern that if he didn’t cancel, the public might assume he “has no mind for the suffering of the innocent.” As for Roger Waters: to be fair to him, he doesn’t exactly belong on a list of cowards who caved in but, rather, on a roster of out-and-out Jew-haters: a concert he held in Belgium the other day, which kicked off his European tour, featured a Star of David as a symbol of oppression.

Then there’s Elton John. When word got around in 2010 that he was planning a concert in Tel Aviv, he received a long communication, dripping in condescension and moral lecturing, from a bunch of U.K. academics called the British Committee for the Universities of Palestine. They told him that when he “gets to that ‘Candle in the Wind’ moment, and thousands of lighters flicker…there won’t be any Palestinians from the Occupied Territories swaying along with the Israelis” because “the army won’t let them leave their ghettoes….when you stand up on that stage in Tel Aviv, you line yourself up with a racist state.” Many a bubble-headed celebrity, ignorant of the realities of Israel and Palestine and scared of bad PR, might well be taken in by such propaganda. Sir Elton was not. He went ahead with the concert, at which he told his massive audience that recent cancellations of Israeli shows by other entertainers weren’t “gonna stop me from playing here.” Musicians, he underscored, aren’t supposed to “cherry-pick our conscience.” Nice turn of phrase, that.

One organization that’s claimed much of the responsibility for cancelled performances in Israel is Boycott from Within, a group of Israelis who, among other things, pen missives to celebrities urging them to stay away from Israel. In 2010 the group wrote an open letter to an “alternative rock band,” the Pixies, in which it asked: “Are you ready to perform in Tel Aviv when right in front of you millions of people are suffocating under a cruel Israeli military regime that denies them basic human rights?” It worked; the Pixies backed out. In 2011, the group wrote to French chanteuse Vanessa Paradis, telling her that if she went ahead with plans to perform in Israel, it would “have the effect of contributing to Israel’s image of normality” and would “allow the state of Israel to use your reputation to whitewash its crimes!” She cancelled too. It is cheering, however, to note that the group’s attempts to scare off more famous names – among them Morgan Freeman, Alanis Morissette, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers – met with failure.

Remember those names, all of them – the knights and knaves alike. And remember, too, that boycotts can work both ways.

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/bruce-bawer/the-b-lister-israel-boycotters/

Thursday, July 25, 2013

Why No Separate Palestinian State West of the Jordan


Why No Separate Palestinian State
West of the Jordan

Two Peoples--One Land:
Federal Solutions for Israel, the Palestinians, and Jordan


Daniel J. Elazar


Around the world more and more voices are being rised calling for recognition of the Palestinians' right of self-determination. Few would disagree that the Palestinians should have a place in the sun with sufficient authority and power to shape their own collective destiny. They question remains as to how this can best be done without jeopardizing Israel's survival and security.


The Problem of a Second Palestinian State

While Israel should be willing to take risks for peace, they must be prudent risks. There is the rub in arguments on behalf of a separate Palestinian state west of the Jordan River.1 There is little or nothing in the past behavior of the Palestinians to suggest that, other than a handful of moderates, they are likely to respond in a measured way to a measured Israeli offer of statehood. Instead, Israel's concessions are viewed by most of them as signs of weakness, not efforts at rapprochement.

The often bewildering shifts in relationships among Arab states and political leaders appear to most Westerners to be simply a chaotic melange of shifting alliances and seeming betrayals. Students of Arab politics, however, understand that this particular way of relating to one another is characteristic of Arab political entities from Bedouin tribes to the Arab summit and that there are indeed rules to the game. Those rules, however, are not those that non-Arabs would want to live by.2 Those rules also make it especially difficult to accept any Arab agreement involving the concession of territory believed to be rightfully Arab as more than a temporary expedient, to be abandoned as soon as it seems possible to reclaim additional territory. Hence any Israeli concession in the way of a Palestinian entity west of the Jordan River must be accompanied by as close to iron-clad devices to prevent that as possible.

Had the Palestinian Arabs embraced less than a maximalist position on any number of occasions between 1917 and 1948, they could have had their Palestinian state -- an even larger state than those Israelis willing to do so are prepared to offer them now. In 1948 they could have had their own state in nearly half the territory of western Palestine. Yet they have always insisted on the maximalist position -- and they have always lost.3

Late in 1988, PLO and PLO-related spokesmen for the Palestinians made a series of statements and declarations that made it appear that they had retreated from their previous maximalist position that called for the destruction of Israel and a Palestinian state in all of western Palestine. For the first time they publicly stated that they were prepared for a two-state solution, although it is not entirely clear whether even at this point they will be content with the territory occupied by Israel in 1967, not to speak of the border adjustments required to meet Israel's security needs. In their ambiguous statements, these Palestinians keep referring to the 1947 United Nations partition resolution as still binding, encouraging some to interpret the PLO view to suggest that it is binding not only to the extent of embracing a two-state solution but also leaving open the possibility that the borders it defined should also be considered binding for any peace agreement.

Even these statements, directed to the non-Islamic world, were frequently accompanied by very different presentations in Arabic which reaffirmed the maximalist position and argued that the use of salami tactics such as first gaining a small Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza and then using that state to pursue maximalist goals was what the PLO had in mind. At this writing there is not yet any reason to simply take PLO statements to the Western world at face value. They are still too ambiguous to be treated as more than a softening of the PLO position. For example, while demanding self-determination for the Palestinians as a separate people -- despite the fact that they are an acknowledged part of the larger Arab nation -- the PLO still refuses to recognize the Jews as a people, claiming that they are merely a religious group and hence not entitled as a people to self-determination.

Since the Palestinians in the territories have indicated that they overwhelmingly support the PLO as their sole representative, we must take them at their word and accept PLO statements as the stated Palestinian position. A softening of the PLO position allows Israel to consider more generous arrangements than might otherwise be possible, but it does not make it wise for Israel to consent to a separate Palestinian state west of the Jordan.

Those who advocate the establishment of a Palestinian state argue that Israel's military power is so overwhelming that should there be terrorist attacks from that state or should the state violate the peace agreement, military force could easily be employed to invade it and put an end to these violations. That is a delusion. First of all, it is impossible to invade a neighboring state for what the world considers to be trifling reasons, even if they may not be trifling from the perspective of those who suffer the consequences. Even major violatons may not be subject to military correction if Israel's superpower friends object. We saw how this was so after the Israel-Egypt ceasefire along the Suez Canal in 1970. Almost immediately the Egyptians brought ground-to-air missiles up to the Canal to defend against Israeli air attacks in clear violation of the agreement. Israel could have wiped them out as they were being brought up and wanted to, but the United States indicated its strong objections so Israel refrained. Once entrenched and nearly invulnerable, those same missiles and others brought in their wake played a decisive role in the early stages of the Yom Kippur War three years later. Thus Israel could effectively use its armed forces only under the most severe provocation.

