Updates

Update from AIJAC

November 18, 2011
Number 11/11 #05

The Palestinians appear to have failed in their bid to even force the US to veto a UN Security Council decision to recognise them as a UN member state, and seem a bit confused about their next step. PA President Mahmoud Abbas seems to be now pushing for a unity government with Hamas following secret talks in Cairo. He is planning to meet Hamas head Khaled Meshaal next week, and it seems likely PA Prime Minister Salem Fayyad may be forced out of office.

This Update deals with the general state of play in terms of where the Palestinian could head next.

First up is a useful analysis from the British group BICOM, pointing out the strategic options for the Palestinians, and how Israel may react. It also looks at the roots of the Palestinian decision to reject negotiations and instead pursue statehood unilaterally in international forums and concludes that many of the current plans the Palestinians appear to be pursuing risk “a dangerous deterioration on the ground.” For this important look at the parameters of the current strategic crossroads for the Palestinians and how they got here, CLICK HERE. Former top American official dealing with Israeli-Palestinian issues Elliot Abrams argues that the Palestinians currently appear lost at sea.

Next up, human rights activist David Keyes has a satirical look at those who insist on seeing moderation in the pronouncements of Hamas (which Abbas is now courting). He agrees that they are indeed moderating – going from saying that Jews are “pigs and monkeys” to saying they are “siblings of pigs and monkeys” and moving from them saying all Jews will be killed to saying Hamas will merely “sweep them out of the land.” It’s a very funny piece, based on real quotes, and to read it all, CLICK HERE.

Finally, an important piece, albeit somewhat lengthy, from Yosef Kuperwasser and Shalom Lipner, two senior Israeli public servants. They explain in detail the Israeli perception of the conflict, and compile extensive evidence for their central proposition –  peace has not come because many or most Palestinians continue to refuse to accept the national rights and aspirations of the Jewish people. They tackle in detail both the Palestinian arguments against such recognition of Israel and why it remains a sine qua non of real peace. For this must-read article on the real core of the current peace process impasse, CLICK HERE. A slightly different take on the Palestinian problem with accepting Israel’s right to exist, explained through the concept of “poetic reality”, comes from African-American intellectual Shelby Steele.

Readers may also be interested in:

• Israel again complains to the UN about the ongoing rocket fire from Gaza.
• A Palestinian group hailed as the Palestinian “Peace Now” make it clear their goal is not peace but Israel’s destruction.
• An interesting report on the political effects of the Palestinian UNESCO admission.
• Iran is training Gazans to use anti-tank rockets against Israel.
• Hezbollah’s frightening plans for the next war with Israel.
• Despite its explicit report on Iran’s nuclear program, the International Atomic Energy Agency punts on follow-up and avoids taking the issue to the UN Security Council.
• An account of how Egypt’s interim government is becoming increasingly repressive.
• Some examples from the many stories and comments now appearing at AIJAC’s daily “Fresh AIR” blog:
  • An answer to the question ” How much land do West Bank settlements take up?
  • A post on women and the Arab Spring.
  • The Age and Courier Mail  get it badly wrong in a piece about a Palestinian protest. 
  • Jamie Hyam’s latest Media Week column, featuring Richard Woolcott and a Brouhaha over Israel’s Bedouins.

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 Deterioration in Israeli-Palestinian relations

BICOM Analysis, 11/11/2011

Key points

• The Palestinian request for full membership of the UN is on the verge of failure, having proven unable to garner a nine vote majority. The Palestinians are now expected to seek non-member state status via the General Assembly.

• The intense Palestinian activity at the UN is part of a broader effort to seek alternatives to the diplomatic framework that has guided Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy for decades.

• Palestinian initiatives at the UN, which have led to Israeli and US responses against the PA, threaten to deteriorate cooperation on the ground, and are a reversal of the bottom-up progress made in recent years in the West Bank. The failure of the Palestinians at the Security Council also threatens the PA’s domestic credibility.

• International diplomatic efforts are now underway to formulate a resolution that would enable the Palestinians to receive UN General Assembly endorsement, while preventing steps that could make a return to negotiations more complicated, such as litigation against Israel in the International Criminal Court. It is still unclear whether such an outcome is possible.

Introduction: the Palestinians facing a strategic crossroads

On Friday 11 November the UN Security Council (UNSC) will discuss the report of its admissions committee tasked with assessing the Palestinian request for UN membership. The US declared that it would veto from the outset. It now seems, however, that the Palestinians are unlikely even to garner the nine-vote majority needed to force a US veto.

