Download PDF | (Routledge Handbooks) Joel Peters, David Newman (eds.) - Routledge Handbook on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict-Routledge (2012).
496 Pages
Contributors
Arie Arnon is Professor in the Department of Economics, Ben-Gurion University. Since 2005 he has headed the Program on Economics and Society at the Van Leer Institute, Jerusalem. His areas of research include macroeconomics, monetary theory, the Israeli labor market, and the history of economic thought. He is the author of Monetary Theory and Policy from Hume and Smith to Wicksell: Money, Credit and the Economy (Cambridge University Press, 2011). He coordinates the Israeli side in the Aix Group, a think tank where Israeli, Palestinian, and international experts discuss various economic aspects of the current situation, as well as the areas of cooperation when a permanent peace agreement is reached .
Rex Brynen is Professor of Political Science at McGill University and coordinator of Palestinian Refugee Research Net (www.prrn.org). He is the author, editor, or co-editor of nine books on various aspects of Middle East politics, among them Palestinian Refugees: Challenges of Repatriation and Development (I. B. Tauris/IDRC, 2007, co-edited with Roula el-Rifai) and A Very Political Economy: Peacebuilding and Foreign Aid in the West Bank and Gaza (United States Institute for Peace Press, 2000).
Naomi Chazan is Professor Emerita of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and is currently the Dean of the School of Government and Society at the Academic College of Tel Aviv–Yaffo. She is the author of numerous books and articles on comparative politics, African politics, the Palestinian–Israeli conflict, Israeli politics, and women and politics. She has been active in the Israeli peace and civil society organizations for decades. After three terms as a Member of the Knesset, she served as the president of the New Israel Fund, the largest organization supporting progressive causes in Israel.
Michael Dumper is Professor in Middle East Politics, University of Exeter. He is author of The Future of the Palestinian Refugees: Towards Equity and Peace (Lynne Rienner, 2007), The Politics of Sacred Space: The Old City of Jerusalem and the Middle East Conflict, 1967–2000 (Lynne Rienner, 2001), and The Politics of Jerusalem Since 1967 (Columbia University Press, 1997), editor of Palestinian Refugee Repatriation: Global Perspectives (Routledge, 2006), and joint editor of International Law and the Israel–Palestinian Conflict (Routledge, 2010). Professor Dumper is currently researching on comparative perspectives on exile and displacement and is also an investigator for the five-year Economic and Social Research Council (UK) project entitled Conflict in Cities and the Contested State.
Laura Zittrain Eisenberg is Full Teaching Professor in the History Department at Carnegie Mellon University, where she specializes in modern Middle East history. She is the author of My Enemy’s Enemy: Lebanon in the Early Zionist Imagination, 1900–1948 (Wayne State University Press, 1994) and, with Neil Caplan, Negotiating Arab–Israeli Peace: Patterns, Problems, Possibilities (Indiana University Press, 2010). She has published numerous articles and book chapters on Israel and Lebanon and on the Arab–Israel conflict and peace process and served as consultant for PeaceMaker, a video game simulating Palestinian–Israeli interactions.
Robert O. Freedman is Peggy Meyerhoff Pearlstone Professor of Political Science Emeritus at Baltimore Hebrew University and Visiting Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University, where he teaches courses in the Arab–Israeli conflict and in Russian foreign policy. Among his publications are Russia, Iran and the Nuclear Question: The Putin Record (US Army War College, 2007), Contemporary Israel (Westview Press, 2010), and Israel and the United States (Westview Press, 2012).
Galia Golan is Professor at the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy of the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, and founder/Chair of the MA Program on Diplomacy and Conflict Studies. Formerly she was Darwin Professor and Head of the Department of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She is the author of nine books, most recently Israel and Palestine: Peace Plans and Proposals from Oslo to Disengagement (Markus Wiener, 2007), along with ‘‘Globalization, Non-State Actors, and the Transformation of Conflict,’’ in Bruce Dayton and Louis Kreisberg (eds), Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding (Routledge, 2007). She is an associate editor of the International Feminist Journal of Politics.
Rosemary Hollis is Professor of Middle East Policy Studies and Director of the Olive Tree Scholarship Programme at City University, London. Her research focuses on British, European, and US involvement in the Middle East. She was Director of Research (2005–8) and Head of the Middle East Programme (1995–2005) at Chatham House, and before that at the Royal United Services Institute (1990–95). During the 1980s she was a lecturer at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where she gained her PhD. She also holds a BA in History and an MA in War Studies from the King’s College London.
Khaled Hroub teaches contemporary Middle East politics and history at the University of Cambridge, where he obtained his Ph.D. He is the author of Hamas: A Beginner’s Guide (Pluto Press, 2010) and Hamas: Political Thought and Practice (Institute for Palestine Studies, 2000) and editor of Political Islam: Context vs Ideology (Saqi Books, 2011) and Religious Broadcasting in the Middle East (Columbia University Press, 2012). In Arabic he has published a current affairs account, Fragility of Ideology and Might of Politics (Beirut, 2010) and a book on the Arab Spring entitled In Praise of Revolution (2012). He hosted a weekly book review show on the Al-Jazeera channel from 2000 to 2006.
