By A. Friend – 5 May 2011
[IOA Editor: A similar version of the following was submitted to Haaretz by a friend of the IOA in April 2011 and was not published. It was written by an Israeli-born American on a short visit to Israel, with an Israeli audience in mind.]
How to bring an end to the killing, return Shalit and all Palestinian prisoners home, and work towards peace and security for Israelis and Palestinians
Whenever visiting the homeland, one is struck again with how little is new, even after decades of living away, and how the more things change, the more they remain the same. It is what some Americans like to call “Déjà vu all over again.” Indeed, it repeats again and again, each and every time, especially after violence visits the Jewish-Israeli community of the Land, which is when the talking-heads on Israeli Hebrew TV channels regurgitate the old stuff about ‘Arabs understanding only force’ while recommending that more force be used against the very same ‘Arabs,’ that is, Palestinians. To be fair, here and there, a new, very attractive face suggests otherwise, only to be drowned by the old, tired, and ugly faces, sounding like the broken record that they truly are.
Those of us old enough to be able to claim – proudly, I might add – to have objected to Israel’s June 1967 occupation of Palestinian and Arab lands from day one, have heard it all before. The most astounding thing one hears – consistently, visit after visit after visit – is talk about the ‘next round’: Second Gaza War, Third Lebanon War. It is always about another IDF attack; it is never about trying to negotiate an agreement, however limited in scope, but one which would focus on ending the killing not adding to it.
Moreover, there is never a public discussion about the advantage (and to whom) of engaging in more killing, or on how new or different (let alone better) life after the ‘next round’ is going to be. Rather, the discussion is confined to the number of Iron Dome units to be deployed, or some other new weapon systems manufactured by the Israeli arms industry (and sold to some of the worst regimes in the third world). To an outside observer, Israel looks like a nation obsessed with finding a technological fix for problems that are historical, national, and moral – but entirely not ‘technical.’
And now that yet another Jewish-Israeli youth has struggled, and failed, to remain alive – no doubt, under the best medical care available, quite the opposite of the care available to Gaza residents struggling to survive under Israel’s siege – does anyone really think that the way to stop senseless killing on our side is to repeat the much greater killing on theirs? Or, does anyone really think that by pounding the other side to bits, over and over again, this 100-year-long conflict will go away? Can evidence be found anywhere in history that such cruel madness works?
The Jewish people have yearned for Jerusalem for 2,000 years, as we’re all told from early on. Does anyone really think that Israel can make the Palestinians cease fighting for Palestine after less than 100 years? Do you really think they’re going to go away? Or that keeping them in concentration-camps would lessen the violence? Or is Israel secretly planning to transfer them out? And where to?
anti-Occupation ad - Haaretz, 22 September 1967(for a larger image, click photo)
On September 22, 1967 a handful of Israelis with vision, foresight, and a great deal of courage in the face of Jewish-Israeli society celebrating the 1967 victory, among them the late artist Shimon Tzabar and Matzpen co-founder Moshé Machover, placed a paid ad in Haaretz that read in part:
“Occupation leads to foreign rule; foreign rule leads to resistance; resistance leads to oppression; oppression leads to terror and counter-terror. The victims of terror are mostly innocent people. Keeping the occupied territories will turn us into a nation of murderers and murder victims.”
Is this not what we have been witnessing for over four decades now? The ad concluded with the following: “Let us get out of the occupied territories immediately.”
Fast forward almost 44 years… those of us who have rejected the Occupation from day one can see no demonstrable, measurable advantage in the continuation of the Occupation – not for most Israelis and for Israeli civil society, and surely not for the vast majority of Palestinians. And it is not too late to change things, very much for the better, for most Israeli Jews, Palestinians under occupation, and Palestinian Israelis.
Something along the following lines would provide a workable framework for bringing about change. As should be expected, the key to making any of this happen is in the hands of the side that controls the territory, has the military might, and the financial support (the direct result of vast foreign assistance from the US), namely, Israel. And here is what the Israeli people should demand its government to do on its behalf:
- Unilaterally announce that Israel agrees to the release of all prisoners Hamas demands in exchange of the release of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.
- Unilaterally announce that the Gaza siege will end on the day Shalit and the Palestinian prisoners are released, and that a free, unrestricted flow of goods will commence immediately via both Israel and Egypt; and that Gaza will be rebuilt, including its industrial employment base. In addition, the end of the Gaza siege will include free movement in and out of the Gaza Strip to all, including international aid flotillas.
- Unilaterally announce that Israel is prepared to release, without conditions, all Palestinian (and other Arab) prisoners it now holds, at the start of a broader discussion that it wishes to engage in with the Palestinians.
- Unilaterally announce that Israel wishes to engage in direct talks with Hamas geared to reaching a long-term, broad cease-fire, or Hudna – consistent with wishes Hamas had expressed in the past, that were ignored by Israel – as a first phase toward reaching a broader, long term agreement, and that Israel would like the talks to start soon after the Shalit prisoner exchange is completed.
- Unilaterally announce that Israel intends to allow free travel between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank – with special arrangements to protect the security of both Israelis and Palestinians to be negotiated – and that Israel recognizes the future Palestinian state as encompassing both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, as a single unit.
- Unilaterally call for direct negotiations with the legitimate representatives of West Bank and Gaza Palestinians, chosen by the Palestinian people now occupied and imprisoned by Israel, and declare upfront that the basis for a long-term settlement of the conflict will be the old 1967 “Green Line,” and that Israel recognizes and accepts the need for a viable and truly independent Palestinian state, with security for both peoples to be negotiated by the parties on an equal basis. Declare upfront that Jerusalem – a holy city for Christians, Jews, and Muslims – is to be shared equitably by all and be the capital of both the State of Israel and the State of Palestine.
- Publicly recognize Israel’s historical responsibility for the suffering of the Palestinian people, for the Nakba – a historical event as real and defining for the Palestinians as the Holocaust is for Jews in Israel and everywhere else. And state clearly and directly that Israel is committed to working with the Palestinians on finding a just, equitable solution for all Palestinians, wherever they are.
And, yes, this would also entail another, minor unilateral declaration: the immediate stopping of all settlement construction, everywhere, including East Jerusalem. Right now. Unconditionally.
If any Israeli thinks either peace or security for Israelis can be achieved without being prepared to engage in something along these lines, they should think really hard again, and again, and yet again. The time to end the killing, on both sides and by both sides, is now. It can be done, but only with the vision and courage some Israelis had already had back in 1967: the Occupation must be dismantled – it is very late, but hopefully not too late.
