Ray Cook - As I See It

Israel, Zionism and the Media

Tag: two-state solution

So what’s wrong with the 1967 lines? Let’s not get hung up on semantics

24/05/2011 / / 6 Comments

It all started with Obama in Washington on May 19th at the State Department and ended today with Bibi Netanyahu addressing congress in Washington.

And it’s all about a two-state solution.

A really tense photo-op with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu which looked like a married couple at a party just after a row, desperately trying to convince the guests they still love each other, whilst their body-language says otherwise.

Bibi, unhappy at the ‘1967’ lines thing, gave Obama a bit of a lecture on Jewish history.

Then it was over to AIPAC for Obama, where he clarified what he had just said in the State Department and with Bibi, and spelled out what ‘based on 1967 lines’ means.

All this followed by a quick interview with the BBC’s Andrew Marr (who behaved at times like a 13 year old schoolboy interviewing his idol) and a further clarification of what he really meant about 1967 lines. Then across the sea to Ireland for some schmaltzy, easy publicity in Dublin (a great rousing, inspirational speech which Obama is  so good at) thence to the UK and, no doubt, more on the two-state solution in the Palace of Westminster tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Bibi arrives in Congress and really lays it on the line and tells it like it is to a rapturous reception.

But what is all the fuss about amidst this flurry of diplomatic activity? What did Obama say that was so wrong?

Here’s a snippet from his State Department speech: (full text here)

For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure.  Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state. Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection.  And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist.

Nowt wrong there.

How about:

The status quo is unsustainable, and Israel too must act boldly to advance a lasting peace.

The fact is, a growing number of Palestinians live west of the Jordan River.  Technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself.  A region undergoing profound change will lead to populism in which millions of people -– not just one or two leaders — must believe peace is possible.  The international community is tired of an endless process that never produces an outcome. The dream of a Jewish and democratic state cannot be fulfilled with permanent occupation.

That word ‘occupation’ somehow jangles coming from the mouth of an American President. OK, let’s not get into the legalities but he does seem to be suggesting that Israel does this occupying in an attempt to deny a Palestinian state.

Hmm.

What America and the international community can do is to state frankly what everyone knows — a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples:  Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people, each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

I don’t disagree with that; apparently Bibi doesn’t disagree with that. So who does? Ah – the Palestinians, the Arabs, most of the Muslim world, Iran, Hamas, Hizbollah… get the picture?

Now what appears to be controversial:

We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.

But:

…the recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel:  How can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist?

Exactly. So why mention the 1967 lines?

Melanie Phillips takes issue with the ‘1967 lines’ as follows:

Obama spoke correctly when he referred to the ‘1967 lines’ rather than ‘borders’. There are no 1967 borders. Israel actually has no borders. All it has are the 1949 ceasefire lines, which is where Israel was left when it fought off the attempt by five Arab armies to exterminate it at birth. These lines were referred to as the ‘Auschwitz borders’ because within them no country could possibly defend itself against its enemies. They left Israel at its narrowest point a mere nine miles wide — as Netanyahu said, less than the Washington Beltway. A return to the 1967 lines would mean exposing Israel once more to the likelihood of destruction, and such a proposal runs counter to the spirit and the letter of UN Resolution 242. True Obama added ‘with land swaps’. But no realistic land swaps could make up for this fatal vulnerability.

But ‘with land swaps’ means that the 1967 lines will not be the border but the starting point of negotiations and it has long been known that ‘with land swaps’ means that the areas along the Green Line such as Gush Etzion will remain part of Israel, the ‘settlements’ in Judea and Samaria which are not contiguous with these borders will be part of Palestine.

According to Melanie the fatal flaw was saying that the 1967 lines were the basis of a ‘settlement’ rather than ‘negotiations’. That’s too nuanced for me. And it doesn’t matter if:

Successive administrations carefully stepped round this minefield in accordance with Resolution 242. It is the Palestinians who talk about returning to the ‘1967 borders’. The sting in what Obama did was to adopt the Palestinian position as US policy. Wrote [Glenn] Kessler: [link]

He did not articulate the 1967 boundaries as a ‘Palestinian goal’ but as U.S. policy… for a U.S. president, the explicit reference to the 1967 lines represented crossing the Rubicon.

But this is Bibi Netanyahu’s position, it appears, as he said in Congress a few hours ago:

I am saying today something that should be said publicly by anyone serious about peace. In any peace agreement that ends the conflict, some settlements will end up beyond Israel’s borders. The precise delineation of those borders must be negotiated. We will be very generous on the size of a future Palestinian state. But as President Obama said, the border will be different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967. Israel will not return to the indefensible lines of 1967.

