A DAY OF PEACE
stirrings in his heart, Mr.
Rabin was the very embodi-
ment of Israel's mood.
Anyone who failed to fath-
om the visceral appeal that
this withdrawn, often clumsy
man had to the Israeli public
in last year's election finally
understood it Monday.
In calling out the words
"Enough of blood and tears.
Enough!" he spoke from the
heart of what Ha'aretz
columnist Gideon Samet has
called the "new Israeli major-
ity — quiet, secular, perhaps
a bit tired, and involved first
of all in its own personal
affairs."
In Israel, the reviews for
Mr. Rabin were ecstatic.
The Knesset is scheduled
to debate and ratify the
autonomy agreement next
week, but how the vote will
go remains to be seen.
Israeli society remains as
divided as ever, and in purely
political terms the "new
Israeli majority" could prove
to be a tenuous one.
The last poll published on
the subject (before the
Washington ceremony)
showed that 57 percent of the
country's Jews were in favor
of the agreement, 41 per-
cent were opposed. After fac-
toring in Israel's Arab citi-
zens, support rose to 60 per-
cent — a clear majority in
favor of compromise and rec-
onciliation, but not a smash-
ing one.
Israel's breakthrough
came about because Israel's
present government was
convinced that if it did
not answer the knock of his-
toric opportunity now, it
might not come again for
generations.
This is not the first time in
Israel's brief history that the
nation's leaders have hauled
their people into taking a
momentous and hazardous
step. Fearing a massacre of
the badly outnumbered
Jewish community in 1948,
on the eve of the establish-
ment of Israel, leading
figures in the dominant
Labor movement got cold feet
and wanted to postpone the
declaration of statehood.
But David Ben-Gurion was
convinced, as Abba Eban has
written, "that if the sun set
on 15 May [1948] without the
renewal of Jewish indepen-
dence, it would never rise
again." And it was by dint of
his iron will that the State of
Israel was born.
Egged on by Shimon Peres'
far-reaching vision and
unsinkable optimism,
Yitzhak Rabin overcame his
own psychological barriers
and tendency toward diffi-
dence to take a "risk for
peace," just as he had
pledged to do.
Many of his countrymen
have yet to do so. 111
Benjamin Netanyahu: dire predictions for the peace plan.
The
Vanquished
Arafat.
In spite of the
right wing's passion-
ate, at times violent
demonstrations, and
their relentless
warnings of cata-
strophe, polls
showed that popular
Israeli support for
"Gaza-Jericho First"
had steadily
increased, and was
now running about
60 percent.
In the Likud
Party's Tel Aviv
headquarters, a sec-
retary described the
mood: "It's horrid,
it's so bad you can
hardly describe it in
words. You can feel
it, you can see it on
people's faces:
they're in despair."
After the secret
Israel-PLO agree-
ment was revealed,
the right-wing oppo-
sition tried to con-
vince the public that
the pact did not
mean just autono-
my, or just Gaza
and Jericho, but
something much
larger and more sin-
ister.
Netanyahu pre-
dicted that the PLO
would not only drive
Jewish settlers out
of the West Bank
and Gaza, and end
up with a state in
all of the territories
plus East Jeru-
salem, but that it
would then swallow
up Jordan, and form
a military alliance
with Iraq and possi-
bly Iran.
References to the
Holocaust were com-
mon: a T-shirt worn
by one settler across
from the Prime
Minister's Office
read, "Isn't 6,000,000'
enough?"
But most Israelis
already realized that
the plan wasn't only
for autonomy, that it
could well lead to a
Palestinian state,
and still they went
along with it.
In Tel Aviv's open-
air Carmel Market,
traditionally a bas-
tion of harsh anti-Arab senti-
ment, one fruit seller
explained why he backed the
plan: "My son is going into
the army soon. I don't want
to see him in Gaza.
Okay, it probably will lead
to a Palestinian state, but
that's nothing for us to be
afraid of."
A kitchen utensils vendor
said, "Sure it'll end up in a
Palestinian state. Look what
In Israel's right-wing Likud Party, which
bitterly opposed the peace accord, the mood
is one of despair. LARRY DERFNER ISRAEL CORRESPONDENT
erusalem — The dem-
onstration seemed a
huge success. Jews,
mainly religious ones,
streamed into the capi-
tal from all across the
country, over 1,000 buses
filled with protesters clog-
ging the highways. They
were packed across the vast
slopes facing the Prime
Minister's Office, sure that
such a massive show of
strength would prove that
the Israeli people wanted
this agreement with the PLO
stopped.
"We will win," shouted
Likud leader Bibi Netan-
yahu. But this was their high
point. Three days later,
Prime Minister Yitzhak
Rabin signed a letter
recognizing the PLO. Three
days after that, he was on
the White House lawn with
PLO Chairman Yassir
.
happened in Algeria: they
started off with autonomy,
and then they got a state. All
the settlers are going to
have to leave, and the
Palestinians will have a state
in all of Judea, Samaria and
Gaza - everywhere but Jeru-
salem."
The opposition wanted
new elections. Rabin had no
mandate to do what he was
doing, they said, and before
he took such fateful steps, he
must "go to the people." On
this point, at least, the right
wing had overwhelming sup-
port: polls showed that
roughly two-thirds of Israelis
were in favor of a referen-
dum on Gaza-Jericho First.
However, the government
seemed to take the other poll
results — those that showed
wide backing for the agree-
ment itself — as its referen-
dum.
The fear of civil war
between the Jews began to
fade. At most, it seemed, a
few hotheads might try some
violent stunts — if the Shin
Bet didn't get to them first —
but there would be no upris-
ing. Still, Baruch Marzel, one
of the leaders of Kach, said,
"Our program is to do every-
thing — and that includes
everything — to stop the sui-
cide of Israel."
Some of the mainstream
settlers, however, were talk-
ing about other tactics, main-
ly mass civil disobedience.
Benny Katsover, head of the
settlements in Samaria, said
their aim was to galvanize
"the high percentage of
people who care, who are
dedicated, who are ready to
go to jail" to bring the nation
to a halt and force new elec-
tions. "If we get tens of thou-
sands of people to sit down
on the streets all over the
country, we can do it," he
said.
He was standing in a
sandlot on a hill about 100
yards from the PM's Office. It
was the third and next-to-
last day of the demonstra-
tion, and there were no more
than 200 people there.
Down the hill, in the street
separating the protesters
from the PM's Office, a pha-
lanx of policemen was stand-
ing, relaxed. They had used
billy clubs and water can-
nons on the protesters who
tried to cross the barricades,
and arrested dozens of them.
The demonstrations petered
out.
That night, one dogged set-
tler banged a metal pole on a
big rock, and blew a whistle,
trying to send a message to
Rabin. It was not known if
Rabin was in his office, and
even if he was, by the time
all the banging and whistling
reached his ears, it would
have sounded like faint back-
ground noise. ❑