No: It's an Israeli Ploy

By Jerome M. Segal

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's basic objective is to thwart the emergence of a Palestinian state. To do that he seeks to find a way of ending the intifada and dividing the Palestinians. The Palestinians' basic objective is to succeed in their efforts to create a Palestinian state. To do that they seek to sustain the intifada and to maintain their unity.

The Palestinians have at different points suggested various ideas for elections. At the beginning of the intifada, local leaders called for municipal elections. Last August, Bassani Abu Sharif, an adviser to PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, floated the idea of a referendum on whether or not the PLO represents the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza. Most recently Abu Sharif has suggested elections which would determine West Bank and Gazan representatives to an all-encompassing legislative body of the Palestinian people. So neither the PLO nor the Palestinian people are opposed to elections.

In short, the Israeli proposal offers the Palestinians little reason to believe that this is a process through which their objectives can be reached. It looks very much like a proposal to divide the Palestinians, end the Intifada and prevent the emergence of a Palestinian state.

What they oppose is the Shamir election plan. The plan has three central features which make it unacceptable to the Palestinians.

It provides no role for the PLO. In calling for the election of a negotiating team other than the PLO, it threatens to divide the Palestinians and lead them down the road toward a conflict of leaderships.
It provides no clear role for Palestinians outside the occupied territories. Thus it tends to divorce the Palestinians living inside the territories from the larger body of Palestinians on the outside.
It calls for negotiations leading to a five-year transitional period, without any broad understanding of what is to follow. For instance, it does not say that the final negotiations would be based upon the principle of exchanging land for peace, and nowhere does the Israeli proposal accept the necessity of ending the occupation. What it does say is that the initiative is premised on Israeli opposition to a Palestinian state.

In short, the Israeli proposal offers the Palestinians little reason to believe that this is a process through which their objectives can be reached. It looks very much like a proposal to divide the Palestinians, end the intifada and prevent the emergence of a Palestinian state.

No serious American or Israeli observer of the Middle East could have expected that any Palestinian nationalist would accept this proposal.

The US position is that Shamir's initiative provides something to work with. Regardless of his motives, the process might take on a life of its own, ultimately transforming the environment in ways that will contribute to a peace settlement.

The PLO has not rejected the idea of elections. What it needs to do, is to put on the table a detailed, precise and reasonable counterproposal. Let the Americans take this counterproposal back to the Israelis. Given the lack of good faith on Shamir's part, it is likely that the Israeli government will not agree to a reasonable offer. If this is the case, the onus will be on the Israeli government. And if there should happen to be a real breakthrough, then let the process begin.

Jerome M. Segal is a research scholar at the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, University of Maryland His recent book, Creating the Palestinian State-A Strategy for Peace is reviewed in this issue of Washington Report and is available through the AET Book Catalog.