BACKGROUND
Putting The Squeeze
On Once More
Washington is determined to settle the
Israel-Palestinian dispute, but the
obstacles remain formidable.
HELEN DAVIS
Foreign Correspondent
erusalem — As 1991
dawns, the words of
Secretary of State
James Baker are still ring-
ing in the ears of Israeli
Prime Minister Yitzhak
Shamir, following his visit to
the United States last mon-
th.
Washington, he was told
emphatically, had not aban-
doned its quest for a set-
tlement between Israel and
the Palestinians. The Gulf
crisis had served merely to
temporarily transfer the
issue to the back-burner.
Mr. Shamir chose to
characterize the encounter,
which is likely to set Israel's
agenda for the next 12 mon-
ths, as "a pleasant
meeting," but he cannot
have drawn any comfort
from Mr. Baker's repetition
of the international com-
munity's determination to
capitalize on its newfound
consensus and, one way or
another, find a solution to
the festering Arab-Israeli
conflict.
Recent political history
has demonstrated, however,
that peace-making in the
Middle East will take more
than the determined resolve
of the united international
community.
The Arab-Israeli conflict,
and, more specifically, the
Israeli-Palestinian dispute,
has stubbornly resisted all
attempts at resolution and
has already provided the
graveyard for scores of peace
plans and diplomatic in-
itiatives.
Israel is profoundly divid-
ed over the question of ter-
ritorial compromise — which
is implicit in any suggestion
of negotiations — for a host
of political, religious and
security reasons.
Mainstream Israeli polit-
ical opinion ranges right
across the waterfront, from
support for a total Israeli
withdrawal from all the ter-
ritory occupied in 1967 to a
blanket rejection of any no-
tion of withdrawal.
The depth of disagreement
could be gauged last March
when the mere hint that
Israel might be heading for
talks about talks with the
Palestinians was enough to
j
bring down the government
of national unity.
In the general elections
which followed, Mr. Shamir
won a paper-thin majority
for a radical right-
wing/religious coalition, a
majority that is thought to
have been strengthened by
Palestinian support for Iraq
in the Gulf crisis.
Indeed, Israeli political
analysts believe the balance
of Israeli opinion is shifting
decisively toward the hard-
line position of Mr. Shamir's
Likud Party, which is
dogmatically opposed to any
territorial concessions.
An additional com-
plicating factor in the Israeli
equation is the position of
the 800,000 Arabs who live
within Israel's pre-1967
borders, who hold Israeli
citizenship, but who have
become intensely radicalized
by the Palestinian intifada
over the past three years
and, more recently, by the
Gulf crisis.
There is growing, though
still undefined, agitation for
a measure of Arab self-
expression within Israel,
perhaps in the context of an
autonomous Arab area;
perhaps in confederation
with some future Palestin-
ian state and Jordan.
"The separatist trends
among the Palestinians in
Israel are increasing," one
Palestinian political activist
on the West Bank told me
last week. "Israeli Arabs
have been outspoken in their
support of Iraq, which
shocked many Israeli Jews."
Israelis were indeed
shocked when Abdel Wahab
Daroushe, a moderate Arab
member of the Knesset
(parliament) and formerly a
member of the Israeli Labor
Party, recently expressed his
support for the Iraqi regime
in the current crisis.
The Palestinian side of the
equation is also far from
monolithic. Like the Israelis,
the Palestinians are multi-
faceted and consist broadly
of three discrete elements:
the Palestinians in the oc-
cupied West Bank and Gaza
Strip; the Palestinians in
Jordan, and the Tunis-based
Palestine Liberation Organ-
ization (PLO).
Moreover, within each of
these are a variety of com-
peting, often conflicting, in-
Artwork from the Los Angeles nines by Catherine Kanner. Copyright G 1989, Catherine ICann....wt. by Los Angeles Times Syndicate.
terests — some political,
some religious.