Amal Jamal is Senior Lecturer at the Political Science Department of Tel Aviv University, Director of the Political Communication Graduate Program and Co-Chair of the International Graduate Program in Political Science. He served three years as the Chair of the Political Science Department and serves currently as the General Director of I’lam: Media Center for Arab Palestinians in Israel. He has published extensively on Palestinian and Israeli politics in leading international journals. His recent books are Arab Minority Nationalism in Israel: The Politics of Indigeneity (Routledge, 2011), The Arab Public Sphere in Israel: Media Space and Cultural Resistance (Indiana University Press, 2009), The Palestinian National Movement: Politics of Contention, 1967–2005 (Indiana University Press, 2005), and Media Politics and Democracy in Palestine (Sussex Academic Press, 2005).
Ahmad Samih Khalidi is Senior Associate Member of St Antony’s College, Oxford. He is editor-in-chief of the Arabic-language edition of the quarterly Journal of Palestine Studies and has written widely on Middle Eastern political and strategic affairs in both English and Arabic. His books (co-written with Hussein Agha) include Syria and Iran: Rivalry and Cooperation (Chatham House, 1995), Track-2 Diplomacy: Lessons from the Middle East (with S. Feldman and Z. Schiff, MIT Press, 2003), and A Framework for a Palestinian National Security Doctrine (Chatham House, 2006).
P. R. Kumaraswamy has taught since September 1999 at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, where he has been researching and writing on various aspects of the Middle East. Between 1991 and 1999 he was a research fellow at the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Among his publications are India’s Israel Policy (Columbia University Press, 2010) and Historical Dictionary of the Arab–Israeli Conflict (Scarecrow Press, 2006). Professor Kumaraswamy runs the virtual Middle East Institute, New Delhi (www.mei.org.in), and serves as its Honorary Director.
Yehezkel Landau is Faculty Associate in Interfaith Relations at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut, where he directs an interfaith training program, ‘‘Building Abrahamic Partnerships.’’ His work has been in the fields of interfaith education and Jewish–Arab peacemaking. During the 1980s he directed the Oz veShalom-Netivot Shalom religious peace movement in Israel. He was co-founder in 1991 and co-director until 2003 of the Open House Center for Jewish– Arab Coexistence and Reconciliation in Ramle, Israel. His publications include (as co-editor) Voices from Jerusalem: Jews and Christians Reflect on the Holy Land (Paulist Press, 1992) and a research report entitled Healing the Holy Land: Interreligious Peacebuilding in Israel/Palestine (United States Institute of Peace Press, 2003.
Steve Lutes is Director of Middle East and North Africa Affairs at the US Chamber of Commerce, where he is specifically responsible for managing the US–Iraq Business Initiative. He was previously a senior legislative affairs specialist in the International Trade Administration at the US Department of Commerce. Earlier in his career, he held a variety of positions in the US House of Representatives, including Chief of Staff and Legislative Director. Lutes earned his bachelor’s degree from Indiana University and is currently pursuing a Masters in Public and International Affairs at Virginia Tech. He is a regular contributor to the Diplomatic Courier, a global affairs magazine based in Washington, DC.
Rami Nasrallah is the founder and Chairman of the International Peace and Cooperation Center (IPCC), a policy urban research center based in East Jerusalem. Dr Nasrallah received his doctorate degree in Urban Planning from TU Delft, Netherlands. From 2003 to 2007 he was a Research Associate with the ‘‘Conflict in Cities’’ project at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Architecture and History of Art. He is co-author of a number of publications: The Jerusalem Urban Fabric (IPCC, 2003), Cities of Collision (Birkhauser, 2006), Successful Jerusalem (IPCC, 2007), Is a Viable Democratic Palestine Possible? Future Scenarios for Palestine (Floersheimer Institute, 2007), and Divided Cities in Transition (IPCC, 2003), in which he contributed to urban studies and the political/social transformation of Palestinian society.
David Newman is Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Ben-Gurion University and editor of the international journal Geopolitics. A political geographer, he was educated in the UK at the universities of London and Durham. His work focuses on the territorial dimensions of ethnic conflict and an analysis of the contemporary significance of borders in a globalized world.
Magnus Norell is an Adjunct Scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in Washington, D.C., and a Senior Research Fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs in Stockholm. He has extensive experience in Middle Eastern studies, primarily concerning conflict research, terrorism studies, and security policies in the Middle East region. He has a background as an analyst with the Swedish Secret Service and Swedish Military Intelligence. He has lectured at the Swedish National Defence College, where he developed courses on terrorism studies, and the US Marine Corps Staff and Command College in Quantico, Virginia. He has published widely and is a commentator in the media on current affairs in the Middle East and Central Asia.
