April/May 1994, Page 13

Seven Views: Reassessing Declaration of Principles of Peace in Light of the Hebron Massacre

After Oslo and Before Gaza-Jericho: A Time for Unity Despite Adversity

By Alfred M. Lilienthal

The road to and from Jericho-Gaza still remains a rocky one with no end anywhere in sight as deadlines pass. Arab-Israeli-Palestinian multinational and bilateral talks sputter along while Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat claims that the Cairo agreement "puts Palestine back on the map." But meanwhile, the Israeli occupation continues, and Palestinians are killed daily, as are Israelis in far fewer numbers.

Israel has given up little of substance, other than recognizing the PLO, and remains intransigent, incessantly invoking the need for absolute security as the number one consideration in all negotiations. To date, only Israel's government can boast of tangible gains from the negotiations.

Israel also has been the principal beneficiary of the diplomatic boom set off by the September White House signing ceremony. The Vatican, Kenya, Ireland and Nigeria (the most populous nation in Africa) have opened embassies in Israel. Even before the Sept. 13 signing, China and India had sent their first ambassadors to Tel Aviv in the wake of the 1991 Madrid Conference. In all, the one-time diplomatic pariah nation now has established diplomatic ties with 138 countries.

The contrasting negotiating strategies are obvious. The PLO seeks to endow its interim regime with all possible trappings of sovereignty and statehood. The Israelis seek to make certain that the Gaza-Jericho self-rule interim regime, if and when it comes into being, remains only that and nothing more-and stays dependent on Israeli consent for further evolution. At all costs, Tel Aviv endeavors to make certain that there will be no Palestinian state.

Potent forces in the United States are dedicated to the same goal. Mindful of the approaching mid-term congressional elections, and the need to protect narrow margins in the Senate, where the Democrats now dominate 56 to 44, and in the House, where the 81 -seat Democratic majority is threatened by the impending retirement of 58 members, the White House will do nothing to endanger its command of the Jewish vote, a perennial stronghold of the party since the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.

Both President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Warren Christopher firmly refuse to intervene at any stage of the negotiations by pressuring Israel to fulfill its international obligations. Just as there were wide differences in the interpretation of the 1978 Begin-Carter-Sadat Camp David agreement, the same is true of the current negotiations, particularly when it comes to the extent of Palestinian self-determination. "Hands off" is the administration's motto.

Meanwhile the White House openly woos its pro-Israel constituency. Not content with the earlier plethora of Zionist appointments to cabinet and sub-cabinet posts, climaxed by the choice of Martin Indyk, an Australian Zionist whose naturalization as an American citizen had to be accelerated to enable him to assume the White House Middle East adviser position, the Clinton administration briefly revived the nomination of former Brooklyn Congressman Stephen S. Solarz as ambassador to India. This was after a year of delay amid reports that the nomination was dead.

It was Solarz's pressure on the State Department to issue a visa to a Hong Kong businessman with a criminal record that held up his nomination, not his record of writing the third largest number of bad checks in the 1991 House bank scandal.

Also unmentioned in the speculation over his nomination was the former congressman's 1973 letter to constituents entitled "Delivering for Israel. " In it he explained that he took an assignment to the House Foreign Affairs Committee "to better serve the needs of Israel." The Solarz letter detailed how he intervened with then Secretary of State Cyrus Vance to win for Israel a considerably higher foreign aid appropriation.

Slanted U.S. reportage to maintain Israel's image as a besieged Jewish state, likewise, has supported Israel throughout the peace negotiations. Day in and day out, the printed media compete with television as to who can make a more meaningful contribution to the persisting Holocaustomania—considerably aided and abetted by the entertainment world.

The Hebrew word for the Holocaust is Shoah. Proving the Israeli maxim that "there's no business like Shoah business," the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC and the new film "Schindler's List" have taken the place of "Exodus" and The Diary of Anne Frank as the most effective instruments for laying on Christians and Jews the guilt from which Israel benefits.

One day it is the charges of bigotry leveled against Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan which provide excuses for bold headlines about anti-Semitism. The next day the headlines trumpet the apology of Croatian President Franjo Tudjman to the Anti-Defamation League for a book in which he raised questions about the number of European Jews who perished in the Nazi Holocaust.

In August 1991, when PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat wrote a letter seeking my advice on whether he ought to attend theMadrid Conference, I replied: "By all means do so, but no matter what happens, never be the party to leave the negotiating table. " I also warned my friend about the Israelis' unbelievable public relations prowess, supported as they are by a strong and largely united American Jewish community and backed up by the powerful, often brutal Anti-Defamation League, effectively crushing the first sign of dissent from either Christians or Jews.

Likewise, I urged him at all times to give clear and open recognition to the vital difference between Judaism and Zionism hence he was to regard Israel not as the Jewish state, but as the Israeli state. I contended there was a big distinction, however little this may be publicly acknowledged. Therefore, the normalization of Israel's nationalism ought to be a primary objective of his, as it has been to the handful of anti-Zionist Jews in the U.S. It was in his hands to persuade Israel to give up being the Jewish state at war to become the Israeli state at peace.

Today the Palestinian leader faces many serious problems, not only the implementation of the Oslo, Washington and Cairo pacts to which he was a signatory as head of the PLO, but those entailed by the second phase of the negotiations. Meanwhile the Israelis are rushing to build a Greater Jerusalem which will exacerbate the existing differences over its future.

All this should give Arafat serious pause. Somehow, he must provide the leadership to overcome growing suspicions of his motives within the Palestinian community and among the other Arab states upon whose goodwill the Palestinians depend. Without the removal of this grave impediment, which blocks any hope of standing up successfully to the Israeli government, he will be unable to meet the formidable Israeli-Zionist challenge.

In the wake of the Hebron massacre, it's a very different ballgame. The quest for a peaceful, just solution has received a near-death blow!

Dr. Alfred M. Lilienthal is the author of What Price Israel?, There Goes the Middle East, The Other Side of the Coin and The Zionist Connection.