Fifteen years ago, after the polical upheaval that followed the
Knesset elections of 1992, the new Israeli Labor-Meretz-led
government recognized the PLO as the sole legitimate representative
of the Palestinian people, and signed the Oslo Accords as a first
step in a process that was supposed to lead to the conclusion of
peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Although it signed the
agreement, Israel was not really prepared to meet the commitments
as stipulated by the Accords, nor indeed to implement the relevant
international resolutions pertaining to the Israeli-Palestinian
question.
Under the leadership of former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon during
the past five years, Israel's policy shifted from the search for a
solution to the conflict to a new strategy that focuses on
"conflict management," predicated solely on its own interests - the
strategy of "unilateral disengagement." It is the contention of
this article that Israel has moved to this new stage in managing
the conflict with the Palestinians essentially to contain the
demographic danger to the Jewish state and, at the same time, to
solve the problem of a protracted occupation without having to pay
the price expected by the Palestinians, or, at least, as demanded
by the relevant international resolutions.
Sharon depended on broad public support to pursue a gradual,
long-term interim solution, judging that the time hadn't yet come
for achieving a comprehensive peace with the Palestinians.
Following the failure of the Camp David summit in the summer of
2000, he estimated that the international community recognized that
rapid solutions usually led to failure. He also realized that
retaining control over the Palestinians of the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip would add an economic burden to Israel and make it
vulnerable to the many international and Israeli-Palestinian peace
initiatives, like the Geneva Initiative by Yossi Beilin and Yasser
Abed Rabbo, and the Nusseibeh-Ayalon initiative, both of which
gained significant Israeli public support. Sharon was faced with
the basic dilemma that Israel has been unable to resolve since its
occupation of the Palestinian territories in 1967: the
contradiction between the Zionist tendency to expand and annex new
territories, and the need to preserve the Jewish character of the
State of Israel (Ghanem, 2005a; Kabha, 2005; Muhareb, 2005;
Mansour, 2006; Nofal and Shalhat, 2006).
Sharon's new approach allows Israel to arrive at some sort of
settlement with the Palestinians while bypassing all the
commitments of the Oslo agreement and, at the same time, to
safeguard Jewish demographic superiority within the internal
borders of the state up to the Green Line. This way Sharon could
satisfy his public's demand for a long period of calm, without
having to pay the hefty price of compromising to the Palestinians
as required by international resolutions. Not surprisingly, this
approach found a good deal of public backing, since the majority of
Israelis support the establishment of a Palestinian state with a
limited sovereignty and independence.
For Sharon, unilateral withdrawal became the only viable course for
dealing with the Palestinian issue. It is largely based on his
age-old vision of the need to annex large areas of the West Bank
along the Green Line and the Jordan Valley, while concentrating the
Palestinian population in segregated enclaves, connected, at best,
by narrow strips of land. Gaza was the first enclave established
along these lines. The substantive change in Sharon's stance here
is not the acceptance of the need to divide the land of Israel, but
rather the readiness to call the Palestinian enclaves a
"state."
Components of the Israeli 'Post-Oslo' Stand
The goal of the Israeli post-Oslo policy is essentially based on
the following points: the drawing of Israel's permanent borders
unilaterally and not through bilateral agreements; the preservation
of a Jewish numerical superiority within the borders of the State
of Israel; the establishment of a cooperating authority on the
Palestinian side to cater to Israel's security and basic economic
and services needs. To accomplish this, Israel would have to annex
all of the land along the Green Line and in the Jordan Valley, and
additional large swaths of land to achieve contiguity between the
Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea.
Furthermore, Israel would expand settlements that are to stay in
the Palestinian territories by stepping-up building and encouraging
Jews to settle there. This suggests that Israel would have to cede
control over densely populated Palestinian areas to a Palestinian
authority and remove the Jewish settlements in those areas.
Consequently, eight to nine Palestinian enclaves would be
established, each hemmed in by settlements and military structures.
Israel would have no objection should the Palestinians choose to
call these enclaves a "Palestinian state."
* Unilateral Withdrawal/Withdrawals
The failure of Camp David and Ehud Barak's declaration that "there
is no Palestinian partner" prompted Sharon to draft his vision for
a unilateral withdrawal plan. He presented it during the Herzliya
conference on December 18, 2003, and which came to be known as the
"unilateral disengagement plan." He rejected withdrawal to the June
4, 1967 lines. Fully aware of what Zionism calls the "demographic
danger," Sharon sought the cantonization of historical Palestine
when he adopted the strategy of swapping withdrawal from the Gaza
Strip and 42 percent of the occupied West Bank in return for the
annexation of the Palestinian areas where the Jewish settlements
are established and as much land area of the West Bank as possible.
(Ghanem, 2005a; Amara, 2005; Kabha, 2005; Muhareb, 2005; Mansour,
2006; Nofal and Shalhat, 2006).
During the campaign for the 17th Knesset elections held on March
28, 2006, Kadima's candidate for prime minister, Ehud Olmert, was
unequivocal in his declared intention to forge ahead with the
unilateral option, totally sidelining the Palestinians as
negotiating partners. ("The Israeli View," Madar, Edition: 128,
March 7, 2006).