Nigel Parsons is Senior Lecturer in Politics at Massey University, New Zealand. His research focuses on Palestinian institutions. Funded by a grant from the Royal Society of New Zealand, he is currently researching Israeli population management understood through the Foucauldian concept of ‘‘biopolitics,’’ plus the institutional responses of the Palestinian Authority. He is the author of The Politics of the Palestinian Authority: From Oslo to al-Aqsa (Routledge, 2005).
Joel Peters is Professor of Government and International Affairs in the School of Public and International Affairs at Virginia Tech. He was previously a founder member of the Department of Politics and Government and the founding director of the Centre for the Study of European Politics and Society at Ben-Gurion University. He is the author (with Sharon Pardo) of Uneasy Neighbors: Israel and the European Union (Lexington Books, 2010) and Israel and the European Union: A Documentary History (Lexington Books, 2011), as well as of numerous articles and chapters in books on the Arab–Israeli conflict, and the editor of The European Union and the Arab Spring: Promoting Democracy and Human Rights in the Middle East (Lexington Books, 2012).
Paul Scham is Professor of Israel Studies at the University of Maryland and Executive Director of the University’s Gildenhorn Institute for Israel Studies. He is co-editor (with Walid Salem and Benjamin Pogrund) of Shared Histories (Left Coast Press, 2006), which explores the role of Israeli and Palestinian historical narratives in the conflict, and of a forthcoming book, Shared Narratives. From 1996 to 2002 he coordinated Israeli–Palestinian joint research projects at the Truman Institute for Peace of the Hebrew University. He has published articles on various aspects of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process and since 2010 has been managing editor of the Israel Studies Review.
Michael Schulz is Associate Professor in Peace and Development Research at the School of Global Studies at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. His most recent publications are ‘‘Palestine,’’ in Joel Peters (ed.), The European Union and the Arab Spring (Lexington Books, 2012), ‘‘Palestinian Public Willingness to Compromise: Torn between Hope and Violence,’’ in the Journal of Security Dialogue, and ‘‘The Role of Civil Society in Regional Governance in the Middle East,’’ in Valeria Bello, Cristiano Bee, and David Armstrong (eds), Civil Society and International Governance (Routledge, 2010).
Kirsten E. Schulze is Senior Lecturer in International History at the London School of Economics. She is the author of The Arab–Israeli conflict (Longman 1999, 2008), The Jews of Lebanon: Between Coexistence and Conflict (Sussex Academic Press, 2001, 2008), and Israel’s Covert Diplomacy in Lebanon (Palgrave Macmillan, 1998). She has also written articles on the Arab–Israeli conflict, the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, the Al-Aqsa Intifada, the Lebanese civil war, post-civil war reconstruction and reconciliation, the Jews of Lebanon, and Israeli–Maronite connections.
Colin Shindler is Emeritus Professor and Pears Senior Research Fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He is founding chairman of the European Association of Israel Studies. His most recent book is Israel and the European Left: Between Solidarity and Delegitimization (Continuum, 2012). An updated second edition of his History of Modern Israel will be published by Cambridge University Press at the end of 2012.
Steven L. Spiegel is Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Los Angeles. Among other publications, he is co-author of The Peace Puzzle: America’s Quest for Arab–Israeli Peace, 1989–2011 (Cornell University Press, 2012) and World Politics in a New Era (Wadsworth, 2003) and author of The Other Arab–Israeli Conflict: Making America’s Middle East Policy, from Truman to Reagan (Chicago University Press, 1986). He is working on a book on American– Israeli relations. Professor Spiegel serves as Director of the Center for Middle East Development at UCLA and is the editor of its series for Routledge on Middle East security and cooperation. He also provides assistance to Middle East programs at the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation of the University of California, San Diego.
Gerald M. Steinberg is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at Bar Ilan University, Israel, and is the founder of the Program on Conflict Management and Negotiation. He research focuses on diplomacy, military strategy and arms control, and human rights as a form of soft power. He has worked with international organizations such as NATO, the UN University, OSCE, and SIPRI and is president of NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based research organization. Among his academic publications are ‘‘Examining Israel’s NPT Exceptionality,’’ Non-Proliferation Review, 13 (2006): 117–41; ‘‘The Centrality of Confidence Building Measures: Lessons from the Middle East,’’ in A. Schnabel and D. Carment (eds), Conflict Prevention (Lexington Books, 2004); and ‘‘The Politics of NGOs, Human Rights and the Arab–Israel Conflict,’’ Israel Studies, 16 (2011): 24–54.
Julie Trottier holds a research chair with the Centre national de la recherche scientifique, France. She was previously a lecturer at the University of Newcastle and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Oxford, UK, and a post-doc researcher at McGill University, Canada. She is the author of Hydropolitics in the West Bank and Gaza Strip (PASSIA, 1999) and, with Paul Slack, co-editor of Managing Water Resources: Past and Present (Oxford University Press, 2004). Her forthcoming book, The Problem with Water, will be published by I. B. Tauris.
