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Israel’s missed opportunities for peace

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Israel has squandered so many opportunities for peace that its very identity as a ‘Jewish state’ is in jeopardy.

Monday 29 October 2012

It is 39 years since the 6^th October/Yom Kippur war of 1973. After the peace talks in Geneva following the war, Israel’s then foreign minister, Abba Eban, the ever-articulate founding father of Israeli diplomacy, quipped that, “The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”

While there is indeed truth in Eban’s famous assertion (which I will explore in my next article), the Israeli fixation on this hypothesis, with its implication that there is no Arab “partner for peace”, and that the situation today is somehow inevitable, clearly overlooks the long annals of opportunities missed by…Israel.

Eban seems to have wilfully turned a blind eye to one glaring example of this lack of engagement which occurred on his watch: Israel’s failure to avert that same all-out war in 1973, shattering the prospects for forging a lasting peace that its victory six years earlier had opened up.

Although that 1967 war ‘officially’ lasted just six days, it in reality continued in various forms for a further six years – until the next war of 1973. This period could have been an important window of opportunity, but the Israeli government, drunk on victory and convinced that it could have its cake and eat it, rejected peace plan after peace plan. Had Israel taken action back then to return the Arab territories conquered in 1967 in accordance with UN Resolution 242 and the Rogers Plan, it could have avoided the drift to the current impasse in which hundreds of thousands of settlers live in occupied territory and millions of Palestinians live unhappily and in segregation under Israeli military rule.

Back to 1967. Those who subscribe to the received Israeli narrative will argue that Israel was dragged quivering into a fight for its very survival in June 1967, the state had no territorial designs at the time, and would have ceded the conquered territories had there been a true partner for peace.

There is no doubt that the Israeli public, exposed to a continuous barrage of bombastic radio broadcasts from Cairo promising to “put an end to the entire Zionist existence”, was terrified in the run up to the war – as those on the ground, including the Palestinian national poet Mahmoud Darwish, observed. However, the Israeli military establishment, which had been meticulously preparing for just such a confrontation since at least 1956, was confident it could defeat the bellicose Arab paper tiger, whose roar was definitely worse than its bite.

Indeed, I disagree with those who believe that Israel was acting in self-defence. Evidence of this can, for example, be found in how Israel cold-shouldered an Egyptian invitation in 1965 for then Mossad chief Meir Amit to go to Cairo for a clandestine meeting with none other than Abdel-Hakim Amer, Gamal Abdel-Nasser’s vice-president and confidante who unbeknownst to himself stood on the threshold of infamy with his subsequent mishandling of the 1967 war.

Israeli, pointing to the famous “Three No’s” of the Khartoum Summit of 1967, allege that there was no Arab partner for peace at the time. But this reveals a severe misunderstanding of the changes defeat had brought to Arab politics. For instance, Nasser tried to contain Syrian rejectionism in Khartoum, agreed to the principles of Resolution 242 and signed Egypt up to the Rogers Plan shortly before his death. “Go and speak of… a comprehensive solution to the [Palestinian] problem and a comprehensive peace,” Nasser reportedly told King Hussein of Jordan in Khartoum.

Regardless of whether Israel’s conquest was premeditated or accidental, the fact remains that the appetite to hold on to conquered land has been stronger than the urge to exchange it for peace ever since, despite early warnings of the dire consequences of this for the Zionist enterprise from the likes of Uri Avnery and Amos Oz.

The ultimate irony implicit in such warnings against Israeli intransigence, or perhaps inertia, is the possibility, with the direction things are heading, that Israel may ‘succeed’ where the Arabs have failed: destroying the Zionist dream of a Jewish-majority state by its own hand, especially with the recent revelation that there are now more Arabs living under Israeli control than Jews.

Moreover, it was not just the sting of comprehensive defeat that was prodding Nasser to pursue a revisionist course.

Although it was Israel which initiated peace overtures with Egypt soon after the 1952 Free Officers coup, it was Gamal Abdel-Nasser, who was then prime minister, who sustained and nurtured, along with then Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett, the secret channels which eventually led to a blueprint for a peaceful resolution. Nasser had early on showed remarkable restraint in his public pronouncements and admitted in private that eventual peace with Israel was inevitable – but this early willingness to seek out an accommodation fell prey to the pincer movement of Israel’s predatory hawks and Nasser’s disastrous ambition to lead the Arab world by following the loudest and most radical voices on the “Arab street”. Nasser’s clandestine partner for peace, Sharett, was ousted by David Ben-Gurion, also in 1955, who believed this Israeli dove – who, far more than any other Israeli leader, understood his Arab adversaries – was “raising a generation of cowards”.

Ben-Gurion’s fears provide significant insight into a major psychological barrier on the Israeli side. The long history of persecution endured by Jews had not only created a deep and painful trauma, it also helped fuel Israel’s obsession with might and courage as ends in their own right.

But it is not just a question of psychology. Israel’s failure to reach a resolution with the Arabs, particularly the Palestinians, has deep ideological roots. The elephant in the room which classical Zionism has ignored or dealt with myopically is the Palestinian people.

Theodor Herzl himself seemed to expect the local Arabs would embrace the Zionist newcomers with open arms, because they would bring the gifts of science and progress with them. In the egalitarian, multicultural Utopia Herzl imagined in his novel Altneuland (The Old New Land), an Arab character, Reshid Bey, expresses his gratitude that Jewish immigrants have helped modernise Arab villages and boost the value of Arab property.

Despite his early talk of Jewish-Arab class solidarity, Ben-Gurion was more realistic. “A people which fights against the usurpation of its land will not tire so easily,” he admitted to colleagues in the Mapai Political Committee in 1938. This could only be addressed, he believed, through a show of strength that would persuade Arabs to submit to Zionist hegemony.

Like Zionist leaders before and after him, including Herzl, Ben-Gurion was also convinced that the support of the great powers, or a great power, was more important than reaching any kind of agreement or accommodation with the local Palestinian population.

That can help explain Israel’s long refusal to recognise or deal with the PLO, despite Egyptian attempts dating back to the 1970s to persuade Israel to enter into talks and despite the Palestinian National Council (PNC) shifting the focus of its national charter away from armed struggle and towards a phased political solution. In fact, Yitzhak Rabin, who was prime minister at the time, expressed his desire to keep the Palestinian question in “the refrigerator” – and by the time he took it out of the fridge, it was perhaps already too late to thaw it as Israel did not possess the willpower to reverse the too many facts on the ground it had established in the meantime.

Even after having reached peace with Egypt and despite the Camp David accords stipulating that “Egypt, Israel, Jordan and the representatives of the Palestinian people should participate in negotiations on the resolution of the Palestinian problem in all its aspects”, Israel still refused to countenance dealing with Arafat and his comrades.

Even after Yasser Arafat had, during the first intifada, persuaded the PNC to recognise Israel’s legitimacy, at least implicitly, and to accept all relevant UN resolutions dating back to the 1947 UN partition plan, Israel still refused to play ball. “The PNC declaration is an additional attempt at disinformation, a jumble of illusions, meant to mislead world public opinion,” was the Israeli cabinet’s harsh verdict of the historic 1988 declaration. But as the faulty Oslo Accords a few years later clearly demonstrated, the PLO’s willingness to recognise Israel was not an illusion but very real.

Israel is repeating a similar series of errors with its refusal to deal with Hamas and its inhumane blockade on Gaza, which is bound to fuel grievances for long years to come and is clearly against Israel’s own self-interest. Even PA president Mahmoud Abbas, one of the architects of the two-state solution, is seen as beyond the pale in many Israeli circles today.

And so the endless, impossible, rhetorical search for a “suitable” partner for peace continues fruitlessly.

Although Eban’s assertion about missed opportunities is the one that has lodged in the Israeli popular psyche, another of his quotes is a far more apt description of Israel and Zionism’s approach to the Palestinians and wider Arab context: “History teaches us that men and nations only behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.”

Sadly, we do not seem to have reached this vital juncture in history yet.

