Israel/Palestine: How to End the War of 1948

INTRODUCTION

The state of Israel was founded in 1948 following a war which the Israelis call the War of Independence, and the Palestinians call the Nakba—the catastrophe. A haunted, persecuted people sought to find a shelter and a state for itself, and did so at a horrible price to another people. During the war of 1948, more than half of the Palestinian population at the time—1,380,000 people—were driven off their homeland by the Israeli army. Though Israel officially claimed that a majority of the refugees fled and were not expelled, it still refused to allow them to return, as a UN resolution demanded shortly after the 1948 war. Thus, the Israeli land was obtained through ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Palestinian inhabitants.

This is not a process unfamiliar in history. Israel’s actions remain incomparable to the massive ethnic cleansing of Native Americans by the settlers and government of the United States. Had Israel stopped there, in 1948, I could probably live with it. As an Israeli, I grew up believing that this primal sin our state was founded on may be forgiven one day, because the founders’ generation was driven by the faith that this was the only way to save the Jewish people from the danger of another holocaust.

But it didn’t stop there. In 1967, following a comprehensive war with three neighboring Arab countries, Israel conquered and occupied the West Bank (from Jordan), the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula (from Egypt), and the Golan Heights (from Syria). The Sinai Peninsula was eventually returned to Egypt, in a framework of a peace agreement between the two countries. (Israeli withdrawal was completed in 1982.) The rest of the territories acquired in 1967 are still occupied by Israel. During the 1967 war, a new wave of Palestinian refugees escaped from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. (The number, according to Israeli sources, was 250,000 people.) About three million Palestinians still live in these two areas today, under Israeli occupation, surrounded by Israeli settlements built on their land.

Renowned Israeli philosopher and scientist Yeshayahu Leibovitz warned of what the occupation would lead to right from the start. In 1968 he wrote: A state governing a hostile population of 1.5 to 2 million foreigners [the number of the Palestinians in the occupied territories at the time] is bound to become a Shin Bet [Security Service] state, with all that this implies for the spirit of education, freedom of speech and thought and democracy. Israel will be infected with corruption, characteristic of any colonial regime. The administration will have to deal with the suppression of an Arab protest movement on the one hand, and with the acquisition of Arab quislings on the other...The army, which has been so far a people’s army, will degenerate as well by becoming an occupation army, and its officers, turned into military governors, will not differ from military governors elsewhere in the world.¹

In the power-drunk atmosphere which prevailed in Israel at the time, not many people paid attention to Leibowitz’s warnings. U.S.-Israeli relations improved after Israel’s military victory in 1967, which proved that Israel was a valuable strategic asset for U.S. interests in the region. Backed by the U.S., Israel felt omnipotent.² In 1982, then-defense minister Ariel Sharon led Israel into a new adventure in Lebanon with the ambitious goals of creating a new order in the Middle East, destroying the Palestinian Liberation Organization—which had developed in the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, and gaining permanent control over Southern Lebanon, which borders with Israel. The attack left over 11,000 Lebanese and Palestinians dead.³ Even though Israeli society perceived the war with Lebanon as a failure, the Israeli military stayed in the conquered land of Southern Lebanon until May 2000. Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian land acquired in 1967 continued undisturbed.

The first Palestinian uprising (1987-1993) brought a change. Israeli society discovered that its military occupation of Palestinian land had a heavy price. Many realized that Leibovitz’s warning was becoming reality, and many could no longer accept the occupation on moral grounds. On the Palestinian side, the struggle for independence was also based—for the first time—on explicit recognition of Israel’s right to exist (in its pre-1967 borders). As we shall see, the Intifada Meeting of the Palestine National Council in 1988 called for the partition of the historical Palestine to two independent states. The struggle against the occupation became a joint Israeli-Palestinian struggle, with many Israeli opposition groups demonstrating in the territories, or inviting Palestinian leaders to speak at teach-ins in Israeli universities. In one of the many events of that joint struggle, twenty-seven members of the Israeli 21st Year movement (including myself) were jailed for five days following a demonstration in the West Bank.