Dov Waxman is Associate Professor of Political Science at Baruch College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). He has published widely on the Arab– Israeli conflict, Israeli politics, and US foreign policy towards the Middle East. He is the author of The Pursuit of Peace and the Crisis of Israeli Identity: Defending/Defining the Nation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006) and (with Ilan Peleg) Israel’s Palestinians: The Conflict Within (Cambridge University Press, 2011). He is on the board of directors of the Association for Israel Studies and was previously associate editor of the journal Israel Studies Forum.
Introduction Understanding the Israeli–Palestinian conflict Joel Peters Without question, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has been one of the most bitter and protracted of modern times. Its continuation is seen as a threat to global security, and its resolution is viewed by global leaders as a strategic priority crucial to long-term peace and stability in the Middle East. Efforts to resolve the conflict have featured prominently on the global agenda since its outset. Leaders of the international community have expended considerable time and energy trying to bridge the differences between Israel and the Palestinians. The United Nations has spent more time discussing this issue than any other international conflict. The region is awash in peace plans and envoys on peace missions. American presidents have hosted summits, placing their personal prestige on the line. The international community has committed considerable financial resources to providing support for the Palestinian refugees, to developing Palestinian civil society, and to building the institutions needed for Palestinian self-government and statehood. Despite these many and varied efforts, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict persists, with little prospect of an end in sight. The history and issues surrounding any international conflict can be variously interpreted, depending on narrative and perspective. Rarely (if ever) do the dynamics of a conflict point to an objective or shared understanding, and the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is no exception. It has been marked by a number of pivotal moments subject to competing narratives, explanations, and justifications. These narratives feed into Israeli and Palestinian notions of history, selfidentity, and perceived ideas about the motivations and goals of the other side (see chapter 3, by Paul Scham). The oft-cited phrase ‘‘One land, two peoples’’ captures the essence of the conflict. For many, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is a struggle of national identity, of two peoples and two nationalist movements (Zionist and Palestinian) located in the same territorial space. Framing it as a territorial dispute has led to a narrative of ownership and dispossession, with each side denying the rights, claims, and legitimacy of the other. The notion of partition, first mooted by the 1937 Peel Commission and enshrined in the 1947 UN partition plan and the 2003 Road Map, has had a chequered history. In 1946 the British government handed its Mandate for Palestine over to the United Nations and, after considering various options, the UN General Assembly opted for partition. Resolution 181 of 29 November 1947 called for the creation of two separate states – one Jewish, one Arab – and for the internationalization of the city of Jerusalem. The immediate result of the vote was an intensification of violence between the Arab and Jewish communities in Palestine. Following Britain’s withdrawal and Israel’s declaration of independence on 14 May 1948, the violence turned into interstate war between the new State of Israel and the armies of the neighboring Arab states. The fighting came to an end in early 1949, with Israel signing armistice agreements with Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria. No peace accords were discussed or signed. By the end of the war, Israel had increased its territory by 21 percent in relation to the boundaries set out by the UN partition plan. By contrast, the Palestinians had lost any hope of an independent state – Jordan took control of the West Bank and Egypt the Gaza Strip. Above all, the war gave rise to the Palestinian refugee question. Close to three-quarters of a million Palestinians became refugees in the Arab world, having fled during the fighting or been driven out of their homes. The 1948 war is a defining moment in the history of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The history of the war and its accompanying narratives continue to influence the politics of the peace process. For Israel, the 1948 war is depicted as a heroic struggle for survival, wherein the outnumbered forces of the Haganah (pre-state Jewish army) overcame overwhelming odds to defeat the combined forces of the Arab world intent on strangling the nascent Jewish state. That narrative has been challenged in recent years by a new wave of Israeli historians (see chapter 4, by Kirsten Schulze), but the discourse of vulnerability, annihilation, and Arab rejection of Israel’s legitimacy are recurring themes in Israeli thinking on the conflict. For Palestinians, the 1948 war marks the start of their exile. Referred to as al-Nakba (the Catastrophe), the war is a symbol of Palestinian dispossession, displacement, and loss, individually and collectively, and of deliberate expulsion. The outcome and consequences of the 1948 war plunged the Middle East into a cycle of conflict: a further five Arab–Israeli wars (the 1956 Suez Crisis, the Six Day/June War of 1967, the Yom Kippur/October War of 1973, and the Lebanon wars of 1982 and 2006); the eruption of two Palestinian Intifadas, in 1987 and 2000; a history of terrorism and political violence; and periodic cross-border clashes, military raids, and incursions. For the better part of the next three decades, however, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the Palestinian issue became submerged within the wider context of Israeli–Arab rivalry and the broader politics of the Cold War. The question of Palestinian national rights fell largely by the wayside. The outbreak of the Six Day/June War in 1967 escalated as a result of friction along the Israeli–Syrian border and had little to do with Palestinian rights. Indeed, UN Security Council Resolution 242, drawn up in the aftermath of the war and the cornerstone of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, fails to mention the question of Palestinian national rights and makes reference to the Palestinians only within the context of ‘‘achieving a just settlement to the refugee problem.’’ Instead, the resolution focuses on both the rights of all states in the region to live within secure and recognized borders and the return of territories captured by Israel in the war in exchange for peace. The impact of the June 1967 war on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict cannot be overstated. Israel’s dramatic victory created a new set of geopolitical and demographic realities. With the capture of the West Bank from Jordan and the Gaza Strip from Egypt, Israel now controlled all the territory allocated for both the Jewish and the Palestinian state under the terms of the 1947 UN partition plan. Jerusalem, divided after the 1948 war, became reunified. Israel immediately expanded the municipal boundaries of the city and applied Israeli law to East Jerusalem too (see chapter 10, by Michael Dumper). Significantly, a further million Palestinians now came under direct Israeli military rule.
