Ira Sharkansky (Emeritus)
Department of Political Science
Hebrew University
Several of the American Jews who were avid supporters of Barack Obama and angled for appointments in his administration use the term "tough love" for their preferred course of action toward Israel. Their point is that supporters of Israel, like themselves, should tell the Jewish state what it must do in order to reach an accord with the Palestinians. They are sure that Israel does not know what to do, or is not able to take the appropriate steps without American pressure. Their pressure would ultimately bring peace to Israel as well as Palestine. It would be a boon to Israel. Hence, tough love. More recently there has been another indication that "tough love" is less appropriate for what should be American policy than "benign neglect."
Israelis know pretty much what their government has offered, and they know that it has never been enough to satisfy Palestinians. Perhaps it never could be enough, given the extremism of several Palestinian clusters, and the reluctance of even those considered moderate to persuade their people to accept something other than 1967 boundaries and the right of return to Israel for 1948 refugees and their families.
Recently Javier Solana suggested that the international community impose on deadline on Israel-Palestine negotiations, and then declare the creation of a Palestinian state if the parties do not reach an agreement by the deadline.
No surprise that the Palestinian leadership has accepted that as the ideal rule of the game, and are pressing the Americans to adopt that policy as their own.
Again the Palestinians are waiting for someone else to solve their problem. They can continue demanding what they want, and when the Israelis do not agree by the date set for ending negotiations they may get it from the international community.
Hence the need for benign neglect.
Again and again, against what has become acceptable among the flakey left, it is essential to repeat that the problem is not Israel but Palestine. A few minutes with Google can demonstrate to anyone who is literate what Israelis have offered and what the Palestinians have rejected.
It is time for the Palestinians to mature, if they want a state of their own. They must recognize that the international community is not likely to bind Israel. And if tries, Israel may not accept the shackles.
An empty threat?
Maybe not.
I am not about to predict when Israel will fold in order to go along with international players, and when it will pursue its own course.
Anyone who casually assumes that all the cards are with the United States or Western Europe should take another look at Gaza. Not only are there piles of rubble and people still in tents seven months after the destruction, but there is little or no construction material getting through the blockade.
That's what Israel does when it tires of rocket attacks on its civilians, even though the incidence of Israeli casualties was substantially lower than those due to traffic accidents.
My own tough love directed at Palestinians is to start thinking about an agreement that will strike Israelis as reasonable. My tough love directed toward the United States and other Western democracies is to adopt benign neglect. It is the only chance of helping the Palestinians recognize that they must learn to help themselves.
There are two late flashes showing the futility of tough love directed at Israel. They apply to the ban on Jewish construction in East Jerusalem demanded by key members of the Obama administration. The Israeli government has rejected the demand. And Varda has demonstrated that the Obama administration is nothing against an insistent householder. Her curtains have arrived, and are hanging where she wants them.
If tough love will not work, benign neglect will not work quickly.
It is unlikely to produce a Palestinian state in less than a generation or two, until those committed to the fantasy of 1967 borders and the return of refugees' families pass from the scene. The refugees themselves will pass before then, and descendants holding keys to doors that no longer exist may also have to pass away.
Meanwhile, things are not all that bad on the West Bank. A recent New York Times report describes an economic resurgence that results from improved security. That is provided by Palestinians trained in Jordan by Americans, whose loyalties are to the principle of providing security to Palestine as opposed to following the orders of a family elder, gang leader, or a charismatic figure who claims to speak for Allah. As new units have shown they can be reliable, Israel has limited its involvement in Palestinian towns and has reduced the roadblocks between them. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/17/world/,17westbank.html?scp=2&sq=West%20Bank&st=cse
Those committed to the idea of a Palestinian state should recognize that most nations (i.e., ethnic groups) do not have a state of their own. The list includes the Basques and Catalonians of Spain, the Welsh of Great Britain, hundreds of native tribes in North and South America and most tribes in Africa. Palestinians discovered themselves to be an ethnic group only in the last century. They may have to wait a while, and perhaps forever, to achieve a state called Palestine.
Things remain bad in Gaza, and will continue as long as the leadership persists in its pledges to destroy Israel. Should those people gain power in the West Bank, I would no longer recommend it as a place for Palestinians to invest their money or their lives
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#2-Coping
My note about benign neglect brought several criticisms to the effect that such a posture would prevent a solution of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
It is time for another note on coping.
