From Egypt to the promised land

By Terry Lacey

(June 12, Jakarta, Sri Lanka Guardian) The last thing anyone wants to do is to discourage the attempt by President Obama in his Cairo speech at a fresh start both in relations with the Muslim world, and on the Middle East peace process. But the road-map and its final destination must be reviewed, or those traveling down it, like Moses, might spend a long time in the desert before they see the Promised Land.

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares his keynote speech to set out the Israeli bargaining position after his initial talks with President Obama, it is time to confront new realities. The Israelis have changed, and so have the Palestinians. The twin state solution may have become out-of-date.

First, there is not going to be a fully-fledged Palestinian State that can freely decide foreign policy and military alliances, without restraints. If a Palestinian State wanted a military agreement with Iran to train its army, its neighbors would go ballistic (if that is an appropriate expression).

Second, the twin state solution is impossible without Palestinian national reconciliation, including that the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem can be ruled by one administration, backed by elections and perceived as legitimate.

The previous policies of Israel and the West to somehow destroy or reduce the power of Hamas (respectively) have failed and been counter-productive, making Hamas stronger in Palestine, and probably in Israel too. So there has to be reconciliation with Hamas for Palestinians and Israelis.

Third the whole process cannot be concluded and lasting peace obtained until one last issue is resolved, and it would be a great illusion to think otherwise.

Israel and Israelis have to be clearer on the future of the State of Israel. As a Jewish State that will contrive to maintain a Jewish majority, for ever and regardless of demographic trends, or a democratic State of Israel, with a secure home for the Jewish people, but which may one day itself not have a Jewish majority, or be part of a Middle East Regional Common Market or Confederation with an Arab majority.

This decision on the future of the state will be the one that decides if the conflict continues or not, and not the decision on how to constitute a Palestinian state alongside Israel, or its alternatives.

In other words Israel in an inherently unstable entity as long as it remains isolated in the region and because of its ethnic majority policy given its location, mixed population and the higher Arab birth rate, so it must decide how to become stable, instead of projecting its inherent instability onto its neighbors.

Avigdor Lieberman and Yisrael Beiteinu understand the demographic realities and talk about them openly, which is better than pretending they do not exist.

Therefore Lieberman advocates more land swaps and population movement than now envisaged in the twin state solution. But this tactic only delays the growth of the non-Jewish Israeli population. Many Israelis, and perhaps the Supreme Court of Israel, will not agree to remove citizenship from Israeli citizens.

But if Israel is to keep a Jewish majority over say two centuries, then depending on demographic starting positions, it would have to periodically attract more Jewish migration, or from time to time change its boundaries and push out Arab citizens.

Lieberman is however correct that full rights of citizenship should involve full obligations to military service, or alternatives. Israeli liberals have evaded these issues and that is now a weakness. But none of this justifies a racist state or pushing citizens out.

This is not the time to jump head first into the twin state negotiations which were fundamentally and perhaps terminally flawed by the heavy-handed approach of President Bush and his Peace Quartet, who moved from negotiation to coercion, to boycott and blockade, in the pursuit of an imposed peace.

Neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis can or should be forced into a peace agreement they do not want and cannot support. It would be ludicrous if the US and the West still insist on the twin state if it becomes evident that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians do not support it.

(Terry Lacey is a development economist who writes from Jakarta on modernization in the Muslim world, investment and trade relations with the EU and Islamic banking.)

-Sri Lanka Guardian