The Palestinian leadership is at a crossroads following the failure of the UNSC bid. The option they are expected to take is to ask the the UN General Assembly to upgrade Palestine to the status of non-member observer state. The Palestinians would expect to secure a majority in the General Assembly for such a move. There are reports that the Palestinians may seek a vote on 29 November, the date that commemorates the UN vote endorsing the 1947 plan to partition Palestine into a Jewish and Arab state.

Being recognised as a state by the General Assembly could pave the way for the Palestinians to seek membership of other UN affiliated international bodies. Israel is particularly concerned that the International Criminal Court might accept the 2009 Palestinian request to be recognised as a state, which could pave the way for war crimes allegations to be brought against Israel.

The Palestinians are also reportedly preparing to apply for membership of 16 other UN affiliated international agencies, starting with the World Health Organisation and the World Food Programme. This follows their recent success as being admitted as a full member of UNESCO.

However, the collapse of the UNSC bid may alternatively push Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to pursue more radical strategies. Abbas is reportedly keen to resign his position as President of the Palestinian Authority, and to be looking for an opportunity to do so. He may yet decide to reject the possibility of non-member state status at the General Assembly, and instead pursue the stalled unity agreement with Hamas and the plan to hold new Palestinian elections in May 2012.

Another, more dangerous possibility being mooted by some Palestinian officials is the threat to dismantle the Palestinian Authority. This would seem to run contrary to the strategy of having Palestine recognised as a state, and it is far from clear how this threat could be carried out in practice. Nevertheless, it reflects a genuine desire among some Palestinians to sweep away the current framework for negotiations, which they believe no longer serves Palestinian interests.

What are the Palestinian strategic options?

In many respects the Palestinian leadership has been internally divided over its strategy and goals. However, the broad thrust of their approach, since the election of current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu three years ago, has been to seek alternatives to negotiations.

The Annapolis final status talks in 2008 culminated with a substantial offer by then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, to which Abbas did not respond. At the same time, despite constructive direct talks, many Palestinians were calling into question the very notion of negotiations, and considering alternative strategies to promote Palestinian aims. An influential 2008 document by the Palestinian Strategy Group (PSG) offers important insights into the Palestinian’s strategic alternatives.

The authors of the PSG report argued that the negotiation process had proven unable to secure Palestinian demands, because Israel, as the stronger partner, had proven unwilling to make the necessary compromises for peace. The document claimed that attempts to resolve the conflict through negotiations served Israel’s interests, by perpetuating the status-quo and making the occupation easier for Israel to manage. Consequently, it rejected the existing approaches to peacemaking and promoted securing Palestinian rights with international support instead. This included promoting Palestinian rights in the context of a one-state solution that would challenge, “the existence of the State of Israel in its present form.”

There are other interpretations that argue that Israel has in fact made significant compromises in negotiations. These include, for example, the proposals made by Ehud Barak in 2000 and Ehud Olmert in 2008, and would claim that negotiations failed because the Palestinians have proven unwilling to face up to the compromises they would have to make for peace.

Some of the alternative approaches articulated in the 2008 PSG document can be identified in recent Palestinian policies. Since the election of Benjamin Netanyahu in 2009, at the head of a right leaning Israeli coalition, the Palestinians have evaded negotiations, which Netanyahu has repeatedly called for, and sought alternatives. In recent months the Palestinians have rejected intense international efforts to restart negotiations. This is despite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu making significant concessions on the terms of reference – including reportedly accepting the reference of the 1967 borders as a basis for negotiations, as long as demographic changes on the ground were recognised. However, instead of negotiations the Palestinians have focussed on moving the Palestinian diplomatic struggle into the international arena. This also includes a campaign to deepen Israeli isolation internationally through boycotts and divestment.

A further step proposed by the PSG 2008 report, and now being advocated by some Palestinian officials, is for the Palestinians to consider “A radical reconfiguration (or abolition) of the PA” in the face of failed negotiations. Policy-makers in Ramallah are clearly divided over the way forward. However, under the leadership of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, over the past four years the institutions for a Palestinian state have been successfully developed on the ground. The bid for UN recognition, led by PA President Abbas, in confronting the US and Israel, risks the withdrawal of funds and endangers the viability of these nascent Palestinian institutions. Furthermore, the proposal to actively reconfigure or abolish the PA also runs counter to the state building approach.