Does it really matter if they are ‘based’ or ‘must be negotiated’. It’s the same thing unless you wilfully misconstrue. Apparently it’s a major shift in US policy. That is, it’s a major shift to say what we already knew. With such subtle nuances no wonder the peace process gets stalled.

The Glenn Kessler Washington Post article quotes Hillary Clinton in 2009:

“We believe that through good-faith negotiations the parties can mutually agree on an outcome which ends the conflict and reconciles the Palestinian goal of an independent and viable state based on the 1967 lines, with agreed swaps, and the Israeli goal of a Jewish state with secure and recognized borders that reflect subsequent developments and meet Israeli security requirements.”

Did Obama really make a policy shift or was it a gaffe? Was it a sop to the Arabs?

So what if Obama says ‘based on’? The facts on the ground are already ‘based on’ the 1967 lines because the major ‘settlements’ around Jerusalem are more or less contiguous area bestriding the Green Line. If you are serious about a viable Palestinian state it cannot look like a moth-eaten bit of Gorgonzola. To be viable it has to be contiguous.

The big threat to any negotiation is the status of Jerusalem.

Bibi:

As for Jerusalem, only a democratic Israel has protected freedom of worship for all faiths in the city. Jerusalem must never again be divided. Jerusalem must remain the united capital of Israel. I know that this is a difficult issue for Palestinians. But I believe with creativity and goodwill a solution can be found.

‘Difficult issue’ is right because the 1967 lines (really 1949 ceasefire lines) cut through a hitherto undivided city leaving the eastern section to be ethnically cleansed of its Jewish majority (by the Jordanians) and between 1948 and 1967 the eastern part of the city became what is now termed ‘Arab East Jerusalem’.

This is what Obama had to say:

… the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees.  But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of both Israelis and Palestinians

I’m not sure what rights anyone has who has been on the losing side three times, refused a state four times and still claims the whole of Israel as Palestine. Nevertheless, it is clear that a very imaginative solution will have to be reached for Jerusalem because I can’t see the Palestinians ever accepting that it will not be their capital, however absurd such a claim or aspiration is. It is now part of the ‘narrative’ and well-nigh impossible to deracinate from their collective psyche.

Robin Shepherd also takes issue with the ‘1967 lines ‘. He also believes Obama is throwing Israel under ‘the proverbial bus’.

And it all revolves around what ‘based on the 1967 lines’ means again:

No Israeli government — let me rephrase that, no government of any description, anywhere — could accept a peace deal which leaves its people at the mercy of a declared enemy long committed to the state’s destruction.

And that is exactly what the 1967 lines would mean for Israel: Not so much gambling the lives of your children on the kindness of strangers as gambling them on the kindness of people very well known to you who (literally) teach their own children to hate yours.

Well, if that’s the issue with the ‘based on the 1967 lines’ thing then it doesn’t matter where you delineate a Palestinian state because wherever its borders are it’s never going to be very far from Israel. What difference would a few kilometres make to Israel’s security?

None.

Shepherd’s conclusion:

In the end then, you can pore over Barack Obama’s speech all you like. You can put this bit of his speech against that bit. You can draw comfort from one part and be concerned by another. You can agonise about what the 1967 borders with land swaps really means. You can pull and push until it sounds innocent enough on the one hand or nothing short of disastrous on the other.

But it’s all an exercise in futility.

This is a president cocooned in delusions about how to deal with tyrannical regimes and the political cultures which underpin them. Obama is an appeaser through and through. And when you read between the lines, that was the message we should draw from yesterday’s speech.

I’m not sure he is an appeaser. Deluded, yes. And this delusion stems from a profound refusal by him and the Europeans and, indeed British PM Cameron and Foreign Secretary Hague, and just about everyone in the Labour Party, to grasp one simple fact:

The current Palestinian leadership has clearly demonstrated that it is not interested in 1967 or 1948 or 1750 or 2012 or any other date. It is only interested in a single, Palestinian state including what is now Israel.

Any and every diplomatic effort it makes to have a unilateral de facto state declared by the UN in September points to this.

The pact with Hamas points to this.

The PA education system with its vicious anti-Semitic vitriol and historical revisionist mythology points to this.

The PA naming squares after terrorist murderers and putting convicted murderers on the PA payroll points to this.

Into this mix is a further US and Western delusion that the Arab Spring, wherever it is, is a bid for western-style democracies even though not one of the the Springers has yet achieved anything resembling democracy.

