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Back To The Future

The emerging stories from Israel for 1997
might hold a few surprises.

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KENNETH W. STEIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

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ometimes in telling about president would be Israel's best
the Middle East, it's far friend since Harry Truman?
How about if I had added that
simpler and less painful to
foretell the future than to Yitzhak Rabin, again prime
minister, would have been
predict the past.
Everyone has a different Gettin g back assassinated and that Shi-
spin on the past. That's be- up: An Israeli mon Peres would replace
soldi er in
him as the Labor Party
cause ideology becomes Hebro
n plays
candidate, but lose the
tangled with reality. And
wit ha
election to Binyamin Ne-
with the Arab-Israeli con-
Pales tinian
tanyahu, then in his late
flict, rarely are audiences
bo y.
20s?
satisfied with a historians
For good nature, Pd toss in that
rendition.
But in retelling the past, the building and expanding Israeli
expert is accountable to everyone settlements in the territories
including the Almighty. For ex- would create an uncomfortable
ample, if I left out that Israel burden to the U.S.-Israeli rela-
Prime Minister Binyamin Ne- tionship.
Would the credibility police at
tanyahu was no Menachem Be-
gin, that Bill Clinton was no Emory have stripped me of a hard
Jimmy Carter, or that Yassir earned and costly University of
Arafat was no Anwar Sadat, Michigan doctorate? Would I be
someone would have held my feet made chairperson of the Depart-
to the fire. They would have been ment of "Misplaced Reality " or
been awarded an endowed chair
absolutely correct.
On the other hand, in fore- in certified nonsense? Of course
telling the future, the worst that not.
So, since there are no penalties
can happen is that an expert or
analyst is called crazy. In all the for predicting the future, here are
speaking I have done over the my estimates for 1997:
• There will be an agreement
years, the only warning I ever re-
on Hebron. Mr. Netanyahu will
ceive is don't be too left or too right
honor a public obligation to the
about the past.
But no one ever cautions me Oslo agreements and will try si-
not to be audaciously speculative multaneously to hasten conclu-
about the future. So what if in sion of the final status talks with
May of 1977 I had predicted that the Palestinians in order to avoid
the Israeli government would, additional territorial concessions.
• American Jews, regardless of
within two decades, have signed
peace treaties with Egypt and Jor- the personal feelings about Mr.
dan, that the cold war in the Mid- Netanyahu, will come to under-
dle East would end, that the stand and even appreciate his de-
influence of Arab oil money would finition of statesmanship. As he
fade, that Israel would willingly recently said, "The test is to pro-
recognize and negotiate with the tect your own interests by setting
PLO and turn portions of West policy that defines the limits and
Bank and Gaza territory over to demands and the parameters of
Yassir Arafat, and that the U.S. the game."
• Israelis will continue to seek
Dr. Kenneth W. Stein is professor
separation of their lives from the
of Near Eastern history and
Palestinians, but will not be able
political science at Emory
to reach a political consensus
University.
about the degree of further terri-

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