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| Purchase by David Grossman. |
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David Grossman is one of Israel's leading writers. He is the author of four award-winning, internationally acclaimed novels, two powerful journalistic accounts, as well as a number of children's books, and a play. In December 1998, he was decorated by the French government with the Chevalier de l'Ordre des Artes et des Lettres. Grossman's groundbreaking work of nonfiction, The Yellow Wind (1988), is a personal account of his three-month encounter with Palestinians prior to the outbreak of the Intifada.
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By David Grossman
May 19, 2003
Originally published in the Los Angeles Times.
Secretary of State Colin Powell arrived in the Middle East, met with the leaders of Israel and the Palestinian Authority and left without any diplomatic achievement. True, Israel made a few small gestures, but it did not commit to the "road map," the American-backed plan for restarting the peace process.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon rebuffed the American request that he freeze construction in Israel's settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, explaining that this construction is essential to providing for the "natural increase" of the settlements' population. Appealing to his guest's Republican heart, Sharon asked: "Do you want the settlers to have abortions?"
So, in the aftermath of Powell's visit, large numbers of questions continue to waft through the Middle East. But they are all, when it comes down to it, progeny of one central question: What does Sharon really intend to do?
Sharon has, for more than a year, been declaring that he is prepared to take "painful steps" to achieve a lasting peace with the Palestinians. He even speaks of a process that will lead to an end to Israel's occupation of the territories, with the Palestinians receiving their own state.
These promises are encouraging, especially coming from a man who has in the past branded as "traitors" people who dared suggest this very kind of compromise.
Is he speaking truthfully? Or is he pulling the wool over our eyes, as he has done so often before? Maybe he is handing out generous promises, assuming that he can always count on Palestinian terrorism to abort any dialogue or, at least, provide a good excuse for suspending it.
Sharon's promises offer hope, but only until one examines the preconditions he places on them. The Palestinians, he says, must completely cease all terrorist actions and disarm all militias. They must also give up their demand for a "right of return" - that is, the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their former homes in Israel. This concession must come before negotiations begin, according to Sharon.
In principle, Sharon's demand is logical and just. In fact, Israel must insist on a Palestinian abjuration of the right of return in the final agreement. Yet to insist that the Palestinians make this concession before negotiations even begin is to ensure that there will be no negotiations and that terror will continue. It ensures that desperate Palestinians will take ever more extreme positions, including on the right of return. It is clear to everyone that giving up the right of return will be an extremely difficult and painful psychological step for the Palestinians.
Senior Palestinian officials with whom I've spoken recently say they realize that they will, in the end, have to give up their aspiration for the refugees' return to homes that are inside Israel's borders. Yet they add that they will be able to insist that their countrymen make this concession only if they can show that they have achieved, in negotiations, significant Israeli concessions.
"A Palestinian leader foolish enough to propose conceding the right of return in order to begin negotiations with Israel would be assassinated immediately," I was recently told by a minister in the Palestinian Cabinet, headed by the Palestinian Authority's new prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas, known also by his nom de guerre, Abu Mazen.
Sharon's other demand, that the Palestinian Authority fight terror, is also justified and morally correct. Nevertheless, no Israeli or Palestinian believes that Abu Mazen, in his current stage of weakness, can eradicate terrorism or even fight it effectively.
For the last three years, Israel has made a huge and effective effort to fight Palestinian terrorism itself. In doing so, however, it also shattered the same Palestinian governmental and security apparatuses that it now expects to halt terrorist acts.
Furthermore, Abu Mazen knows very well that he must act with determination of a type not yet seen in the Palestinian Authority against Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Yet he is trapped and nearly paralyzed between the contradictory pressures, expectations and threats weighing on him at home and from the outside. If he fights a war to the death with Hamas, he will lose the support of his own people. If he does not fight Hamas, he will lose the support of the Americans and Europeans. If he does fight, a Palestinian civil war could well break out. That would lead to increased Palestinian support for Yasser Arafat, who is lying in wait for his prime minister to fail. If Abu Mazen does not fight and terrorists succeed in carrying out attacks against Israel, Israel will have an excellent excuse for pulling out of its negotiations with the Palestinians.
There can be no doubt: The keys to moving the process forward are not in Abu Mazen's hands. Neither, apparently, are they held by President Bush, who will have no choice but to support Sharon if the Palestinians do not succeed in meeting his tough demands for fighting terror - and which the Palestinian prime minister can hardly hope to meet.
The Europeans, who participated with the U.S., Russia and the United Nations in the "quartet" that drew up the road map, have but marginal influence over Sharon. In any case, Germany will have no choice but to avoid, for historical reasons, putting massive economic pressure on Israel.
So the keys are in Sharon's pocket and the one really essential question, the axis around which the entire situation moves, is: Does Sharon really, seriously mean to keep his promises? Is he speaking the truth when he speaks of a "window of opportunities" and a commitment to Bush's vision of a Middle East peace?
It's amazing how much depends on a single man. It's no less amazing to realize that if Sharon were to decide to truly turn onto the path of compromise and take serious steps to build Palestinian confidence, he would have the support of the great majority of Israelis. So the polls say.
Will he do it?
In Israel there are quite a few people who are certain that Sharon is playing cat and mouse with the Americans and the rest of the world. They say he's playing for time, encouraged by recent events that move, he thinks, in his favor.
Others, more optimistic, recall the transformation that Yitzhak Rabin underwent in his later years. Sharon, these observers say, will do anything to enter the history books. It is hard to take any real comfort in this hope. Sharon is not Rabin. His antipathy for the Arabs seems to be deeper and more "mythological" than Rabin's ever was.
Furthermore, it's not at all clear which "history" Sharon wants to enter. Does he really want to be remembered as the man who, with his own hands, established a Palestinian state and uprooted Israel's settlements in the territories - the very settlements that have, to a large measure, been his life's work?
Look where we are now: Iraq has ceased to be a threat to Israel. A frightened Syria is promising to rein in the terrorist organizations that operate with its support. Arafat has for all intents and purposes been relieved of his powers and influence. The Palestinian prime minister sharply condemns terror against Israel. The only major military power in Israel's proximity today is the United States.
Had an angel come from heaven a year ago and given Israelis a glimpse of their current position, they would have thought that the Messiah was on his way. Yet this really is our position, and our leaders must read the map properly to prepare for the future. Sharon is liable to see justification for his stubbornness and refusal to compromise. If he acts on that reading of the map, if he refuses to take advantage of this rare opportunity to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict once and for all (on terms very good for Israel), if he continues to play tough and arrogant, it will be an act of historical irresponsibility. It will increase hostility to Israel in the region and in the world. It would entrench the current state of conflict and prevent any chance of normality.
Which way will he choose?
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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