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99
Israel And The PLO:
Cut To The Tough Issues
DR. ROBERT 0. FREEDMAN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
M
ore than a year and a
half after the famous
handshake on the
White House lawn be-
tween Israeli Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Lib-
eration Organization Chairman
Yassir Arafat, and more than a
year after the signing of the May
4, 1994, implementation agree-
ment between Israel and the
PLO in Cairo, it is clear that the
Israeli-Palestinian peace process
is not working.
Similarly, despite the limited
agreement on security arrange-
ments reached last month, the
peace talks between Syria and Is-
rael are moving at a glacial pace
— at best — while war rages in
South Lebanon between Syrian
proxy forces and Israeli troops.
Only in the case of Jordan, with
which a peace treaty was signed
in October 1994, can Israel point
to real progress in the peace
process, and there is a real ques-
tion as to whether the Israeli-Jor-
danian peace agreement can be
maintained if there is no progress
in the Israeli-Palestinian or Is-
raeli-Syrian talks. Given this sit-
uation it is time for Israel to
re-examine its peace strategy.
It was the premise of the Oslo
agreement that there would first
be a two-year period of "confi-
dence building" between Israel
and the PLO during which the
easier questions such as tourism,
education and taxation would be
dealt with. As the parties got
used to cooperating, the theory
went, momentum would be built
up so that, after two years, they
could tackle more difficult prob-
lems such as the future of
Jerusalem, Israeli settlement in
occupied territory, and final se-
curity and territorial arrange-
ments.
Unfortunately, the confidence-
building period has turned into a
confidence-destroying period, as
acts of Palestinian terrorism em-
anating from the Gaza Strip have
raised serious doubts in the
minds of the majority of Israelis
about turning over large parts of
the West Bank to Palestinian
rule lest that area too become a
base of terrorism.
Mr. Rabin's protestations that
his government "will fight ter-
rorism as if there were no peace
negotiations and pursue peace
negotiations as if there were no
Dr. Robert 0. Freedman is the
acting president of Baltimore
Hebrew University and editor
of "Israel Under Rabin"
(Westview Press, 1995).
terrorism" ignores the obvious
link between the two in the eyes
of most Israelis, and is the rea-
son for his plummeting in the Is-
raeli polls.
Mr. Rabin should simply ac-
knowledge that the "confidence-
building" strategy has failed and
move directly to a discussion of
final status issues. This would en-
tail Israel's drawing a map of the
territories it wants to keep while
turning the others over to the
Palestinians.
Such a strategy would prevent
diplomatic fiascoes like the re-
cently suspended Israeli annex-
ation of Arab property in east
Jerusalem and the continuing
irritation caused by settler ac-
tivities in Hebron and Kiryat
Arba. Jerusalem, it will be re-
membered, was to be a final-sta-
tus issue and such annexations
violate the spirit if not the letter
of the Oslo accord. Drawing the
line on settlers will mean that a
number of them (and their sup-
porters in the Likud and Na-
tional Religious parties) will be
angered.
Forget "confidence
building" between
Israel and the PLO.
Unlike the Golan, however,
there is no national consensus
that all the settlements should
be kept. In addition, it should be
remembered that the majority of
West Bank and Gaza settlers
moved to those areas not for ide-
ological reasons but because they
got cheap mortgages when the
Likud was in power. Indeed,
what was perceived as wasting
more than $2 billion in settle-
ment construction was one of the
reasons Likud lost the 1992 elec-
tions to Labor. In addition, the
settlers comprise only 2 percent
of Israel's population.
There remains, of course, the
question as to how Israel should
respond if the West Bank terri-
tories Israel gives up to the Pales-
tinians in a final peace settlement
are used, as Gaza has been, for
terrorist attacks against Israel.
The answer is simple. Israel, ex-
ercising the right of self-defense
that is part of the U.N. charter,
should not hesitate to pursue ter-
rorists into the West Bank, or
Gaza for that matter.
One of the major mistakes
made by Mr. Rabin was not fol-
lowing this policy against Hamas
PLO page 12
F