This delusion ignores the emboldening of elements within these countries to seize an opportunity to attempt to destabilise Israel: in Egypt the threat of ending the peace treaty and cutting of gas supplies, in Tunisia attacks on Jews, in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan mass invasion of Israel’s borders by Palestinians and others claiming they are walking to their homes in ‘Palestine’ when ‘Palestine means pre-1967 Israel.

So the 1967 lines may well be a starting point for negotiations with land swaps,  but if Israel insists on all of Jerusalem and no return of so-called refugees, and if the Palestinians are negotiating not for a final settlement, but a stage toward the complete conquest of all of Israel, then the whole process is a non-starter. And, by the way, I agree with that Israeli position, in case you are wondering, but what I am saying is that that position cannot currently be accepted by Palestinians.

The problem for Israel is that powerful allies want to force yet another round of negotiations even though the Palestinian position is hardened and emboldened by Washington and the EU countries who persist in their double-think and delusion that Israel can negotiate with its would-be destroyers.

As Melanie says:

Bottom bottom line: it’s all a pile of steaming irrelevance. The Arabs aren’t going to play anyway. The immediate reason for the nine-decade war thus remains firmly in place. The deeper reason, that the aggressor is indulged and rewarded by the west and thus has every incentive to ratchet up his rejectionism and aggression, also remains firmly in place.

That is what Netanyahu has to address. He has to tell America and Britain that this murderous impasse is their fault — and that only they can end it by refusing for the first time to indulge and reward those committed to the destruction of Israel, the real cause of the continuation of this conflict. Netanyahu did well last Friday. Now he has to turn telling truth to power into a new strategic approach.

Bibi had his chance today in Congress, but I’m not sure it was a ‘new strategic approach’.

What British Jews think of Israel

20/07/2010 / / 2 Comments

Earlier this month the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR) published a report of their ‘initial’ findings from an ‘Israel Survey’ they carried out this year.

The headline summary of British Jewish attitudes to Israel was ‘Committed, concerned and conciliatory’.

I’d like to explore if the findings really matched the conclusions and also add some comments as to how this reflects my own views and experiences, or not, as the case may be..

Firstly, let’s see what the JPR says about itself:

The Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR) is a London-based independent Jewish research institute. It aims to advance the prospects of Jewish communities in Britain and across Europe by conducting research and developing policy in partnership with those best placed to influence Jewish life.

I’m not sure what ‘advance the prospects’ means. I take it to mean that this group, supported by the Pears Foundation, wants to influence the ‘policy’ of those who are influential in Jewish life in Britain.  In this context, I take it that they want to assist in helping the development of policy vis-a-vis Israel.

The survey, therefore, is meant to provide communal leaders and organisations with data on their own constituency.

Looking at the Pears Foundation website, it would appear that ‘Committed, concerned and conciliatory’ could be their own mission statement when it comes to Israel.

The Pears Foundation also supports the New Israel Fund which has been the subject of much controversy recently. The NIF was accused by NGO monitor (which is an Israeli NGO itself), of being anti-Zionist. There were other accusations of supporting Palestinian-Arab groups which deny Israel’s legitimacy. This year, Im Tirtzu which is a Zionist student organisation, accused the NIF of collaboration with the UN’s Goldstone report on Operation Cast Lead and providing it with the ammunition with which to attack Israel. It was all a bit messy.

This is the provenance of this report. I would point out that Pears and NIF are both heavily involved in the advancing the welfare and economic status of Israeli Arabs. This is a laudable and commendable mission but it is fraught with the dangers of Israeli and Palestinian political entanglement. It is probably unavoidable that the objects of charitable causes in Israel can be, in turn, targetted by Palestinian and, indeed, Israeli political groups whose agenda is not charitable but to attack or even delegitimise the state.

Given this provenance we must tread carefully and see whether there is any political interpretation of the data. After all, the expressed aim of JPR is to develop policy, and policy is the offspring of politics.

First point is that the pdf document is annoyingly a 2-column format which makes it very difficult to read in a browser.

Are the data truly representative of the Jewish community? As the report authors say in the Introduction:

Short of an official census which all members of a population are required to complete, no sample survey can provide a perfect representation of the target population. That is particularly the case when sampling the Jewish community, because members of the population cannot be identified by a list, or accessed by any form of random process. Further, in a survey such as this, which was carried out on-line, and where respondents are self-selected, there is additional potential for bias in the data.

There were 4,081 responses. There is no way of telling that all these respondents were actually Jewish or even British. 4,000 represents something like 1.5% of Britain’s Jewish population, but a significantly higher proportion of its adult population, perhaps 4-5% or 1 in 20/25. This is a remarkable sample. If you were to have an online survey directed at the UK population, the same percentage would return 3-400,000 responses from the adult population, if my maths are correct.