The outcome of the war had far-reaching consequences for the internal social and political dynamics of both Israel and the Arab world, many of which are still felt today. For the Arab world, it was a humiliating defeat and a reminder of its weakness in the face of Israel’s military power. For Israel, the feeling of being encircled and the threat of annihilation so prevalent before the war were replaced by a new sense of confidence and strength. Israel’s capture of the West Bank provided it with important strategic depth. It was widely celebrated in Israel and gave birth to Gush Emunim (Bloc of the Faithful) and the Israeli settler movement (see chapter 22, by David Newman). For many Israelis, especially those from the right-wing and religious spectrum of society, the West Bank is part of the Greater Land of Israel, the biblical lands of Judea (in the south) and Samaria (in the north), to which the Jewish people have historic right and claim. The electoral victory of Menachem Begin and the Likud Party in 1997 gave impetus to the settler movement and to the sustained growth of Israeli settlement-building in the West Bank and Gaza. The West Bank were no longer regarded by the Israeli government as just a ‘‘good,’’ as territory to be bartered and returned in exchange for peace. Instead, Judea and Samaria, as the region came to be termed, was considered an integral part of the territory of the State of Israel. Today over 300,000 Israelis live in settlements in the West Bank, a testament to the influence of the settler movement to dictate policy. This has occurred in spite of the opposition of the international community, which has denounced Israeli settlement-building as illegal under international law. The future of the settlements has become a key issue in the peace process, impacting critically on discussions on the future geographic contours and territorial dimensions of a Palestinian state. The post-1967 period did not lack for diplomatic initiatives (see chapter 7, by Laura Eisenberg). These efforts were, however, directed primarily at resolving the wider Arab–Israeli conflict and not at the question of Palestinian self-determination and statehood. In 1977, the Egyptian President, Anwar Sadat, broke ranks with the Arab world to make peace with Israel. The 1978 Camp David Accords and the 1979 Israeli–Egyptian peace treaty contained provisions for talks on autonomy for the Palestinians in the West Bank. Those talks quickly foundered. The Palestinians lacked representation in the diplomatic initiatives during this period – diplomacy was concerned more about the status of the West Bank than with the Palestinians. Israel refused to talk to the PLO, which it saw as a terrorist organization bent solely on Israel’s destruction, and received the full backing of the United States in this stance. Instead, Israel sought – with little success – to develop an alternative locally based Palestinian leadership from the Occupied Territories, and looked upon King Hussein of Jordan as its main interlocutor. The question of Palestinian self-determination and statehood slowly reemerged in the 1970s to take centre-stage on the global agenda. The PLO was steadily garnering international support, especially from Third World states, which identified the Palestinian cause with their own post-colonial struggles for independence. In 1974, the PLO was granted observer status in the United Nations and Yasser Arafat was invited to address the General Assembly. The European Community (EC) added its voice in support of Palestinian national self-determination with the issuing of the Venice Declaration in April 1980, though the Europeans fell short of explicitly calling for Palestinian statehood. Significantly, the nine member states of the EC called for the inclusion of the PLO in any future peace talks. But Europe exerted little influence in effecting diplomatic progress or in determining events on the ground (see chapter 28, by Rosemary Hollis). At the beginning of December 1987, an Israeli truck collided with a car in Gaza, killing all four passengers. This accident triggered an unprecedented wave of demonstrations, starting first in Gaza and quickly spreading to East Jerusalem and the West Bank. The outbreak of the Intifada (literally, a ‘‘shaking off’’) marks the next significant transition in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Guided primarily by an emerging grassroots leadership rather than by the exiled political leadership of the PLO, the Intifada was a campaign of civil disobedience and popular resistance to the Israeli occupation. It is most notable for the widespread and active support it received from all sectors of Palestinian society (see chapter 5, by Rami Nasrallah). The intifada succeeded in directing international attention to the conditions of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Moreover, it highlighted the fact that Israeli rule and occupation, disingenuously portrayed by Israel as benign and even beneficial to Palestinian society, was not sustainable in the long run. The Intifada led many Israelis to consider a process of physical, if not emotional, disengagement from the West Bank and Gaza. The demand for separation from the Palestinians gained increasing traction within Israeli society following the collapse of the peace process at the end of 2000 and the outbreak of the Second, al-Aqsa, Intifada (see chapter 16, by Gerald Steinberg). The end of the Cold War, the 1991 Gulf War, and the convening of the Madrid Conference in November 1991 combined to create a political dynamic that culminated in the dramatic breakthrough between Israel and the PLO and the signing of the Declaration of Principles on 13 September 1993. With