Israel and the Palestinians: A New Strategy

By Moshe Yaalon

The former IDF chief of staff proposes a different approach to dealing with an old conflict.

Israel has had and continues to have a decisive influence on mobilizing the PA to adopt a policy of “one authority, one law, one army,” without which there is no future for the Palestinian people and no peace for the citizens of the Jewish state. The Israeli security forces have so far cooperated with the PA and the countries that have come to its aid, allowing, for instance, Palestinian forces to train in Jordan and return to the West Bank afterward.⁵⁵ Israel has also agreed that these forces should be properly equipped with rifles, military vehicles, and bulletproof vests.⁵⁶ This is a calculated risk, but one that appears to be unavoidable. In July 2007, Israel took a daring step when it agreed to grant amnesty to nearly 180 wanted terrorists from Tanzim and the Al-Aksa Martyrs’ Brigades on condition that they hand their weapons over to the Palestinian security forces and refrain from further terrorist activities.⁵⁷ This arrangement has met with only partial success thus far, and it remains to be seen if it will lead to a drastic reduction in the number of Palestinians who possess illegal arms.

Still, it is not enough for the PA’s security reforms to focus on improving law enforcement. The Palestinian security services also need a systems overhaul in order to fight terror. To this end, the security forces must develop the operational capabilities to collect real-time intelligence. At present, they still lack these capabilities, which severely limits the effectiveness and range of their operations. Furthermore, if the PA wishes to demonstrate its determination to combat terrorism, it must implement major reforms in its judicial system. Arafat’s “revolving door” policy suited the late chairman’s interests but also undermined the rule of law in the Palestinian territories. The Palestinians must understand that the effort to stop terrorism does not end with arrests and weapons confiscation. They must bring terrorists and the brains behind their attacks to a court of law, try them, and punish them accordingly. An independent judicial system, which conducts itself according to the written letter of the law—and does not hesitate to severely punish murderers—is not a luxury that can be postponed. The Palestinians must take immediate measures to establish and reinforce such a system—and Israel, along with the PA’s various donor countries, must continue to demand it from them.

Strengthening judicial authority constitutes an important step in the rebuilding of a functioning Palestinian society. Unfortunately, during the Oslo process, Israel failed to recognize the full importance of this condition and did not insist on its implementation. Note the late prime minister Yitzhak Rabin’s famous statement that the PA would be able to tackle terrorism more effectively than Israel because it could operate “bli Bagatz uvli B’tselem,” without the Supreme Court and B’tselem, an Israeli human rights organization. This reflected the commonplace notion that an authoritarian regime is able to cope with violent fundamentalist groups more forcefully than a constitutional democracy. Here Rabin not only miscalculated the extent of Arafat’s commitment to terrorism, but also made a more fundamental error: He failed to recognize that corrupt authoritarian regimes, which violently suppress opposition and routinely violate human rights, are usually sitting on a volcano of pent-up rage waiting to erupt—a situation that religious fundamentalists are all too ready to exploit. This was the case, for instance, with the Shah of Iran, whose oppressive regime was so hated by his people that the Islamic takeover became almost inevitable. Similarly, under slightly different circumstances and on a smaller scale, this occurred when Hamas won the majority vote in the January 2006 elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council.

The Hamas victory undoubtedly weakened the case for democratization in the Arab world as a whole and in Palestinian society in particular. Nevertheless, it should be noted that Hamas’s electoral triumph was only possible due to a flawed process: The very participation of an armed terrorist organization in an election is unacceptable in a proper democracy, and the Americans made a grave mistake in allowing it. Furthermore, experience has shown that a society that maintains democratic norms over a long period of time tends to develop more effective means of containing fundamentalism. A regime whose legitimacy rests on wide broad-based popular support can address not only the external manifestations of extremist violence but also the internal forces that feed it.