More than that, military operations cost lives. For Israelis, the life of each of their soldiers is precious. Difficult as the intifada has been psychologically and in terms of Israel's image, Israeli casualties have been very light -- a situation much preferable to the invasion alternative.

In presenting the best possible case for Israel's conceding a Palestinian state, it is suggested that unless we try it we will never know. But this is not a laboratory experiment. Once a Palestinian state is established there is no way back. It is an irrevocable step. Borders between states can be readjusted; balances of power can change. But in our world states themselves are sacrosanct. Should a Palestinian state be established, widely recognized, and admitted to the United Nations -- which it would be immediately -- even if it were to provoke Israel into a war in which once again the Israel Defense Forces would be successful, Israel would certainly have to withdraw and let the state of Palestine continue to exist, thus making any military victory pyhrric since it could not bring about a positive political result.

In other words, Israel would be acquiescing to a situation that could put it in an even more Sisyphean position than it is in now. Sisyphus, the mythic Greek figure, was condemned by the gods to roll a rock up a hill; as soon as he got near the top, he was fated to slip and fall, so the rock rolled back down. And this happened again and again.

This has been Israel's problem with regard to the neighboring Arab states. No Israeli military victory can be more than partial, since Israel cannot occupy Arab capitals and hold them until the Arabs sue for peace. Hence Israel has always had to withdraw with an interim agreement or to make peace under unfavorable terms, as with Egypt. At least all of those capitals have been at some distance from Israel proper. A Palestinian state next door would bring that Sisyphean situation into Israel's backyard.

This does not mean that territorial compromise would not be possible if the territories heavily populated with Palestinians were linked to Jordan. If that were the case, even in the event of another war and the necessity of further boundary adjustments, the possibility for negotiation would remain because Israel would not have to challenge the very existence of a state, only the location of its borders.

The establishment of a Palestinian state would require Israel to withdraw from essentially all the territories it captured in 1967 on the grounds that no truncated West Bank Palestinian state could possible satisfy the aspirations of the Palestinian Arabs. Unfortunately, such a total withdrawal would, from the first moment, endanger Israel's security. Israel would not only have to give up all chances of achieving strategic depth, but even minimum defensive positions. If Israel were to give back all the territories, there is some question as to whether there would be enough ground for IDF training maneuvers, much less room to station forces close enough to the critical points along the coast and near Jerusalem where they would be needed in case of attack in order to block the first assaults on Israel's population centers. While it might have been possible for the smaller armies with less equipment of the pre-1967 period to be so placed, the exponential increase in armament and military equipment, not to speak of the increased size of the forces more than twenty years later which require more space.

It is hard to say that doubling the seven miles between the Mediterranean Sea and the old Green Line near Netanya would create strategic depth, but at least it would be fourteen rather than seven miles. To achieve a mere twenty miles of "strategic depth" in Israel's most populated areas, it will be necessary to draw the new borders near the mountain crests of Judea and Samaria. We have seen how Israel suffered losses whenever it was surprised, as in 1973 and in 1987. Unless Israel has sufficient depth to contain those losses, it will be destroyed. And since everybody gets surprised at one time or another, Israel must never lack that depth.

It has been suggested that the Palestinians are likely to be constrained from taking advantage of their new position by the pleasures and the responsibilities of statehood that would preoccupy and ultimately deter them from risking what they have. There is no sign of that from their past behavior. It is true that people can change under appropriate circumstances, but we have all too many examples of peoples for whom statehood has not brought moderation, but simply more power to do mischief. When Pol Pot and the Khymer Rouge took over Cambodia, they did not become responsible -- they simply used the power of the state to commit genocide on their own people. Two generations ago, many German conservatives supported Hitler because they believed that only he could stabilize the country and save them from the Bolsheviks. They argued that once he gained power, the responsibility of office would moderate his radicalism. We all know the result. To suggest that moderation will occur among the Palestinians is nothing more than a pious hope at this point, especially since the PLO is now challenged by the Muslim fundamentalist movement, Hamas, that rejects any kind of Jewish state in "Palestine."

There are those who suggest that the establishment of a Palestinian state would provoke internal troubles for the new state as the local leaders confronted the diaspora PLO leadership who would seek to move into a position of power. This indeed is quite likely, but there is no reason to believe this internal Palestinian dissension will distract them from making trouble for Israel. It may very well be that both sides will be tempted to seek a way out of their troubles through provoking a conflict with Israel, especially once their statehood is guaranteed by the world community. That is at least as much a feature of historical experience as the other scenario.

Perhaps most worrisome is what to do about the irreconcilables in a Palestinian state. Look at Ireland today. The Irish Republic has a peaceful, stable government with no desire to conduct a war with Britain or even with the Protestants of Northern Ireland, much as it may sympathize with the Catholics in that unfortunate province. Moreover, the Irish Republican Army is down to a tiny hard core of irreconcilables. Nevertheless, without circumscribing the civil liberties of its citizens to such a degree that no self-respecting Western government would do so, there is no way that the Irish Republic can totally suppress the IRA or keep it from using its territory as a base.

In any Palestinian state, there would be a far greater number of irreconcilables dissatisfied with the settlement, wanting to continue the struggle. Moreover, they would have a level of weaponry that so far has not been available to the IRA. hey could shoot missiles at airplanes landing at Ben-Gurion Airport about three miles from the Green Line, or, for that matter, rockets at the heart of Tel Aviv, another few miles away. All the Israeli coastal areas and the Jerusalem area -- where six out of seven Israelis live -- would be in the gunsights of individual terrorists. It is unlikely that the Palestinian government would have either the will or the wherewithal to control these irreconcilables, especially if it were preoccupied with an internal power struggle that could well lead to civil war (as it did under similar circumstances in Ireland immediately after independence in the 1920s).

If an internal Palestinian power struggle develops, scoring points against Israel will most likely become one of its principal features. True, the Israeli army can retaliate. But we have learned from experience what the limits of retaliation are. Indeed, it is not sensible to retaliate for everything; when one side retaliates it only provokes counter actions. A state cannot go to war over every terrorist incident; on the other hand, people can be killed by any individual terrorist. Informal border raids by both sides are hardly the answer. Many Israelis remember the days when to walk through the fields of Netanya, a city on the Mediterranean coast 30 miles north of Tel Aviv, at night was to risk being murdered by terrorists who had come across the border from the area now full of Israeli suburban settlements. Few Israelis are prepared to go back to those days again.