Yet it remains the fact that respondents, including myself are a) Internet savvy, b) are aware of the survey and c) want to respond.

It would be a fair assumption that those responding want to express their views and those who don’t are uncommitted or have no strong desire to contribute to the data and the story they tell.

The Executive Summary is broken down into a number of headings.

Deep ties and strong commitments

This is borne out by the data. An overwhelming majority believe that Israel is central to their identity, is their ancestral homeland, believe themselves to be Zionists and believe they have a ‘responsibility to support Israel’ and that Jews are ‘responsible for ensuring the survival of Israel’.

So,  British Jews still overwhelmingly cleave to a Jewish identity anchored in the soil of Israel. This also confirms Jews affinity with other Jews (as we say every New Month, chaverim kol Yisra’el – all the people of Israel are one brotherhood) and adds up to a national identification as a Jewish People.

Dovish stance on key policy issues

The data clearly show that British Jews are in favour of a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict and do not wish to see any further expansion of settlements.

The next statistic, however, is worrying: 52% believe that Israel should negotiate with Hamas. Only 39% do not.

This is worrying because it means that 52% of correspondents actually believe that Hamas would ever negotiate with Israel. Hamas have repeatedly rejected any such negotiations. Israel will not talk to them until they forswear their genocidal policy against Jews and Israel.  Clearly the Jewish public in Britain are not informed about the nature of Hamas. I’m sure there ‘vote’ is for the best intentions, but there is a clear lack of understanding of the nature of Hamas and perhaps some confusion.

Clear support on security issues but with some reservations

This section dealt with Israel’s control of the West Bank (Judea/Samaria), the Security Barrier, the Gaza War and Iran. Again, the respondents generally appear to adhere to a progressive Zionist view of Israel’s ‘occupation’ of the West Bank. They feel it is a necessary evil whilst there is a threat but are prepared to cede land for peace. Only 48% of professed Zionists saw Israel as an occupying power.

The definition of Israel’s position on the West Bank is a complex historical issue. If Israel is occupying the West Bank, which country is being occupied? Palestine has never existed even though the West Bank is land earmarked as a future separate state in the 2-state solution. The land is termed ‘disputed’ by those who don’t like ‘occupied’, but the religious Right see it simply as Israeli/Jewish land by right.  But it matters little; the main thrust of the response is that British Jews are willing to cede most of this land for peace and to create a viable Palestinian state.

Most (72%) supported Cast Lead , the Gaza War in 2008-9 (even though, as mentioned above, 52% want to negotiate with Hamas. Again, negotiate what? The destruction of Israel?) and the same number also support the Security Barrier as vital.

The response on Iran as representing a threat to Israel gained a massive 87% agreement. Jews have learned by bitter experience that anyone who calls for the destruction of Jews should be taken seriously.

Some mixed feelings about the state of Israeli society

The main concerns were corruption in Israeli political life, the influence of Orthodox Judaism (the Haredim) and a lesser concern, but still a majority, about discrimination against minorities in both the Jewish and non-Jewish community. This too shows a what could be termed a somewhat left-leaning view of Israel and is completely commensurate with British Jews growing up in and identifying with the values of British society and desiring those same values are observed in Israel.

Corruption in the UK parliament with the expenses scandal may affect their views on accusations of corruption against former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. But more likely is a desire to avoid the embarrassment of Jewish leaders facing criminal charges.

Concern for minorities is also a natural and commendable expression of British mainstream multi-culturalism but also, and perhaps even more so in this context, an expression of Jewish moral values and a belief that Israel, though a state of the Jewish people, can accommodate non-Jews and a varied ethnic mix in a cohesive society. Jewish charities have historically concentrated their efforts on Jews in Israel. As Israel has become more affluent this is shifting slightly toward assisting with integration of non-European ethnicities and improving the lot of Arabs.  The data reflect these concerns.

20% of correspondents do not believe democracy is ‘alive and well in Israel’. I would hazard a guess that these 20% are either hard Left or concerned with corruption, the vagaries of the Israeli voting and multi-party system and the situation in the ‘territories’. Maybe democracy is alive but has a bit of a temperature would be more apt. But at least it is a democracy.

Some divergence of opinion on the will for peace

Confusion on who wants peace. Only 59% thought Israel was less responsible for the failure of the peace process and only 47% believed the Palestinians want peace. As we cannot know what Palestinians really want we can only go by their actions. 60 years of rejectionism and the failure of Fatah/PLO/PA to accept a Jewish state should have convinced more people that Israel has always been willing to make sacrifices for peace and the Palestinians offer rockets and intifadas in return.