Internal political calculations play an important role in shaping the Palestinian diplomatic strategy. Pressurising Israel on the international stage and defying international demands to return to negotiations has won Abbas, and his Fatah party, significant support among the Palestinian public. It has also permitted Fatah, at the helm of the PA, to avoid unpopular compromises, which a negotiated settlement with Israel would entail. This is particularly important given the pressure Fatah is under from Hamas, which continues to promote violent ‘resistance’ as the only way to promote Palestinian goals.

What is behind Israel’s reaction?

In responding to the Palestinian moves, the Israeli government finds itself balancing competing considerations. Following the Palestinian rejection of negotiations and its successful bid to gain membership of UNESCO, Israel felt compelled to retaliate. It did so by advancing the construction of housing units in some West Bank settlement blocs, and temporarily freezing tax transfers to the PA. The response drew inevitable criticism from the US and the European Union, but Netanyahu, like Abbas, also has to consider his domestic political audience. In recent weeks, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who is competing for Netanyahu’s centre-right support base, has increased his rhetorical attacks on the Palestinian leadership and PA President Abbas.

At the same time, the temporary freeze of tax transfers drew criticism from members of the Israeli defence establishment, who argue that the money is needed to fund vital PA’s security forces. Despite increasing tensions between Jerusalem and Ramallah, IDF commanders continue to work closely with their Palestinian counterparts. Israel recently transferred anti-riot gear to the Palestinian Security Forces. Furthermore, Palestinian West Bank security forces have also arrested an increasing number of Hamas activists involved in terrorist plots in the last few months.

The improved performance of Palestinian security forces has been the basis for the reduction of IDF activities in the West Bank, leading to improved freedom of movement for Palestinians and considerable economic development. It is in Israel’s interests to see this positive momentum in the West Bank continue. However, it is unclear whether this bottom-up approach is sustainable in the long run without a top-down diplomatic effort. The Palestinian determination to avoid bilateral negotiations makes this tension increasingly difficult to resolve.

What are the repercussions for the broader diplomatic effort?

Events in recent weeks have validated many of the concerns expressed about the Palestinian unilateral bid for recognition at the UN. In an interview with the Jewish Chronicle, BICOM Senior Visiting Fellow Brig.-Gen. (Rt.) Mike Herzog argued that Israel is in a “very dangerous situation in our relationship with the Palestinians, things could escalate very quickly politically and on the ground.”

Palestinian relations with the US have also deteriorated to the detriment of the financial stability of the PA and the peace process. In response to the Palestinian application for UN membership, US Congress froze for several months the transfer of approximately $200 million to the PA. This prevented many Palestinian civil servants from receiving their salaries. Another $192 million, intended for infrastructure projects, is still being withheld and could add to the PA’s financial difficulties.

The Palestinian efforts to internationalise their diplomatic struggle is also undermining America’s role as the key international broker in the process. The PA’s determination to force the Americans to use their veto in the Security Council was intended to embarrass President Obama’s administration. This risks creating a diplomatic vacuum, as no other international actor has the leverage on both parties that is required to take the US role as the key broker in the peace process.

The Palestinian diplomatic effort has exposed the extent to which the EU lacks internal cohesion on the issue, despite the efforts of Britain, France and Germany to coordinate its policy. The UNESCO vote saw a three-way split with France supporting the bid, Germany opposing it and the UK abstaining. What’s more, Britain and France are both expected to abstain in the Security Council, whilst Germany is likely to vote against.

Having proven unable to unite the international community behind its UN membership bid, or even to force the US into an embarrassing veto, the Palestinian Authority may suffer further damage to their credibility among the Palestinian public – to the benefit of Hamas and others that reject the peace process.

To prevent this deterioration, international efforts are underway to formulate a General Assembly resolution that would enable the Palestinians to claim success in their bid for recognition, without inalterably damaging the peace process. This means not prejudicing future negotiations by imposing final status terms that Israel cannot accept, or paving the way for steps that make negotiations harder to resume, such as litigation at the International Criminal Court.

A statement by Foreign Minister William Hague about the UK’s position ahead of the UN Security Council vote did not rule out British support for a General Assembly resolution, but stressed that: “We and the other countries of the EU will continue to emphasise that any proposition put to the General Assembly must make a return to negotiations more likely.” It remains unclear whether such a balance can be struck.