Sober advocates of a Palestinian state try to protect Israel against such a situation by requiring that the establishment of such a state would have to be preceded by, in the words of Mark Heller, perhaps the most sober of them all, "an explicit, unambiguous Palestinian commitment to peace and to the renunciation of all further claims against Israel...by...the PLO...and [this must] have active ratification by other Arab states."4

Advocates of a Palestinian state would require a comprehensive peace that would include Arab states' economic support for the new Palestinian state and, again quoting Heller, would require "closing down refugee camps and disbanding UNRWA" coupled with "the military neutrality of the Palestinian state,...limitations on the size, equipment and deployment of Palestinian military forces, consistent with internal security needs, as well as procedures for verification, monitoring and early warning." Heller would also require "a special regime for Jerusalem" and probably a transitional period for staged withdrawal of Israeli forces.5

All this is the minimum that realistic Israelis who are prepared to accept a Palestinian state would require. Indeed, most Israelis who would accept a Palestinian state call for its total demilitarization. Heller is more realistic; he understands that it is impossible to have a completely demilitarized state. But that is one of the reasons why so many Israelis object to such a separate state in the first place. For most Israelis, the conditions Heller lists are the minimum necessary for any kind of political concessions, much less a separate Palestinian state.

The economic viability of the Palestinian state is not the issue. So many non-viable states have been established with the assistance, or under the protection, of one or another of the world's larger powers that the point has become moot as long as there is some other state or group of states around to provide needed assistance. In fact, given the talents, energy and education of the Palestinians, it would be far from last among the Arab states. Still, as recent unsuccessful efforts on the part of the Palestinians to develop separate marketing arrangements with the European Community have demonstrated, finding a place in today's world economy is not easy, even where an energetic and talented population is involved. A state has to be competitive in a world where the competition is growing ever more fierce. It is precisely the lack of economic viability and limited opportunity for improvement that is likely to encourage some segment of an increasingly frustrated population to seek nationalist and irredentist solutions.

It has been suggested that continuing to allow Arabs to work in Israel will help matters. This is feasible (although it will be opposed by some), but it will also have to be accompanied by appropriate economic links in other spheres, especially in connection with trade, currency controls, worker benefits and the like. By the time we begin to add up those needs, we begin to move away from the idea of a fully sovereign Palestinian state into something like a confederation. This becomes even clearer when we add the necessary security guarantees and means of inspection and monitoring.

If there are the expected acts of terrorism by the irreconcilables, workers crossing the borders will have to be subject to careful search and screening similar to what is now done at the Jordan River crossings. To do this on a daily basis would be a hardship and added cost for everyone. The Arabs will feel demeaned and the Israelis will feel harassed.

Then there is the issue of Israeli settlements across the Green Line, which Heller ignores. Nearly 200,000 Jews now live in what the Palestinians and others refer to as the West Bank.6Approximately 60 percent of these Jews live in the new neighborhoods of Jerusalem built across the Green Line since 1967. Most of the remaining 40 percent live along the western border of Samaria. Still others are scattered throughout the Judean and Samarian highlands. Even assuming that the scattered highland settlements are expendable -- that they could be evacuated or removed either as part of a peace agreement or through natural processes of emigration once the territory is ceded to a Palestinian state -- Israel is not likely to evacuate Jerusalem neighborhoods or western Samaria under any circumstances. There would be very little sentiment even among the most forthcoming Israelis to concede those territories to a Palestinian state. That, in itself, would probably make the establishment of a separate Palestinian state impossible. The Palestinians would not give up their claims to those territories and the Israelis would not leave them -- for good reason. This, too, suggests that some other solution must be sought, even by those who want to provide the maximum possible self-determination for Palestinian Arabs.


Divisions Among the Palestinians

Politically the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza can be divided into five groups:

The old elites -- the notable families that for generations dominated public life in their respective communities, and most particularly the heads of those families.

The old left -- which, since the days of the British Mandate, has been identified with the Communist party.

The active PLO supporters -- generally but not exclusively the younger leadership.

The fundamentalists -- a growing group, especially among students and intellectuals who are undergoing a religious revival.

Finally there is the vast majority of the working and middle classes who are relatively apolitical and basically try to go about living their private lives, even more so than in countries with a democratic tradition since they have never expected to be involved in politics.

The old elites and the old left are in decline. The notable families have been discredited as part of a general transformation of the quasi-feudal order which characterized Arab Palestinian society and indeed the Arab world as a whole. As ordinary people acquire greater education, new economic opportunities have opened up, supplemented by the political currents of modernization, the power of the notables has been significantly weakened. They have been additionally weakened because so many of those families were the mainstays of the Jordanian regime between 1948 and 1967 and continued to back the return of Jordanian rule in the subsequent decades, secretly if not openly.

The Communist left has become irrelevant as have Communist parties elsewhere. Their radical thunder has been stolen by others. The apolitical working and middle classes continue to be frightened into silence. Thus the field is left open for the PLO and the fundamentalists to take over and to fight each other for control.

At the very least that fight would continue after the establishment of a Palestinian state. In this respect the spread of Muslim fundamentalism is most worrisome.

Given what we know about religious fundamentalism, of which Muslim fundamentalism seems to be the most extreme in its willingness to engage in political violence to gain power, the establishment of a Palestinian state, offering something very concrete to control, would intensify that conflict. More than that, the arrival of the diaspora PLO would probably lead to an alliance between the old elites and the apolitical working and middle classes against it, which would turn the struggle into a three-way affair, complete with assassination and terror, as has been the Palestinian habit in the past.

Those who advocate a Palestinian state are right about several things. One is that the Palestinians do need some kind of territorial political entity to satisfy their legitimate group aspirations. Moreover, it would be better for Israel if it were separated from the vast majority of Palestinians, who will never be happy as a minority living in a Jewish state and who, if they become a majority, would certainly change the Jewish character of the state.

On the other hand, it is also true that Israeli security requires an Israeli presence in all the territories west of the Jordan River. In addition, Jews should have the right to settle in all parts of Eretz Israel. Jordan, which occupies the eastern third of the historic land of Israel/Palestine also has to be considered. Its population is approximately 70 percent Palestinian, with Palestinians dominating the economy and occupying many of the key positions in the Jordanian government, outside of the army.7 More Palestinians live in Jordan than in the West Ban and Gaza. Most of the Palestinians west of the river do not want to be ruled again by the Hashemite kingdom. Given their experiences between 1948 and 1967, we can hardly blame them. On the other hand, the Hashemite dynasty will not last forever.

Israel need not acquiesce to two Palestinian states, one east and another west of the Jordan, in a land promised to it not only by God according to the Bible but by mandate according to the League of Nations, especially since the PLO makes no secret of its grand ambition to take over the existing states on both banks of the Jordan and to consolidate them into one Palestinian whole.

