A Balcony Over Jerusalem
Page 32
But in 2017, the Israeli Government dropped all artifice when the Knesset passed the Regularisation Bill. This law allows Israel to retroactively legalise Israeli settlements in the West Bank. It allows Israel to expropriate private Palestinian land and give it to Jewish settlements for their exclusive use. In effect, it makes ‘theft’ an official Israeli policy.
Even leading lights of the Likud Party expressed their concern. Former Likud Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor described the law as ‘evil and dangerous’, explaining that ‘the Arabs of Judea and Samaria did not vote for the Knesset, and it has no authority to legislate for them’. Another Likud heavyweight, Benny Begin – the son of former Prime Minister Menachem Begin and considered one of the most right-wing members of Netanyahu’s government – called it ‘the robbery Bill’, saying it allowed for the ‘looting’ of Palestinian land.1
The leader of the Labor Party, Isaac Herzog, predicted that the law would see Israel’s leaders face international justice one day. Speaking before the Bill was passed, Herzog said: ‘It is not too late to stop the horror of a freight train. The train that leaves from here will only stop at the Hague’: a reference to the International Criminal Court. ‘Its car will carry international indictments against Israeli and Jewish soldiers and officers.’2
But the ruling extreme right wing applauded the passing of the Bill. Bezalel Smotrich, a member of Orthodox party the Jewish Home, called it ‘an historic day for the settlement movement’, adding: ‘From here we move on to expanding Israeli sovereignty [in the West Bank] and continuing to build and develop settlements across the land.’3
The Knesset also pushed ahead with a range of new laws that weakened the position of Palestinians still further. Documented by the Association of Civil Rights in Israel, they included a law allowing the State to revoke someone’s citizenship in absentia. It prevented a citizen who is outside Israel from returning home if the State has a ‘concern’ that their return could endanger Israel’s national security. It also permitted courts to sentence someone convicted of throwing stones to 20 years’ imprisonment, and even to impose fines on the parents of stone-throwers. Another law allowed the banning of entry to Israel or the West Bank of someone regarded as an advocate of the pro-Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
The Israeli–Palestinian ‘marriage’ has become so abusive that every sign of conciliation goes nowhere. In January 2017, Hamas announced that it would rewrite its charter, in response to claims that its old charter was anti-Semitic. It agreed to change the language of the charter to make it clear that it did not oppose Jews but the occupation. The draft of the new charter said that Hamas ‘considers the establishment of a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of 4 June 1967’.4 This meant that Hamas was accepting the existence of Israel up until its occupation of the West Bank began – that is, accepting the boundaries set out by the United Nations in 1947.
This was big news: it essentially meant that Hamas accepted a two-State solution, putting it in line with countries such as the US and Australia. But that change led to nothing: a few weeks later, Hamas leader Mazen Faqha was shot dead outside his home in Gaza City, a killing Hamas claimed was a targeted operation by Israel.
It is still important to cling to hope, no matter how forlorn this hope may be.
One idea that former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin put forward involved developing a large parcel of land between Israel, Egypt and the Gaza Strip into one massive hospital complex. Patients and doctors from all three places would come together for medical care. Those advocating the idea saw it as a way of building on one of the few areas of common interest, and seeing enough relationships develop from this to create a well of goodwill. From that well of goodwill, it was hoped that greater understanding of each other could be found.
Developers and architects were engaged for the project – but they were sworn to strict confidentiality. A Turkish benefactor offered US$800 million as a contribution. Rabin’s advisers also looked at building a similar complex at a site where Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria meet. Doctors from Gaza could sit in the cafeteria next to doctors from Israel, while children from Lebanon would be lying in beds next to Israeli children.
But one day it all came to a halt. The Israeli Ministry of Defence informed those involved in the project that it would not be proceeding. Their reason? That they could not guarantee security of the hospitals. Even though an Israeli prime minister had come up with the plan, Israel’s defence establishment sank it. It confirmed my view that the Israeli military establishment was sometimes more powerful than the country’s elected officials.
My own suggested solution draws more broadly on the fundamentals of the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002. I believe that that plan stands the test of time. The great advantage – from Israel’s point of view – is that in one document it delivers a peace agreement with the 22 members of the Arab League.5 The economic power that this would deliver to Israel is unimaginable: the commencement of business and diplomatic dealings with countries as regionally powerful as Saudi Arabia and Qatar would unleash a new economic bloc on the world. Business dealings already go on between Israel and the Gulf States – indeed, even discreetly with Iran – but they are done at an unofficial and under-the-radar level. Enacting the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative would exponentially increase trade and joint ventures.
One factor rarely considered when people discuss the Arab Peace Initiative is that it would deliver to Israel a new peace agreement not just with 22 countries but with 57. This is because the Arab Peace Initiative was also endorsed by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, a group of 57 countries that include Iran.