Conclusion

The approach advocated by some Palestinians to transform the current diplomatic framework by rejecting negotiations, internationalising the conflict and threatening to dismantle the PA risks a dangerous deterioration on the ground. A negotiated two-state solution remains the best option to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even if an immediate return to negotiations is not likely, it remains important to avoid making the situation worse. This includes avoiding a reversal of the bottom up progress seen in the Palestinian Authority in recent years, and avoiding steps in international forums that will undermine the basis for a future negotiated agreement.

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I was wrong about Hamas

David Keyes

 Israel Hayom, Nov. 18, 2011

I was wrong about Hamas and I admit it. For years, I have consistently said that Hamas is a radical terrorist organization that must never be negotiated with. After much reflection, I now realize that Hamas has moderated its positions and can be an ally in peace.

Consider the dramatic changes in rhetoric by Hamas leaders. Back when he was a extremist in 2007, Hamas parliamentary Deputy Speaker Ahmad Bahr said that Jews were “apes and pigs” and should all be killed. “O Allah, vanquish the Jews and their supporters,” he cried out. “O Allah, vanquish the Americans and their supporters. O Allah, count their numbers, and kill them all, down to the very last one.” But weeks ago, Bahr moderated his position and now calls Jews the “siblings of monkeys and pigs.” He hasn’t called for genocide against Jews in months and now simply urges his brethren to “sweep them out of our land.” From genocide to ethnic cleansing in just four years? Imagine what 2012 might hold! Perhaps calling merely for the enslavement of Jews? Indeed, anything is possible if we remain hopeful.

Back in 2008 when Hamas parliamentarian Yunis al Astal was an extremist, he called for the conquering of America and Europe. In a moment of youthful indiscretion — and who hasn’t had a few of those? — he termed Jews the “brothers of apes and pigs.” Today he has changed his tune almost entirely. In May, on Al Aqsa TV, he said, “All the predators, all the birds of prey, all the dangerous reptiles and insects, and all the lethal bacteria are far less dangerous than the Jews.” Jews, he added, have been brought to Palestine so that Muslims “will have the honor of annihilating the evil of this gang.” Notice how he entirely dropped the global conquest rhetoric? Today he speaks modestly and moderately of slaughtering Jews only.

In 2008, Hamas parliamentarian Fathi Hammad berated the Arab world for allowing 300 million people to be subjugated by a few million Israelis — the “brothers of apes and pigs” in Hammad’s then radical words. Fast-forward to today and Hammad, as interior minister, has had to deal with the realities of governing Gaza. His rhetoric has seen a commensurate shift toward moderation. “The Jews have become abhorred and loathed outcasts, because they live off corruption and the plundering of the peoples — not only the Arab and Islamic peoples, but all the peoples of the world,” he said last December on Al Aqsa TV. Who can doubt that “abhorred and loathed outcasts” is a step forward from “brothers of apes and pigs”?

When Hamas Culture Minister Atallah Abu al-Subh was a radical back in 2008, he spoke of the “evil of the Jews, their deceit, their cunning, their war-mongering, their control of the world, and their contempt and scorn for all the peoples of the world …” Today, Subh, too, has moderated his message. “The Jews are the most despicable and contemptible nation to crawl upon the face of the Earth,” he said in April on Al Aqsa TV. “Allah will kill the Jews in the hell of the world to come …”

If Hamas keeps up this dramatic transformation, one can imagine a world in the not too distant future in which Jews are no longer hatefully called “apes and pigs” but rather moderately called “second cousins once-removed of apes and pigs.”

David Keyes is the executive director of Advancing Human Rights and co-founder of CyberDissidents.org.

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The Problem Is Palestinian Rejectionism

By Yosef Kuperwasser and Shalom Lipner

Foreign Affairs, November/December 2011

Peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have failed miserably. The reason, write two senior Israeli government officials, is not disagreement over specific issues, such as settlements or Jerusalem, but something much more fundamental: the Palestinians’ refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

Nearly two decades of peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have failed miserably. The key reason for this failure is the Palestinians’ refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

The basic paradigm of the Oslo accords, signed in 1993, held that both the Israelis and the Palestinians were, at long last, prepared to recognize the legitimacy of each other’s national rights and aspirations. With that essential threshold crossed, it was thought, all that would remain was to work out a compromise on core issues: where to draw borders, whether and how to divide Jerusalem, and how to resolve the Palestinian demand that refugees from the 1948 war be allowed to return to Israel.

