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Michael Anbar , PhD, is a professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Buffalo. Formerly a professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, he is the author of , published by iUniverse.
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By Michael Anbar
October 24, 2003
The recently unveiled "Geneva Accord" will never work. For the plan to be acceptable to Israel, the proposed new Arab state must have limited sovereignty. The entwined geography of the proposed new Arab state alongside Israel mandates that it must be demilitarized, have limited control of its airspace, have limitations on entry and exit of people, have limited rights to form alliances with other countries, and be economically extremely dependent on the State of Israel for many decades to come. The PLO may welcome these restrictions for a while, but only to be used as leverage to eventually dislodge the Jewish state by a combination of political pressure, terrorism and military assault.
Even if the Palestinians gave up on their "right of return," the new accord would continue to ferment local Arab dissatisfaction, which undoubtedly would be exploited by extramural Arabs to continue to undermine the existence of the Jewish state by incessant terrorism. The previously proposed "Roadmap to Peace" requires dismantling of Arab terrorist organizations, but the "Geneva Accord" has no such conditions. As such, it is an unmitigated reward for terrorism. If accepted it would only encourage more of it inside Israel and elsewhere.
Although the "Geneva Accord" will never be accepted by Israel, primarily because it sidesteps the crucial issue of terrorism and the dismantling of terrorist organizations, the media coverage of its ceremonial presentation in November will offer an important benefit to the PLO: It legitimizes this despotic terrorist organization as the sole representative of the "Palestinian" Arabs. The truth is that the PLO represents the "Palestinian" Arabs just as much as the Israeli citizenry is represented by a bunch of renegade Jewish politicians who are cosponsors of this new "Accord". The "Geneva Accord" is evidently collusion between two groups of self-appointed "negotiators" who defy democracy.
One might ask at this point: Is there an alternative suggestion? How can one stop the decline of morale and the deterioration of the economy in Israel? How could one eliminate Arab terrorism and improve the livelihood of the Arabs involved?
I suggest a separate and sustainable coexistence under new and different terms. I suggest the establishment of an autonomous, independent Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip, with a possible increase of its area from 360 to say, 600 square kilometers. At the same time, all other PA territories west of the Jordan would be annexed to the state of Israel.
After an appropriate period of "dePLOization" (cf. denazification), all Arab inhabitants of the "West Bank" territory will be offered full Israeli citizen's rights pending their acceptance of Israeli nationality (i.e. they must swear allegiance to the existence of the democratic State of Israel). Militant religious or nationalistic Arabs amongst them will have the option to become citizens of the independent Palestinian state of Gaza, whether they move there physically or not. If they stay in Israel as alien residents they would have obey all laws of land but have no voting rights. Immigration of Muslims from other countries into the State of Israel would be limited, however, to maintain a demographic balance (immigration quotas have existed even in the USA). My suggestion offers the Arabs a politically and economically viable Palestinian state, while offering Israel its required long-term security and alleviation of the Islamistic demographic threat.
Let us analyze the merits of this suggestion:
1. The Gaza Strip does not pose an insurmountable military threat to the state of Israel, even if annexed by Egypt, which is not very likely, or even if it or another Arab country sends hostile troops there. In any case, Israel must maintain its military strength to confront aggression from any Arab country in the region or a combination of such.
2. The border between Israel and the Palestinian state may be open to commerce or hermetically closed, depending on the political relationship between the two countries.
3. The historical geopolitical position of Gaza at the crossroad of three continents lends itself to becoming again a commercial and industrial city-state, similar to Singapore or Hong Kong. There is enough land in the Gaza Strip for a large population with a flourishing economy. The population density in the Gaza Strip is currently 3542 people per square kilometer. Economically flourishing Singapore and Hong Kong have 6667 and 6767 people per square kilometer, respectively. However, the GDP in Gaza is $600 per capita, compared with $24,000 and $26,000 in Singapore and Hong Kong, respectively (all 2003 statistics are from the 2003 World Fact Book of the U.S. CIA). Moreover, unlike Hong Kong and Singapore, the Gaza Strip has commercially valuable natural gas reserves.
4. Using the 2003 CIA figures, there are at present 1.26 million Arabs in the Gaza Strip and this population could double or triple, given the appropriate political and economic incentives. Adding 240 square kilometers to the Gaza Strip could economically support additional two million people who could live very comfortably in the new commercial-industrial Arab country.
6. On the "West Bank" there are 1.68 million Muslims, while within Israel there are today 905,000 Muslim citizens. Thus if Israel annexed the West Bank, it would include approximately 2.6 million Muslims and more than 5 million Jews plus over 700,000 others. Even if all these Muslims chose Israeli citizenship they would constitute less than a third of the Israeli electorate. Therefore, the fear of a demographic takeover of the State of Israel by Islamists would be unfounded, especially as the Muslim birth rate is likely to decrease dramatically as their dismal economic status improves. Today the GDP of the Arabs on the "West Bank" is $800 per capita compared with $19,000 of Israelis (this figure includes the GDP of 1.2 million non-Jewish Israeli citizen!)
The new Muslim Israeli citizens would thus have a long way to go to improve their standard of living rather than sacrifice their livelihood to violent, religion-motivated illusions. The experience of the last decade must have taught them that hatred and terrorism do not improve the standard of living, except for that of the corrupt terrorist leadership. Given a free choice, the new Israeli Arab citizens will adopt Western democratic values and abandon militant Islam. Israeli Muslims will have to make the same choice Muslims must make in Italy, Germany, Scandinavia, the Netherlands or the U.S. Notwithstanding potential abuses by unscrupulous local politicians, if members of Muslim minorities chose to join militant international Islamism to the detriment of their host countries, they would be crushed and expelled. No country will tolerate an ethnic or religious minority that tries to undermine its regime.
This proposed solution would alleviate terrorism while allowing Jews and Arabs to coexist in peace and prosperity in two truly independent states. Terrorism cannot be sustained without the active support of a large segment of the population. It will not exist anymore in Israel, just as it has not been committed by the overwhelming majority of the current Muslim citizens of Israel, over the last fifty five years. What is most important, while it will allow the Jews in Israel to maintain a separate and sustainable existence as an ethical democratic society, it will also allow the "Palestinians" in the Gaza Strip to maintain a social and political structure of their choice under entirely unrestricted conditions. However, until a major reform takes place in Islam, giving up its illusionary global supremacy and Jihadism, Israel will have to maintain its military superiority.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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