The frustration about the apparent lack of progress in the current negotiations between Israel and Palestinians is in no small measure a reflection of the widely accepted view that the broad outlines of an agreement had already been formulated years ago, during the negotiations in Camp David and Taba.
Perhaps the most fundamental problem that has bedeviled the efforts to achieve the envisaged goal of a two-state solution is the predicament that arises from the “land-for-peace” formula derived from UN Resolution 242. It obviously provides a sound basis for negotiations between existing states, but it is clearly a different matter when land has to be exchanged for peace with a yet-to-be— established state whose nature and capabilities to keep its commitments remain uncertain.
In an attempt to learn the lessons from more than 15 years of failed peace efforts, three former negotiators have come up with the “Ten Commandments for Mideast peace”, and their very first commandment is based on the conviction that the “time for interim agreements ... is long past. Because they satisfy neither side’s essential needs, and because both sides know that the final compromises still await, partial agreements tend to diminish what they seek to augment, if what they seek to augment is mutual confidence.”
But if the incremental approach should be discarded as unhelpful, the problem that remains unresolved is that when it comes to Israel’s part of the deal — which would involve not only evacuating a considerable number of settlers, but also withdrawing Israel’s security forces from the West Bank — there is no reason to assume that the Palestinian authorities would be able to uphold their end of the bargain by guaranteeing peace.
One illustration of the difficulties was provided by the reactions to the decision of the current Palestinian government of Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayad to adopt a platform that omitted the previously always present reference to “armed resistance” against Israel. Unfortunately, this attempt to establish a monopoly over the use of force for the authorities was met with much contempt and derision from the very beginning, including threats against Prime Minister Fayad and demands for his dismissal.
Such evidence of the persistent popularity of “armed resistance” among Palestinians is obviously cited as a winning argument by those who assert that it is unrealistic to hope for a resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict on the basis of an exchange of land for peace.
Yet, the majority of Israelis would clearly prefer to believe that Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, was right when he suggested that the re-launching of the Saudi initiative in March 2007 signaled a “revolutionary change in outlook” among Arab leaders. Indeed, it was perhaps never realistic to pursue the resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict without the explicit backing of the Arab League — it was, after all, the Arab League that 60 years ago mobilized its forces to crush the just established Jewish state.
Ever since, attempts to achieve a comprehensive peace have been made difficult by the fact that in the Arab world, it was all too often claimed that “the day when Israel was founded created the basis for our problems”.
It is only a very recent development that senior officials would openly declare that the “Arab world, by the Arab peace initiative, has crossed the Rubicon from hostility toward Israel to peace with Israel and has extended the hand of peace to Israel, and we await the Israelis picking up our hand and joining us in what inevitably will be beneficial for Israel and for the Arab world.”
Judging from a list of priorities for 2008 which the Foreign Ministry in Tel Aviv circulated among its staff, Israel is determined to take up this initiative: The ministry’s top priority for 2008 is described as “promoting diplomatic processes in the Middle East with the goal of achieving comprehensive peace in the region and protecting Israel’s security.” The daily news may still provide ample illustration that both Arabs and Israelis have much reason to complain about the gap between rhetoric and reality, but that should not obscure the importance of the fact that the current efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East enjoy for the first time a broad backing from Arab leaders willing to promise peace in exchange for land.