the handshake on the White House lawn, Israel and the Palestinians had seemingly put their troubled history behind them and were about to enter a new era of mutual recognition, reconciliation, and peace. Yasser Arafat and the PLO leadership, long demonized, had now seemingly become Israel’s partner for peace. The Oslo Accords comprised a set of interim measures designed to transfer land and authority to the Palestinians, paving the way for the eventual end of Israeli occupation and the signing of a full peace treaty. Critical issues such as the future of Jerusalem, borders, settlements, water, and refugees (termed ‘‘final-status issues’’) were to be negotiated at the end of the process. The Declaration of Principles was followed by a further set of agreements (the Gaza–Jericho Agreement, the Oslo II Accord, and the Wye Memorandum) leading to the return to Gaza and the West Bank of Yasser Arafat and the PLO leadership, the creation of the Palestinian Authority, and the holding of elections to the newly created Palestinian Legislative Council (see chapter 8, by Galia Golan). The Oslo process was not without its detractors. The historic compromise lauded by many was seen by some as a threat to core values and interests. In Israel, Yitzhak Rabin was vilified for reaching out to the PLO and for his willingness to give back the West Bank and Gaza. Ultimately, this readiness to compromise cost Rabin his life. On 4 November 1995, he was assassinated by a lone right-wing Jewish fanatic, Yigal Amir, incited by the groundswell of hatred that had been building up. The interim stages of the Oslo process were designed to allow Israelis and Palestinians to build confidence and trust. But the implementation of the Oslo Accords was fraught with difficulties. The Oslo process lacked sufficient mechanisms to ensure compliance by the parties and demanded a defined, shared goal. Commitments were not fulfilled, deadlines were ignored, and agreements were renegotiated. Israeli settlementbuilding continued unabated, and even increased in intensity. Life for Palestinians involved economic hardship, restrictions on movement, roadblocks, and security closures. Israelis lived under the ever-present fear of terrorist attacks and bus bombings. Above all, Israeli and Palestinian leaders failed to engage and prepare their respective publics for the hard choices and compromises needed for peace, especially on the question of Jerusalem and the refugees. By the time the Israelis and Palestinians met at Camp David in July 2000 to discuss finalstatus issues, they were skeptical of each other’s commitment to peace. The idea behind the Camp David summit was ill-conceived and the meeting itself badly planned. The decision to hold the meeting was driven more by the political timetables of the Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Barak, and US President Bill Clinton than by the belief that the two parties were ready to conclude a final settlement. The discussions at Camp David, notable only for the symbolic spectacle of the two sides discussing final-status issues together for the first time, achieved nothing of lasting substance. The long-term importance of the summit, however, lies in the conflicting accounts that emerged to explain its failure (see chapter 6, by Joel Peters). At the conclusion of the summit, Israel presented an account that became the dominant and unchallenged narrative within both Israeli society and the American political establishment. Yasser Arafat was cast as the villain of the story. According to Israel’s version of events, Ehud Barak made an unprecedented and generous territorial offer to the Palestinians which they rejected. Arafat, uninterested in making peace with Israel, failed to offer any counterproposals of his own. It was the question of Jerusalem that dominated discussions at Camp David; the refugee issue was barely mentioned. However, Israeli leaders intimated to the Israeli public that it was Palestinian intransigence over the right of return that led to the summit’s collapse. Palestinian advocacy of the right of return was portrayed within Israel as a demographicpolitical weapon aimed at subverting the Jewish state. Israelis from across the political spectrum were of one mind that, by raising the issue of the right of return, the Palestinians had demonstrated they were not yet reconciled to the idea of coexistence. The ‘‘no partner’’ narrative severely undercut the voice of the Israeli peace movement (see chapter 23, by Naomi Chazan) and has had a stranglehold on Israeli discourse on the peace process for the past twelve years. In a parallel vein, the Palestinians considered Israel’s proposals unsatisfactory, if not dangerous. In their eyes Israel was interested only in restructuring the nature of the occupation, with the Palestinian Authority acting as its enforcer. They saw the Camp David summit as high-wire diplomacy aimed at pressuring them to reach a quick agreement, lowering their expectations, and increasing the political and symbolic costs if they did not. These fears were confirmed by the finger-pointing and ‘‘blame game’’ that occurred immediately following the summit’s collapse. Shortly after the failure of the Camp David summit, the Second (al-Aqsa) Intifada erupted, triggered by Ariel Sharon’s visit to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif at the end of September. The outbreak of a second Palestinian uprising hinted at deeper underlying causes: pent-up frustration and disenchantment with the Oslo process, economic hardship resulting from Israeli security measures, and a growing mistrust of Israel. In Israeli eyes, however, the outbreak of violence merely confirmed that Arafat was not a true partner