To this end, the formal framework of democracy must also include a democratic “spirit.” The conditions that foster such a spirit do actually exist in Palestinian society, whose tradition of opposition to the occupation, along with its exposure to Israeli democracy, has given it an effervescent and rebellious character. Even Arafat, a leader of almost mythological repute, understood his people and knew that he could not impose a full-fledged authoritarian regime on them. The Palestinian collective enjoys the cultural mindset necessary for the establishment of a true democracy but has yet to build a prospering civil society in which institutions and voluntary organizations are free to act and are not subordinate to the dictates of the regime. Sadly, while several such organizations were formed in the West Bank while it was under Israeli military control, a significant portion of them identified and identify still with terrorism and radical Islam. In order to block their influence and set up a viable alternative, Israel and the donor countries must support, to the best of their abilities, Palestinian institutions that demonstrate a genuine commitment to democratic values and human rights. In the past, these groups did not receive Israeli, American, or European support because of their opposition to Arafat—the “facilitator” of the peace process—and were viewed, in fact, as little more than a nuisance. Furthermore, their sharp criticism of Israel certainly did not endear them to the authorities in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. It has since become apparent, however, that a Palestinian who denounces Israel on the basis of an enlightened political and ethical worldview is a worthier negotiating partner than one who seeks to endear himself to Israel for questionable ends.

Economic convalescence, an effective rule of law, and democratization are essential conditions for the rehabilitation of Palestinian society—but they are in no way sufficient.⁵⁸ Decades of struggle, humiliation, and especially incitement and indoctrination have poisoned the minds of the Palestinian people and have given rise to a morbid popular culture engaged in a cult of suicide terrorism, the likes of which the world has never seen. The Palestinians must realize that as long as they continue to perceive themselves as victims of a demonic evil, and as long as they continue to raise their children to be martyrs in a jihad against Zionism, the violence will never stop, and they will never achieve peace and prosperity. A comprehensive revision of Palestinian education is not only in Israel’s interest, but of vital importance to the Palestinians themselves. Israel will have a difficult time pressuring the PA to make such a change, but the international community can do so more easily. After all, a sizable portion of the funds requested by the Palestinians at the Paris Donor Conference in December 2007 is earmarked for the Palestinian educational system.⁵⁹ Furthermore, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA)—funded by the United States, the EU, Canada, and other nations—operates nearly one hundred schools in the West Bank.⁶⁰ It is only appropriate that the aid money allocated through these channels be granted on the condition that new teachers who do not identify with terrorism are hired and trained, and that new textbooks are developed that promote modernization, tolerance, and humanism instead of backwardness, fundamentalism, and hate.

The implementation of some of the reforms proposed in this article has already begun, others are still in preliminary stages, and some exist only on paper. Yet if these reforms are to be successful, they must all be put into practice simultaneously. Economic recovery cannot be separated from the enforcement of law and order. Democratization cannot be separated from the war on terror and putting an end to incitement and hate-mongering. These processes are inextricably bound to one another, and their realization is contingent first and foremost on the Palestinian leadership’s voluntary (or involuntary) compliance with the measures necessary to save its people from certain destruction. In order to ensure this, the United States and the donor countries need to formulate a new “road map,” one that will delineate clear guidelines and conditions for their cooperation with the PA. In the past, the Palestinians enjoyed international support and generous economic aid despite having broken every promise and reneged on every commitment they made. The openhanded policy of the United States and other donor countries simply did not give them any serious incentive to change their ways. Only an unrelenting, uncompromising quid-pro-quo approach by Israel and the international community can push things in the right direction—and perhaps bring some comfort to two peoples who have known so much suffering.

The strategy outlined in this paper is not particularly uplifting. I doubt that it will thrill the public or win prestigious international awards. It requires, after all, diligence and a good deal of patience. Its enactment would mean giving up expectations of reaching an immediate “solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian problem, and instead adopting a more pragmatic attitude that focuses, at least in the short term, on “managing” the conflict. Yet this new strategy is no less ambitious than the former one. It, too, strives to end Israel’s control over the Palestinians and to establish a new, safer, and more stable order west of the Jordan River. Unlike the Oslo paradigm, however, it begins by laying the foundations for the establishment of this new order, and only then proceeds to build from the bottom up. The policy proposed here rests on the understanding—which has so far eluded Israeli statesmen—that in our geopolitical arena, “the realities on the ground shape agreements, not the other way around,” as Guy Bechor, an Israeli expert in Middle Eastern affairs, once said.⁶¹

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