Coping is the default response when a problem appears to be chronic, or insoluble. On the personal level such a problem can be a family member, neighbor, or boss who is intolerable, irremovable, and for whom one's own option to leave is not appropriate. It can be an illness or injury for which there is nothing but a palliative (i.e., a medication or appliance that represents medical coping). The chronic problem can be personal poverty resulting from debt, a lack of education, or a physical condition that limits one's capacity. Old age is filled with insoluble problems.
In the public arena, insoluble problems may be ingrained corruption, extensive poverty, or cultural conflict that persist for generations without responding to programs of welfare, education, or policing that the regime is able or willing to implement.
Israel's chronic problem is the Palestinians.
I do not think of myself as a racist. Some of my good friends and best students are . . .
Mahmoud Abbas and those around him may have given up on violence as a way to deal with Israel. If so, that is a blessing. However, they are not willing to pursue anything less than full satisfaction of their slogans: a return to the borders of 1967, and a right of return to Israel for refugees and their families. Either they firmly believe that they can achieve those dreams, or they are wary of pressing more extreme and violent Palestinians to give up their dreams of displacing Israel entirely.
One should not underestimate the internal problems of Palestine. Their on-again, off-again civil war resulted in more than 400 Palestinians killed by Palestinians from 2006 through 2008.
http://www.btselem.org/English/statistics/Casualties_month_table.asp?Category=23®ion=TER
Whatever the sources, the Palestinian regime has shown itself to be a chronic problem.
If world opinion or the governments of the United States and Europe press Israel to be more accommodating, it will not solve that problem. Israel has offered something close to the 1967 borders, with land swaps for the rest, and has agreed to take a number of refugees.
It has never been enough, even to tempt the Palestinians to make a counter offer.
There are other problems in dispute, not worth mentioning here. The borders and refugees by themselves demonstrate the insoluble nature of the problem.
So Israel copes.
Among its tactics are going along with international demands that it negotiate, despite sufficient experience that the negotiations will lead nowhere. It absorbs considerable violence in order to pay heed to persistent international demands that it not react to every provocation. There were numerous violations of its northern border before its attack on Lebanon in 2006, and seven years of rockets on its civilians before it went into Gaza earlier this year. It has learned to avoid occupation of Palestinian areas. It left Gaza after three weeks, and moves in and out of West Bank towns only when it goes after bad people. It invests heavily in intelligence, which allows it to locate the bad people. It employs check points to control the movement of Palestinians. They are unpleasant for Israeli soldiers as well as Palestinians, so it removes those that appear to be unnecessary. It reestablishes them when the removal appears to have been premature. It grants individuals permits to enter Israel for medical treatment, schooling, religious and family purposes, but closes the borders or rescinds individual permits when its intelligence advises that. It blockades the northern and eastern boundaries of Gaza (Egypt blockades the southern boundary), but monitors the need for fuel, medication, and food, and lets in enough to prevent a disaster. Reports are that Gazans live better than most Africans. We do not know if the Israeli prisoner there is still alive. There have been no visits by the Red Cross or other international organizations. Perhaps they are too busy criticizing Israel for human rights violations.
You want to help?
Some international programs may assist the Palestinians. Not more food aid and financial transfers. They breed dependence and corruption. A good deal of the money has gone to foreign bank accounts without buying goods or services for Palestinians.
An American-Jordanian program to train security personnel has produced some protection of individual Palestinians from exploitation and violence at the hands of other Palestinians, and has allowed Israel to reduce its security activities in the West Bank.
Urging Palestinians to stop inciting hatred of Israel in its schools and media has not produced results. Further preaching may help.
Insisting that Israel stop all construction in what others view as "occupied territories" may be counterproductive. An Israeli view is that the territories are "disputed" and not "occupied." Prime Minister Netanyahu says that no western government can no longer deny a Jew the right to live in a residential neighborhood of Paris, London, or New York,, and no Israeli government will deny Jews the right to buy property anywhere in Jerusalem. That has considerable support among Israelis familiar with anti-Semitism. Numerous Israelis, other than extremists, support the extension of Netanyahu's line to include the purchase of property by Jews anywhere in the Land of Israel.
The proclamations about freezes in settlements, including neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, by President Obama and his people may actually provoke more construction by Israelis, and more funding of land purchases by overseas Jews.
Leave Israel alone. It knows the neighborhood, and how to take care of itself.
Thanks to Nurit
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