—

Follow Khaled Diab on Twitter.

This is the extended version of an article which first appeared in Haaretz on 22 October 2012.

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Tags: 1967 war, abba eban, amos oz, arab world, camp david, david ben-gurion, egypt, gamal abdel-nasser, hamas, israel, israel-palestine, jewish state, mahmoud abbas, mahmoud darwish, moshe sharett, oslo accords, palestinian question, peace talks, rogers plan, syria, theodor herzl, un resolution 242, yasser arafat, yom kippur war, zionism

Behind the ‘Zion Curtain’

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By Khaled Diab

Living behind the ‘Zion Curtain’ reveals how alike Israelis and Palestinians are and how ordinary people must build common ground on this shared land.

Thursday 19 July 2012

Sharing the same land has caused Israelis and Palestinians to become more alike. Can this be used to build common ground? Photo: ©Khaled Diab

Not so long ago, an Iron Curtain split Europe. Similarly, a sort of “Zion Curtain” still divides the Middle East. But unlike communism and capitalism, Zionism and pan-Arabism are remarkably similar: both have sought to unify and empower diverse cultures who share a common religious heritage, on the one side, and a common language, on the other.

In addition to the physical barriers separating most Israelis and Palestinians from one another and the Holy Land’s isolation from the wider region, there are the apparently insurmountable psychological and emotional walls behind which each side takes cover, lest they unwittingly catch a glimpse of the human face peering across that political minefield littered with the explosive remnants of history.

Carrying as little political baggage as possible, I took the rare initiative – for an Egyptian – and stole across this no-man’s-land a few years ago in a personal bid to connect with ordinary people and see for myself the reality on the ground. Last year, I returned – this time with my wife and toddler son – to deepen my knowledge and do my little bit for the cause.

Egyptian intellectuals in the past who have preceded me on similar journeys have often faced censure and even ostracism, because their critics confuse dialogue and sympathy with Israelis with normalisation with Israel and approval of its policies towards the Palestinians. Despite the Camp David peace agreement, there is little traffic between Egypt and Israel. However, though I am a rarity in this land, I am by no means the only Egyptian who has made this journey. In addition to diplomats and some Christian pilgrims, a steady trickle of Egyptian pacifists has crossed the border.

Most Israelis are aware of the late president Anwar al-Sadat’s historic visit in 1977, but he was not the first Egyptian to cross the border. Some years earlier, when Egypt and Israel were still in a state of war, a young maverick and idealistic PhD student by the name of Sana Hasan threw caution to the wind and crossed the border. During her three-year sojourn, Hasan met just about everyone and did just about everything in her bid to understand her enemy and extend a hand of peace. She even wrote a memorable book about her exploits.

Another notable example is the leftist Ali Salem, the famous satirist and playwright who wrote perhaps the most famous Arabic-language stage comedy of the 20^th century. In the more optimistic early 1990s, the portly, larger-than-life Salem mounted his trusted stead – a Soviet-era Niva jeep – and set off on a conspicuous road trip through Israel, which he fashioned into a bestselling book.

Both these brave individuals faced more condemnation than approval for daring to cross enemy lines. Personally, despite some criticism, I have encountered a great deal of positive reactions and encouragement, especially from Palestinians themselves. For their part, many Israelis I encounter are thrilled to connect with a genuine McAhmed Egyptian, and ply me with so many questions that I sometimes feel like I’m the sole representative of an alien race from a faraway planet.

Viewed from the inside, one of the most striking things about this tiny land – whose combined Jewish and Arab population is barely half that of my hometown, Cairo – is its sheer, dizzying diversity, which could be its most powerful asset in the absence of conflict.

Not only do you have two self-identified nations and three main religious groups, you also have enormous ethnic, social and cultural variety within Israeli and Palestinian ranks. Jerusalem is a colourful – and often monochromatic – catwalk of the variously attired faithful, while Tel Aviv and Ramallah are the choice hangouts for the secular.

The downside of this variety is discord. While the outside world is acutely aware of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, less noticed are the fault lines within each society, between the religious and the secular, hawks and doves, maximalists and pragmatists, to take just a sample.

Another striking feature is how much Israelis and Palestinians have in common, despite their bitter political differences. For instance, though Israel is variously perceived as an “outpost” of Western civilisation or a Western “implant,” depending on your political convictions, culturally and socially it is also very Middle Eastern, not only because a significant proportion of its population is of Mizrahi Jewish descent, but also because of the direction in which Israeli society has evolved. I am sometimes surprised by how much Arab culture has sunk into the Israeli mainstream, despite the Ashkenazi cultural dominance. In fact, despite Israel’s European aspirations, Israel certainly does not feel like part of Europe: it is an odd blend of Middle Eastern colour and tradition, Eastern European austerity and communalism, and, like other parts of the region, sprayed over with a recent layer of superficial American consumerism.

In fact, I would hazard to say that Israelis, Palestinians and the people of the wider Levant resemble each other more than they do the Jewish Diaspora or Arabs from, say, the Gulf. Israelis and Palestinians share a wide range of attitudes to family, education, work, friendship, socialising, driving, and even creaking bureaucracies and rough-round-the-edges finishing. Moreover, even though many Israelis in public are somewhat abrasive and direct, they often have a Middle Eastern attitude to helpfulness and, in private, share regional notions of hospitality, as I have personally experienced.

Moreover, the close proximity in which Israelis and Palestinians live – and the very extensive contact that occurred between the two peoples prior to the current segregation, as recalled oft-nostalgically by older people – has profoundly influenced both sides. In Israel, the Arab influence is clear to see in the culture, music, cuisine and language, while the Israeli influence, as well as the necessities of the conflict, seems to have made Palestinians more individualistic and anti-authoritarian than many of their Arab neighbours.

In terms of language, modern Hebrew was profoundly influenced by Arabic, while Palestinian Arabic is increasingly borrowing from Hebrew. Sometimes Palestinians use Hebrew words, yet are convinced they are Arabic, such as “ramzor,” the word for “traffic light.” Moreover, young Palestinian-Israelis speak in a confusing mix of Hebrew and Palestinian Arabic, while older Iraqi Jews liberally inject Baghdadi Arabic into their Hebrew.

When it comes to cuisine, while Israel’s acquisition of hummus as its national dish has led to the so-called “Hummus Wars,” Palestinians too have borrowed, albeit to a lesser extent, food from their Jewish neighbours. The prime example is, as I discovered, the surprising popularity of schnitzel among Palestinians.

The decades-old conflict has also profoundly shaped the psyche of both peoples, though it takes a far greater physical and material toll on the Palestinians. Most Palestinians and Israelis alive today were born into conflict, and this has bred a deep level of insecurity, paranoia and despair. This translates not only into positive attitudes towards, for instance, education, solidarity and steadfastness, but also into self-destructive notions that the world is against them, and the conflict is insoluble.

But the conflict is resolvable, not in any dramatic, comprehensive, final manner, but gradually, inch by painful inch, as pragmatism and the need to coexist slowly defeat ideology and intolerance. And the key to that future lies not with the failed leadership on both sides, or the ineffectual international community, but with ordinary people, Israelis and Palestinians willing to work together to transform the land they share into a true common ground.

—

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This is the extended version of an article first published in Haaretz on 17 July 2012.

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Tags: ali salem, arab, ashkenazi, camp david, culture, diaspora, egypt, hebrew, holy land, hummus, israel, israelis, jerusalem, middle east, mizrahi, palestinians, ramallah, sana hasan, schnitzel, tel aviv, zionism

Mustafa Barghouti: “We are heading towards a Palestinian Spring”

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By Khaled Diab

Palestinian reformer Mustafa Barghouti on the demise of the peace process, the death of the two-state option and the dawning of the Palestinian Spring.

Friday 4 May 2012

From beginnings as a medical doctor, Mostafa Barghouti has been a prominent Palestinian reformer, human rights activist and politician for many years. Before entering politics, he founded, and still chairs, the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees, which has grown to become one of the largest and most successful medical charities in the West Bank and Gaza. During the first intifada, he also set up a think tank to research health and development issues.