‘Israel is in the region but not part of the region,’ a senior Jordanian official – a supporter of the Arab Peace Initiative – told me during a visit I made to Amman in 2012. ‘To become part of the region they need to solve the Palestinian issue, and that means helping to create a Palestinian State.’
The world was given a taste of what peace could bring to the Middle East after Israel and Jordan signed a peace agreement in 1994. The change within Jordan was profound. Before that deal was signed, the conflict with Israel – and the potential for war at any time – had consumed Jordanians and their political dialogue. But once peace was made, Jordan began to focus on internal issues: creating employment, alleviating poverty and building schools and hospitals.
The enthusiasm of a move towards Israeli–Palestinian peace ended, of course, in 2000, amid the disappointment of the failure of the Middle East Peace Summit at Camp David, and the beginning of the Second Intifada after Opposition Leader Ariel Sharon famously visited the Temple Mount (one of the contentious topics of the peace talks). Four years later, around 4000 Palestinians and Israelis were dead.
Israeli writer Amos Oz believes that the end to the conflict will not be a happy one, but continues to hope that it will not be marked by violence. ‘The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is a clash of right and right,’ he wrote. ‘Tragedies are resolved in one of two ways: the Shakespearian way or the Anton Chekhov way. In a tragedy by Shakespeare, the stage at the end is littered with dead bodies. In a tragedy by Chekhov, everyone is unhappy, bitter, disillusioned and melancholy but they are alive. My colleagues in the peace movement and I are working for a Chekhovian not a Shakespearian conclusion.’6
Historian Simon Sebag Montefiore wrote in Jerusalem: The Biography that the city belongs to no one and exists for everyone in their imagination. ‘And this is the city’s tragedy as well as her magic; every dreamer of Jerusalem, every visitor in all ages from Jesus’ Apostles to Saladin’s soldiers, from Victorian pilgrims to today’s tourists and journalists, arrives with a vision of the authentic Jerusalem and then is bitterly disappointed by what they find.’7
Like so many through the ages, I, too, left Jerusalem bitterly disappointed. For me, though, it wasn’t a disappointment with my vision of Jerusalem but with the decisions of modern politicians �
� led by Benjamin Netanyahu. He and his government today have unprecedented power. They could give the Middle East its best chance – its only chance – for decades to resolve one of the region’s most destabilising conflicts – the Israeli–Palestinian conflict (the other being the Shia–Sunni conflict whose resolution will rely on Iranian and Saudi Arabian leadership). As long as Palestinians living with no rights and no hope keep increasing in number, a time bomb ticks away. Israel does not need to pretend any confected warmth towards the Palestinians. Now is the time to act, not when another round of sustained violence envelopes Israel in the distrust of the international community.
Twenty years ago, when Sylvie and I first visited Israel, debate among Israelis was fierce. Now, as the country becomes more isolated, many Israelis want to cut contact with those who challenge what their government is doing in the West Bank.
When Sylvie, Jack and I arrived in Jerusalem, we had hope. As we sat on that balcony at the beginning of our great adventure, we looked across Jerusalem with awe and excitement. But now we’ve seen the reality.
If the whole world could see the occupation up close, it would demand that it end tomorrow. Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians would not pass muster in the West if the full details were known. The only reason Israel is getting away with this is because it has one of the most formidable public-relations machines ever seen, and enormous support from its diaspora communities. But while this worked for the first few decades of the occupation, now virtually every incident between an Israeli soldier and a Palestinian is filmed by a mobile phone. Military occupations look ugly because they are ugly. Israel’s reputation will bleed as long as its control over another people continues.
I predict – with sadness – that one day history will catch up with Israel. The longer that takes, the more tragic it will be.
Former Washington Post publisher Philip Graham once said that journalism is the first rough draft of history. From our balcony over Jerusalem, I’ve written this first draft of an extraordinary period. I deeply hope that the final version of history is not what it is shaping up to be.
We must avoid a coming tragedy.
ENDNOTES
Author’s Note
This books draws on conversations during my six years in Jerusalem. Extensive interviews were done with Chris Mitchell, Bob Carr, Kathryn Greiner, Tim Fischer, Jodi Rudoren, Philippe Agret, Crispian Balmer, Dominic Waghorn, Dror Etkes, Gideon Levy, Chris McGreal, Gil Yaron, Akiva Eldar, Daniella Weiss, Jonathan Cook, Gerard Horton, Ahmad Aweidah and Uffe Taudal.
Prologue: The Handshake
1
Thomas Friedman, 13 September 1993, http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/big/0913.html
2: My Long Journey to Jerusalem
1
Council on Foreign Relations, 10 April 2008 and 1 August 2014.
2
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/aug/22/israel1
3: Arriving to a War
1
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/bill-clinton-s-russian-immigrants-are-obstacle-to-peace-comment-draws-fire-in-israel-1.315244
2
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/feb/04/israel-palestinian-territories-war-crimes
3
https://972mag.com/israels-top-news-channel-govt-asked-us-to-show-more-gaza-devastation/99033/.20 November 2014.
