Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Israeli Intransigence? Try Palestinian Rejectionism

November 17, 2011
Israeli Intransigence? Try Palestinian Rejectionism
By Aryeh Tepper
 
The conventional wisdom in diplomatic and media circles concerning the
Israeli-Arab conflict is that Israeli intransigence—especially on the
building of West Bank settlements—is the dead weight that prevents the
achievement of a two-state solution in the Middle East.  The Netanyahu
government has been trying to convince anyone willing to listen that
the real cause of the conflict's persistence isn't Israeli
intransigence but Palestinian unwillingness to accept a Palestinian
state so long as that means accepting a Jewish state alongside it.
Unfortunately and unsurprisingly, these efforts haven't met with much
success.
 
But Israelis are nothing if not persistent; and two high-ranking
officials in the Netanyahu government, Shalom Lipner and Yossi
Kuperwasser, have just given it another try.  Their article in the
current issue of the influential journal Foreign Affairs faithfully
reflects the reasoning behind the government's position and does so
with careful documentation and lucid argument.
 
Lipner is a long-time civil servant in the Prime Minister's Office;
Kuperwasser is Director General of the Ministry of Strategic Affairs.
The head of the Ministry, former Israel Defense Forces chief of staff
Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon, is a soft-spoken, independent-minded kibbutznik
who has been taking on conventional pieties ever since he was forced
out of the IDF by Ariel Sharon for opposing, on strategic grounds, the
"disengagement" from Gaza.  True to form, Ya'alon recently argued that
a construction freeze in the West Bank would amount to an "ethnic
cleansing" of the region's Jews.
 
Lipner and Kuperwasser, acknowledging that "two decades of peace
negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have failed
miserably," state their thesis: that "Palestinian refusal to recognize
Israel as a Jewish state stands at the root of the struggle and behind
every so-called core issue, from determining borders to resolving the
dispute over Palestinian refugees."  Since signing the Oslo accords,
they explain, the Palestinians have pursued "two complementary
approaches" to dealing with Israel, "one that rejects Israel outright
and another that accepts Israel as a political entity but continues to
refuse to accept its character as the homeland of the Jewish people."
In other words, the Palestinians have, on parallel tracks, pursued an
explicitly rejectionist approach and an implicitly rejectionist
approach.
 
It is unsurprising that Westerners remain unaware of the explicitly
rejectionist approach, which is articulated in Arabic and reserved for
domestic consumption.  What is sold to international audiences as the
voice of moderation is the implicitly rejectionist approach, in which
Palestinians appear to have recognized the State of Israel—but never
actually accept the existence of Israel as the nation-state of the
Jewish people.  They express willingness to recognize an entity called
"Israel," but this entity does not possess a particular Jewish
identity.  As Yassir Arafat made clear, this "voice of moderation"
calculates that the recognized entity called Israel will in due time
lose its Jewish majority, through both the Palestinian "right of
return" and the "Palestinian womb"—i.e., demographics.
 
The authors, reflecting the Netanyahu government's strategy, say
progress between the Israelis and the Palestinians will require a
"daring paradigm shift."  And what is the character of this paradigm
shift?  The present paradigm focuses on "land for peace" as the key to
ending the conflict; therefore, the building of settlements assumes an
importance far beyond its inherent significance.  The new paradigm
would shift the focus to the mutual recognition of national rights.
Israel must recognize a nation-state for the Palestinian people,
reflecting Palestinian culture.  As everyone with eyes in their heads
can see, the founding of such a state will require the uprooting of
Israeli settlements.  The Palestinians must recognize a Jewish state—
that is, the nation-state of the Jewish people.  That means no
Palestinian "right of return" to Israel proper, no Palestinian state
encompassing all of mandatory Palestine, and an end to the conflict.
 
The article does not spell out all the implications of such mutual
recognition, but they are clear enough.  The day the Palestinians
recognize Israel as a Jewish state, the Israeli public will more than
be willing to support compromise on other core issues.  If, however,
the Palestinians cannot do this (and by all indications they can't),
then again, everyone with eyes in their heads should see that this
incapacity—this rejectionism—is the source of the conflict's
continuation.
 
The logic of the argument would seem inescapable, but it isn't.
Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in her recent memoir,
recounts a story of classic Palestinian rejectionism.  In 2008, then-
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered to hand virtually 100
percent of the West Bank over to the Palestinians, divide Jerusalem,
appoint an international body to supervise the Holy Sites, and even
allow some Palestinians into Israel.  Palestinian National Authority
President Mahmoud Abbas refused the offer because it didn't include a
universal Palestinian "right of return."  And what lesson does Rice
take from this incident?  Amazingly, but perfectly in line with the
conventional wisdom, she concludes that an "Israeli-Palestinian deal
is doable, but they can't keep missing opportunities."  The
possibility does not seem to have crossed her mind that the
Palestinians will continue to "miss opportunities" so long as those
opportunities require acknowledging Israel as a Jewish state.
 
Has the possibility crossed President Obama's mind?  In his recent
September speech at the UN, he termed the Jews' ancient connection to
the land of Israel a "fact" and called on Arab governments to
acknowledge this fact.  This constituted a significant departure from
Obama's 2008 speech in Cairo in which he referred to the founding of
the state of Israel as a response to the Holocaust, and it's
reasonable to assume that Israeli diplomacy played a substantial role
in the change. But declaratory rhetoric aside, Obama has done little
to show he is willing to make the Arabs confront "difficult truths" in
the same way he has been willing to make the Israelis confront
settlement-building in the West Bank.
 
Lipner and Kuperwasser's goal is the goal of Netanyahu's government:
to get the international community in general, and the United States
in particular, to "pressure the Palestinians" into recognizing that
Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people.  But the Obama
administration's behavior is proof, if proof were needed, that the
conventional wisdom dies hard.  One wonders what measures the
Netanyahu government will take, aside from diplomatic persuasion and
the writing of learned articles, in order to achieve its goal.

 Israeli Intransigence? Try Palestinian Rejectionism
 
il "rejectionism" palestinian non impedisce l'esistenza di Israele,
l'intransigenza israeliana impedisce l'esistenza della Palestina. Le
chiacchiere stanno a zero

 il "rejectionism" palestinian non impedisce l'esistenza di Israele,
 
Perche` non hanno la forza per impedirlo.

  zero
 
Toh, qualcosa di cui ti intendi.

 legittima in una  trattativa, no?
 
E soprattutto estremamente produttiva, dal punto di vista negoziale.
 
 
-- 
Quando ti incontro per la strada ti darei calci nei denti. Ma forse non 
li senti.
E' meglio se ti rullo di kartoni (kartoni).

 
 
amalric ha scritto:
 
Qui c'era il divertente post di un alcolista convinto che il
comportamento verso i palestinesi sia l'unita' di misura per stabilire
quanto uno e' ebreo.

Il 20/11/11 10:27, נחום ha scritto:

Grazie. Pur essendo un gentleman, trovo talvolta divertente sentire eco 
lontane dei rantoli da ubriaco del povero pazzo che gratta alla porta.
 
Però trovo sgradevole farmi inzaccherare dalla sue vomitate. Questa è la 
distanza giusta.


 lontane dei rantoli da ubriaco del povero pazzo che gratta alla porta.
 
Il compito del rabbino e' insegnare agli ebrei, nel rispetto della
sensibilita' di ognuno. E poi, suvvia, anche dall'ubriacone a volte si
impara. Quali sono le cazzate che si dicono nei bassifondi, per
esempio.

,

Qui c'era la risposta dello stesso alcolista, che si e' dimenticato di
aver parlato di insegnamento dei profeti.