The
Middle East and the
EU Model as a solution
By
Johan
Galtung, TFF Associate
August 4, 2006
The unspeakable tragedy unfolding
in this sixth Israel-Arab war should force us to focus on
what peace might look like. The building blocs are clear,
but they are threatened particularly by those who stop
thinking when it is needed most. The building blocs
are:
[1] The UN Security Council
Resolutions 194 and 242, demanding the return of
Palestinians, and the withdrawal of Israel to the 1967
(meaning before the June war) borders.
[2] The resolution by the
Palestine National Council of 15 November1988, accepting
a two state solution.
[3] The proposal by Saudi
Arabia in 2002 that Israel withdraws to the1967 borders
in exchange for recognition by all Arab
states.
Putting the building blocs in place
we get two states side by side with East Jerusalem and
most of the West Bank reverting to Palestine (Israel has
already withdrawn from Gaza), the Golan Heights to Syria,
and some minor border problems solved, sometimes through
creative adjustments. No big revolution. Only common
sense.
But there are also minimum and
maximum demands on both sides. Palestine has three
minimum, non-negotiable demands:
- a Palestinian state in line with
[1] and [2] above, with
- East Jerusalem as the capital,
and
- the right of return - as a right,
numbers to be negotiated.
Israel has two minimum,
non-negotiable demands:
- recognition of the Jewish state,
Israel,
- within secure borders
All five goals are legitimate, and
compatible. The Palestinian legitimacy rests on continued
residence, and the Jewish legitimacy on territorial
attachment in their cultural narratives, and their
residence there in the past. It does not rest on their
suffering at German and European hands. Any territorial
bill on that basis would have to be placed at the feet of
Germany.
The demands are compatible because
they can be bridged by a two states solution with the
1967 borders, to be spelt out below.
But there are also maximum goals:
an Eretz Israel defined by Genesis between the two rivers
Nile and Euphrates (or something in that direction), and
on the Palestinian/Arab/Muslim side no Israel at all,
erased from the map. Their incompatibility is obvious.
But they are also illegitimate. There is more than a de
facto basis for a Jewish state, even if never anything
with that extension.
How strong are the maximum demands?
A major tragedy of this war that it strengthens the
maximalists, not only "hatred". On the Israeli side some
will feel the borders cannot be far enough out, at least
where disarmament of anyone hostile to Israel is
concerned. And their numbers are increasing by the day,
week, month(?) of war. On the Arab/Muslim side there some
will feel the solution to Israel is no Israel at all;
their numbers are no doubt also increasing.
The two maximalist positions are
emotionally and intellectually satisfying, being simple,
easy to understand. And spell nothing but endless war.
The Arabs have to accept SOME Israel state, but not the
overextended, belligerent monster of today. And the Jews
have to understand that settler colonialism AND
occupation AND continued expansion will never bring them
secure borders.
The road to security passes
through peace. There is no road to peace that passes
through security in the sense of eliminating
people-supported Hezbollah and democratically elected
Hamas. What perhaps might work against smaller and less
firmly rooted groups will never work today.
There will be new groups coming up
all the time. Governments may be bribed or threatened
into acquiescence, people never. Behind Israel there are
some increasingly unwilling governments, also behind
settler colonialism: USA, UK, Australia. Behind Palestine
there is the Arab and Muslim world - considerably larger.
Maybe 1.3 billion and increasing, as against 0.3 billion
and decreasing.
The in-between peace position must
be made equally compelling. There is the 1967 possible
meeting point with minor revisions and the idea of two
states with capitals in Jerusalem -thus, Jerusalem could
become a confederation of two cities, East and
West.
But two demands still have to be
met: the Israeli demand for security and the Palestinian
for the right of some, limited, return.
Saudi Arabia's recognition is a
necessary but not sufficient condition for positive
peace. Sovereign states may recognize each other and
still go to war. They must be woven together in a web of
positive interdependence making sustainable peace
desirable to both.
Since Israel wants secure borders,
why not focus on the border countries Lebanon, Syria,
Palestine recognized, Jordan and Egypt? Imagine the five
border countries add to recognition a readiness to
consider a Middle East Community, along the lines of the
European Community, as a major carrier of sustainable
peace in the region? The formula that accommodated
Germany may also accommodate Israel.
