The greetings President Obama extended last week to Israel’s new government may
have sounded
conciliatory, but Mr. Obama no longer entertains any illusions about
Israel’s leaders.
In the wake of last month’s election, the longtime
peace activists and diplomats who have devoted much of their professional lives
to achieving a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are more
depressed and demoralized than ever before.
Well before Mr. Netanyahu declared during the recent
election campaign that Palestinians would remain under
Israeli military occupation as long as he is Israel’s prime minister, Mr. Obama
understood that the Israeli government’s enthusiasm for continued peace talks
with the Palestinians served no purpose other than to provide cover for
Israel’s continued expansion of Jewish settlements and to preclude the
emergence of anything resembling a Palestinian state in the West Bank.
Related in Opinion
Faced with this grim reality, some observers naïvely
rooted for the center-left Zionist Union during the campaign. But the notion
that a government led by Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni might have produced a
two-state accord with the Palestinians was also a delusion. An agreement based
on the 1967 lines never appeared in the Zionist Union’s platform or crossed Mr.
Herzog’s lips.
Indeed, it was clear to anyone familiar with the
history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that what little hope remained for
a two-state solution would depend on the emergence of an Israeli government
entirely under the control of Israel’s far right. Only a far-right government
that so deeply offends American democratic sensibilities — as this one surely
will — could provide the political opening necessary for a change in America’s
Middle East policy.
Related Coverage
Mr. Netanyahu has wasted no time providing that
offense by appointing
as his justice minister a Knesset member, Ayelet Shaked, who approvingly
posted an article on her Facebook page that called for the destruction of
“the entire Palestinian people, including its elderly and its women, its cities
and its villages, its property and its infrastructure.”
The victory of Israel’s far right has thus provided
an unexpected, if narrow, opening for Mr. Obama, allowing him to call for a
reassessment of America’s peace policy.
Such a reassessment must begin by abandoning the old
assumption that Palestinians can achieve statehood only by negotiating with Mr.
Netanyahu. Because of Mr. Netanyahu’s statements and behavior during the
elections (not to mention the continued construction in the settlements), that
belief has been irreparably discredited. It is now certain that a two-state
agreement will never emerge from any bilateral Israeli-Palestinian
negotiations.
Such an agreement can only be achieved if the United
Nations Security Council, with strong support from the United States, presents
the parties with clear terms for resumed peace talks that will produce an
agreement within a specified timeframe. (This would go far beyond a rumored
French proposal.)
If either Israel or Palestine, or both, do not accept
the Security Council’s terms, or fail to reach agreement within the specified
timeframe, America would then join with other countries in asking the Security
Council to resolve the outstanding final-status issues like the status of
Jerusalem, the fate of Palestinian refugees and illegal settlements and
security arrangements.
A right-wing Israeli government will of course not
accept a Security Council decision calling for the establishment of a
Palestinian state and an end to Israel’s occupation. But such a decision would
encourage international boycotts of Israel and challenges to its legitimacy.
Israel’s status as a democracy would be widely questioned, and America’s
unconditional friendship and support would inevitably be eroded. These
circumstances would be far more likely to change Israel’s policies than any of
the present strategies.
Such a shift by the Obama administration would no
doubt encounter fierce domestic opposition from the Israel lobby and many
members of Congress. But the disappointment with Mr. Netanyahu’s policies that
I believe is becoming increasingly widespread among non-Orthodox segments of
the American Jewish community (and possibly even within parts of its sclerotic
establishment organizations) could provide Mr. Obama with the political space
he needs to move decisively in a new direction.
The United States government has never made an
unconditional commitment to Israel to block a Security Council role in bringing
about a two-state peace accord. It committed to blocking a Security Council
role only so long as there is a reasonable prospect that the parties might
reach such an accord on their own. That prospect no longer exists.
America has made an unconditional commitment to
Israel’s security — and rightfully so. But that commitment is in danger of
eroding if the Obama administration continues to prevent the Security Council
from pursuing a two-state agreement while continuing to provide Israel with the
military assistance that helps it keep the occupation in place.
America would then be seen as collaborating with Mr.
Netanyahu’s government in the continued subjugation of the Palestinians. That
would irreparably damage the United States’ honor and its national interests.
America’s commitment to Israel’s security obliges it
to push the Security Council to seek an end to the occupation and pave the way
for Palestinian statehood.
Henry Siegman, a
former head of the American Jewish Congress, is the president of the
U.S./Middle East Project and a former senior fellow at the Council on Foreign
Relations.
No comments:
Post a Comment