That, at least, was the theory. Yet over the course of the last 18 years, during which negotiations were conducted along these lines, the rhetoric and actions of the Palestinian leadership have proved that paradigm wrong. The Palestinians have not in fact recognized the legitimacy of the national rights of the Jewish people. Consider, for example, the Palestinians’ refusal to negotiate with Israel over the past year, a result, they say, of continued settlement construction in Jerusalem and beyond the 1967 lines. This is a dubious claim given that the Palestinians have never made halting construction a precondition before. And when Israel did freeze settlement building for ten months in 2009–10, the Palestinians still refused to talk, only agreeing to do so at the last moment and even then only to prevent a crisis in their relations with the United States.

The true reason for the intransigence among Palestinian officials has nothing to do with settlement building; rather, it is their continued rejection of the Jewish character of Israel. The Palestinians are fully aware that once they sit down at the negotiating table and agreement is reached on all other outstanding issues, they will need to answer whether they are ready to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. And as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the U.S. Congress this past May, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “has never been about the establishment of a Palestinian state. It has always been about the existence of the Jewish state.” He continued: “The Palestinians have been unwilling to accept a Palestinian state if it meant accepting a Jewish state alongside it.”

Israel has maintained its independence and self-determination through its ability to defend itself. But prowess on the battlefield is not equivalent to true stability and peace. The Palestinian refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state stands at the root of the struggle and behind every so-called core issue, from determining borders to resolving the dispute over Palestinian refugees. Genuine reconciliation can be achieved, then, only once the Palestinians come to terms with Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.

IT’S 1947, NOT 1967

The assumption that the Palestinians had consented to accept Israel as a Jewish state was based on a letter that the Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat sent to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin just prior to the signing of the Oslo accords. The letter, which states that “the [Palestine Liberation Organization] recognizes the right of the State of Israel to exist in peace and security,” was seen as a breakthrough, confirmation that the Palestinians were ready to forsake violence and live in peace with Israel. But Israeli negotiators at the time misinterpreted what exactly Arafat meant when he claimed he would recognize Israel. Arafat’s letter carefully avoided acknowledging that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people, giving rise to two complementary approaches to Palestinian recognition of the Jewish state by the PLO: one that rejects Israel outright and another that accepts Israel as a political entity but continues to refuse to accept its character as the homeland of the Jewish people.

The first Palestinian strategy maintains that Israel has no right to exist, let alone as a Jewish state. According to this position, which is reserved for domestic consumption, all the land from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River belongs to the Palestinians, and thus the existence of any political entity other than a Palestinian state within that area is unacceptable. There may be temporary or even long-term cease-fires with Israel, but sooner or later, the entire land will be “restored” to the Palestinians, either by political means or by force of arms. The most obvious advocates of this blunt stance are Islamic terrorist organizations, such as Hamas, which now controls the Gaza Strip, and other associated groups. This past May, Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas prime minister in Gaza, commemorated the 1948 war by pronouncing his “great hope of bringing an end to the Zionist project in Palestine.” Similarly, last November, his Hamas colleague Mahmoud al-Zahar declared in a speech in the Gaza Strip that “the expulsion [of the Jews] will come . . . from all of Palestine. . . . We are going to expel them.”

Yet these Islamic groups are hardly alone in believing that Israel should be entirely destroyed. In fact, as recently as 2009, Fatah, the supposedly moderate party that constitutes the largest faction of the PLO, reaffirmed its official charter, which mandates the continuation of armed struggle until the Palestinians have achieved the “complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military, and cultural existence.” The Fatah official Abdallah Abu Samhadana confirmed this sentiment in May when, in celebration of the Fatah-Hamas reconciliation agreement, he noted that there exists “full conformity” between the political programs of the two movements.

The second prong, meant to be palatable to an international audience, accepts the existence of Israel and even recognizes its right to exist, but only as a state without any ethnic or national identity. Underlying this position is a faith that Israel will ultimately be transformed into a Palestinian state through demographics, as higher birthrates among Arab citizens of Israel and an influx of Palestinian refugees fulfilling “the right of return” create an Arab majority. Arafat best captured the logic of this argument when he spoke of the “Palestinian womb” as his best weapon against Israel. This track seems more pragmatic, but it agrees with the first position in its ultimate aims. It speaks of a two-state solution, but not of a “two states for two peoples” solution.