A member of one of the largest West Bank families, in terms of numbers, and one known for its political activism, it was almost inevitable that Mustafa Barghouti would enter politics. One of his earliest forays into politics was when he attended the Madrid Peace Conference in 1991 as a member of the Palestinian delegation, though he quickly became disillusioned with the peace process launched with the Oslo Accords. Along with other Palestinian luminaries, he established the Palestinian National Initiative (al-Mubadara al-Wataniyya al-Filistiniyya) in 2002, which has sought to reform the Palestinian political landscape by providing a third viable alternative to the PLO and Hamas. Though he has been dismissed as a ‘no hoper’ and the Mubadra did badly in the previous legislative elections, Barghouti himself became Mahmoud Abbas’s strongest rival for the presidency in 2005 and insists that his movement has matured and now enjoys a significant support base.

Having followed him for some time and seen him perform in debates, I was looking forward to meeting the man. Our encounter took place in his spacious office in Ramallah, at the medical NGO he set up. When introducing myself, I mentioned that I lived in Jerusalem, to which he responded by informing me that he and other West Bankers are not allowed to visit the city. I expressed my bewilderment and disappointment that I, as a foreigner, had more freedom of movement here than Palestinians. I asked him whether he, as a politician, had a permit to visit Jerusalem to which he said he didn’t but that he defied what he considered to be illegal restrictions by taking back routes regularly into the Holy City – and occasionally getting detained for it.

During our interview, he talked about the peace process, the future of the two-state solution, Israeli policies, Palestinian divisions, and the coming dawn of a Palestinian Spring.

Khaled Diab: I’d like to begin with a general question: are you optimistic about the future?

Mustafa Barghouti: I am optimistic when it comes to the future of the Palestinian people – of course. I am optimistic that the system of occupation and racial discrimination will be broken, and we will gain our freedom. But if you mean to ask whether I’m optimistic about what is called the “peace process”, then the answer is no. The peace process is dead.

You were a member of the Palestinian delegation which went to the Madrid peace conference.

And I was amongst the group which included Dr Haidar Abdel-Shafi who vigorously opposed the Oslo agreement.

So you find that the Oslo Accords do not accord with the Madrid principles?

No, the Oslo agreement contravened the Madrid principles in three areas. Firstly, it accepted the notion of a transitional solution. Secondly, it accepted a partial solution. Thirdly, it accepted the resolution of the Palestinian question in isolation from the wider Arab sphere.

The other dangerous aspect of Oslo was that an agreement was signed without the cessation of settlement building. I am with Haidar Abdel-Shafi, who is also one of the co-founders of the Mubadra [Palestinian National Initiative], along with Dr Edward Said. The three of us said that there can be no agreement without a full cessation of settlement activity.

Because the settlements have created realities on the ground?

Settlements have become a weapon for destroying everything, including Oslo itself. And that is what Yossi Beilin is now talking about. But Beilin does not admit that he is also at fault and responsible for the situation, even though he is one of those who allowed the continuation of settlement building to occur.

Do you think it would have worked if, after Madrid, instead of Oslo, an attempt to forge a comprehensive deal was pursued?

With the power of the intifada behind it, yes. There was also an international consensus. I believe that the successes of the intifada were squandered when the Oslo Accords were signed.

And do you think Israel could’ve accepted a comprehensive solution?

Israel was losing a lot at the time. The occupation was costly. And so Israel could’ve compromised. We might well have been living in an independent state by now. It’s also possible that we wouldn’t have been. I don’t know.

However, I believe it was entirely possible. I also think it was wrong for the Palestinian leadership to accept the notion of autonomy instead of full independence. Autonomy was supposed to be transitional and temporary, but the transitional has become permanent.

Why do you think that the exiled PLO leadership in Tunisia accepted this transitional agreement?

Perhaps one of the reasons is the huge international pressure that was exerted on the Palestinian leadership. Another factor was the allure of power. They began to hold on to the fantasy that the establishment of the Palestinian Authority (PA) would enable them to change the reality on the ground. But this has been proven to be a fallacy.

Do you think that the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin affected the peace process, that if Rabin had lived things could have turned out differently?

It’s possible, yes. Look, Rabin’s assassination and the electing of Netanyahu together sent out a clear signal that Israeli society would not go down the road of an independent Palestinian state. And this message should have been read and understood early on. Arafat understood this in 2000 and that is why he refused to submit to the pressures at Camp David and refused to give up the claim to Jerusalem, as was being demanded of him. And this led to the second intifada.

In my personal view, the message was already clear in 1996 and the duty at the time should have been to tell the world that the process is over. I believe that the establishment of the PA played a negative role because now the leadership is preoccupied with the trappings of power rather than the liberation movement. Israel has exploited the Oslo agreement to empty the liberation movement of its content and has transformed the PLO into little more than a cost item in the PA’s expenses.

This has had the effect of weakening Palestinian unity and has created enormous fractures in the Palestinian arena in two areas: between the supporters and opponents of Oslo, and between the internal and external dimensions, weakening the ability of exiled Palestinians to support the national struggle internally.

After the second intifada, the pro-Oslo camp – who built their election platform around the continuation of the Oslo process based on the false conclusion that it had failed due to our own errors and if we correct our ways everything will be fine – have been trying to revive the process since 2005 and to no effect. It is all an illusion planted by the international community and the United States in support of Israel.

The reality is that the Zionist movement has not accepted since its creation and until now the right of Palestinians to establish an independent state. But it is an intelligent movement. It procrastinates and delays to the fullest, accepting certain things temporarily while working towards its ultimate goals. But it has always kept a tight rein on maintaining the strategic initiative.

What do you say to those on the Israeli side who counter that the Palestinians “never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity”?

Firstly, these are Israeli lies. For example, they say that in 1947 the partition plan failed because the Palestinians refused to accept it. There are documents that prove that Ben Gurion intended to continue his plan, even if the Palestinians had accepted partition. Even if we assume that what they say is true, why did they not stop at the borders set by the partition? These are lies. Even now, they had the chance to permit the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, who has prevented them from doing so? The Palestinians? On the contrary.

So are there no rejectionists on the Palestinian side to the establishment of two states?

No, the vast majority are with the two-state solution. Even Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

But Hamas and Islamic Jihad were opposed to it at first.

Yes, but today, they support it. Who has prevented the establishment of an independent state? Israel.

You were among the biggest supporters of the two-state solution. In light of the current situation, do you still have faith in it?

Look, I believe in the freedom of the Palestinian people, and its right to independence and self-determination, and its right to end its subservience to Israel, either in the framework of two states or a single state.

But what I witness around me is that the Israelis have destroyed the two-state solution. Right now, we are in a grey area where it is difficult to determine empirically whether the two-state solution has actually died or is about to. Have we crossed the red line or are we about to cross it? In either case, it is clear that Israel, with the density of its settlement activity and its policies and the inability of the United States to exert pressure, is preparing to kill off the two-state option.

Under these circumstances, I say that the Palestinian people are not without options. One option is a single, fully democratic state in which every citizen has full and equal rights. However, for the time being, we must not allow differences of opinion over the one- or two-state solution to divide us once again.

Our slogan must be the freedom of the Palestinian people, whether in two states or one. When we reach the moment of truth, then we can decide. We cannot allow this to become another cause of internal division in the Palestinian ranks. Secondly, when we shift from one option to another, the decision must be a collective and unified one. Thirdly, we must not allow Israel to forfeit, this time, its responsibility for destroying the two-state option.

If Palestinians, Israelis and the international community wish to salvage the two-state solution, what needs to be done?

Firstly, pressure needs to be exerted to change the Netanyahu government. Military and economic aid to Israel must be stopped. Israel must pay a price for its occupation. There must be a clear resolve on the cessation of settlement activity and the removal of settlements. And there must be a clear reference to the 1967 borders. I do not accept the idea of land swaps and see it as a trap for the Palestinians. First, there’ll be talk of swaps, then of larger swaps. The settlements are illegitimate and so they must be removed – just as they were removed from Gaza.