Israelis have long since agreed, even if somewhat reluctantly, that the land that was once called Palestine by Europeans (including the land east of the river) should be partitioned between a Jewish state and an Arab state. Few Israelis have any objection to that Arab state being Palestinian. Indeed, most Israelis believe justice requires that the state be Palestinian. But that is a question for the Arabs to answer. The most we can do is to decide that if Hussein cannot deliver as a partner for peace, then Israel no longer needs to support him.

There can be no solution based on two entirely separate states -- one Jewish and one Arab -- apart from Jordan. Once Jordan is in the picture, then we can negotiation with the Palestinians about the division of the land; we can negotiate about how the territory west of the river will be used; we can try to reach an accommodation that will be far from ideal for both sides but as fair as possible under the circumstances.


New Realities in the Territories

Time does not stand still -- rather, it inexorably moves on, changing circumstances as it passes by. It is now well over two decades since the Six-Day War and the political realities which emerged in its aftermath for both Israel and the Palestinian Arabs.

Any new solution which is to be found to the Arab-Israeli conflict must take into consideration the situation as it exists today. The approaches used in the past are no longer applicable or realistic. The growth of Jewish settlements throughout the territories, and the web of economic integration and public services -- roads, water sources, electricity and communications lines -- all have contributed to weaving a connecting fabric between the territories and Israel that cannot be easily cut. At the same time, the existence of limited de facto joint rule involving Israel and the Palestinian residents of the territories, and Jordan until 1988 offers possibilities for utilizing that fabric to weave a long-term settlement of the conflict between those parties to the benefit of all.

Certain other trends have also continued and must be taken into consideration. There has been a consistent, if uneven, out-migration of Palestinian Arabs from the territories since 1948. The continued influx of Palestinian Arabs has added further to Jordan's role as the main center of the Palestinian Arab population. Another trend is the growing sense of "Palestinian-ness" on the part of that population. This Palestinian identity is based on a sense of isolation from the larger Arab world which does not seem to care what happens to the Palestinian Arabs as people. Real as it may be, it is not necessarily committed to a PLO-centered solution to the conflict.

Several of these new realities stand out in particular, affecting the immediate future of any negotiations: (1) the extent of Israeli settlement in Judea and Samaria; (2) the shifting fortunes of the PLO establishment in the territories; (3) the growth of economic interdependence between Israel and the territories; and (4) the emergence of de facto, if limited, shared rule under Israeli administration.


1. The Israeli Settlements8

Since the Likud's rise to power in 1977, the administered territories have been transformed from relatively self-contained Arab areas to integral parts of the Jewish settlement network in the Land of Israel. The fact that these new settlements were established in empty territory or on lands purchased locally without displacing the local residents, itself reflects that there was -- and is -- space for both people in those territories. This has created new realities which now heavily influence the possible ways to resolve the conflict. Israeli settlements in Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza District fall into five groups:

The neighborhoods, towns and settlements surrounding Jerusalem;

Settlements in the Jordan River Valley;

Settlements on the western fringes of the Samarian mountains overlooking the coastal plain;

The security belt of settlements at the southeastern edge of the Gaza District;

Settlements in the heartlands of Judea and Samaria adjacent to major cities such as Nablus, Ramallah, el-Bireh, and Hebron.

Each of these five groups is reflective of a particular stage or set of goals in Israeli settlement policy. All have some, if not substantial, support from most sectors of the Israeli population. At least the first four are essentially non-negotiable according to the positions of all the major parties in Israel.

1) The neighborhoods, towns and settlements surrounding Jerusalem, in addition to housing the increased population of that city, are designed to provide the city with a buffer zone and to strengthen its Jewish hinterland to the north, east, and south. While most are satellites of Jerusalem, they include the Etzion Bloc to the south. These are settlements originally established before 1948 to guard the southern approaches to Jerusalem, that were destroyed by the Arabs in the War of Independence, and rebuilt in the years immediately after 1967. Seventeen miles south of Jerusalem, the Etzion settlements, including the town of Efrat have been expanded into true satellite cities and now divide Arab Judea into two districts, one centered around Bethlehem/Beth Jallah, and the other around Hebron. They combine agriculture with local and regional service industries and have many commuters who work in Jerusalem. East of Jerusalem is Maale Adumim, a new city, and a number of smaller settlements surrounding it.

2) The settlements in the Jordan River Valley were also established in the years immediately after the 1967 war by the Labor government, in accordance with the Allon Plan, which provided for the absorption into Israel of the Jordan Valley and the ridges immediately to its west, desert areas almost entirely unpopulated at the time. Fourteen settlements were established in that region between 1967 and 1977 and since then another seventeen have been established. They are almost entirely agricultural in character.

3) The initial settlement of the western ridges of the Samarian mountains overlooking the coastal plain was also undertaken by the Labor government, again reflecting the Israeli consensus that somehow Israel's coastal strip had to be widened even if part of Samaria were to be turned over to Arab rule. There, however, the Likud government greatly expanded activities, in effect setting off a land rush. Because of the territory's proximity to Israel's heartland, it is eminently suitable for suburbanization, offering low cost housing within easy commuting distance of most of Israel's major industrial and commercial centers. Most of its settlers are commuting suburbanites looking for more housing for their money rather than ideologically motivated.

4) It has been the policy of both the Labor and the Likud governments to build a security belt of settlements at the southeastern portion of the Gaza District. Indeed, the Labor government expanded that security belt into northern Sinai (the Yamit area). The Israeli evacuation of the Sinai led to intensified efforts in the territory of former Mandatory Palestine. Between 1967 and 1977, only two settlements were established in the Gaza District. Since 1977, another nine have been erected.

5) Jewish settlements in the heartland of Judea and Samaria, except for the Etzion Bloc, have been the most controversial element of Israel's settlement policy, although even there the establishment of Kiryat Arba, the Jewish city abutting Hebron, was initiated and advanced under the Labor government, if somewhat reluctantly. It is the expansion of settlement in the heartland which is gradually dividing Judea and Samaria so thoroughly that repartition is increasingly impossible. Between 1967 and 1977 only ten settlements were established in all of Judea and Samaria. Since 1977 their number has been augmented by more than sixty new ones. They combine cottage industries, a bit of agriculture, and commuting to jobs in Jerusalem or along the coast.

A cumulative effect of Israeli settlement activity has been to transform Judea, Samaria, and Gaza from separable territories, detachable from Israel for whatever future they may have, into integral parts of the Israeli network. Since the region's geography lends itself to that kind of integration, even a modest concerted effort on the part of the Israeli government has been able to capitalize on geographic reality. As time passes, the success of that effort will become even more pronounced.