Apparently this view is not at all universal in the Jewish community and I suspect the reason is an exasperation with the Netanyahu government and the antics of Lieberman.

Israel is prominent in the daily lives of Jews in Britain

This was really interesting.76% believe Israel is relevant to their lives but most of these do not feel a conflict of interest with loyalty to Britain. This is wholly commensurate with a population that has roots over 4 or more generations in Britain and still feels gratitude to Britain for absorbing their grandparents and great grandparents fleeing from Russisan pogroms over 100 years ago. I know I do. This loyalty is even reflected in the prayer for the Royal Family recited in synagogues every shabbat.

About a quarter feel uncomfortable living here because of events in Israel. This is mainly due I would suspect, to anti-Israel demonstrations and the rise in anti-Semitic incidents every time Israel is pilloried in the press for defending itself. For me this is not a permanent state of being. But I felt considerable wariness walking to synagogue during Cast lead and after the Mavi Marmara incident with a vague feeling that I was a potential target for the rage of some sections of British society who make no distinction between Jews and Israelis.

This feeling was an almost atavistic sense of impending pogrom and even guilt, even though I supported Israel’s actions, I was the perennial Jew, the outsider, the enemy within braced for the abuse of a passing motorist or a missile lobbed from across the road. These fears were not realised, but the feeling they could have been was fuelled by anti-Israel sentiment in the news and media. And or me, anti-Israel always means anti-Jew on the streets of Britain.

The survey showed why I have these feelings:

• Almost a quarter (23%) of the sample had witnessed some form of antisemitic incident in the previous  year. Of these, over half (56%) believe that the incident was ‘probably’ or ‘definitely’ related to the abuser/assailant’s views on Israel.

• More than one in ten respondents (11%) said they had been subjected to a verbal antisemitic insult or attack in the 12 months leading up to the survey. Over half of the victims (56%) believe that the incident was ‘probably’ or ‘definitely’ related to the abuser/assailant’s views on Israel.

Division of opinion on the right to speak out

Again,a surprise for me. Only 35% said Jews should always feel free to criticise Israel in the British media. As many as 25% said this was never justified.

Although I can sympathise with a reluctance to criticise when there are more than enough non-Jews around who are more than willing to do so, I think it is false loyalty not to speak up when you feel Israel is wrong. The problem is, as I’ve said before, that when so much of the so-called debate is so shrill and vicious, it is not easy to add your reasonable voice to a cacophony of vituperative polemic which is neither reasoned or reasonable.

However, just because the general debate is malign should not deter a Jew or a supporter of Israel from expressing reservations or criticism. The attempts to demonise Israel cannot be used as an excuse for moral cowardice if you feel Israel is wrong.

The survey came up with another , for me, unfortunate statistic: 45% do not believe Jews in Britain have a right to criticise Israel because we don’t live there. This is crazy. I don’t live in Iran but I have a right, in this country at least, to criticise it. Jews have a long history of not wishing to ‘rock the boat’, to put up the shutters and retreat behind a communal defensive wall where any criticism of Israel is disloyal. This is an absurdity in the 21st century.

If Israeli democracy cannot take external criticism or if Jews feel pangs of disloyalty as critical diaspora Jews then the relationship between the diaspora and Israel will lose an important linkage. However, this line of thought can lead to J-Street whose ‘pro-Israel’ criticism hides a more pernicious agenda which is decidedly anti-Zionist. Nevertheless, we live in free societies and the antidote to anti-Zionism and anti-Israel sentiments, from Jews or anyone else, is confidence to express support and valid criticism and to confront invalid criticism or views inimical to the best interests of Israel.

Religiosity and educational attainment

The final summary section simply states that the more religious, the more hawkish, the better educated, the more dovish. What about well educated ‘frummers’?

Education may lead to dovishness because it exposes the individual to views not encountered within closed communities and, as Ayaan Hirsi Ali has explained in her latest book :

The European Enlightenment of the eighteenth century gave birth to schools and universities run on the principles of critical thinking…

(Nomad, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, pp xviii and xix, published by Simon and Shuster, 2010)

The critical thinkers are more likely to reject religious certainty for nuanced rationalism and so be able to see both  sides of an argument. This leads to greater toleration of opposing views and the willingness to find compromises.

In Summary

The survey is fascinating but, unless you are a BBC reporter, there are no real surprises.

Jews generally support Israel, and sometimes uncritically.