for peace. They were certain that Arafat had made a strategic decision in the aftermath of Camp David to pressure Israel through a campaign of terror alongside the diplomatic-political route. For Israel, the return to violence was evidence that the Palestinians had not abandoned the armed struggle to promote their national goals. The al-Aqsa Intifada left Israelis and Palestinians bitterly divided. Cooperative ventures and dialogue between Israeli and Palestinian civil society, which had flourished during the Oslo years, quickly evaporated. Strategies of peace and coexistence were replaced by confrontation, containment, and separation. Violence on a scale heretofore unwitnessed took root. In a period of four years, successive terrorist attacks on civilian targets led to over 1,000 Israeli deaths. In response, Israel resorted to overwhelming military force to suppress the uprising, destroying Palestinian infrastructure and leaving more than 5,000 Palestinians dead and scores more wounded. While Israel and the Palestinians moved further apart, paradoxically, support for the two-state solution solidified. With the adoption of the 2003 Road Map, the promotion of a Palestinian state became the cornerstone of international policy and part of Israeli discourse on the conflict. Within Israel, this support arose more from a desire for separation from the Palestinians than from a genuine acceptance of the legitimacy of their national aspirations. Successive Israeli governments over the past decade have endorsed the two-state solution with varying degrees of enthusiasm and sincerity.
Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza in the summer of 2005 offered a glimmer of hope. Supporters of the Gaza disengagement plan saw it as an opportunity to kick-start the moribund peace process. Skeptics, on the other hand, saw it as a cynical and calculated ploy by Ariel Sharon to tighten Israel’s grip on the West Bank (see chapter 17, by Joel Peters). The Gaza disengagement led only to further violence and to the rise of Hamas. The latter’s replacing of Fatah as the governing authority in Gaza has resulted both in the physical separation of Gaza from the West Bank and the outside world and in the bifurcation of Palestinian politics and society. In recent years, statements by the international community have contained an equal measure of urgency and frustration at the inability of the Israelis and Palestinians to resolve their conflict. President Obama made its resolution a top priority of his administration, calling for an immediate settlement freeze and for the two sides to negotiate – to little effect. Despite his efforts, Israel and the Palestinians have become even more entrenched in their positions, their leaders lacking the political will and courage to make the compromises necessary for peace. With the rise of popular support for Hamas and the demand for the right of return, the majority of Israelis see themselves as engaged in a struggle for survival. It is not a return to the 1967 boundaries that is at stake, but unresolved issues dating back to 1948. Palestinians see Israel’s support for Palestinian statehood as mere rhetoric. They claim that Israel’s continued expansion of the settlements and expropriation of land undermines the viability of any future Palestinian state and argue that Israel is offering little more than the bantustanization or cantonization of Palestinian lands. Partition, a solution first mooted in 1937, is no longer seen by many on either side as a viable solution to the conflict. Ideas are beginning to circulate that address the rights of Israelis and Palestinians outside a territorial framing. But it remains to be seen if they are real alternatives to the two-state solution that has held stage for the past seventy-five years.
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict has, understandably, spawned a vast literature: competing histories of the wars and peace efforts; personal memoirs; journalists’ accounts; ideas produced by think tanks and various Track II initiatives; reports by NGOs and international organizations; online blogs; and detailed analysis of different issues (such as settlements, borders, water, Jerusalem, refugees) and conflicting descriptions of the motivations of the actors (domestic and international). This literature can be overwhelming and confusing to the reader and student of the Middle East and international relations. This book comprises a set of thirty essays on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. It does not offer a detailed history of the conflict or of diplomatic efforts aimed at reaching a solution. Instead, we identify six broad themes that provide a comprehensive overview of the issues, the motivations of the various actors, and the dynamics underlying the conflict. The book opens with two essays, by Colin Schindler and Ahmad Khalidi, which detail the early origins and aims of the Zionist and Palestinian national movements. The next section addresses the competing narratives surrounding the conflict. Paul Scham in his chapter offers an overview of those narratives, while essays by Kirsten Schulze (1948 war), Joel Peters (Camp David summit), and Rami Nasrallah (Palestinian Intifadas) look at the debates and meanings ascribed to three specific historical junctures which have affected both Israeli and Palestinian discourses on the conflict and continue to impact on the politics of the peace process. The various diplomatic initiatives are the subject of the third section of the book. Laura Zittrain Eisenberg covers the period through to 1993, while Galia Golan continues the story from the signing of the Oslo Accords in September 1993 through to the present day.