The remove of the settlers or the settlements too?

It’s up to them whether they take the infrastructure or leave it behind, but the colonisation must end.

What do you think of the idea that if some of the Israeli settlers wished to stay on the land…?

If they are there in a legitimate fashion…

As Palestinian citizens?

If the place where they are living is not stolen from the Palestinians, then they are welcome to acquire Palestinian citizenship. But they cannot stay with us as Israeli citizens, like ‘Joha’s nail’.

So, you’re saying they should either become Palestinians or return to Israel?

Yes. They cannot stay here as Israeli citizens.

If Palestinians choose to go down the road of the single state, what strategy should they pursue?

The peaceful popular resistance that we are currently employing, the struggle for our rights.

Your civil rights?

Not just our civil rights. All our rights. Citizenship rights. Our national rights too. This has to be recognised. If we are to have a single state, this state must recognise the Arabic language and the Palestinian people. This is fundamental.

Popular resistance is a successful formula because it works both in the case of two states or one. In my opinion, the strategic choice before us is made up of four elements: the escalation of popular resistance, the BDS campaign, revamping all domestic Palestinian economic policies to focus them on reinforcing the people’s steadfastness instead of drowning them in debts, taxes and consumerism, rejecting the distinction between Areas A, B and C, and fourthly, national unity. We must end our divisions and form a unified leadership pursuing a unified strategy.

Do you think, in practical terms, with all the cracks in the Palestinian ranks, they can agree on a unified position?

Our destiny depends on it. Perhaps the deepening level of division has reached an untenable level. This could prove to be an opportunity to change the status quo, but the continuation of the current divisions will weaken us all and weaken our national cause. It will also cause enormous losses in popularity both for Fatah and Hamas.

Until you reach this fork in the road where you must choose between the two options, what should be the demands of the popular resistance movement?

Security co-ordination with Israel must end. The PA’s security role must be terminated. The PA cannot play a security role at a time when Israel mistreats us.

Before we started recording, you told me that the number of demonstrators on Land Day was greater than expected. Is this a sign that popular resistance can truly be stepped up and become a new intifada or revolution as has occurred in other countries?

I believe that we are heading towards a Palestinian Spring and it is inevitable that there will be another intifada.

Do you think the next intifada will be like the first one, peaceful, or…

Peaceful. I’m sure of it.

Do you think it will happen in the near future or…

It’s hard to say. But what we are seeing is a gradual escalation, as we expected. This phase of popular resistance began 10 years ago.

There are those who say that the Palestinians have already tried to mount their revolution during the first intifada, and its failure led to a sort of disillusionment.

No, the first intifada was a success. It was the political leadership which failed to consolidate the gains of the intifada.

Do you think the “Palestinian Spring”, as you called it, will have a clear leadership or will it be largely leaderless like the other Arab uprisings?

Ideally, there should be a unified leadership. But life goes on even in a vacuum. If the politicians fail to forge a unified leadership, then the intifada will create its own grassroots leadership.

You were a co-founder of the Mubadra and you took part in the previous presidential elections, where you came second to Mahmoud Abbas. Do you intend to enter the forthcoming presidential race?

Firstly, there are no elections. And when elections are called, we need to know elections for what, for the presidency of a country or the presidency of a Bantustan. If it is to lead a Bantustan, then I have no interest or desire – I don’t even accept the principle. If it is for the presidency of a country, then we can debate it closer to the time.

The danger is that the Palestinian Authority is without authority. It has no real existence. That is why we insist that, if elections are to take place, they must include the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem without exception. It should also include the Palestinian diaspora. The elections need to be both for the PLO and the PA simultaneously. We must never accept that the PA becomes the government of a Bantustan.

You personally scored well in the presidential elections in 2005, but the Mubadra only gained three seats, if I recall correctly. Is this a true reflection of the Mubadra’s power?

No, at the time, the Mubadra was still a new movement, so when we entered the legislative elections, we had not yet built a strong and effective organisational presence. Today, the situation is different. This is reflected in the results of the university elections, where the Mubadra has collected between 13 and 20% of the votes. These are decent gains.

Life has proven that the Mubadra is a necessary movement. Many new movements have been established but the only movement that has endured and survived and proven its capabilities, and has become the third power in the Palestinian arena, is the Mubadra. This is proof that this movement possesses a manifesto that is vital and needed. It is also the most youthful movement, and has a great future ahead of it.

What distinguishes the Mubadra are four things. Firstly, the popular resistance it has called for since its inception, and now everyone has adopted this strategy. It also stands out for its stance on domestic democracy, and that is why we do not participate in any government except a national unity one. It is also distinguished by its constructive role in unifying Palestinian ranks. We were the mediators in the most important agreements, namely the national unity government and the most recent Cairo accord, with the help of our Egyptian brothers, of course. Fourthly, the Mubadra upholds the principle of social justice. In addition to its vision for the liberation of the Palestinian people, the Mubadra also possesses an equitable social vision which takes into account the interests of the poor and the needs of Palestinian society. In addition, we are against party fanaticism and factionalism. Despite the hostility we sometimes face, we insist on remaining a unifying influence.

So, in your view, the Mubadra truly represents a third way in Palestinian politics?

Yes, and its ability to play a unifying and mediating role is linked to the fact that it is fully independent of both Fatah and Hamas.

You are in favour of peaceful resistance but there are others who criticise non-violent resistance and say that it has no future.

I am in favour of resistance as a principle. And the Palestinian people have the right to resist in every form. But it must comply with international and humanitarian law. We are not against other forms of resistance but we say that, in light of the current situation, the best, most appropriate and most effective means is Palestinian popular resistance. The evidence of this is that all the Palestinian political forces have adopted this strategy without exception.

I read in the papers that elections in May or June are impractical, and it would even be tough to organise elections in 2012.

True. I now believe that elections will be impossible as long as Gaza and the West Bank are divided. How can you have credible elections in the presence of this division? How can there be credible elections in the absence of the freedom to engage in political activities?

But in the absence of elections, there is also a democratic deficit?

That is exactly what I have said. We have regressed a lot, whereas we were once at the forefront of the Arab world. In 2005 and 2006, the Palestinian people were in the lead. I was the only Arab who ran against the president of the established order and did not go to jail, unlike Ayman Nour in Egypt and others. Unfortunately, the refusal to recognise the Palestinian unity government and the results of the elections divided Palestinian ranks.

So, the international community played a major role in this?

Israel and the international community were the main culprits behind the loss of democracy. That is why we insist on national unity, not for the sake of unity in itself. We are in favour of political pluralism and the right of Palestinians to choose but we cannot regain democracy without a transitional phase of reconciliation and national unity.

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Egyptian in the holy land

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By Khaled Diab

As a rare Egyptian in Jerusalem, I have felt something akin to being a B-list celebrity.

Tuesday 27 September 2011

The Dome of the Rock. ©Khaled Diab.

Loathe thy neighbour is the unwritten rule which, despite exceptions, generally governs the relationship between Arabs and Israelis. Despite living together on the same land, few Israelis and Palestinians interact on a personal level. And with travel restrictions and the political baggage of mutual hatred, fear and distrust, there is little traffic between Israel and the rest of the Arab world.

Even between my native Egypt and Israel, which have had a peace treaty for almost as long as I’ve been alive that, at least in principle, allows mutual travel, few venture across the border in either direction.

So, what made us decide to come here?

In 2007, I visited Israel and Palestine to express solidarity with the Palestinians and extend a hand of understanding and empathy to Israelis, and partly to learn more about the socio-cultural reality behind the geopolitical situation which I’d been interested in and writing about for years.

Since then, I’ve toyed with the idea of returning to spend a longer sojourn. My wife, too, has a profound interest in the country – not only is she an Arabist, she has also researched creative ways of breaking the deadlock in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. So when my wife was offered a job in Jerusalem, and with the portable nature of my profession, we jumped at the chance.