By 1993, it seemed that the occupation was reaching its end. Many believed that the Oslo Accords, signed in Washington that year, would lead to Israel’s withdrawal from the occupied territories and the formation of a Palestinian state. But this is not how things turned out. As we shall see, the political leadership of the Israeli peace camp has turned the Oslo spirit of reconciliation into a new and more sophisticated form of maintaining the occupation.

Sharon, now Israel’s prime minister, describes its present war against the Palestinians as the second half of 1948. Israeli military echelons had already used the same description in October 2000, at the outset of the second Intifada—the present Palestinian uprising. By now, there can be little doubt that what they mean by that analogy is that the work of ethnic cleansing was only half completed in 1948, leaving too much land to Palestinians. Although the majority of Israelis are tired of wars and of the occupation, Israel’s political and military leadership is still driven by the greed for land, water resources, and power. From that perspective, the war of 1948 was just the first step in a more ambitious and more far-reaching strategy.

This book focuses on the post-Oslo era, and follows Israel’s policies in the three years since Ehud Barak became prime minister, until the summer of 2002—the darkest period in the history of Israel so far. As we shall see, the shift in Israeli policy at this period was neither a spontaneous reaction to terror nor an act of self-defense, but calculated plans, systematically executed. The book is an updated and expanded version of my Détruire la Palestine, ou comment terminer la guerre de 1948, which appeared in French in April 2002 (France: La Fabrique, 2002). Détruire la Palestine examined (inter alia) the development of Israeli plans to destroy the Palestinian Authority. In the period between April 2002 and July 2002, these plans were fully executed.

Note: The book is based mainly on sources from the Israeli media, though other sources are cited as well. Of the Israeli Hebrew papers, only Ha’aretz has an Internet English version, which I used for most quotes from Ha’aretz. For the other Israeli papers, the quotes are my translation of the original Hebrew. In a few cases, where I could not check the English version of a piece that appeared in Ha’aretz in Hebrew, the quote is marked as author’s translation. Since approximately April 2002, Ha’aretz’s English version appears to be more heavily censored than its Hebrew version, and certain quoted items appeared only in the Hebrew version. These are marked as Hebrew edition only.

Source: CIA World Factbook 2001

CHAPTER I

THE OSLO YEARS: FALSE EXPECTATIONS

Israel—parroted by mainstream Western media—describes its handling of the Palestinian uprising as a war of defense: The Palestinians are terrorists—they are a violent, noncompromising, fanatical people who reject Israel’s generous peace offers. Whatever you give them, Israel argues, they always want more; they are extremists who are willing to kill their children just to gain a few centimeters of what they view as their own land, and their true goal is to push the Israelis into the sea. As former prime minister Ehud Barak put it, I have not yet managed to understand from Arafat that he is willing to acknowledge the existence of the state of Israel.⁴

But just stop and recall. These are the same Palestinians who in the early 1990’s offered their hands in peace to Israel. In September 1993, the Oslo Accords were signed at a ceremony at the White House, which many took to be the start of a new era of reconciliation. For most Palestinians, September 1993 was a month of euphoria and optimism. Members of the PLO Hawks—the local military units of the PLO—returned their arms, and were interviewed on Israeli TV speaking of the new era of peace and living side by side as good neighbors. There was much talk about how similar and close these two peoples are. There was a real feeling that a new chapter had opened and that the past would be forgiven.

The ceremony at the White House was the climax of a process that had started much earlier. For many years, there were two lines of thought in Palestinian society. One called for the Palestinians to resist anything less than regaining the whole of Palestine, and even to let the Jews be thrown into the sea; the other called for a solution based on recognizing the rights of both nations, and emphasized the need to find a model for coexistence between the two peoples. From the Palestinian perspective, accepting the idea of two states has been an enormous concession, one that involves giving up almost 80 percent of the historical Palestinian homeland. (The West Bank and Gaza Strip only make up 22 percent of the historical Palestine, but that 22 percent is the only territory now under discussion as the future Palestinian state.)

Even during the worst periods of oppression in the occupied territories, when their position was far from popular, the secular leadership and the local PLO institutions, as well as independent intellectuals, human rights activists, and workers unions, were calling for cooperation with the Israeli peace forces opposing the occupation.