The changing character of the settlements is also indicative of the change that has taken place. In the first stages of settlement, only hardy ideologists went forth to the territories, whether in the form of the young pioneers of the Jordan Valley, or the ideologically motivated settlers of Gush Emunim in the Judean and Samarian heartland, or the sons and daughters of the original settlers of the Etzion Bloc who saw themselves as returning home. Toward the end of the 1970s, these settlers were joined by those who shared the government's view that the territories should be absorbed by Israel but were not ideological crusaders. They saw opportunities for personal benefit in the territories in ways which also allowed them to be of service to their people.

Subsequently, those groups were joined by a third category of settlers, those who have no ideological motivation but simply want to take advantage of the opportunity to acquire better living conditions at a price they can afford. It is precisely the prosaic character of this last group -- which greatly outnumbers the first two -- that marks the transformation of a collection of outposts to an extension of Israel proper into the territories.

In the mid-1980s, the pace of Jewish settlement slowed down, in part for lack of money and in part for lack of Jews. Thus the plans for more extensive settlement, which were reflected in the extensive lands acquired by the Israeli military government, the Jewish National Fund, and private purchasers, remained unfulfilled. Subsequently, the intifada added another obstacle to more settlement, although as of this writing it has not led to any Jewish out-migration from existing settlements or to a cessation of new settlement efforts. Thus the Jewish settlement effort will likely continue as long as there is no peace. On the other hand, it could be halted with the lands acquired in anticipation included in the negotiations over the future status of the territories.

While few Soviet Jewish immigrants will choose to settle in the territories, some will, offering increased possibilities for "deepening" the Jewish presence. Thus with every month that passes, there is less chance the Arabs have missed the opportunity to secure a complete or even substantially complete Israeli withdrawal and the Arabs must now reckon with a changed map.


2. The Shifting Fortunes of the PLO Establishment9

At this writing, the PLO is in perhaps its strongest position ever in the territories. But its present status is not the result of steady growth. Rather it is one more peak in a series of peaks and valleys that has marked its standing among the indigenous Palestinians since 1967. Nor is its present status guaranteed to continue. Indeed, it was only after a struggle with the United National Committees (UNC), the body that has led the intifada locally, that the PLO has been able to hold on. Given past history, one can assume that it will continue to do so only insofar as it appears to be able to deliver.

The PLO had a difficult time in the years between the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War as the local population was unwilling to extend it serious credibility. The problems Israel had in winning the Yom Kippur War led to a resurgence of nationalism in the territories with a concomitant strengthening of the PLO, which reached its peak when Yasser Arafat appeared before the United Nations in November 1975 and PLO-backed candidates virtually swept the 1976 municipal elections in Judea and Samaria. A subsequent Israeli crackdown, including the removal from office of mayors known to be active PLO supporters and the disruption of the flow of PLO-dominated funds from Jordan into the territories, led to a decline in PLO influence in the latter years of the 1970s.

Early in the 1980s PLO strength in "Fatahland" in southern Lebanon once again raised its profile and influence in the territories. The Israeli success in overrunning Fatahland and securing the ouster of the PLO as a major organized entity from Lebanon in 1982 and 1983 once again led to a decline in PLO fortunes among the indigenous Palestinians, again on the assumption that the PLO was too weak to deliver. PLO fortunes reached their lowest point in the Amman Arab summit in the fall of 1987, only to be given a new lease on life as a result of the intifada and the ability of the PLO leadership outside of the country to capitalize on the Arab uprising to launch its own peace offensive. What is clear is that the issue is not closed. No doubt the PLO leadership is mindful that they need some successes or their fortunes may take another downturn.


3. Growth of Economic Interdependence and the Provision of Public Service Delivery Systems10

Since 1967, Israeli policy has been to enable Palestinian Arabs to work freely in Israel. Before the intifada, these Arab workers account for 36 percent of those employed in construction, 15 percent in agriculture, 5 percent in industry. The highest percentages are employed in tourism and household services. At the same time, Arab labor in Israel has substantially increased the standard of living in the territories. In 1972, for example, 6.5 percent of the families in the Gaza District owned a gas or electrical appliance for cooking; in 1987, 87.1 did. Comparable figures for refrigerators were 8.7 to 78 percent. The increase in private automobiles has not been nearly as spectacular but has been significant enough, from 3.2 percent in 1972 to 14.5 percent in 1988.

The economic development of Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza District from 1967 until it was halted by the intifada attests to the benefits derived by the Palestinians in the territories from contact with Israel. The gains achieved from this interaction result from both contact with a more advanced economy and to the framework of relationships instituted by Israel since 1968. An exclusive relationship with either Israel or Jordan would not have served the economic interests of the territories. While some Palestinians argue that an independent Palestinian state would have offered them the possibility for the development of a stronger indigenous economy, there is no evidence to that effect. Where they have been able to operate independently, the Palestinians have demonstrated that it would be as hard for them to compete in the world market as it is for other small underdeveloped countries. For example, the European Community pressured Israel to allow the Palestinians to market their citrus products directly to Europe, not through the Israel marketing boards. The end result was a disaster. The Palestinians could not get their shipments to the market on time, the agents who were willing to serve them in Europe were not competent to serve their needs, and their prices were too high.

Essentially, the economic interaction which has developed between Israel and the territories has taken the form of a common market. This common market also incorporates industrial growth and agricultural development. Needless to say, the unusually high economic growth rate that was a feature in the territories until overwhelmed by political events was paralleled by substantial gains in economic welfare, reflecting a steep rise in the disposable income of the Palestinians and a shift in their occupational structure toward that of a more developed economy. Furthermore, the provision of public service systems -- roads, electricity, water sources, and communications lines -- have also been integrated. For example, the Jerusalem metropolitan area provides public services to the hinterland comprising Bethlehem, Ramallah/El-Bireh, and Jericho.

Any drastic transformation in the present network of economic relationships and public service systems would inflict grave costs on the population of those territories. Under any future political arrangement, Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza District should, for their own benefit, maintain close economic relations with both Israel and Jordan.


4. Existing De Facto Shared Rule11

In the years following 1967, a de facto shared rule developed in Judea and Samaria that until 1977 gave the Palestinians almost complete internal self-government involving a minimum of coercion and a maximum of consent, and for the next decade nearly as much self-rule. Overall, Israel and Jordan provided the umbrella. Israel controlled security and the economy while Jordan shaped the relationships between individuals and groups in Judea and Samaria and the Arab world. Jordan provided the Palestinians with a legal identity; the Jordanian curriculum was (and is) used in their schools; Jordan registered organizations and controlled the operation of trade relations between the territories and the Arab world, in addition to being the second most important outlet (after Israel) for their exports. In short, for two decades the portion of land that is the focus of the dispute was already in joint tenancy, with local inhabitants enjoying considerable autonomy de facto in their internal matters and daily life.