Despite the outright opposition or reluctance of most Egyptians to travel here, family, friends and acquaintances have been generally positive about our move, even in light of worsening bilateral ties, especially following the deadly terror attack launched from Sinai and Israel’s violent, sovereignty-defying retaliation which sparked anger on the streets of Cairo, culminating in the trashing of the Israeli embassy.

“I admire what you’re doing,” a good Egyptian friend said. “But personally I couldn’t do it. I have too many moral objections and I don’t think I could cope with the occupation.”

Nevertheless, some Egyptian friends have expressed excitement.

“Damn, spring in that greenish, dynamic city. Sounds like a wow to me. Cuisine, lingos, music… and tension,” another close Egyptian friend enthused, though he did express concern about the “anti-Arab, anti-Muslim or anti-Egyptian” sentiments that I might encounter.

Fortunately, until now, my main experiences of discrimination have been at the hands of officialdom, the army and the police, but rarely on the individual level, at least explicitly. In fact, in places where Israelis and Palestinians are thrown together by accident, such as the controversial light railway in Jerusalem, they tend to be polite and respectful to each other.

When paths cross in Jerusalem. Photo: ©Khaled Diab

“Wow” is perhaps not the word that first crops up in my mind when describing Jerusalem – “surreal” seems more appropriate. For an agnostic whose only interest in religion is social, political and historical, the spirituality – and fundamentalism – of the city holy to the three Abrahamic faiths is somewhat lost on me. Although I’m of a Muslim background, the Dome of the Rock complex fails to shake my soul, even during the intense spirituality of Ramadan. That said, its architectural grace is sublime, as is the artistic beauty within the Church of the Holy Sepulchre – while, to the unspiritual eye, the Western Wall is, as its name suggests, just a wall.

But it’s not just the historical and spiritual backdrop; there are also the conflicting realities of one’s mundane domestic routines carried out in a bubble of relative tranquillity amid the wider context of tension caused by decades of conflict and a rapidly changing geopolitical situation.

Although my previous visit had already convinced me that Israeli society has so much in common with the rest of the Middle East, despite its greater individualism and non-conformism, the Egyptian in me still cannot fully overcome the sense of strangeness of the experience. And, even in my short sojourn here, I have encountered such a diverse array of the weird, wonderful and eccentric – including Palestinians who expressed qualified admiration of Theodor Herzl, the founding father of Zionism, and Israelis who criticised him harshly – as well as the good of heart, not to mention the bad and the ugly of intent and action.

Here the political encroaches on the personal with sobering regularity. For example, choosing where to live, shop or hang out raises constant ethical conundrums. The neighbourhood we live in is surrounded by settlements, which, if you lack knowledge of the political topography, you might mistake for well-off suburbs, while the nearby refugee camps resemble the popular quarters of many Middle Eastern cities, though they are walled in on all sides.

With the movement restrictions they must endure, it is often hard to meet up with Palestinian friends and acquaintances. Given the segregated nature of the city, many Jewish friends and acquaintances are reluctant – or even fearful – to come to east Jerusalem, though some do, while those from Tel Aviv and other more secular parts of Israel really don’t like visiting because of the city’s increasingly theocratic vibe.

An Orthodox neighbourhood of Jerusalem. Photo: ©Khaled Diab

Ever since we arrived in the unholy mess of the Holy Land, we have felt quite conspicuous, with our particular Middle Eastern-European blend drawing speculative glances from Israelis and Palestinians alike, obviously trying to work out whether we’re one of them or the other side or just tourists. Also, our toddler son, with his blond curls and his mother’s delicate features, disarming smile and socialite swagger, is treated like a rock star wherever we go.

As an Egyptian, I have felt something akin to being a B-list celebrity myself – you know the type whose name no one knows but they’re certain they’ve seen before. Given that so few Egyptians travel to Israel or Palestine, most of the Egyptians Palestinians “meet” are through films, pop music, soaps and talk shows – which seems to endow their more mortal compatriots with a certain glamour and mystique, even if they can’t act, sing or dance.

Despite the criticism my presence here elicits from some Egyptians, Palestinians themselves usually express pleasure that a fellow Arab has come, and they are always eager to know what I think of their society and my take on the situation.

In trouble spots in particular, I am made to feel especially welcome. For instance, quite a few people in Hebron, and especially the shopkeepers, where over 1,000 shops have been shut down in the Old City to accommodate 400 or 500 settlers, told me, “We’re so glad that an Egyptian has come to see for himself what we have to endure.”

In fact, the uprising in Egypt has enhanced the “street cred” of all Egyptians in the eyes of Palestinians. Since we arrived, I have received endless congratulations for the revolution. Even while out researching an article in a tiny Palestinian village effectively cut off from the outside world by settlements, the locals I met got sidetracked from talking about their own plight to wax enthusiastic about the achievements of the Egyptian people.

“You Egyptians have raised the head of every Arab,” Mohammed Barakat, a local lawyer, told me.

Quite a few Israelis have also been inspired by events in Egypt, despite the fears elicited by Mubarak’s downfall among politicians and in mainstream society. “[The Arab Spring] has made me more eager to dream that the borders will open one day,” Mati Shemoelof, an Israeli journalist, poet and activist told me over drinks. “And I feel that we can only learn from this fabulous, new, brave movement.”

And as if to confirm his point, Israel has subsequently been gripped by protests over soaring housing prices, centred on Tel Aviv’s Rothschild’s Avenue, which has been described by some commentators as the country’s own “Tahrir Square”. I recently headed to the Israeli Tahrir to attend the largest demo so far – and probably the largest in Israel’s history – and was impressed by the vibrancy, creativity, diversity and good-naturedness of the crowd. An Israeli I know was keen to find out if I thought the protests compared favourably to those in Egypt.

Generally, being Egyptian carries a different significance for Israelis, who tend to feel isolated and rejected in the region. And so, when they find out that I’m from Egypt, they are often pleasantly surprised even confounded, such as during the protest in Tel Aviv where I was perhaps the only Egyptian in the crowd.

“But why do Egyptians never come here?” is a common question I get. “We were so hopeful after the peace treaty that we would become normal neighbours,” a leftist artist once said regretfully.

After explaining the reasons, I often turn the question around and ask Israelis why so few of them go to Egypt, despite the desire of many Israelis I have met to be accepted as normal citizens of the Middle East.

Israelis not only fear the intermittent terrorist attacks that target tourists, they are also unsure of the reception they will receive from Egyptians, with many apprehensive that they will face such indiscriminate hostility that they may simply be mobbed on the street by angry crowds.

However, Israelis I have encountered who have actually been to Egypt have returned with generally positive stories to tell. For example, Ofir Winter, a post-graduate student specialising in Egyptian politics at Tel Aviv university, attended the annual Cairo book fair and not only thoroughly enjoyed the debates and seminars, but was also pleasantly surprised by how Egyptians reacted to him.

“I recall that the warmest welcome I got was in a Salafi book store,” he told me. In fact, so enthusiastic was the welcome that one of the workers tried to convert him, “but in such a tolerant, delicate and kind manner that I could not dislike him,” Winter explained.

And if an Islamist and an Israeli can hit it off so well together, there is hope for the future yet. In fact, I am whole-heartedly convinced that the most under-utlised yet powerful weapon in the peace arsenal is dialogue and joint action across enemy lines that mobilises the massive “silent” majority.

This is demonstrated by the fact that, despite the bickering of their leaders, not only do 80% of Palestinians support the Palestine’s controversial application for UN membership but, surprisingly, so do 70% of Israelis, a recent joint poll found. That said, few Palestinians or Israelis I meet hold out much hope that this latest “game changer” will change the game for the better.

But walls of suspicion stand in the way of greater joint action. “We don’t feel the majority of Israelis care enough or are interested in our plight to do anything about it. Besides, there isn’t enough mutual trust,” one young Palestinian activist told me.