Since at least 1988, a majority of Palestinian society subscribed to this line. In November 1988, at the peak of the first Palestinian Intifada (uprising), the nineteenth session of the Palestine National Council (PNC)—the top forum of all Palestinian organizations—was held in Algiers under the title Intifada Meeting. In an overwhelming majority vote of 253 to 46, it passed unequivocal resolutions accepting the partition of the historical Palestine, in which a Palestinian and an Israeli state would coexist along the lines of the pre-1967 borders, as determined by UN resolutions 181, 242, and 338. The PNC’s resolutions called for a peaceful settlement of the conflict, and denounced terrorism in all its forms. An enthusiastic Edward Said, who was present at the historic meeting said, Most of us there had grown up with the reality (lived and remembered) of Palestine as an Arab country, refusing to concede anything more than the exigency of a Jewish state, won at our expense in the loss of our land, our society, and literally uncountable thousands of lives. A million and a half of our compatriots were under brutal military occupation…. For the first time, also, the declarations were implicitly recognizing a state that offered us nothing whatever.⁵

The six years of the first Palestinian uprising (1987-1993) convinced the majority of Israelis that maintaining the occupation is unfeasible. Combined with the victory of the reconciliation line in Palestinian society, many people felt for the first time that a two-state solution might be realistic. September 1993 was also a euphoric month for many Israelis. The dominant public perception was that the occupation was over and a Palestinian state was imminent. Israel’s right wing and settlers reacted with true panic, and the rest with a new, almost unfamiliar, sense of optimism. During those first couple of months after Oslo, most Israelis believed that the settlements were going to be dismantled and prices of apartments in central Israel shot up in expectation for the wave of relocating settlers. Nevertheless, in the polls two-thirds of the Israelis supported Oslo.

But that’s not how things turned out. By 2000—seven years after the Oslo Accords were signed—the situation was worse than it had ever been. It is particularly revealing to see what happened in the Gaza Strip, as Gaza was the subject of substantial consensus in Israeli society before Oslo. With one million people living in one of the most densely populated and poorest areas of the world, with little water or natural resources, What do we need Gaza for? was a common question in Israel for years.

Nevertheless, during the Oslo negotiations, Israel insisted that it would not dismantle any settlements in Gaza, at least during the five-year interim period. The Palestinian negotiators agreed to this condition when they signed the Oslo Accords at the White House ceremony. Yitzhak Rabin’s insistence was not driven by popular pressure. Many of the settlers in the more isolated settlements wanted, in fact, to leave at the time, and demanded compensation for alternative housing. But Rabin refused.

What followed was worse. In the Taba negotiations just a month after the White House ceremony, Israel presented its actual maps for Gaza, which left much more than the settlements under full Israeli control. Israel insisted that the settlements would be grouped in three blocs that would also include the lands between the individual settlements. Combined with a rich network of bypass roads, these blocs amount to over one-third of the land in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian negotiators responded with what appeared to be shock and anger. Nabil Sha’at described the proposal as a Swiss cheese plan for the cantonization of Gaza. The Palestinian delegation left in protest, and the crisis appeared serious.⁶

But two weeks later, in talks in Cairo on November 18, 1993, the Palestinian negotiators fully accepted all the Israeli demands. That first sweeping Palestinian surrender marked the beginning of a long series of negotiations in which Israel dictated and Arafat protested, cried, and signed.

The process through which a leader of a national liberation movement is coerced into collaboration is a long and complex one. On the eve of Oslo, Yasser Arafat’s grip on the territories was deteriorating—as well as his control over the refugee camps in Lebanon and in Jordan. In the occupied territories, there were daily complaints and protests regarding the corruption of his aides in Tunis, his undemocratic rule, and his sole control over the organization’s finances. The local Palestinian delegation headed by Haidar Abd-el Shafi was gaining much more respect in the territories than Arafat’s anachronistic administration. A major victory was the only thing that could then save him, and the Oslo agreements initially seemed to be just such a victory. While the local Palestinian delegation insisted in its negotiations with Israel that it would not accept any agreement that didn’t include immediate dismantlement of the Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip, Arafat signed such an agreement behind its back.