Jews care about Palestinians but only if Israeli security can be assured.

British Jews support democracy, compassion and moral behaviour, but they also believe that, in face of existential threats, Israel has a right to defend itself robustly.

British Jews want peace and reconciliation, a plural democratic Israel respecting all faiths and ethnicities.

British Jews’ bond with Israel is strong and affectionate as is their loyalty to Britain.

Hence,  ‘Committed, concerned and conciliatory’ appears to be a correct conclusion.

Palestinian Authority rejects the two-state solution

10/08/2009 / / 0 Comments

Fatah, led by the Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, has held its first congress for 20 years.

Draw your own conclusion as to why now.

My guess is that things are going very well for Fatah which is in power on the West Bank and nominally in Gaza where it has been chucked out by the nice Hamas people by a series of gunfights, murders, torture, intimidation, throwing people off high buildings etc. you know, the sort of stuff that passes for politics in the Palestinian world.

Anyhow….

… things are going well because Israel is under intense attack not just from the usual suspects in the Arab world, the EU, NGO’s and the UN, but also from its closest ally, the United States of America.

This means that Fatah, alias the Palestinian Authority, alias the PLO (yes, I know they are all different but they temd to have the same cast list) believes it can make another small step or two forward in its ultimate goal of destroying Israel.

It doesn’t need to use an Intifada, armed resistance, suicide bombings and other terrorist tactics, it just has to sit back and watch Israel dangle from an ever-tightening noose, partly of its own making but mainly from the pressure from the Obama administration.

It appears the world wants Israel to make concessions: freeze “settlements”, freeze expansion of “settlements”, grant a Right of Return for the great grandchildren of  Palestinians who left, or were driven out in 1947-9, concede East Jerusalem which is supposed to be “Arab” m, and withdraw to the 1967 borders (thereby rendering the Arab attack on Israel in 1967 as of no consequence).

But Fatah have made some surprise moves on the compromise front – the main one being no compromise at all, so:

it will not change its charter which calls for Israel’s destruction whilst retaining the option of armed struggle enshrined within this charter ““until the Zionist entity is wiped out and Palestine is liberated”.

So where is there room for two states if they still want to eradicate Israel? They say they will pursue peace but reserve the right to use arms. But what peace do they intend? A peace where Israel no longer exists. The road to peace from the Fatah perspective is a series of concessions by Israel which will lead to its destruction. That is Fatah’s idea of peace and if they don’t get it, they will take up arms – possibly.

Fatah refused to recognise Israel as a Jewish state. In fact it’s quite derisory about the idea and considers a Jewish state to be a racist concept but not an Islamic state.

The whole tenor of the Fatah congress was refusal to compromise, refusal to recognise Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people, refusal to give up the armed struggle, refusal to relinquish any part of its charter where the destruction of Israel is its stated goal.

Of course, recent events in Israel show the current administration to be equally uncompromising: Prime Minister Netanyahu states that the whole of Jerusalem is indivisible; retains the right to expand “settlements” and cares little about how evictions of Palestinians, however legal, play out on the world stage and give fuel to Palestinian rhetoric.

Israel has not ruled out a Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza, but the Palestinians’ idea of a two state solution appears to be little more than empty rhetoric aimed at the non-Arab world whilst they tell each other that the liberation of ALL of Palestine is still their goal. So we may have two entrenched positions but what is there to negotiate from an Israeli perspective until their right to exist is fully recognised.

What happened to the two-state solution?

28/05/2009 / / 1 Comment

I thought, and certainly President Obama thought, that Israel and Palestine were pursuing a two state solution.

The key issues to be resolved with regard to this 60 year conflict are as follows:

1. Borders and security

2. End of belligerence

3. Status of Jerusalem

4. Refugee issues

5. Israeli settlements on the West Bank/Judea-Samaria

It’s very easy to get confused with long litany of “peace agreements” , accords, understandings etc. We have Oslo, Geneva, Camp David, Taba, Annapolis, road map, Saudi Plan and so on.

Despite Ehud Barak offering Yasser Arafat 95-7% of the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and compensation for refugees, not only was the offer rejected, without a counter proposal,  to the dismay of all involved, including the Saudi Ambassador, but Arafat issued orders for the Second Intifada covering his own inability to confront the possibility of a just peace and leading to the deaths of thousands of Palestinians and Israelis.

Now the Netanyahu government is turning away from seeking a  final status solution, including the two-state solution and instead is following a course to ameliorate the conditions on the West Bank and to improve the infrastructure and living standards of Palestinians.