“The Arabs I deal with in my activism are both sympathetic and suspicious of Israelis,” Shemoelof says, noting that the anti-normalisation movement is a great hindrance to joint action.

Although I agree that Arabs should not normalise their economic ties with Israel until a just resolution has been reached, I believe that there is much to be gained for the cause of peace if like-minded Arabs and Israelis come out of their trenches and join forces to build some common ground in the no-man’s land which separates them.

This essay was first published by The Institute for War and Peace Reporting on 26 September 2011.

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Egypt, Israel and Palestine: towards the promised land of peace?

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By Khaled Diab

It is high time for Israelis and Palestinians – with grassroots support from Egyptians – to unlock their latent people’s power and forge a popular peace.

Monday 15 August 2011

Although it has primarily focused on domestic issues, the Egyptian revolution has sent ripples of hope and shockwaves of fear across the Middle East. Not only has Egypt traditionally been regarded as the unspoken leader of the Arab world, the dramatic exhibition of people power in action has inspired ordinary people everywhere and terrified the region’s fossilised leadership.

As Egyptians grapple to redefine their relationship with those who govern them, questions are being asked about how the revolution will affect Egypt’s foreign policy. One area of particular interest is how the ‘New Egypt’ will relate to Israel and the Palestinian struggle for statehood.

Like other political elites across the Middle East, the Israeli and Palestinian leadership – including both Fatah and Hamas – have been eyeing the Egyptian revolution with nervousness, because it threatens to upset the status quo on which they depend. But reality is gradually sinking in.

Many questions about the future remain. Can post-revolution Egypt play a more dynamic mediating role in the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process? Will Egypt’s cold peace with Israel chill further? Will popular anger at Israel’s occupation spill over into Egypt ‘tearing up’ its peace accord with Israel, as many Israelis fear? Is the enthusiasm of some Palestinians that Egypt’s ’return to dignity’ will help their cause warranted? How will the Egyptian revolution affect Israeli and Palestinian politics and how the two sides relate to each other, and to Egypt?

I will seek to answer these questions, as well as to consider how Egypt can best walk the tight rope of championing the Palestinian cause and nudging Israel towards a just resolution of the conflict, without returning to the ‘bad old days’ of futile belligerence. I will also explore what role the largely uninvolved Egyptian grassroots and civil society can play in bridging the gap between the two sides.

Israelis: between fear and enthusiasm

First, I will consider the Israeli response to the revolution and how the revolution has played out among Israel’s political class, the general public and progressive activists. When the revolution first broke in late January, the initial reaction of the Israeli government and establishment was one of concern and even panic, though ministers and officials were initially ordered not to make any public statements on the issue.

This ‘wait and see’ attitude rapidly shifted when the Mubarak regime looked in real danger of collapsing. Israel’s hard-line prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu even toured Europe and the United States to try to convince Western leaders to prop up the collapsing and corrupt dictator, though he now, at least rhetorically, welcomes the prospect of democracy in Egypt.

So what was behind this diplomatic panic and why was Israel, which describes itself as the Middle East’s “only democracy”, so fearful of the Egyptian people’s democratic aspirations?

In Israel, like in the United States and some parts of Europe, Mubarak was seen as a ‘benign dictator’ who protected both Western and Israeli interests against the perceived threat of extremist Islamism and kept Israel’s western front, historically the most dangerous, quiet.

In addition, many Israeli leaders, including Netanyahu, have long been lecturing that the reason that peace has been elusive is not due to the Israeli occupation but to the absence of democracy in the Arab world. Now what if the dawn of Arab democracy arrives and Israel still fails to resolve its conflict with the Palestinians and the wider Arab world?

In addition, I suspect that the current extremist Israeli government, despite its rhetoric of wanting peace with the Palestinians if only there were a true “partner for peace”, feared the unknown impact of the Egyptian revolution on the Palestinian question. Would Palestinians follow the Egyptian and Tunisian examples of mass protest and disobedience? Would a revolutionary Egypt ratchet up the pressure on Israel to reach a deal with the Palestinians or, worse, side more clearly and robustly with the Palestinians?

Among the general Israeli public who know little about Egypt and the Arab world, and understand it even less, the experts and officials who lined up to deliver dire warning that Egypt could well become the “next Iran” and tear up the Camp David peace treaty pumped up the fear level among a population which already felt isolated, surrounded and beleaguered.

A typical response was delivered by Israel’s president Shimon Peres in February. Expressing his feeling that Mubarak’s “contribution to peace will never be forgotten”, he warned that “”Elections in Egypt are dangerous. Should the Muslim Brotherhood be elected they will not bring peace.”

At the time, I wrote that such fears were unfounded: that Egypt was no Iran and that the country was unlikely to renege on its peace treaty with Israel, though, given the plight of the Palestinians, “this probably means that the cold Egyptian-Israeli peace will become frostier”.

Since then, events seem to have largely confirmed my analysis. Although the Muslim Brotherhood is a significant force in the post-revolutionary landscape, it is by no means the only show in town, despite backroom deals between its leadership and the army’s top brass. In fact, a July poll showed that the Ikhwan’s approval rating stood at only around 17%.

In addition, now that the possibility of entering government has become realistic, the group has demonstrated its political pragmatism. Despite its official opposition to peace with Israel and its call for the Camp David agreement to be reviewed, a spokesman has said that the future of the peace treaty would be up to “the Egyptian people and not the Brotherhood”.

And it appears that most Egyptians desire peace. Two recent polls (here and here) showed that, in addition to supporting the creation of an independent Palestinian state, nearly two-thirds of respondents were in favour of maintaining the peace deal with Israel.

But it would be a mistake to think that the Egyptian revolution lacks support in Israel. Not only have some in the liberal and progressive end of the Israeli media spectrum expressed support for the revolution, a number of voices in its more conservative reaches have also publicised their backing.

Writing in The Jerusalem Post last week, Rabbi Shmuley Boteach chastised Israel’s former deputy prime minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer for expressing admiration for Mubarak. “The unseemly spectacle of the Middle East’s sole democracy failing to support a revolutionary freedom movement in Arab countries is a stark omission that the Arabs are not likely to forget,” he wrote.

More importantly, the Egyptian revolution and the ‘Arab Spring’ in general enjoy a surprising amount of grassroots support in Israel, especially among the young and liberal, with various groups releasing songs and letters of support. I have personally encountered numerous Israelis who wax enthusiastic about it. “[The Arab Spring] has made me more eager to dream that the borders will open one day,” Mati Shemoelof, an Israeli journalist, poet and activist told me over drinks. “And I feel that we can only learn from this fabulous, new, brave movement,” he added.

As if to confirm his point, Israel has subsequently been gripped by protests over soaring housing prices, centred on Tel Aviv’s Rothschild’s Avenue, which has been described by some commentators as the country’s own “Tahrir Square”. Moreover, the protests provide a perhaps unprecedented opportunity for Israelis and Palestinians (both Israelis citizens and those in the West Bank and Gaza) to rally around a common issue – housing shortages – that affect them all.

Although the protests have so far remained apolitical, more and more Israelis are connecting the housing crisis within Israel to the generous state subsidies lavished on West Bank settlements and the high cost of maintaining the occupation.

“By removing the single most divisive issue in Israeli politics, the protesters have created a safe space for Israelis of all ethnic, national and class identities to act together,” Dimi Reider and Aziz Abu Sarah wrote in the New York Times earlier this month. “Israel will never become the progressive social democracy the protesters envision until it sheds the moral stain and economic burden of the occupation,” they went on to caution.

Palestinians: inspired but disillusioned

Palestinian reactions to the Egyptian revolution have been complex and divided, both at the official and popular level. Fatah, which received a lot of backing from the Egyptian regime, tried to walk the tight rope of supporting both Mubarak and the “legitimate demands” of the people.