* Partial Self-Determination for the Palestinians
One of the most important aspects of the post-Oslo Israeli stand is
its evasion of the responsibility incumbent on an occupying power
to cater for the daily needs of the occupied population (in this
case the Palestinians), and its search, instead, to install a
Palestinian authority that would shoulder this burden.
Since the onset of the Oslo negotiations, it was clear that Israel
facilitated the establishment of the Palestinian Authority (PA),
while at the same time it imposed its own concept of what form it
should take and what mechanisms and tools it should have at its
disposal. It went as far as to accept the introduction of
legislative and administrative changes within the PA if this meant
the latter would meet Israeli expectations and interests (Ghanem,
2001).
However, when the al-Aqsa intifada broke out in 2000, Israel took
several measures to hamper the functioning of the PA. It waged a
full-scale military offensive against the territories, and
systematically destroyed all the PA infrastructure, rendering the
extension of services virtually impossible. It crushed the
Palestinian security forces and blocked any communication between
the Presidency in Ramallah and the rest of the territories, and all
but blocked diplomatic relations between the Palestinians and the
international community, especially Europe and the U.S.
Despite all the measures aimed at disabling the PA, Israel stopped
short of liquidating it on the official level. The intention was to
claim that a Palestinian body exists that is responsible for taking
care of the basic needs of the Palestinians, and to divest itself
from any responsibility as dictated by international law.
Following Yasser Arafat's demise and just before the Palestinian
legislative elections (January 2006), Sharon's government
de-escalated its confrontation with the PA in response to a call by
U.S. President George W. Bush. Israelis and Palestinians met to
discuss arrangements for the legislative elections. Israel
untertook to allow the Palestinian candidates to campaign and to
ensure calm and order on election day. Furthermore, it promised to
halt its incursions into Palestinian territories, to stop arrests
and assassinations and to ease restrictions on movement, especially
at checkpoints.
Although Israel publicly declared its intention to boycott any
Hamas-led government, preemting the election results, it did not go
as far as to dissolve the PA. This goes to prove that what Israel
needs is a Palestinian administrative body that would relieve it of
its responsibilities toward the Palestinians living under
occupation, but that would not have any real powers so as to pose a
threat to Israeli interests.
* Continued Settlement
In his declaration that he would take into consideration the
"natural" growth of settlers," Sharon did not propose an innovative
formula. The phrase "natural growth of settlers" has always been
used as a pretext for the annexation of more Palestinian land, and
for the enlargement of settlements and the construction of bypass
roads. The area of land seized and the number of housing units
added to the settlements largely exceed any "natural" growth of
settlers. In some settlements, thousands of housing units have been
built while dozens of flats remain vacant.
The official Israeli Sasson Report of March 2005, substantiates the
validity of allegations that almost all the Israeli ministries and
departments are engaged in funding what Israel itself considers as
illegal settlement. The 300-page report reveals the existence of a
steady official channel for providing services and maintenance to
outposts that don't have government construction approval.
Allegedly, several Israeli parties are accomplices in the
establishment of these outposts, including the Ministry of Defense
and the ministries of infrastructure, education, industry and
trade, finance, and others, as well as the Israeli army, the police
and the so-called Civil Administration. According to the report,
officials in these ministries and departments turned a blind eye
when settlers took over Palestinian-owned land or land considered
by the occupation as "state-owned," in violation of the law. The
settlers established 120 settlement outposts with a view of turning
them into entirely new settlements or new neighborhoods within
existing settlements that are only a few kilometers away.
* Building the Separation Wall
In mid-March of 2006, two weeks before the Israeli general
elections, the Kadima candidate, Ehud Olmert, stated his intention
to make the separation wall a permanent border for Israel. The idea
of building the separation wall wasn't devised by the present or
former Israeli government, but goes back to Labor Party leaders -
mainly Yitzhak Rabin and Haim Ramon - who came up with the
suggestion after the Beit Lid suicide attack in 1995. They proposed
the idea of total separation between the two peoples as a solution
that included sealed borders running along the Green Line, with
some amendments based on Israeli security considerations. The Likud
government developed Ramon's idea of "security amendments" to such
an extreme that a clear-cut separation between Palestinians and
Israelis became unfeasible. With the substantial land area
confiscated in the name of security, not only has separation become
impossible but the option of establishing a Palestinian state with
geographical contiguity has become unrealizable.
The proposed route for the separation wall - both completed and
planned - takes away large areas of the remaining Palestinian land
and leads to its fragmentation by Jewish settlement blocs, where a
Palestinian state is slated to be established as proposed by the
Road Map that was drafted as a possible future solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. When the Palestinians approached the
International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague, the Israeli
media launched a campaign to foil their efforts, or at least to
mobilize international support for Israel's stand so as to mitigate
the effects of any possible unfavorable ruling by the ICJ. When the
court ruled in support of Palestinian rights, the Israeli media
roundly rejected it, fully justifying the Israeli government's
pretext of security concerns (Ghanem, 2005a; Amara, 2005; Kabha,
2005; Muhareb, 2005; Mansour, 2006; Nofal and Shalhat, 2006).