Despite their differences, these coexistent Palestinian approaches agree that Israel’s Jewish character must not be acknowledged. To avoid doing so, the Palestinian leadership distinguishes between organizations, such as Fatah and Hamas, and institutions, such as the PLO and the Palestinian Authority. The former continue to reject the existence of the state of Israel entirely, whereas the latter formally recognize Israel — with which they must interact in order to operate — but continue to indoctrinate the Palestinian public against any acceptance of Israel as a Jewish state. This dichotomy was best expressed in 2006 by PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who told Palestinian television that “Hamas, Fatah, and the Popular Front [for the Liberation of Palestine] are not being asked to recognize Israel. . . . It’s the right of any organization [to deny Israel’s existence]. But the government . . . will have to operate daily with the Israelis . . . to solve people’s problems.” This careful division allows Palestinian institutions to seem reasonable, currying favor with and receiving assistance from the international community, while still bypassing recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. And it allows Palestinian political parties themselves to avoid recognizing Israel as a state at all.

REASONS FOR REJECTION

Last November, writing in the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot, Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, summarized the three fundamental reasons why Palestinians have continued to resist the notion of a Jewish Israel. First, he wrote, recognition of Israel as a Jewish state would “empty the negotiations on the refugee issue of all content,” implicitly abandoning any hope for Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war and their descendants to return to their former homes now within Israeli territory. Although the Palestinians have offered some compromise on this question in the past, they remain unwilling to publicly renounce the right of return — which, if implemented, would threaten or ultimately eliminate the Jewish majority in Israel. 

Erekat also said that recognizing Israel as a Jewish state would “adversely impact the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel.” This is a baseless argument, since Israel will continue to guarantee the full and equal civil rights of all its citizens, and reflects the way in which Palestinian leaders see the Arab citizens of Israel as allies in their struggle. Only last year, for example, an Arab member of Israel’s Knesset was introduced at a PLO rally as “our representative within the 1948 territories.”

Finally, Erekat pointed out that recognition of Israel’s Jewish character would require the Palestinians to change their basic narrative about the conflict to the point of its “absolute annulment.” From his perspective, recognition of Israel as a Jewish state would mean the “adoption of Zionist ideology,” a position that the Palestinian national movement could never endorse.

For these reasons, the so-called moderate Palestinians, whom Erekat represents, will agree only to an Israel with no formal ethnic identity and that thus has the potential of becoming an Arab-majority state. These leaders praise the idea of a two-state solution but deliberately reject the notion of two states for two peoples or two nation-states. For example, Abbas declared in 2007 that “Israel has Jews and other people, and this we are ready to recognize, but nothing else.” More recently, Abbas’ associate Nabil Shaath told a Lebanese television network that the “two states for two peoples” formula “is unacceptable to us. . . . They can describe Israel itself as a state for two peoples, but we will be a state for one people.”

Indeed, when challenged, the current Palestinian leadership has steadfastly maintained its opposition to recognizing Israel as a Jewish state. Speaking in Ramallah this past August, Abbas said, “Don’t order us to recognize a Jewish state. We won’t accept it.” And he and his team reinforce this notion throughout Palestinian society. Palestinian school curricula publish maps that omit Israel, and Palestinian state-run television airs testimonials such as this one from May 2010: “I’m from Jaffa, I’m from Haifa, I’m from Acre, I’m from Nazareth. . . . Where are you [Jews] from? Why have you stolen my homeland and taken my place? This is my homeland. Go back to your homeland.”

These statements must be taken seriously. They are not simply rhetoric, meant to win public support or to be used as a bargaining chip in negotiations. Were that the case, the Palestinians would have used them long ago as leverage to win a favorable compromise and gain the state that they claim to seek. Instead, they have failed to demonstrate any desire to relinquish these positions for the sake of peace and sought to force the recognition issue off the agenda through a variety of deflections.

To begin with, they argue that the Israeli government’s current request that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state is a new precondition set by Netanyahu, simply meant to stall the peace process. Yet this particular issue, whose resolution is not an Israeli prerequisite for talks, has surfaced in every round of negotiations between the parties, either explicitly or in relation to topics such as the refugee question. Indeed, the official reservations of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s government to the “road map” peace plan, introduced in 2002, highlighted the absence of Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and insisted that “declared references must be made to Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and to the waiver of any right of return for Palestinian refugees to the State of Israel.” According to documents of negotiations held in 2008 between then Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and the Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qurei, leaked by al Jazeera and The Guardian last January, Livni stressed that “Israel is a Jewish state” and its nation “the Jewish nation.”