This arrangement was disrupted by Palestinian extremists and the PLO on the eve of Israeli-Jordanian negotiations to give it a more permanent character. Their disruption of these arrangements was based on their struggle for what they believed to be would be a greater long-term gain, namely independent statehood. In the meantime, it is the indigenous Palestinians who are paying the price. In 1986, Israel and Jordan again came close to establishing a more formal shared rule arrangement, actually agreeing to a de facto condominium which was launched at the end of August 1986. It was disrupted by Shimon Peres' premature efforts to bring about an international peace conference which was scheduled for the end of a period of consolidation of this arrangement.


Changes in the Legal System

The extent of the integration of Israel and the territories is manifested clearly in the changes that have taken place in the legal system serving Judea and Samaria and to a lesser extent the Gaza District since 1967. It is accepted practice under military occupation of territories whose future status is not yet settled to retain the laws previously in force, subject only to necessary modifications which can be introduced by occupation authorities under international law. Israel firmly adopted this position in 1967 but here, too, the pressures of the passage of time have been inexorable. Over the years what is, in effect, a new legal system has been introduced, built upon Jordanian legal foundations but modified in the direction of incorporating substantial elements of Israeli law. This has been true for both the Arab and Jewish inhabitants of the territories, those who retain their Jordanian citizenship and those with Israeli citizenship who settled within them. Thus the Israeli Supreme Court has extended its jurisdiction to all the inhabitants of Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza district on the grounds that, since they live under the Israeli flag, they are entitled to the basic civil rights protections that Israel as a western democracy seeks to secure.

The application of Israeli law is particularly extensive in the case of the Israeli citizens who have settled in the territories. It can be said that they and their settlements are almost fully under the laws of Israel in fact, if not technically.12 The turning point was in March 1978, a few days prior to the signing of the Israeli-Egypian peace treaty, when the military commander of Judea and Samaria, as supreme authority in those territories, established local and regional councils for the Israeli settlers by legal order (Hebrew: tzav) and established a system of by-laws based on Israeli law, for them. The pace of Knesset legislation applicable to the territories also has increased over the years.

Israel's original negotiating position with regard to the extension of autonomy to the Palestinian Arab residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza under the Camp David agreement was based upon certain basic guidelines, namely that the autonomy should be extended to people, not territory; that Israel must maintain sufficient control over security matters, water and other essentials that directly affect its safety and the lives of Israeli settlers in the administered territories; and that the right of Jewish settlement remain open. While these points were basic to Menachem Begin's government, they were not self-executing. For example, even if the Israeli government had been successful in securing endorsement of its stand that autonomy should fall upon people rather than territories, still there were and are territories predominantly Arab in population, including most of the duly constituted municipalities in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza region. At the very least, for the foreseeable future, there will be clearly separate Arab and Jewish cities and villages. Hence some relationship between people and territory would have to be worked out so that the people in those territories will implement the autonomy within them. Any successful solution depends upon how it combines the governance of peoples and territories, for there cannot be governance of one without the other.13 Even if the emphasis will be on peoples, it will be necessary to govern those peoples in their territories.


The Territories in the Context of the Metropolitan Frontier

Beyond the political and military reasons why Israel is seeking a solution that does not involve complete withdrawal from the administered territories, there are others which also reinforce the necessity to reach an accommodation based upon some combination of self-rule and shared rule in the territories in the interests of both Israelis and Palestinians. These reasons lie in the changed circumstances of settlement and economic development in which both find themselves. They can be seen through the prism of the unfolding frontier of development initiated in the land by the Zionist enterprise over a century ago and which has continued through all the frontier stages which have shaped the frontier societies of the modern and postmodern worlds.

As an extension of the great frontier of the Western world, the original Zionist settlements were principally rural in character.14 With the establishment of the State, Israel moved into a second frontier stage which also had its parallel in other Western countries, that of industrialization and urbanization. In the latter years of the 1960s, approximately coincident but not a result of the Six-Day War, Israel began to move into the next stage of development, namely metropolitanization. Its industrial base was transformed through the application of sophisticated new technologies while its patterns of settlement were being transformed by new modes of transportation and communication. The earlier unity of place of residence and place of work began to disappear as the possibility of moving quickly across substantial distances on a daily basis became real. So, for example, during the days of the urban frontier, Israeli Arabs living in the Galilee had to forego involvement in the industrialization process because their villages did not attract industry, or move to Jewish cities away from their own cultural frameworks and live lonely lives in order to achieve economic advantage. With the coming of metropolitanization, the same Arabs could remain residents of their villages and take a bus to some destination in the Haifa Bay metropolitan region to work in the morning and then back again at night without being unduly burdened as a result.

Israel's urbanization and metropolitanization began along the coast in the Tel Aviv and Haifa Bay regions. Jerusalem, whose urban development had always taken a very different turn, never really entered the urban-industrial frontier because at the time it was cut off at the end of the Jerusalem corridor surrounded by territory under Arab rule. Then came the Six-Day War and suddenly Jerusalem was reunited with its potential hinterland, precisely at the time that metropolitanization was beginning to engulf the country.

In the ensuing decade, Jerusalem not only gained strength as a focus for Jewish development activities related to servicing the metropolitan frontier, such as higher education, government and other public sector activities, but also was re-integrated with a hinterland in Judea and Samaria that was increasingly drawn toward it. From an agricultural point of view, the region from Hebron on the south to Nablus on the north, Jericho on the east and Bet Shemesh on the west, became a single market with produce flowing into Jerusalem daily from every part of it. Jerusalem, in turn, became a magnet for employing the residents on the mountain ridge along the same axis, particularly as development of first its Jewish sections and then its Arab areas required more hands for building, a need met principally by the Arab population. Some of these new workers moved to the city, others remained in their native towns and villages and commuted. Thus the country's newest metropolitan region united both Jewish and Arab nodes within a single economic framework whose prosperity rested upon their mutual interaction.15

This new development, as much as any security or other considerations, makes a return to partition an atavistic step. This is not to say that it cannot be done. History has shown that politics can overrule economics even in such circumstances. Jerusalem probably could be cut off at the end of a corridor again and returned to the peripheries of Israel. The Arab areas around the city could be cut off from their natural focal point if political decisions are made to that effect. But in such a case everybody would suffer, not only the individuals who would lose their only significant opportunities for employment but the two peoples as peoples would lose a major opportunity for economic and social development enhancing their prosperity which has been the result of the reconnection since 1967.

Thus there should be a major interest on the part of both parties to work out a political arrangement that will recognize the unity of the country even as it provides for maximum self-government for its peoples combined with shared rule where necessary.