At the same time it is saying that it will honour all previous agreements. It’s getting very confusing. Clearly, the Netanyahu government has decided to follow its own agenda in the apparent belief that there is no current partner for peace. Netanyahu is, therefore, giving the distinct impression that he has accepted a sort of de facto annexation of the West Bank as part of Israel but with Palestinian autonomy.

Whilst Netanyahu kicks the two-state solution into the long grass, Mahmoud Abbas and the PA continue with their own maximalist agenda: Jerusalem is Muslim only and Jews have no claims to it or to any of Palestine (that means Israel too).

Let’s take a look at some recent pronouncements:

Yesterday the Prime Minister’s Media Adviser issued the following:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today (Wednesday), 28.5.09, convened the Ministerial Committee on Improving the Situation of the Palestinian Residents of Judea and Samaria.  At the start of the meeting, he said that advancing economic projects for the Palestinian population of Judea and Samaria would a better economic, social and political reality and would improve the Palestinians’ quality of life and personal welfare.

Note “would be a better… reality”. This means better than pursuing any further peace negotiations which both Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman have rejected as having a history of leading not to peace but to Israeli concessions and Palestinian violence.

The communique continues:

Defense Minister Ehud Barak presented economic projects in the PA, including: The establishment of an industrial zone in the Mukibleh-Jenin area of northern Samaria, the establishment of an industrial zone for the processing and marketing of agricultural produce in Jericho, the establishment of an industrial zone in the Hebron-Tarkumiyeh area, the establishment of an industrial zone in Bethlehem, environmental protection projects (waste disposal and sewage treatment sites) and the establishment of a Palestinian city near Ramallah.  He noted that approximately 100 projects in various fields in the PA areas of Judea and Samaria are currently in various planning stages.

And so it continues. The strategy here appears to be that an economically stronger Palestine with greatly improved living standards would lead to the de-radicalisation of certain elements with Palestinian society on the West Bank. This in turn would lead to the easing of security arrangements and a better quality of life.

Although I can only applaud the improving of Palestinian economic conditions and easing of restrictions, if they result from this strategy, I also have an impression that this is the language of quasi-annexation. It certainly does not address Palestinian self-determination or any of the agenda items at the top of this page.

Yesterday Arutz 7 reported :

Minister of Strategic Affairs Moshe (Boogie) Yaalon believes that the time has come for Israel to “free itself from the failed paradigm” of the “two-state solution.” Yaalon spoke Tuesday at a meeting of MKs dedicated to finding an alternative to the creation of a Palestinian Authority-led Arab state.

While the creation of a PA-led state in Judea, Samaria and Gaza is perceived as a necessity both in Israel and worldwide, such a state would not solve the Israel-PA conflict, said Yaalon. In fact, he said, it is doubtful that the possibility of creating such a state exists, due to Arab and Muslim reluctance to take any step that would imply recognition of Israel or compromise on Arab claims to the entire Land of Israel.

Meanwhile President Obama is advancing his “peace plan” although we only know vaguely what it entails. The Jerusalem Post reported:

US President Barack Obama’s statements about how to advance the peace process do not differ significantly from those of his predecessor, George W. Bush, Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon told The Jerusalem Post…

He denied reports in the Hebrew press that Obama had drafted a Middle East peace plan calling for a democratic, contiguous and demilitarized Palestinian state whose borders would be determined by territorial exchanges with Israel.

According to the reports, the Old City of Jerusalem would be established as an international zone. The initiative would require the Palestinians to give up their claim of a “right of return,” and Europe and the US would arrange compensation for refugees, including passports for those residing abroad.Arab countries would institute confidence-building measures to clear the air with Israel. When Palestinian statehood would be achieved, diplomatic and economic relations would be established between Israel and Arab states.

“I don’t know of any Obama plan that has been finalized,” said Ayalon, who has been briefed on the closed-door meetings between Netanyahu and Obama. “Don’t believe the headlines. What was in the papers was mere speculation, and there is no substance to it,” he said.

So what IS the plan?

Ayalon said his Israel Beiteinu Party would oppose the internationalization of Jerusalem and the relinquishing of Israeli sovereignty in the “holy basin” around the Old City. He said the party would also insist that Israel not take in a single Palestinian refugee, citing legal, moral and historical grounds.

Tzipi Livni now leader of Kadima said in the Knesset:

“We will not be able to keep Jerusalem if we say no to everything, or if out of fear we adopt unwillingness as a policy and frozenness as an ideology,” Livni said. “I believe that it is possible, through proper management, to make the world understand the things that are important to us, and with them we can keep Israel as a national home for the Jewish people and Jerusalem as its eternal capital.”