Palestinian leaders also exploit Israel’s demand to be recognized as a Jewish state as a means of inflating the religious dimension of the conflict. According to the basic Palestinian position, Judaism is merely a religion, not a nation — and, as a result, Jews should not be entitled to an independent state. The Palestinian National Charter, for example, originally stated that “Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.” This position ignores the fact that Israel seeks acceptance not of its religious identity but of its ethnic and national character as the nation-state of the Jewish people. Even so, Israel maintains a reasonable separation between religion and state, and it has no desire to become a theocracy.

So far, the international community has proved unwilling to pressure the Palestinians on this point. Of late, U.S. policymakers and some of their European counterparts have begun to emphasize their commitment to Israel as the Jewish state or the homeland of the Jewish people and to refer to the need to reach a settlement involving “two states for two peoples” (and not just “two states”). For example, whereas the road map made no reference to Israel as a Jewish state, U.S. President Barack Obama called this past May for mutual recognition based on “two states for two peoples” and acceptance of Israel as a “Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people.” A subsequent French initiative referred to “two states for two peoples” (albeit without explicitly mentioning the Jewish people) and was followed up in July by French Foreign Minister Alain Juppé’s call for Israel to be recognized as the “nation-state of Israel for the Jewish people.”

But the United States and the European Union have largely preferred to focus on the other core issues rather than pressure the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. The Palestinians can thus claim, with some degree of truth, that there has never been any global expectation that they accept Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

WHY RECOGNITION MATTERS

The Palestinians often say that it is not their job to define Israel’s identity. In April, for instance, Abbas declared that Israel could name itself “the Hebrew Socialist Republic” if it wanted, but that it was “none of [his] business.” But acknowledgment of Israel as a Jewish state is both justified and critical. To begin with, Palestinian acceptance would ease Israeli fears about the Palestinians’ true motivations. The violent Palestinian uprising launched after the breakdown of the Oslo process in 2000 was at least partially financed and orchestrated by the PA leadership, leaving Israelis cynical about the PA’s intentions. Although Abbas has stated his personal opposition to armed resistance, which he regards as counterproductive to the Palestinian cause, Israelis remain wary of terrorism emanating from territory controlled by the PA.

A peace based on mutual recognition — a positive peace — is the only long-term antidote to the deep-seated cultural animosity between the two sides. Any agreement that does not address the underlying ideological motivations of the conflict would allow for an eruption of hostilities at the first sign of trouble. Social and political institutions that promote violence can be eliminated only through the development of a culture of peace and a transformation of the popular mindset. The Palestinians are not alone in needing to combat the radical ideologies in their midst; Israel must also devote more effort to uprooting pockets of xenophobia among its people.

Palestinian leaders often complain that Israel did not seek this kind of mutual recognition in its peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. This is true, and it is regrettable that these countries do not acknowledge Israel as a Jewish state; their lack of acceptance is certainly one of the reasons that the wider public in those countries has not embraced their peace with Israel. But the relationship between Israel and the Palestinians is fundamentally different from that between Israel and Egypt or Jordan.

To begin with, in their negotiations with Israel, Egypt and Jordan never asserted any territorial claims against the area of sovereign Israel. Unlike many Palestinians today, the Egyptians and the Jordanians harbor no aspirations to make Israeli cities, such as Haifa or Jaffa, part of their respective states. And whereas there are no Egyptian or Jordanian national minorities living within Israel, many Arab citizens of Israel identify themselves as Palestinian nationals. Operating among them are political, religious, and ideological forces dedicated to subverting the existence of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. In 2006, for example, representatives from the National Committee for the Heads of the Arab Local Authorities in Israel issued a document entitled The Future Vision of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel, which calls for the introduction of “consensual democracy” in Israel, in which both the Palestinian and the Jewish nations would partner to govern Israel jointly — the equivalent of a binational state. And leaders of the Islamic Movement in Israel, a group advocating Islam among Arab citizens of Israel, have been convicted of funneling millions of dollars to Hamas. If Israel were to drop its demand for recognition of its Jewish character, it would lay the groundwork for collaboration between leaders of a future Palestinian state and sympathetic Arab citizens of Israel to erode Israel’s legitimacy as a Jewish nation-state.