* A De Facto Annexation of the Jordan Valley
Generally, the Israeli army prohibits the entry of Palestinians to
the Jordan Valley in the eastern part of the West Bank, and
restricts access to the area except to those officially registered
as residents of that area. B'Tselem warned that isolating the
Jordan Valley from the rest of the West Bank is a dangerous
violation of the human rights of many Palestinian residents. Yet
the step has been implemented without any formal government
decision and without any public information (Nofal and Shalhat,
2006).
Israel erected seven permanent roadblocks along the area from the
western Jordan Valley to the northern part of the Dead Sea. Four of
these roadblocks encircle the Jericho enclave, where the Israeli
army placed significant restrictions on the movement of the
Palestinians in the past four years. A spokesperson for the Israeli
army responded to the B'Tselem report of January 2006, saying that
access through these roadblocks was confined only to the residents
of the Jordan Valley based on their address in their identity
cards, and provided their place of residence was one of the
villages in the Jordan Valley. Other West Bank residents would be
required to have a special permit issued by the Civil
Administration.
The policy implemented by Israel in the eastern sector and the
related statements of high-ranking officers indicate that the real
motive behind Israel's policy isn't security or military, but
political. What is taking place is a de facto annexation of this
area to Israel, as happened in the case of the annexation of large
areas falling on the western side of the separation wall, in
flagrant violation of Palestinian right to
self-determination.
Summary
Under the leadership of Sharon, Israel shifted from seeking to
solve the conflict with the Palestinians to adopting a new strategy
for conflict management based on Israeli interests - the unilateral
disengagement plan.
It has now become clear that Olmert will follow in Sharon's
footsteps initiated in the disengagment from Gaza, and will
contemplate further unilateral withdrawals from parts of the West
Bank without considering the need for bilateral discussions with
the Palestinians, alleging that Hamas is a "terrorist" organization
with whom Israel cannot negotiate. Consequently, Israel seeks to
establish a "separation system" without achieving a historic
settlement; as a result, an entity will be established which is
"more than autonomy and less than a state." This situation will
lead to a crisis among the Palestinians and force them to seek
alternative solutions to an independent state, which might include
placing on the discussion table the proposal for a binational
state.
It is difficult at this stage to predict the path a future solution
will take. However, as we distance ourselves from the two-state
option, the possibility of a solution based on the concept of a
joint entity cannot be ruled out.
Bibliography
Alpher, Joseph and Shai Feldman (1989). The West Bank and Gaza:
Israel's Options of Peace. Tel Aviv:
Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, Tel Aviv
University.
Amara, Mohammad (2005). "The Political & Partisan Situation" in
As'ad Ghanem (ed.) Madar Strategic
Report: Israel 2004. Ramallah: Madar - The Palestinian
Forum for Israeli Studies, pp. 73-113
(Arabic).
Ghanem, As'ad (2001). The Palestinian Regime: A Partial Democracy.
London: Sussex Academic Press.
- (2001a). "The Palestinians in Israel: Political Orientation and
Aspirations,"
International Journal of
Inter-Cultural Relations 26: 135-152.
- (2002). "The Binational Idea in Palestine and Israel: Historical
Roots and
Contemporary Debate" The Holy Land
Studies Journal. 1/1. pp. 61-84.
-(2005) Marginalized Groups in Israel: A Challenge to Ashkenazi
Dominance. Ramallah: Madar - The
Palestinian Forum for Israeli Studies (Arabic).
- (2005a). (Ed.). Madar Strategic Report: Israel 2004. Ramallah:
Madar - The Palestinian Forum for
Israeli Studies (Arabic).
- (2005b). "The Binational Solution to the Israeli-Palestinian
Crisis: Conceptual Background and
Contemporary Debate" in: Abdul-Hadi, Mahdi (Ed.).
Palestinian-Israeli Impasse:
Exploring Alternative Solutions to the
Palestinian- Israeli Conflict.
Jerusalem: PASSIA (Palestinian Academic Society for the
Study of International Affairs), pp.
19-44.
Kabha, Mustafa (2005). "The Strategic Situation" in As'ad Ghanem
(ed.) Madar Strategic Report: Israel
2004. Ramallah: Madar - The Palestinian Forum for
Israeli Studies, pp. 115-145
(Arabic).
Mansour, Johnny (2006) (Ed.). Madar Strategic Report: Israel 2005.
Ramallah: Madar - The Palestinian
Forum for Israeli Studies (Arabic).
Nofal, Mamdouh & Atwan Shalhat (2006). "Israel, the Peace
Process & International
Relations" in Johnny Mansour (ed.). Madar Strategic Report:
Israel 2005. Ramallah: Madar - The
Palestinian Center for Israeli Studies
(Arabic).
Muhareb, Mahmoud. "Israel: The Palestinian Question &
International Relations" in As'ad
Ghanem (ed.) Madar Strategic Report: Israel 2004. Ramallah: Madar
- The Palestinian Center for Israeli
Studies, pp. 37-70 (Arabic).