The Oslo process identified a number of final-status issues to be discussed at the end of process. Rex Brynen discusses the ideas put forward to resolve the Palestinian refugee question, Mick Dumper writes on the status of Jerusalem, Julie Trottier on water, and David Newman on the question of borders. Five other issues are covered in this section. Arie Arnon addresses the economic aspects of the conflict and various ideas on the nature of economic relations between Israel and the Palestinians.
The question of terrorism and political violence, a recurring theme that has dominated the headlines throughout the conflict, is the subject of the chapter by Magnus Norell. As Yehezkel Landau notes, the conflict over Israel/Palestine is not, at its core, a religious conflict. However, religion, with its powerful symbols and loyalties, is fundamental to the identities of both Arabs and Jews, and religious traditions that sanctify territory and history are invoked to justify nationalistic claims, even for those who do not define themselves as traditionally observant. As discussed earlier, the demand for separation and disengagement has become a powerful theme in Israeli discourse on the conflict, the emergence of which is explored in Gerald Steinberg’s essay. This demand for separation led to Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in the summer of 2005. The chapter by Joel Peters offers an analysis of the motives for and consequences of the Gaza disengagement. Hopes that the latter would revive the peace process failed to materialize. Instead, Gaza has become separated from the West Bank, governed by Hamas, and isolated from the world. A vast array of actors, both domestic and international, have influenced the course of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The next section consists of five essays looking at the influence and role of domestic forces within Palestinian and Israeli society. Nigel Parsons looks at the critical role played by the PLO and its leadership of the Palestinian national movement. The Oslo Accords led to the return of the PLO leadership to the West Bank and Gaza and to the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA) as the governing structure to replace Israel. Parsons follows up his essay on the PLO with an analysis of the PA.
The majority of Palestinians quickly lost faith in the PA, seeing it increasingly as corrupt or powerless. Michael Schulz provides an analysis of the role played by civil society organizations in Palestinian life and discusses the change in scope, activity, and outreach of those organizations before, during, and after the Oslo process. For many years, the PLO dominated Palestinian political life. That position of hegemony has been challenged in recent years by the rise of popular support for Hamas. Khaled Hroub describes milestones in Hamas’s historical and intellectual development and the political challenges it faces. He pays particular attention to the tension between utopian and ideological ideals driven by religious aspirations within the movement, as well as to the political realities which have compelled Hamas to consider relaxing its ideology and adopting more pragmatic positions.
Israeli society is deeply divided over the possibility of peace with the Palestinians and the future status of the West Bank. Peace movements have been an integral part of the Israeli political landscape since the inception of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Naomi Chazan tracks the development of extra-governmental peace activities in Israel since 1967. The essay maps the constituent groups, discusses the dynamics, and assesses the impact of the Israeli peace movement over time. The West Bank holds a particular religious significance for many Israelis as it forms part of the Greater Land of Israel, the biblical lands of Judea (in the south) and Samaria (in the north), to which the Jewish people have a historic claim. This has led to the steady growth of Israeli settlements in the West Bank since 1967. David Newman’s essay assesses the impact of the settler movement on Israeli society and how the settlers have influenced Israeli policy on the peace process. The final section of the book covers the role and interests of various international actors in resolving the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Steve Spiegel discusses the changing positions and influence of the United States from the Truman administration through to the present day. Robert Freedman addresses the role of first the Soviet Union and then Russia.
This is followed by an essay by Rosemary Hollis on the position of the European Union and its role in the Israeli–Palestinian peace process. P. R. Kumaraswamy looks at the way in which the Palestinians have sought and received political, economic, diplomatic, and, at times, military support from their Arab friends. He also shows how Arab rulers have occasionally exploited the Palestinian issue to further their own interests and to delegitimize their rivals. In recent years, scholars, experts, and policy-makers have increasingly recognized the role, both positive and negative, that diaspora groups can play in violent ethno-national conflict. To understand fully the dynamics of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, it is essential to take this extraterritorial dimension into account. For many Jews and Palestinians living outside Israel, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem, the conflict, though far away, is the focus of their political activity. The book concludes with a chapter by Dov Waxman in which he discusses the role of the Jewish diaspora – in particular, the American Jewish community – and its impact on the dynamics of the conflict. The authors of these essays are leading authorities in their field, and all have published extensively in their subject and on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict/peace process as a whole.
Many have played a leading role in various Track II initiatives accompanying the peace process. The essays do not share a common position on the conflict or its resolution and should be read as stand-alone pieces. No strict editorial guidelines have been imposed on the authors, beyond asking them to be critical in their analysis, to desist, as far as possible, from apportioning blame, and to refrain from engaging in policy advocacy. In recent years discussion of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has become increasingly polarized, a sort of dialogue of the deaf. It is the hope that this book might in some small way lend itself to the emergence of a more constructive conversation.
Link
Press Here
0 التعليقات :
إرسال تعليق