Think of some of the possibilities. Jerusalem by its very nature does not lend itself to becoming a major industrial center. Indeed there are many reasons why the city and its environs have escaped the impact of industrialization so as to preserve Jerusalem's special character. Prior to the metropolitan frontier, this, in effect, doomed Jerusalem to being a backwater and its region to suffer from lack of development. One of the characteristics of the metropolitan frontier, however, is that other nodes in the metropolitan region can industrialize to everyone's benefit without damaging Jerusalem's special character.

On the metropolitan frontier, education itself becomes a major industry, a means of developing a population that is equipped to participate in the sophisticated socio-economic systems of the metropolitan era. Jerusalem is ideally suited to be a major educational center. Indeed, education is one of the functions that is most appropriate to the city, given its historic role.

Jewish Jerusalem has already become the educational center of the Jewish people, through the Hebrew University, its many yeshivot, and, increasingly through the technical colleges sponsored by the Orthodox community and social and humanistic research institutes of various kinds. There are, in addition, many renowned Christian-sponsored institutions for Bible and theological study. While no similar development has taken place in Arab Jerusalem proper, the beginnings of serious institutions of higher education serving the Arab population are to be found in adjacent Bir Zeit and Bethlehem. Only peace will enable those institutions to develop further. United within a common metropolitan region, they will add an additional dimension to Jerusalem's position on the world's educational map. Together, these institutional complexes can put Jerusalem in the forefront as a world educational center. But it is precisely the ability to concentrate a number of separate institutions, each maintaining its separate identity in every respect, but within close proximity to one another so that synergism can play its role, that will make the difference. This indeed is the essence of the metropolitan frontier -- separate but synergistic -- and is the way in which other great educational centers in the world have become what they have become.


Combining People and Territory: The Local Dimension

In any solution, it will be necessary to link particular local jurisdictions either with a Palestinian entity or with Israel. This, indeed, is the direction in which things have developed informally since 1967. In local government matters, Arab municipalities and villages were given almost complete self-rule, while Israeli settlements began with internal self-rule and were subsequently organized into regional councils or given more clearly cut municipal status under Israeli law so that they could formally exercise those self-same powers.16

The importance of these local organs should not be minimalized. In an age and region where the focus tends to be on national governments and international relations, it is far too easy to minimize the importance of local self-government. Jews with good historical memories will know how the local community became the focal point for Jewish self-government and the maintenance of a Jewish corporate identity throughout the long years of the exile in very meaningful ways. Similarly, it can truthfully be said that the Palestinian Arabs have never had so much self-government as they have had since 1967 under the Israeli policy of maximizing local self-rule through Arab municipalities.

This is not to suggest that the Palestinian Arabs would be satisfied with a simple continuation of that arrangement. There are certain areas of self-government which are closed to them, some of which are substantively important and others symbolically necessary. Be that as it may, the possibilities of building an appropriate combination for governing people with some local territorial base is a real one that offers many advantages.

Whatever the final arrangements, there is enough experience around the world and, for that matter the territories themselves, with regard to the mechanisms for autonomy to develop proper substitutions for its implementation. For example, all the tools are available and much has already been done to establish a legal basis for an arrangement in which persons take precedence over territory in determining who belongs where legally. There are over one hundred models of diversity of jurisdiction arrangements, mixed governments, power-sharing and the like presently in operation around the world from which to draw, not to speak of the highly significant and, in the end, the most important fact that there are twelve years of experience behind us of de facto autonomy in the territories.17 The problems that often are presented as the most difficult in fact can be overcome technically without any particular inventiveness.


What Then?

No Jew need to deny the Jewish people's historic claim to all of Eretz Israel; no democrat can deny the principle that, insofar as humanly possible, no one should be governed without his or her consent. In the twentieth century, government by the consent of the governed for identifiable peoples has been associated with self-determination.

There are two problems with this extension of the democratic principle. One is that self-determination has all too often been used as a cover and justification for one internal tyranny or another which does not advance the democratic principle. Often it does not even secure whatever modest benefits there might be in transferring power from an external tyrant to an internal one since in many cases the external power was far more benign, even democratic, than its successor regime. Thus the two principles should not be confused in that regard.

The second reason is that self-determination does not necessarily require totally independent, politically sovereign statehood to be achieved. We have already noted that in the present world of intense interdependence there are no fully sovereign states anymore. Not even the superpowers can act as they please.

Beyond that, some peoples, out of desire or necessity, gain their self-determination through federal arrangements. Some, like the native American (American Indian) tribes, because of their size alone, can never be more than "domestic dependent nations," to use the defining phrase applied to them by the United States Supreme Court. That is the kind of self-determination possible for "nations" of a few hundreds to a few thousands in size, where even the largest of them, the Navaho nation, does not reach 200,000.

In other cases, for the Basques and Catalonians, for example, self-determination has been achieved within the land that they share with other Spaniards, even though both are large enough in terms of population and resources to maintain independent states and are the strongest and most vigorous peoples on the Iberian Peninsula. The nature of their identity and situation is such that this was the most feasible and probably the most equitable solution available to them and the other parties involved. Nor is politically sovereignty feasible for the six republics that have federated to form Yugoslavia. In their case external enemies have made it necessary for the peoples of Yugoslavia to seek self-determination together, whatever the tensions and animosities between them.

The Palestinians as individuals and as a group need to be governed with their consent, something which is not presently the case. They, too, have their claims to the land which they believe to be as legitimate as the Jewish claims. In fact, neither side will be able to fully exercise its claims. All will have to concede something on that point.

Israel has long since given up exercise of its claims east of the Jordan and most Israelis have come to recognize that Israel will not be able to exercise exclusive control to all the territory west of the river. Jordan has now formally relinquished its claims west of the river, which it had originally exercised, presumably, in the name of the Palestinians, a claim which many Palestinians disputed. On the other hand, Hashemite claims to rule east of the river must be considered in light of the fact that 70 percent of the residents of Jordan are Palestinians with roots in the West Bank. The Palestinians may now have come to realize that they will never be able to exercise their claims to the entire land. They have yet to determine how they will exercise their claims east of the river, and must come to realize that even west of the river they will not be able to have exclusive control over territory. This does not mean that they cannot achieve self-determination or government with the consent of the governed, but it does mean that they, as well as Israel and Jordan, will have to rely upon federal arrangements to do so.