Arafat’s shaky position was also obvious to the Israeli side. The prevailing interpretation of the early Oslo negotiations is that Rabin—the architect of the Oslo process—intended the process to lead eventually to full Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories, which he may have viewed as a necessary response to changing public opinion in Israel. By this interpretation, it is hard to explain why he insisted, from the start, on keeping the Gaza settlements and expanding the areas they control. But even if he originally had such intentions, Rabin could not resist the opportunity provided by Arafat’s weakness of turning this unique historical moment into a heightened form of Israeli domination and control.

As of summer 2005 approximately seven thousand Israeli settlers occupy close to one-third of Gaza (including the military bases and bypass roads), and over one million Palestinians are squeezed into the remaining two-thirds. Surrounded by electronic fences and military posts, tightly sealed from the outside world, Palestinian Gaza has turned into a massive prison ghetto. The standards of living in Gaza, which were already among the lowest in the world, have deteriorated sharply since Oslo. Until Oslo, it was possible for Palestinian Gaza residents to obtain exit permits. Since Oslo, they are not even allowed to visit their relatives in the West Bank, and only a lucky few carry exit permits for work in Israel.

Possibly Israel intended to allow the Palestinians, in some future time, to call their prison the Palestinian state, but the overall dynamic of Israeli domination would remain the same. If the prisoners try to rebel, as is happening now, the internal roads are blocked and the area is divided into smaller prison units, each surrounded by Israeli tanks. The Palestinian prisoners can be bombarded from the air, with nowhere to escape to; their food supply, electricity, and fuel are all controlled by Israel and cut off at the will of the prison guards. Israel has given the Palestinians in Gaza one choice: Accept prison life, or perish.

Israel’s efforts have since focused on extending the Gaza arrangement to the West Bank. By September 2000, the Palestinians’ areas were already split into four isolated enclaves—surrounded by Israeli settlements, military posts, and bypass roads. Many Israeli settlements already form massive blocs ready for annexation, though there are also many isolated settlements in the midst of the Palestinian population. (For more on the Oslo realities, see the Appendix.⁷)

In 2000, seven years after Oslo, nothing was left of the hopes and expectations that the agreements had raised for so many people. Israel had a historical opportunity to reach a just peace with the Palestinian people and to integrate into the Middle East. Instead, it began a new chapter of oppression and control. It soon became obvious that the situation in the territories could eventually explode when the Palestinians realized that after years of humiliating negotiations, all they were going to get were vague promises that would never be kept.

But during all these years Israel’s official line has been that the situation is temporary. According to this line, the Oslo agreement and those that followed it were just interim agreements—necessary steps in the long process required for working out the details of a final agreement. At least the Labor governments, which depend on the votes of those who have long been fed up with the occupation, kept pledging that at the end of the interim period, a new era would start. Their promise was compelling: Israel would eventually withdraw, end the occupation, and a Palestinian state would be formed in the West Bank and Gaza.

In July 2000, a Labor prime minister—Ehud Barak—led the Israelis and the world to believe that Israel was willing to start, finally, this new era of peace.

CHAPTER II

THE CAMP DAVID NEGOTIATIONS: MYTHS AND FACTS

The Camp David Summit of July 2000 has been perceived as a turning point in Israeli-Palestinian relations. The Israeli perspective, shared by both doves and hawks, was that Barak broke every imaginable taboo and offered concessions that no Israeli prime minister offered before, or could possibly offer again in the future. According to this version of the story, Barak offered to return 90 percent of the occupied West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip to the Palestinians. All he wanted in return was to annex 10 percent of the land with the big settlement blocs, where 150,000 Israelis already had their home. Regarding the most sensitive issue of Jerusalem, to which the Israelis feel particularly attached, he took an enormous risk, agreeing to divide the city and recognize part of it as the capital of the future Palestinian state. However, according to this version of the story, the Palestinian negotiators rejected these generous proposals, and failed even to come up with constructive counterproposals. Thus, they not only missed another historical opportunity, but also betrayed their rooted unwillingness to accept the existence of the Jewish state, or live in peace with it. Hence, according to this version of things, Israel’s new war of defense against the Palestinians was inevitable.

To date, that version of history is the one that has been adopted by the United States and reinforced by Western media. The power of constant repetition has given it the status of objective truth in many people’s minds. The first cracks in the story began to appear a year