No, Israel Must Make Peace Itself

By Jerome M. Segal

Should the United States make Israel make peace? Implicit in the question is an assumption: that the US can force Israel to make peace with the Palestinians. Since peace will be possible only on the basis of some variant of the two-state solution, the implicit assumption is that the United States has the power to make Israel withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and accept the PLO-led state recently proclaimed.

While I believe that the United States has a vital role to play in affecting a transformation of Israeli attitudes, I do not believe the US has the power to force Israel to accept a Palestinian state. The main lever at the US disposal is the massive military and economic aid we provide.

A threat to cut off aid is not credible. But if such a threat were made, and if it were credible, to Israelis it would signal an ultimate American willingness to abandon Israel. In the post-holocaust world, almost all Jews are quite sensitive to the possibility of abandonment by the West. To awaken these fears would play into the hands of Ariel Sharon, who has for years urged Israelis to limit their dependence on the United States.

In a situation of heightened fear within Israel, even the actual cutoff of aid would not induce an Israeli troop withdrawal. There would be a command economy and a major decline in living standards. And while the large aid flow from private individuals would probably double or triple, the pain would be severe. But it would not work the way its advocates expect.

Not only would the prospect of an aid cutoff move Israel to the right it would also tend to undermine moderation within the Arab world. It should be remembered that the present willingness to make peace with Israel is based on pragmatism, not on the belief that Israel's creation was just. PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat spoke of accepting "possible justice, not absolute justice," but with an aid cutoff the perception of how much justice is possible would shift.

Thus the prospect of an aid cutoff would move both sides further apart, not closer. In a worst case scenario, Israeli strategists would conclude that another war was likely, and that over time their position would deteriorate. Thus, the stage would be set for a pre-emptive strike against Syria, the expulsion of West Bank Palestinians, and a hunkering down with a nuclear weapons fallback.

In short, I suggest that the aid issue be left alone. It is true that if the intifadah is painless, there will be a tendency inside Israel to accept it as a permanent state of affairs. But it is now clear that Israel's economy has already been harmed quite significantly. Even now over 50 percent of Israelis favor negotiations with the PLO; in time this will become government policy.

Finally, it is not helpful to nourish the belief that the United States can and might force Israel to withdraw from the territories because this increases the tendency to depend upon the United States. Ultimately, if there is troop withdrawal it will come as the result of political transformation within Israel. Bringing this about is the joint project of all who seek to build a lasting peace. This should include governments and the PLO, but it very much involves the Israeli peace movement, the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, and Jewish Americans. We non-governmental actors must seize the initiative and build the underlying basis not merely for negotiations, but for a lasting peace.

Jerome M. Segal is a research scholar at the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland. He is the author of Creating the Palestinian State-A Strategy for Peace, published by Lawrence Hill Books and available from the American Educational Trust.

US Can't Change Everything

By Sol Schindler

The question is interesting because it rests on two false premises, both of which are prevalent in today's thinking.

The first fallacy is the myth of American omnipotence. There was a time when, as the richest, most powerful nation on earth, we felt all things lay in our power. Call it the arrogance of youth, but we had it in plenty and it led us astray in Vietnam. Our fiasco there forced us to see more clearly the limits of our power, as did more recently the events in Panama.

But strangely, this perception of reality never reached the shores of the eastern Mediterranean. There the United States is always omnipotent—at least when it suits the convenience of the speaker. At other times we are just a paper tiger, but much depends on the rhetorical point that is being made.

Nevertheless, the myth of omnipotence is there. Ask any Greek how to get the Turkish army out of Cyprus and the answer will be to put pressure on the United States. And, needless to say, ask any Arab how to get Israel out of—you name it—and the answer is to put pressure on the United States. And if the Azeris are shooting Armenians in Azerbaijan, what should one do? Why write a letter to the State Department.

Middle-Class Liberal Guilt

Back home, the arrogance of youth has changed to middle class liberal guilt. As you must be aware, it is the United States that is responsible for the destruction of the rain forest in the Amazon, famine in Ethiopia, and apartheid in South Africa. If only our collective consciousness could be raised, and we would act in more politically appropriate ways these evils would disappear.

Unfortunately we are not really responsible for everything and therefore cannot change everything. It is the Brazilians who must deal with their rain forest, and the Afrikaners with their apartheid. As for Israel and peace, this leads us to the second fallacy, one of truly Orwellian dimensions, that Israel must be forced to make peace.

Israel Has Always Wanted Peace

Israel has wanted peace since its inception. Peace was broken in 1947 when seven Arab armies (some with more enthusiasm than others) invaded British-mandated Palestine. Peace was discarded in 1967 when Gamel Nasser asked the UN to remove its peacekeeping force that separated the Egyptian and Israeli armies. The occupied territories are now occupied because the king of Jordan threw peace aside and entered that same conflict.

In 1973, peace was trashed when Egypt and Syria again invaded Israel. A partial peace was actually achieved, however, when the only Arab nation that dared to negotiate for peace began doing so.

But peace in this context, I presume, does not mean Arab League-Israeli emnity, but rather the occupied territories. Obviously negotiations are in order, but who negotiates with whom? Shimon Peres has called for free elections but the PLO is against it, and as the Arab mayor of Bethlehem can attest, it is dangerous to be pro when the PLO is anti.

As for the United States, it will continue to do what it has started. It will talk to both Israel and the PLO, attempt to find some common ground of agreement, and work from there. It cannot do much more, and should not do less.

Sol Schindler is a retired Foreign Service officer who writes and lectures on international affairs.