There are also basic strategic disparities between Israel’s agreements with Egypt and Jordan and its relationship with the Palestinians. Egypt and Jordan are organized, sovereign actors on the international stage with a monopoly over the use of force within their borders, as well as U.S. allies. These conditions allowed for reasonable security arrangements and buffers to be put in place with Israel. But the same realities do not prevail in the Palestinian context. The PA is only a would-be state without any legacy of governance or practice in exercising a monopoly over violence. Should it achieve sovereignty, it may not be able to stand on its own two feet without the security support that it receives from Israel, as its loss of Gaza to Hamas in 2007 demonstrated. Whereas both Egypt and Jordan perceive the attempts of terrorist groups to operate against Israel from within their respective territories as a threat to their own interests, it is far from certain that a Palestinian state would take a similar view. In fact, if a newly created Palestinian state did not accept Israel as a Jewish state, it is possible that it would eventually serve as a launch pad for terrorist strikes against Israel’s heartland.

These disparities render peace with the Palestinians distinct from both the Egyptian and the Jordanian cases and explain Israel’s insistence that a positive peace is essential for any final settlement.

THE CHALLENGE OF RECONCILIATION

True progress between the Israelis and the Palestinians will require a daring paradigm shift. Rather than a focus on the issues of settlement activity and territory, success in the negotiations will first require at least a tentative change in the Palestinian position on recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. Such a change would address Israel’s primary security concerns and facilitate rapid progress on all the remaining core issues.

The leadership of pre-state Israel accepted the notion of partitioning mandatory Palestine into two states in 1937, and in more recent times, Israeli leaders have demonstrated that they accept that the Palestinians have legitimate national rights — including the right to self-determination in the historic birthplace of the Jewish people. Israel has adopted this position despite serious reservations about Palestinian nationalism and Palestinian leaders’ unflinching resistance to the existence of the Jewish state. There must now be reciprocity. Israel is prepared to facilitate the creation of a Palestinian state and forgo the dream of a Greater Israel. In return, the Palestinians must abandon their ambitions of eventually expanding their state to encompass all of mandatory Palestine.

But it appears that Abbas simply does not want, feels no need, or is perhaps unable to offer substantive concessions or acknowledge Israel as a Jewish state. In the absence of external pressure, which could conceivably induce him to reconsider his position, and fearing a challenge to his authority from Hamas and other extremist groups, Abbas may continue to resist affirming Israel’s Jewish identity. His hesitancy to take such a step is particularly troubling because it is hard to imagine another Palestinian figure with his pedigree, as a founding member of Fatah, who would be capable of doing so.

Without Abbas’ cooperation, the best that could be hoped for is a cold peace. The Palestinians might continue pursuing unilateral actions against Israel in the international community, but this would only undermine the prospects for a lasting reconciliation. Or they may decide to wait for a future Israeli government that takes a less stringent view of its security requirements, including the issue of Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state — although it is unlikely that the Israeli public would elect a leader willing to capitulate on these core components.

Accordingly, if the Palestinians remain steadfast in their refusal to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, Israel will necessarily shift its focus toward devising a framework that enables some kind of conflict management. Such an arrangement might involve Israel’s continued support for the capability of the Palestinians to guarantee internal security and contribute to broader regional security, while providing a better quality of life for their citizens. Moreover, Israel and the Palestinians could consider interim agreements, such as one that would create a Palestinian state with provisional boundaries. In this context, Israel could work with the Palestinian leadership to promote a culture of peace and tolerance.
But these steps would not solve the fundamental problem impeding negotiations. If Abbas is to gain the confidence of the Israeli public, he must be prepared to sign an agreement that incorporates formal Palestinian acceptance of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. Without this acknowledgment, even effective security cooperation will not win the full trust of the Israelis. Abbas must be made to understand that the only avenue to Palestinian independence — which, at this juncture, only he can achieve — runs through such recognition.

Unfortunately, the Palestinian president appears fundamentally uninterested in negotiations without preconditions. This is, on one level, understandable, for it will be hard to reach an equitable compromise with Israel and still meet the expectations of the Palestinian public. It is a challenge for Abbas to cooperate with Israel’s security arrangements or make concessions that generations of Palestinians have been indoctrinated to reject. But the path to peace is difficult — and if Abbas truly wants to establish an independent and flourishing Palestinian state, he is going to have to do the hard work of accepting that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people and convincing his people to do the same.

YOSEF KUPERWASSER is Director General of Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs and former head of the Analysis and Production Division of the Israel Defense Forces’ Directorate of Military Intelligence. SHALOM LIPNER has served in the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office since 1990.

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