The PLO is the acknowl-
edged political voice of the
Palestinian people, but since
the start of the intifada the
balance of power has shifted
toward the Palestinians
under occupation, who are in
the front line of the struggle
and who are now demanding
a greater voice in Palestin-
ian decision-making.
At the same time, there
are more Palestinians living
in Jordan than in the oc-
cupied territories, which
makes it difficult to con-
template a viable settlement
of the Palestinian issue
without taking Jordan into
account.
Hanna Siniora, editor of
the Jerusalem-based,
Arabic-language daily Al
Fajr, is widely discussed as a
candidate for any Palestin-
ian delegation that will
negotiate with Israel. He
glosses over the intra-
Palestinian differences.
"We insist on standing on
our own feet, having our own
flag, our passport and our
own state (in the occupied ter-
ritories)," he says. "But
in order to survive econ-
omically, there must be a
close working relationship
with Jordan, a confederation
on the basis of parity and
equality.
"We will create a structure
that respects the internal
hegemony of each country,
yet which also leads to econ-
omic interdependence,
security cooperation, joint
foreign policy . . . We will
minimize the points of fric-
tion and maximize issues of
cooperation and develop-
ment."
To some, however, this
formula is simply a utopian
vision of the future, not one
which addresses the need to
tease out the various strands
in the Palestinian move-
ment, apportion weight,
create balance and produce a
credible negotiating team
(see box).
"It's all very well saying
the PLO is the sole legiti-
mate representative of the
Palestinian people, but that
has become something of a
slogan, a rallying cry," one
senior Middle East analyst
told me. "Since the start of
the intifada, a good deal of
the running has been made
by the Palestinians under
occupation, so a good deal of
the weight has shifted to
them.
"But the intifada is not
what it used to be, the PLO
has lost its dialogue with the
Israel's move to the
right is thought to
have been
strengthened by
Palestinian support
for Iraq in the Gulf
crisis.
United States and a lot of its
international standing as a
result of its support for Iraq.
"Despite Jordan's support
for Iraq, it is likely that after
the Gulf crisis the West will
perceive the survival of the
Hashemite throne as being
of important strategic value
and, at that point, the bal-
ance may very well tip back
in favor of Jordan.
"You cannot ignore the
triangular nature of Pales-
tinian demography and Pa-
lestinian interests. In the
past, people have erred in
trying to exclude one or an-
other of these elements.
"The real issue is not how
to exclude this one or that
one, but how to achieve
relative balance among the
three — the PLO, Jordan
and the Palestinians under
occupation.".
The Gulf crisis has added
another dimension to this
complex equation: Jordan
serves as a buffer between
Israel and Iraq, and however
the crisis is ultimately
resolved, even those Israelis
who support a complete
withdrawal from the West
Bank are now insisting on
security arrangements that
relate to the east bank: the
kingdom of Jordan.
"It is highly unlikely that
Israelis like myself, who are
very willing to give up the
West Bank, would do so if
there was a danger that the
Iraqi Army would be
deployed along the Jordan
River the day after Israel's
withdrawal," says Dr. Asher
Susser, head of Tel Aviv
University's Center for Mid-
dle East Studies. "That is
now out of the question from
Israel's point of view."
Any withdrawal from the
West Bank, he says, would
probably require a broader
Arab-Israeli settlement
which would have to include
security arrangements that
guarantee the non-
introduction of foreign forces
into Jordan.
The Gulf crisis has indeed
produced a rude awakening
for Israelis who believed
that the Arabs states had
effectively withdrawn from
the battlefield and that it
was simply a matter of cut-
ting a deal with the Palesti-
nians in order to resolve
Israel's security problems.
"The Iraqi phenomenon is
an indication that Israel has
strategic concerns that go
far beyond the intifada."
"Once the Gulf crisis is
over and talks begin about
how to resolve the conflict —
which means the shape of
the entire Fertile Crescent
between Iraq and the
Mediterranean — I can't
imagine simply going back
to square one." ❑
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
27
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