“We hope that Egypt manages to overcome this crisis while preserving its achievements and meeting the legitimate demands for democracy, political reform, and popular participation,” was Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad’s reaction in early February, according to the al-Ayyam newspaper.

The extremist Islamist group Hamas, too, has been lukewarm about the Egyptian revolution. Although Hamas despised the former Egyptian regime’s hostility to the movement and Egypt’s collaboration in the blockade of Gaza, the secular nature of the youth spearheading the revolution and the sidelining of the Muslim Brotherhood worried the Islamic movement. In addition, like the PA, Hamas also benefits from the status quo and has entertained fears that the Egyptian people’s example might inspire Gazans to rise up against Hamas and its increasingly repressive rule.

Hamas witnessed an inkling of this possibility when a Facebook page calling for a ‘Day of Rage’ in Gaza against the Islamist movement attracted 10,000 members within only three days, despite the intermittent power cuts and relatively low internet penetration in the Strip.

This might explain why both Hamas and the PA suppressed, in the early days of the revolution, rallies in support of the Egyptian and Tunisian revolts.

However, at the grassroots level, the majority of Palestinians seem to feel solidarity with their Egyptian neighbours. Ever since I moved to Jerusalem a few months ago, most Palestinians I have encountered have reacted very positively to the Egyptian revolution. Everywhere I go, I receive warm congratulations as if I was the father or the midwife of the uprising!

While out researching an article in a tiny Palestinian village effectively cut off from the outside world by settlements, the locals I met got sidetracked from talking about their demoralising plight to enthuse about the achievements of the Egyptian people. “You Egyptians have raised the head of every Arab,” Mohammed Barakat, a local lawyer, told me, in a typical reaction.

Even in the more glitzy surroundings of a luxury hotel in Ramallah, at an official celebration of the 23 July revolution hosted by the Egyptian consulate, Salam Fayyad launched into rhetorical acrobatics to pay tribute to both the 1952 and 2011 revolutions, even though the latter only came about because the earlier failed to deliver on its promises.

In addition to awakening hopes that the Egyptian revolution will lead Egypt to become more supportive of the Palestinian struggle for statehood, the protest movement in Egypt has inspired some dedicated young Palestinian activists, under the umbrella of the so-called March 15 movement, to agitate for change.

The date refers to the day when organisers employing social media, text messaging and word of mouth managed to draw thousands of protesters on to the streets of Ramallah and other parts of the West Bank, as well as Gaza City.

However, their demands were not wholesale regime change, but reconciliation. “Our top priority is to end the divisions within Palestinian society. This is the only way to deal with the occupation,” Z, one of the young founders of the movement in Ramallah, explained to me.

That said, the movement has not managed to replicate the most successful ingredient of the protests in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain: constant pressure from the streets. This is partly due to the two-tiered nature of the oppression facing Palestinians, and the restrictions on their movement imposed by the occupation. “Unfortunately, we have two levels of repression in Palestine: Israeli and domestic,” says Z.

In addition, there is the psychological barrier of widespread despair and disillusionment afflicting wide swaths of the population. “The problem among Palestinians is that revolutions are nothing new, yet nothing changes or things get worse,” Z observes. “Neither uprisings nor negotiations have worked, Palestinians believe – we’re still under occupation.”

This sense that whatever happens, the Palestinians are screwed might help explain why quite a few Palestinians I meet are despondent about the ultimate outcome of the Egyptian revolution, with some expressing their expectations that Egyptian will revert to dictatorship. A few, probably drawing on their sense of powerlessness, have even expressed their suspicions that the revolution is not an expression of the will of the Egyptian people but a joint CIA-Mossad conspiracy.

Nevertheless, a number of observers believe that the Egyptian-brokered Hamas-Fatah reconciliation agreement – despite its clear weaknesses – was partly a sign of the success of the youth protest movement. It was inspired, they say, by the fear that ordinary Palestinians would follow the Tunisian and Egyptian lead and rise up against the oppressive rule of Hamas in Gaza and Fatah in the West Bank. In addition, it has been viewed as an indication of the more robust role post-revolutionary Egypt can play in the Palestinian struggle. Similarly, Egypt’s decision to open the Rafah crossing has been interpreted as an early indication of the New Egypt’s more sympathetic approach to the plight of the Palestinians.

September: Palestine or the Palestinians?

We are only a few short weeks away from the moment of truth, when the Palestinian leadership plan to go to the United Nations and demand the world body’s recognition of Palestine as a state.

It strikes me that Palestinians, disillusioned, demoralised and desperate are screaming out to the international community, and particularly the United Nations: “You got us into this mess. Now get us out of it.”

There are parallels to be drawn between this bid and the 1947 UN partition plan which paved the way, despite Arab rejection, to the creation of the state of Israel. However, this time around it is unlikely to serve the Palestinians as well because they are too weak, the Israelis too powerful and the international community lacks the wherewithal to impose a solution on the two parties. Besides, if we are to learn anything from the tragic past, it is that UN involvement with only one side’s support was disastrous, and there is no reason to think it won’t be again.

Personally, I can’t help thinking that, rather than grant Palestinians the statehood they desire, the unilateral UN option could backfire by ending in failure or resulting in a virtual but hollow state that enjoys the sheen of international legitimacy but does not actually exist on the ground.

And I’m not the only one with misgivings. Earlier this week, a young Palestinian activist told me: “I think that nothing will really change on the ground.” He added: “I am really afraid of the PA because they will not ask for a full membership of the UN and instead they will go for non-member status which will not help us in this movement but they will sell it to us as a victory.”

The main reason that Palestinians might shy away from demanding full membership is a function of the way the UN operates. For a country to gain membership to the world body, the UN Security Council must first recommend statehood to the General Assembly. And judging by previous and current form, Washington is very likely to veto any such proposal. In fact, some US officials have warned that Washington could withdraw its funding for the UN, if the proposed vote goes ahead.

Of course, there is a chance that Abbas and the Palestinian leadership are actually not seriously contemplating going to the UN and are using this as a bluff to focus Israeli minds, lure Israel back to the negotiating table and force it to offer the Palestinians a viable state along the pre-1967 borders. But if that is the case, it looks like Israel has decided to call their bluff.

The Israeli reaction to possible UN recognition of Palestinian statehood is difficult to gauge but it is unlikely to be positive. The UN option enjoys the backing of some Israelis who see in it a ‘win-win’ solution for both sides. But such an enlightened Israeli view is a minority one, and the Israeli government and much of the public interpret the plan as an act of hostility.

Besides, previous declarations of statehood achieved little. Palestine, which has existed as a virtual state for decades, and is currently recognised bilaterally by over 110 countries, including Egypt, still remains a state-in-waiting. For example, the 1988 unilateral Palestinian Declaration of Independence, which was made in exile by the PLO in Algiers, was little more than an exercise in symbolism.

The real gains for the Palestinian cause were being made, a quarter of a century before the ‘Arab Spring’, by the ordinary Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza who rose up in the largely peaceful and leaderless first intifada, paving the way to the peace process and the two-state solution.

New Egypt and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Until now, the impact of the Egyptian revolution on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been difficult to gauge. Nonetheless, a number of positive and negative ramifications can be discerned.

On the negative side, the upheavals in Egypt and other parts of the region connected to the Arab Spring have diverted much of the global interest away from the Palestinians question. It has also enabled Israel to more or less quietly create more ‘facts on the ground’ ahead of the Palestinians plan to go to the UN in September. This can be seen, for instance, in the accelerated rate of evictions, displacements and demolitions in East Jerusalem and ‘Area C’ of the West Bank this year.

On the positive side, Egypt has already taken some action that was aimed at improving the situation, such as brokering the Palestinian reconciliation agreement and easing restrictions on Gaza. More intangibly, the Egyptian revolution has provided both the Israeli and Palestinian leadership with a taste of what can happen when an unjust and untenable status quo is left to fester unattended for too long.