4
As he was about to board his plane in Tel Aviv to travel to New York to address the United Nations, Benjamin Netanyahu said he would tell the UN ‘the truth about the heroic soldiers of the IDF, the most moral army in the world’ (Jerusalem Post, 28 September 2014).
5
http://aijac.org.au/news/article/atrocity-or-atrocious-reporting
6: The French School of Jerusalem
1
Israeli Military Order 101, 17 August 1967.
2
http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium-1.573976
3
Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (Temporary Order) 5763, 31 March 2003 (extended June 2016).
4
http://www.militarycourtwatch.org/
5
https://www.unicef.org/oPt/UNICEF_oPt_Children_in_Israeli_Military_Detention_Observations_and_Recommendations_-_6_March_2013.pdf
6
www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jan/22/palestinian-children-detained-jailis-rael
7
Personal communication.
8
Military Court Watch, 29 January 2015.
9
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/life/weekend-australian-magazine/stone-cold-justice/news-story/832380779022d889cdb491120895b45c
8: The Arab Spring
1
https://www.channel4.com/news/sidi-bouzid-roots-of-the-tunisia-revolution
2
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/opinion/a-preventable-massacre.html
9: ‘I think Egypt is Going to Blow’
1
http://www.smh.com.au/world/fear-on-the-nile--no-place-for-the-fainthearted-20110206-1aii2.html
11: Frankenstein’s Monster
1
https://www.adalah.org/ January 2017
2
http://www.haaretz.com/a-civilized-country-doesn-t-traffic-in-bodies-1.371876
3
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/books/probing-the-bureaucracy-of-occupation-1.453805)
4
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-has-101-different-types-of-permits-governing-palestinian-movement-1.403039
5
Hadas, Ziv, ‘The Bureaucracy of Occupation: the District Civil Liaison Offices’, Machsom Watch and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, p. 8.
6
Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling (WCLAC), ‘Life Behind the Wall: Women’s Voices from the Seam Zone’, accessible at www.wclac.org
7
HaMoked, Case 65164, from ‘The Permit Regime: Human Rights Violations in West Bank Areas Known as the ‘Seam Zone”’, www.hamoked.org/files/2013/1157660_eng.pdf
8
Richard Ben Cramer, How Israel Lost: The Four Questions (Simon & Schuster, 2004).
9
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/opinion/02friedman.html
10
‘The Permit Regime: Human Rights Violations in West Bank Areas Known as the ‘Seam Zone”’, Executive Summary p. 2, www.hamoked.org/files/2013/1157660_eng.pdf
11
https://machsomwatch.org/sites/default/files/InvisiblePrisonersEng.pdf
12
Victor Ostrovsky and Claire Hoy, By Way of Deception: The Making and Unmaking of a Mossad Officer, St Martin’s Press, New York, 1990.
13
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/685792.stm
14
https://www.yesh-din.org/en/a-court-of-non-convictions-for-israeli-felons/
15
http://www.jonathan-cook.net/2005-02-04/israels-latest-land-grab-is-part-of-an-old-strategy/
16
Personal communication, 1 March 2014, and Haaretz, 12 December 2013.
17
972mag.com/this-is-how-settlers-take-over-palestinian-land/115754/.
18
https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/01/19/occupation-inc/how-settlement-businesses-contribute-israels-violations-palestinian
19
http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium-1.562975
20
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.733746
21
documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/137111468329419171/West-Bank-and-Gaza-Area-C-and-the-future-of-the-Palestinian-economy
22
Guy Bechor, ‘Jewish demographics have won’, Yedioth Ahronoth, 20 June 2013, p. 24.
23
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/21/AR2006112100482.htm
24
http://files.yesh-din.org/userfiles/Yesh%20Din_Under%20The%20Radar%20-%20English_WEB(3).pdf
2
5
http://www.haaretz.com/secret-israeli-database-reveals-full-extent-of-illegal-settlement-1.266936
12: Coffee with the Israeli Army
1
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/an-objective-journalist-the-unicorn-of-the-middle-east/
2
http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/.premium-1.568875
3
ibid.
4
Sylvain Cypel, Walled: Israeli Society at an Impasse, Other Press, New York 2007.
5
http://www.haaretz.com/survival-of-the-fittest-cont-1.61341
6
http://www.timesofisrael.com/poll-half-of-jewish-high-schoolers-think-arabs-shouldnt-vote-in-israel/ URL; and http://www.jta.org/2016/03/08/news-opinion/israel-middle-east/six-surprising-findings-from-pews-study-of-israelis
7
Jerusalem Post, 2 July 2016.
8
http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Tel-Aviv-cleaning-ad-found-pricing-workers-by-race-spurs-outrage-444122
9
cdn3.phr.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Divide-And-Conquer.pdf.
10
Haaretz, 21 October 2012.
11
Haaretz, 28 March 2015.
12
Haaretz, 15 May 2015.