Remember the Basics

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Remember the Basics
By Aaron Lerner Date: 31 May 2001

1. Remember the basics

Oslo was NOT supposed to be symmetric.

Oslo did not have balanced rights between Israel and the PLO.

And there was a reason for that. Because Oslo was not launched between equal powers. At the time Oslo was launched there was no intifada. In fact, Israel's "wanted list" of terrorists was on a continual decline.

The Israelis who launched Oslo were driven by ideology - not desperation.

Now you may tell a child that he should defer to his younger sibling because he is smaller, but in the real world, when two bodies deal with each other, asymmetric power leads to asymmetric results that reflect this. That is not to say that it is a zero-sum world, just that the deals that are made reflect the cards the parties are holding.

And so, with Arafat being plucked from the dung heap of history, he agreed that a cornerstone of Oslo would be an extremely asymmetric arrangement:

As he wrote in that first letter to Rabin on September 9, 1993 (and as repeated in the agreements):

"The PLO commits itself to the Middle East peace process, and to a peaceful resolution of the conflict between the two sides and declares that all outstanding issues relating to permanent status will be resolved through negotiations."

As the recognized leader of the Palestinians, Yasser Arafat forfeited the right take his struggle with Israel beyond the negotiating table.

And while there are those who claim that the Palestinians had a right under international conventions to fight what they termed the Israeli occupation, that commitment, by their leader, stripped the Palestinians of any legitimate claim to the right to use force and violence.

But if the Palestinians cannot use the threat of violence what would motivate Israel to compromise?

I could hypothesize about what kind of deal the Palestinians might have been able to cut if not for Palestinian terror. (Their economy certainly would have taken off and movement between Gaza, "green line" Israel and the West Bank would have been more like driving between New York and New Jersey than between the US and Canada.)

But even if the absence of Palestinian violence failed to allow Meretz and their fellow travelers to squeeze through approval of a deal that the Palestinians want does not matter. Again: the PLO came into this deal with a weak hand and they committed to the rules of the game. If they did not want to play this game they should not have agreed to the terms.

To repeat: "The PLO commits itself to the Middle East peace process, and to a peaceful resolution of the conflict between the two sides and declares that all outstanding issues relating to permanent status will be resolved through negotiations."

2. Mitchell forgets the basics

The Mitchell Report ignored this very basic and critical cornerstone.

When I read the report I was stunned by a statement that essentially constitutes a license to kill for Arafat:

"We reiterate our belief that a 100 percent effort to stop the violence, an immediate resumption of security cooperation and an exchange of confidence building measures are all important for the resumption of negotiations. Yet none of these steps will long be sustained absent a return to serious negotiations."

Sure, Arafat should try to behave, but if Israel is not "serious" in the negotiations and does not give him what he wants at the negotiating table the United States will UNDERSTAND if Arafat resorts to violence.

Arafat signed it. America was witness to the signing of several agreements with the very same commitment.

The Mitchell Report is not a document for "peace is stages" it is a document for the destruction of Israel in stages.

One would have thought that Senator Mitchell, whose "Good Friday Agreement" in Northern Ireland was a fiasco because it did a botch job on the issue of the disarming of the IRA would have had a little humility when he took on this conflict.

If he had he might have made a serious contribution to peace and stability.

He could have insisted that the Palestinians stop the violence AND get rid of the illegal weapons AT ONCE and take the many other security related steps that they have promised to do time and time and time again.

But he did not.

In fact, the reference to illegal weapons is buried deep towards the end of Mitchell's list of "confidence building measures".

Mitchell, who, as I just mentioned, certainly knows that his failure in Ireland was because of his failure to properly address the weapons issue writes volumes about settlements and Israeli security measures but when it comes to weapons can only mumble "The parties should abide by the provisions of the Wye River Agreement prohibiting illegal weapons."

Get it: "the parties". He won't even identify the Palestinians as the offending party.

3. Sacrifices for PR

Those murdered by Palestinians under Rabin and Peres were "sacrifices for peace". A least someone thought that these people died for a higher cause.

But today our prime minister does not even say that. Prime Minister Sharon made in clear in his Knesset speech that the people being murdered today are nothing more than "sacrifices for PR".

[Sharon claims Israel is gaining by the blood - I do not see it. The big PR gain for Israel already happened before the violence when Arafat refused to agree to a fantastic deal with Barak.]

Is it immoral to let civilians die because it helps Israel's image? Golda Meir held back before the Yom Kippur War because a preemptive Israeli strike would mean bad PR. Was she right?

There may very well be circumstances that allowing civilian deaths for PR is a necessary sacrifice.

But this is extremely expensive PR. It has to be used wisely.

This is not the kind of public relations gain that can be wasted just to buy time or insure a pleasant European visit.

PR gained by blood can only be justified if it is exploited for the implementation of only the grandest of schemes.

And I say, with the heaviest of hearts, that I see no grand scheme.

This week the security cabinet met and it is clear form the meeting that they haven't a clue what they REALY want to do.

Do they want to destabilize Arafat, clean out the West Bank and Gaza of the bulk of the terrorist threat and then move on to some form of long term autonomy - or is the purpose of the exercise to get quiet for a few days, go back to the table and pull back to the Green Line and divide Jerusalem in the hopes that the violence won't start all over again over the right of return and other issues?

The government does not know. This despite that fact that just a few months ago, the People of Israel voted overwhelmingly for a man who clearly going to clear out the terror.

As long as the government does not know WHAT they want to do, those "sacrifices for PR" are sacrifices in vain.

I hoped against hope that maybe Sharon was just keeping his cards close to his chest. That Sharon had a plan. That he was working up to a crescendo, trying to milk the "sacrifices for PR" for all it is worth with the images of protests against his unilateral cease-fire earning him points on CNN. All as part of a grand scheme to ultimately do what he was elected to do.

But if Sharon had a plan he would not lash out at the families of the victims. After all, those angry families ADD to the PR value of the "sacrifices for PR". They would SERVE a plan if he had one. Instead Sharon complained at a Likud meeting today that no one has the right to tell him about tragedy.

Tragedy!?!

It is a tragedy when your son dies in an accident. It is a tragedy when one wife dies in an accident and the second from cancer.

But does this in any way compare to the tragedy of losing one's loved one because a bunch of radical politicians decided to arm the enemy and a prime minister elected to put the terror genie back in the bottle got cold feet?

No. I fear that as we face what may be the most critical battle since the War of Independence Ariel Sharon is fumbling.

As everyone who lived through the Yom Kippur War here the images of that nightmare are as vivid today as they were over a quarter century ago. And I am reminded of two images: Moshe Dayan slumped over in his chair - totally dumfounded, and a confident Arik Sharon preparing for action.

That is the Arik we need today.

Dr. Aaron Lerner, Director
IMRA (Independent Media Review & Analysis)
(mail POB 982 Kfar Sava)
Tel 972-9-7604719/Fax 972-3-5480092
INTERNET ADDRESS: imra@netvision.net.il
pager 03-6750750 subscriber 4811
Website: http://www.imra.org.il

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