In the longer term, many commentators have expressed hope that a democratic Egypt can play a more robust and vibrant role as a peace broker and help mediate some form of reconciliation and peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Some more militant and extremist Palestinians hope, and many Israelis fear, that Egypt will become more hostile and belligerent in its support of the Palestinian cause and its opposition to the occupation.

Personally, I don’t expect either outcome is likely. However, a democratic Egypt more in tune with its public’s mood might act as a deterrent against excessive Israeli militarism. That said, for many years to come, Egypt will be embroiled primarily in domestic affairs. This includes the construction of a new political system, fixing the economy, addressing inequalities, combating corruption, dealing with sectarian tensions, and more. Moreover, even a democratic Egypt will lack the clout to impose a resolution and Egyptians have learnt through long and bitter experience that belligerence leads nowhere.

So, it would perhaps be a mistake for those Israelis and Palestinians who pine for peace to await an Egyptian saviour. Instead, they should look to the more intangible support that Egypt can provide, namely that they need not await a foreign messiah because their true saviour is within themselves.

Egypt has provided Palestinians and Israelis, long cynical and disillusioned that the powers that be can bring about any meaningful change in their situation, with a dose of much-needed hope and inspiration, especially in their own latent powers as people.

People power: the missing link

I am a strong believer in the idea that ‘people power’ is the missing link in the quest for peace between Israelis and Palestinians. The vast majority of the discourse relating to the conflict focuses on a top-down solutions in which an international broker or brokers bring the two parties together to the negotiating table and lean on them until they kiss and make up and agree to live together happily ever after.

The trouble with this model is that it overlooks the fact that no external mediator enjoys the kind of clout or willpower necessary to push through a resolution. In addition, it ignores the glaring disparities in power between Israelis and Palestinians. It also turns a blind eye to the fractured and divided political landscape on both sides which makes reaching a consensus over the painful realities both sides must accept for the sake of peace a task of Herculean proportions.

This is particularly the case given the decades-long mutual distrust and loathing, which renders the necessary groundswell of popular opinion required to achieve peace impossible to attain.

I believe that it is time to follow a new track in which ordinary people lead the process and not just act as passive by-standers. Palestinians and Israelis need to awaken to their own power and unlock their dormant potential to steer their own destiny towards peace and reconciliation. And the best way to do this, as the ‘Arab Awakening’ is illustrating, is through mass, peaceful joint activism.

For many years, a minority of activists on both sides have joined forces and found common cause in opposing the occupation, settlement building, the separation wall and home demolitions and evictions. This needs to be stepped up and activists must find creative ways of inspiring the mainstream – they need to make their movement go viral.

Being the dreamer that I am, I cannot shake the vision in my head of joint Israeli-Palestinian activism infecting the masses, and the current housing protests could be a good foundation upon which to build such a movement.

In my vision, squares in cities across Israel and Palestine would be filled with people rallying around a single goal: “The people demand an end to the occupation.” Protesters on both sides would also pitch tents at checkpoints to demand their removal and, who knows, perhaps one day have their own Berlin wall moment.

Likewise, ordinary Egyptians need to overcome their own apathy and passivity and help facilitate and mediate such a ‘people’s peace’. For the sake of peace and the future, Egyptians need to cast aside their ideological opposition to dealing with Israelis and act in active and open solidarity with the Israeli-Palestinian peace movement and export the spirit of their revolution to neighours who are in desperate need of it.

This article is based on a talk given by Khaled Diab at a conference on the future of Egypt organised by the International Peace Studies Centre which took place in London on Saturday 13 August 2011.

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By Khaled Diab

The Camp David accords between Egypt and Israel remain controversial, but Arabs and Israelis can draw lessons from Anwar el-Sadat’s quest for peace.

1 March 2010

Nearly three decades after his death, the former Egyptian president, Anwar el-Sadat, remains a controversial figure. In Israel and many parts of the West, he is best remembered for his daring trip to Jerusalem, where he became the first and only Arab leader to address the Israeli Knesset, and his deadlock-breaking peace accord with Israel.

But the rosy image of Sadat as world statesman, visionary and peacemaker overlook his questionable domestic human rights record, his dictatorial bent, his disastrous economic policy, the insipid corruption of his regime and his aloofness and arrogance towards other Arab countries.

In Egypt and the Arab world, he is celebrated for the victories he scored in the early parts of the 1973 war, the first time an Arab power had shown the titan of Israel’s military might to be vulnerable and so soon after the crushing defeat in 1967.

However, Sadat’s subsequent peace deal with Israel was far more controversial. Although many Arab leaders privately accepted that peace with Israel was necessary and inevitable – including Sadat’s predecessor Gamal Abdel-Nasser who conducted promising secret peace contacts with then Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett – none at the time were bold enough to say it publicly. Rather than working with Sadat to create a unified Arab position to negotiations, they turned on him instead.

In Egypt, opinion was and remains divided, with many viewing the Camp David Accords as a betrayal. However, most Egyptians, tired of what is widely viewed as the Arab desire to defend the Palestinian cause to “the very last Egyptian”, grudgingly accept the benefits of a cold peace.

Today, with a general Arab consensus on the need for a settlement with Israel, as embodied in the Saudi peace plan, criticism of Sadat has become more muted and nuanced: his vision is accepted, though his unilateral tactics are still widely questioned.

Now, with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict looking as dire and insoluble as ever, what lessons can be learnt from the Sadat experiment?

One important lesson is the importance of symbolism and gesture politics in helping prospective peacemakers scale the walls of paranoia and distrust that separate Israelis and Arabs.

On both sides, many will say that the obstacles to peace – an ultranationalist, right-wing government in Israel, the rise of ultra-conservative Hamas in Gaza, the deadly Israeli siege of the Strip and the disarray and infighting among the Palestinian factions – are insurmountable. But things didn’t look particularly rosy back in the mid-1970s either, when war seemed to be the only show in town.

Then, as now, Israel was led by an ideologically rigid right-wing prime minister who, though he talked of the need for peace, was reluctant to negotiate with the Arabs or give up an inch of the dream of creating Eretz Yisrael. By going to Jerusalem and appealing to the Israeli people directly, Sadat forced Menachem Begin’s hand with a deft masterstroke.

Today’s Arab leaders could do well to learn that, faced with a powerful opponent who nevertheless fears them, a standoffish offer of peace, no matter how attractive, means little when it comes from a great distance. It needs to be delivered in person wrapped in olive branches.

In fact, the need for direct contact and negotiations between politicians from Israel and the frontline Arab states, not to mention the Arab and Israeli peoples, is greater than ever, given the level of mutual dehumanisation and distrust. That does not mean that economic and political ties should be immediately normalised – that will be one of the fruits of eventual peace – but there should be a broad and sincere dialogue and cultural exchange between those on both sides who wish to build enduring peace.

Israel could also draw similar lessons about the value of direct contact. Separated as they are behind physical and ideological walls, ordinary Israelis have negligible contact with their Palestinian neighbours, the people they most need to understand and coexist with. Israel needs to learn the language of its neighbourhood and start dealing with the Palestinians and Arabs in a way that will win them over – a good start would be to end its destructive and counterproductive blockade of Gaza.

In addition, both Israelis and Palestinians need to learn that violence has failed to resolve the conflict and will continue to do so. Israel needs to learn that its gung-ho “deterrent policy” deters little but the prospect for peace, while the Palestinian factions who advocate and employ violence need to realise that it achieves little beyond provoking the wrath of their powerful neighbour. Both sides would do well to learn from the tactics employed by their non-violent peace movements.

In the end, pragmatism is the only solution. As Sadat said in a 1978 speech in Cairo: “Peace is much more precious than a piece of land… let there be no more wars.”

It’s high time for Arabs to overcome their reticence to talk directly with Israel and for Israel to overcome its reluctance to negotiate a simultaneous settlement on all fronts. What we need, but are unlikely to get, is a comprehensive settlement to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

This article was written for the Common Ground News Service on 25 February 2010.

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Tags: anwar el-sadat, camp david, egypt, israel, israel-palestine, menachem begin, middle east peace, palestine, peace process

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