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Ari Shavit's New Strategy

In a long feature in Friday's Haaretz magazine section, Ari Shavit calls for a new strategy to deal with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Shavit's premise is that the "occupation" and the Arab threat to destroy Israel must both end. The threat, he points out, came before the "occupation" and therefore the "occupation" cannot end unilaterally, before the existential threat does. Yet, the "occupation" only increases Arab hatred for Israel, which surely does not reduce the threat to Israel.

Shavit writes:

Even though there is ostensibly worldwide recognition that Israel is a threatened country, that recognition is not translated into concrete policy positions. While the international community is united in a decisive demand to end the occupation (of the Palestinians), it does not put forward a similarly decisive demand to lift the threat (from the Israelis). The incongruence between the adamance of the demand regarding the occupation and the laxness of the stand regarding the threat creates a dangerous situation. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict rests on two pillars. It is impossible to address the one without addressing the other. It is impossible to terminate the occupation without removing the threat - the two are interlocked.

Shavit explains that for years the international community believed that peace would end both the "occupation" and the threat, but the Palestinian rejection of a two-state solution in 2000-01 and the ensuing Palestinian terror shows that peace is very unlikely to be attained in the present generation.

Therefore, according to Shavit, "new thinking is needed now. There is an urgent need for a new overall strategy."

Shavit's strategy is as follows: If Israel agrees to withdraw from "80 to 90 percent of the West Bank" and evacuate tens of thousands of Israeli "settlers", with a Palestinian state to be established in those areas, Israel would have "the right to make certain demands from the international community. It has the right to demand that its withdrawal line be recognized as a line of self-defense, from inside of which Israel is entitled to exercise its right to protect itself."

Shavit's strategy is a pipe dream. If Israel withdraws from "only" 80 or even 90 percent of Judea and Samaria, terrorism would continue and the international world - with the support of some leftist Israelis - would call for a complete withdrawal. Regardless of whether Israel would have "the right to make certain demands from the international community," those demands would be ignored.

Shavit is right, however, that new thinking for a new overall strategy is needed. Consideration is essential of solutions other than the unrealistic two-state solution, including the idea of a Jordanian-Palestinian confederation, which, prior to Oslo, was the potential political solution most favored by the mainstream Israeli left.
posted on 6/28/2005