Wow! She thinks she can make the world “understand” – that’s more ambitious than a peace settlement given the world’s hatred of the only democratic and free country in the Middle East.

And she seems to fear not just losing Jerusalem but Israel itself as the home of the Jewish people!

Silvan Shalom, Vice Premier puts it most succinctly:

“There aren’t two Jerusalems. Jerusalem will not be divided. Jerusalem will remain the eternal capital of Israel. It’s not a promise. It’s a fact. Jerusalem will not be a topic for compromise.”

Now if you think that’s all a bit uncompromising let’s look what the PA are saying.

Again in the Jerusalem Post, reacting to rumours of a Obama’s “peace plan” President Mahmoud Abbas said:

One PA official said Abbas and his aides were currently studying which, he added, included “several positive points.” The official stressed, however, that some of the proposals mentioned in the plan were completely unacceptable to the Palestinians. These proposals, he said, included the talk about resettling Palestinian refugees in Arab countries, swapping lands between the future Palestinian state and Israel, creating a demilitarized state and granting the Old City of Jerusalem the status of an international city.

“The Palestinian position on these issues is very clear,” explained another PA official. “We insist on the right of return for all refugees on the basis of United Nations resolution 194, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with all of East Jerusalem, including the Old City, as its capital.”

The official said the PA had, in the past, rejected the idea of establishing a demilitarized state and swapping land with Israel.

“The only way to achieve real and lasting peace is by forcing Israel to withdraw from all the territories that were occupied in 1967,” he said.

The interpretation of resolution 194 is highly problematical. 194 does not offer a “Right of Return” nor does it mention Palestinian refugees exclusively. See this article for a full discussion.

The Palestinian position is still maximalist in that it demands ALL of Jerusalem and ALL refugees returning to Israel. As Alan Dershowitz so succinctly puts it:

… the only justification for Palestinians opting to exercise their right of return would be a macropolitical, rather than a microhumanitarian, one. It would be part of a large-scale, carefully orchestrated plan to return millions of Palestinians to Israel in order to overwhelm the Jewish state with a Palestinian majority. (The Case for Peace, John Wiley and Sons, inc. p. 47)

No Israeli government can ever agree to that and the Palestinians know it.

As for Jerusalem, the PA has and continues to make obnoxious statements which deny that Jerusalem was ever Jewish, that the Temple was was not built there, the Torah was altered to lay false historic claim to the Holy Land and all Jewish claims to Israel are bogus. This is nothing less than the negation of Jews and Judaism by denying there clear and evidenced historical connections to the Land of Israel.

June 1st 2008 worldnetdaily.com reporter Aaron Klein provided the following report:

“Jerusalem is Muslim. The blessed Al Aqsa mosque and Harem Al Sharif (Temple Mount) is 100 percent Muslim. The Israelis are playing with fire when they threaten Al Aqsa with digging that is taking place,” said Abbas’ chief of staff Rafiq Al Husseini.

WND also reported March 15th 2007:

The Jewish Temples never existed, the Western Wall really was a tying post for Muhammad’s horse, the Al Aqsa Mosque was built by angels, and Abraham, Moses and Jesus were prophets for Islam.

All this according to Sheikh Taysir Tamimi, chief Palestinian Justice and one of the most influential Muslim leaders in Israel. Tamimi is considered the second most important Palestinian cleric after Muhammad Hussein, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem.

… Tamimi, who preaches regularly from the Al Aqsa Mosque, claimed Jews have no historical connection to Jerusalem or Israel and that the Jewish Temples never existed.

“Israel started since 1967 making archeological digs to show Jewish signs to prove the relationship between Judaism and the city and they found nothing. There is no Jewish connection to Israel before the Jews invaded in the 1880’s,” said Tamimi…

“About these so-called two Temples, they never existed, certainly not at the Haram Al- Sharif (Temple Mount),” Tamimi said.

This is the same Sheikh Tamimi who ranted against Israel in front of Pope Benedict as I reported here.

Previously, a leader of the Waqf, the Islamic authority which manages the Temple Mount, was dismissed for stating the Jewish temples existed on the site of the Al Aksa mosque and that denying it is purely political.

The PA is supposed to be “moderate”. Maximalist positions are not moderate. In fact maximalist Palestinian positions and historical revisionism by its lay and religious leaders only give fuel to the current Israeli government to claim there is no point in pursuing solutions using old formulas which have always been rejected.

So we now have two entrenched positions.

Meanwhile President Obama seems to be moving ahead like someone driving a buggy without the horses.

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