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Michael Freund served as Deputy Director of Communications and Policy Planning in the Prime Minister's Office from 1996 to 1999.
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By Michael Freund
June 26, 2003
Originally published in the Jerusalem Post.
These may be difficult times for Middle Eastern tourism, but the Bush Administration is certainly doing its best to help. The stream of top American officials flying into and out of the region has been simply breathtaking.
U.S. President George W. Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.S. special envoy John Wolf are among those who have garnered some valuable frequent flier miles making the trek in recent weeks. Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, is due here in a few days' time and there is now talk of CIA Director George Tenet making flight reservations as well.
With all this coming and going one might be tempted to think that the peace process is effortlessly gaining steam since high-level involvement usually reflects a desire, and an opportunity, to push things forward. Senior U.S. officials, after all, have better things to do with their time than commute back and forth across the Atlantic.
In reality, though, there is no more telling indicator that the U.S.-backed road map to a Palestinian state is encountering great difficulties, many of which were largely unforeseen by its proponents.
The fact that so much diplomatic time and energy has had to be spent convincing the Palestinians to accept control over Gaza land they presumably claim as their own demonstrates just how much the Bush Administration misread the situation here, thinking perhaps that the first stages would be the easiest.
But opponents of the road map should not take too much comfort in the obstacles encountered thus far because, by all indications, Bush is serious about imposing a deal and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon about going along with one.
To a certain extent the heavy diplomatic traffic between Washington and the region recalls Henry Kissinger's "shuttle diplomacy" after the 1973 Yom Kippur War, which led to the signing of an interim agreement between Israel and Egypt.
Then too America stepped in and sought to impose a solution, bringing heavy pressure to bear on Israel to make concessions to the Egyptian aggressors who had launched the previous conflict.
In 1975, U.S. president Gerald Ford threatened a "reassessment" of U.S.-Israel relations, and there was even talk of possible sanctions against the Jewish state.
In the October 6, 1976, U.S. presidential debate Democratic candidate Jimmy Carter blasted the heavy-handed tactics Ford and Kissinger had used, saying, "We almost brought Israel to its knees after the Yom Kippur War by the so-called reassessment of our relationship to Israel. We in effect tried to make Israel the scapegoat for the problems in the Middle East.
"And this weakened our relationship with Israel a great deal and put a cloud on the total commitment that our people feel toward the Israelis."
Those words are equally applicable now as the Bush Administration presses Israel to negotiate under fire and withdraw despite the continuation of Palestinian terror. Instead of placing the onus on the Palestinians, who resorted to the rifle and initiated the bloodshed, Bush is acting as if the two sides were equally to blame for the current predicament.
But whereas the process three decades ago was rightfully labeled "shuttle diplomacy," what is happening now is more akin to "shtetl diplomacy" as the sovereign government of the State of Israel begins to act more and more like a community council in charge of a 19th-century Eastern European Jewish village.
According to reports in the Israeli media on Monday, senior Israeli security officials are currently in Washington discussing which counter-terrorism measures the Bush Administration will allow Israel to take in its ongoing struggle against Palestinian violence. This is said to include talks with the U.S. over whether Israel can target Palestinian terrorists in the process of planning attacks, and where Israel can place its military roadblocks to prevent the infiltration of suicide bombers.
Thus rather than basing such decisions on assessments of what will provide the best security for its citizens Israel is instead giving preference to political calculations, showing more concern for what the US State Department thinks than what the Israeli public deserves.
The fact that the Bush Administration would place its own interests above those of the Israeli people is hardly surprising since a nation's policies are supposed to promote the good of its own above that of everyone else.
But for Israel to yield on this fundamental principle and allow its security policies to be dictated from abroad is nothing short of scandalous. It is not only a blow to the country's dignity and independence, but also sends a dangerous signal to Israel's foes suggesting that the Jewish state has conceded on that most elementary right: the right to defend itself and its citizens.
When the Cossacks were coming over the hill two centuries ago to perpetrate a pogrom, begging for protection from the local authorities was perhaps the only available option. But for a proud and independent state such as Israel to behave like a submissive subordinate, and in the modern-day Middle East no less, is as ominous as it is unbecoming. It demonstrates a lack of resolve and steadfastness, two key ingredients necessary for ensuring a nation's survival in this part of the world.
Nevertheless, Sharon appears undeterred, allowing himself and the country to be dragged into making perilous concessions to an unrepentant foe. If he thinks the road map carries little long-term risk since Israel can ostensibly discard it when it wishes, he is gravely mistaken. The deeper Israel gets mired in the process the harder it will be to extricate itself from it, which is precisely why Washington is pressing so hard to move ahead quickly.
In his October 5, 1938 speech to the House of Commons after the signing of the infamous Munich accord Winston Churchill warned, "Do not suppose that this is the end. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigor we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time."
The choice facing Israel, then, is clear: Take a stand now and stop capitulating to Palestinian terror, or face being drawn down the path of shtetl diplomacy, which will lead to still more violence, bloodshed and pogroms. And while it may not take a genius to learn from history's mistakes, only a fool would aim to repeat them. Israel should abandon the road map now before it is too late. The alternative is simply too horrible to contemplate.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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