There would still be the problem of
Palestinian return, half a million in Lebanon alone. And
there is the problem of some parts of the West bank being
a part of the Israeli narrative of the past. So why not
exchange one for the other? Some Jewish cantons in a West
Bank under Palestinian sovereignty in exchange for some
Arab cantons inside a sovereign Israel? Both states could
become federations rather than unitary states that are
relics of the past anyhow.
The non-governmental Geneva
agreement is a non-starter because it fall short on three
rather major points:
- East Jerusalem as capital and a
right of return are non-negotiable;
- borders can only become
reasonably secure in a peace community, like the Nordic
Union, the European Union, and ASEAN.
This peace solution is compelling
by being so obvious.
But not obvious to Israeli and
Western leaders now traveling down the Viet Nam trail,
with Israel : Lebanon = USA : Viet Nam. USA did not win,
and withdrew. The same will happen to Israel. Further
down, on the same trail of mad stupidity, 9/11 and Iraq
are waiting.
There is the idea of Lebanon in two
parts, with international forces pacifying a South
isolated from two evil outsiders, Syria and Iran. As
doomed to failure as in Viet Nam. Hezbollah is a part of
Lebanon like "Viet Cong" of Viet Nam. And arms are easily
available.
There is the indiscriminate killing
of civilians, in line with the two points made by the
Israeli army chief of staff, General Dan Halutz: to bomb
ten building in the shiite district of Beirut for each
Katyusha missile launched against Israel, and to "bomb
Lebanon 20 years into the past" (El Pais 28/7, Haaretz
and Jerusalem Post; USA said back to the Stone Ages).
Hezbollah also kills civilians, but
the ratios are at least 10:1. The final ratio may be
closer to Hitler's famous order in 1941 to execute 50
civilians for each German soldier killed by the
"terrorists" (they used that term): Lidice in the Chech
Republic, Oradour-sur-Glane in France, Kortelisy in
Ukraine. Today most of Lebanon is used for collective
punishment. And to Israel Jewish lives are worth much
more than Arab lives.
There is the naive idea that
violence disappears if Hezbollah is disarmed, along UNSC
1559 lines. But 1559 makes no sense without 194 and 242.
Israel cannot pick a resolution it wants, relying on USA
forever controlling the UN. And Hezbollah will be
reborn.
THERE IS A CONFLICT, THE CONFLICT
CRIES FOR A SOLUTION, THE SOLUTION IS AT HAND AND WILL
ONE DAY BE AS OBVIOUS AS THE EC/EU.
Everybody should work for real
peace as political complement to immediate humanitarian
cease-fire. To help Israel stumble down the Viet Nam
trail is blind solidarity, not an act of
friendship.
Europeans could mobilize the talent
and experience of the European Community/Union for a
sustainable peace, not for infinite and escalating
warfare. That would be an act of true
friendship.
And in Israel itself? A coming
generation might do well to question the wisdom of the
major Zionist ideologue, Vladimir Yabotinsky, inspiring
Begin, Netanyahu, Sharon and now Olmert. To Yabotinsky
there seem to be only two options, either "impotent,
humiliating self-sacrifice or militant, invincible rage"
(Jacqueline Rose, "The Zionist Imagination" in The
Nation, June 26, 2006, s. 34)
To Yabotinsky Jews had been
humiliated, shamed by violence, and the answer is
militancy, violence. This vision, apart from making
violence a cornerstone of human existence, is short on
the third option: negotiation, settlement,
peace.
And the Arabs, Muslims? Something
similar. But Islam opens for a third possibility, not
only dar-al-Islam and dar-al-Harb, the House of Peace,
the House of war, there is the dar-al-Ahd, the
coexistence with the infidels - possibly in a community,
not too close, not too distant. Possibly also as an
Organization for the Security and Cooperation in the
Middle East. The present generation would also do well to
elaborate this in more detail, today.
When will those generations come,
how far have we been set back? Difficult to tell. The
three building blocs for peace have been there for some
time, but nothing seemed acceptable to Israel.
They never were let into the
collective mind, into public space. Outside pressure will
only confirm the stark Yabotinsky dichotomy. If Israel
wants security, mainstream Israel must want
peace.
That leaves us with the
maximalists. Their strongest argument against the
moderates is "your line doesn't work". And the strongest
counter-argument, like for ETA, for IRA, is to prove them
wrong.
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