Notes

1. On a separate Palestinian state, see Arieh Eliav, Land of the Heart: Israelis, Arabs, The Territories, and A Vision of the Future (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1974); Eliahu Eliachar and Phillip Gillon, Israelis and Palestinians (London: R. Collings, 1978); Mark Heller, A Palestinian State: The Implications for Israel (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1983) and "A Palestinian State: Thinking the Unthinkable," Moment 13:6 (September 1988); Yehoshafat Harkabi, The Bar Kokhba Syndrome: Risk and Realism in International Politics (Chappaqua, NY: Rossel Books, 1983); Yehoshafat Harkabi and Moshe Maoz, "The Palestinian Problem: A Palestinian State or a Jordanian Solution," Middle East Review 71 (1974): 60-67.

All the above advocate that as a solution to the conflict. For the views of those opposed, who addressed the issue, see Daniel J. Elazar, "Palestinian State--Don't Buy It," Moment (September 1988); Hirsh Goodman, A Palestinian State: The Case Against (Jerusalem: Israel Information Center, 1979); Moshe Aumann, The Palestinian Labyrinth (Israel Academic Committee on the Middle East, 1982).

2. On the ways of Arab politics, see R. Taylor, The Arab Balance of Power (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1982); Bassam Tibi, Arab Nationalism (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981); Fouad Ajami, The Arab Predicament: Arab Political Thought and Practice Since 1967 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981); Yehoshafat Harkabi, Three Articles on the Arab Slogan of a Democratic State (Jerusalem: Israel Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Department of Information, 1970).

3. On the Palestinian position in the conflict, see Emile Nakhleh, "Israeli Occupation and Self-Rule in the Territories: The Inhabitants Perspective," in Governing Peoples and Territories (Philadelphia: ISHI, 1982); Yehosafat Harkabi, "The Position of the Palestinians in the Israeli-Arab Conflict and Their National Covenant," Journal of International Law and Politics 3:1 (1970).

4. Mark Heller, "A Palestinian State: Thinking the Unthinkable."

5. Ibid.

6. "Data Base: 191,700 Jews in the 'Occupied Territories'," Survey of Arab Affairs No. 13 (August 15, 1988).

7. On the Palestinians in Jordan, see Avi Plascov, The Palestinian Refugees in Jordan 1948-1957 (London: Cass, 1981); D.L. Price, Jordan and the Palestinians: The PLO's Prospects (London: Institute for the Study of Conflict, 1975); Eliezer Be'eri, The Palestinians Under Jordanian Rule: Three Issues (Jerusalem: Magnes Press and Hebrew University, 1978).

8. On Israeli settlement in the territories, see Aaron Dether, How Expensive are West Bank Settlements (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Post and West Bank Data Project, 1987); Arieh L. Avneri, The Claim of Dispossession: Jewish Land Settlement and the Arabs 1878-1948 (Efal, Israel: Yad Tabenkin, 1982); Anne Mosely Lesch, "Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Territories," Journal of Palestine 8:1 (Autumn 1978): 103-105; Chaim Waxman, "Beyond the Green Line: American Jewish Settlers in Judea, Samaria and Gaza," Jerusalem Letter 84 (December 17, 1985); Mordechai Nisan, Israel and the Territories (Ramat Gan: Turtledove, 1978); R. Watson, "An American Presence (Jewish Settlers from the United States in the West Bank)," Newsweek 103 (June 1984): 40-41.

9. On the PLO's shifting status, see E. Rouleau, "The Future of the PLO," Current 258 (December 1983): 42-58; G. Russell, "Maneuvering for Position," Time 126 (November 11, 1985): 38-39; John W. Amos II, Palestinian Resistance: Organization of a Nationalist Movement (Elmsford, NY: Pergamon Press, 1981); Michael Hudson, "The Palestinian Resistance: Developments and Setbacks 1967-71," Journal of Palestine Studies 1:3 (1972): 64-84; W.L. Chase, "Arafat's Back, Reshaping Outlook For Mideast Talks," U.S. News and World Report 102 (May 4, 1987): 40.

10. On the economic interdependence of Israel, the territories, and Jordan, see Daniel J. Elazar, ed., Judea, Samaria, and Gaza: Views on the Present and Future (Washington and London: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1982); "The Economy of the Territories and the Future of the Arab Palestinians," Survey of Arab Affairs No. 2 (November 21, 1985); David Kahan, Agriculture and Water Resources in the West Bank and Gaza (1967-1987) (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Post and West Bank Data Project, 1987); Meron Benvenisti, The West Bank Data Project: 1987 Report (Washington D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1987); Simcha Bahiri, Industrialization in the West Bank and Gaza (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Post and West Bank Data Project, 1987).

11. On the existing de-facto shared rule and its changing character, see Daniel J. Elazar, ed., From Autonomy to Shared Rule: Options for Judea, Samaria and Gaza (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, 1983); Daniel J. Elazar, ed., Governing Peoples and Territories; Shmuel Sandler and Hillel Frisch, Israel, the Palestinians and the West Bank: A Study in Intercommunal Conflict (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1984).

For futher discussion of what has developed in the administered territories since 1967 from both the Palestinian and Israeli perspectives, see Emile Nakhleh, ed., A Palestinian Agenda for the West Bank and Gaza (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1980); Daniel J. Elazar, ed., Judea, Samaria, and Gaza: Views of the Present and Future.

12. Cf. Moshe Drori, "Israeli Settlement and Israeli Law in Judea and Samaria," Jerusalem Letter 106 (1 February 1989).

13. For a more complete discussion of this point, see Daniel KJ. Elazar, ed., Governing Peoples and Territories.

14. The frontier thesis underlying this argument is, of course, based on the work of Frederick Jackson Turner in The Frontier in American History (New York: Holt, 1920), as extended by Walter Prescott Webb in The Great Frontier (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1952), and subsequently applied on a comparative basis to the various new societies of the modern world, e.g., Louis Hartz, The Founding of New Societies (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1964), and Walker D. Wyman and Clifton B. Kroeber, The Frontier in Perspective (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1965).

This writer has suggested an extension of the Turner thesis as the urban-industrial and metropolitan-technological frontiers in Cities of the Prairie: The Metropolitan Frontier and American Politics (New York: Basic Books, 1970) and The Metropolitan Frontier, A Perspective on Change in American Society (New York: General Learning Press, 1973). I have applied this model to Israel through several studies beginning with Israel: From Ideological to Territorial Democracy (New York: General Learning Press, 1971).

15. Saul Cohen, Jerusalem Undivided (New York: Herzl Press, 1980).

16. See Moshe Drori, Local Government, Democracy and Elections in Judea and Samaria: Legal Aspects (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Institute for Federal Studies and Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University, Institute of Local Government, 1980); and Sasson Levi, Local Government in the Administered Territories (Hebrew) (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University, Institute of Local Government, 1978).

17. See Daniel J. Elazar, et al., A Handbook of Federal and Autonomy Arrangements (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, forthcoming).


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