As long as Israel’s neighbours’ minimum condition is a “Palestine” Judenrein from the river to the sea, there’s nothing to negotiate
Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital despite intense Arab, Muslim and European opposition to a move that would upend decades of U.S. policy and risk potentially violent protests. Alex Brandon/AP
Before Donald Trump even recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, The New York Times characteristically shrieked at 4 a.m. “Igniting fears of violencein the region, President Trump’s decision could derail any peace initiative, Arab and European leaders warn.” In response to which I would ask how you derail something already in the ditch, if the more pertinent question were not how you derail something that does not exist.
Trump continues to confound as the first post-modern president, entirely unbound by logic or convention. About a quarter of his major public acts fall below the minimum standard of decency for his office, and about one in 10 rises dramatically above what other presidents ever dared.
I put this decision in the latter category on moral and historical grounds. But as this point has been ably argued by various Post colleagues, let us narrow our focus to the question of the negotiations for peace that, politicians and pundits rushing in where angels fear to tread assure us, are going on in the region and might be threatened by this move. On what ground, exactly, would doing something that pleases our democratic Israeli ally and offends its bloodthirsty enemies be counterproductive?
Rational negotiation, here as anywhere, involves rewarding behaviour we wish to encourage and punishing the opposite. So what, over the past century, have Arab leaders done that we wish to encourage? Since the 1920s, before the re-establishment of Israel in 1948, they have instantly and indignantly rejected every compromise solution put forward, even though at least through 1949 those offers, if accepted, would have rendered Israel unviable. Moreover, the plain fact that each offer was less attractive to them than its predecessor never gave them any sense that their position was not unassailably mighty.
To a peculiar extent Arab leaders have succeeded in moving the terms of the debate by this delusional inflexibility. If some perfectly reasonable action will cause them to stomp out hurling vainglorious threats, it cannot be taken because the “process” is sacred.
So where, I ask you, is evidence that this approach has worked or is working? Israel has repeatedly ceded occupied territory and sought mutual recognition. And virtually all its neighbours have responded with frontal attacks when they dared and subversion and terror otherwise, coupled with genocidal hate propaganda.
If that’s a peace process, I’m an olive tree. But since noticing the obvious would mean giving up on a negotiated solution pending a change of heart, regime or both in nearly all Israel’s neighbours, it’s regarded as sophisticated to pretend it’s not happening. Thus, paradoxically, the Middle East peace process has been all process and no peace because of a persistent effort to satisfy the insatiable demands of Israel’s enemies, rewarding and thus encouraging precisely the conduct that makes peace impossible.
Israel, of course, has not rewarded this conduct. It has increasingly acted unilaterally to protect its own interests, sometimes establishing settlements in land from which Jews were ethnically cleansed long ago or recently, other times withdrawing as from Gaza, and ignoring screeching abuse about specific actions from people who openly want them dead no matter what they do. And it laid such a beating on Egypt in 1973 as to force Sadat to make peace, for which he was assassinated. But Western “statesmen” almost always urge restraint on Israel while ignoring even the most blatant provocations from its sworn enemies.
Remember Kissinger’s dictum that negotiations can only succeed if the minimum terms of the parties can be made to coincide. As long as Israel’s neighbours’ minimum condition is a “Palestine” Judenrein from the river to the sea, there’s nothing to negotiate, and no sane reason to reward a blood-curdling stance whose tiresome familiarity should not numb us to its atrocity.
It’s not obvious that any conduct on our or Israel’s part can bring most Arab leaders to see reason. A 2001 Mackenzie Institute newsletter memorably noted Arafat’s “impulsive urge for trying to take the pot with a pair of fours,” and the widespread tendency of Israel’s enemies to irrational belligerence makes devising a rational structure of sticks and carrots difficult. But if we really think there’s anything to negotiate, we have to try, right?
Over a decade ago, a pundit lectured us that, “Up to a point, you can fight the terrorist side while encouraging the political side. In fact, the name of the game is precisely to shift their calculus of self-interest toward peaceful politics, by increasing both the costs of violence and the benefits of participation.”
Let’s increase the costs of violence by doing things they don’t want until they start negotiating sincerely. Like recognizing the obvious fact that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. And that people ranting about death to Jews are not part of any hypothetical “peace process.”
@ Michael S:
Czech President defends Trump on Jerusalem. Czechoslavia divided.
http://www.radio.cz/en/section/curraffrs/czech-president-back-us-stand-on-jerusalem
I hope you’re not measuring the “minimum standard of decency” for his office by Obama’s recent 8 year destruction of the United States. If you are, I would change that 25% to being far above the level of decency.
Whatever he’s doing that you don’t like, he’s a 70 year old family man, non-political, outspoken, doesn’t rape women, doesn’t steal, doesn’t commit perjury in court, and is doing the best Presidential work that this generation has ever seen. Practically everything he does is an improvement on the existing situation for Americans. And certainly for Israel, who have never experienced an American President like him, so solidly supporting them.
So whaada ya want from ‘im.? Stop reading the New York Times, do yourself a favour..
@ Russell:
Hi, Russell
I wouldn’t say one has to be ashamed of being “British” because of something Theresa May has done. In my book, she is a closet “Remainer” and not “British” at all.
What we are witnessing, is a wholesale rebellion by THE WHOLE WORLD, save the US, Canada and Australia, against the values that your father and others fought for. I am amazed at the extent of the “groupthink” involved, with 151 nations refusing to recognize the reality on the ground for the past seventy years. You might note that even in the US and Canada, there are millions of people eagerly desiring to throw Israel under the bus in order to advance the agenda of Soros and others. It’s a very wicked situation.
The Book of Revelation speaks about “Two Witnesses”, who would testify with power, in the midst of a world so wicked, the Bible describes it spiritually as “Sodom”. I am not a prophet; but I think Netanyahu and Trump come very close to being those “Two Witnesses”. If this is true, the Bible says they will be killed, and the world will rejoice over their dead bodies. As I said, I am not a prophet; and I would be astounded to see such a thing happen; but then, I am already astounded at what I am seeing in the world.
God bless and keep you, and as many in Britain as love the God of Israel.
@ Michael S: May and the actions of the UK government at the UN tells me that Britain has no shame for its betrayal of Israel in their disgracefully poor and corrupt implementation of the Mandate for Palestine and this abstaining and working against Israel no doubt to appease their own Muslim population or for cowardly fears of protests makes me ashamed to be British. My father and others that fought and many that gave their lives for freedom would be hocked to see what a weak and morally bankrupt nation Great ? Britain has become. Shame on the UK for their weakness at the corrupt UN. They obviously have a swamp in the UK that needs to be drained.
In the UN resolutions this week, attacking Trump, the US and Israel, only Canada stood with us (plus some islands and small, poor countries). Australia abstained. Everyone else: Theresa May of the UK, the EU, fair weather friends Japan and Korea, etc. all stood against us.
The resolution essentially denied Israel the right to act sovereignly in WEST Jerusalem, which has been part of Israel since its resurrection in 1948; and which has been Jewish for thousands of years. This goes WAY BEYOND talk of “1967 borders”. It completely de-legitimizes Israel.
http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/UN-disavows-Israeli-ties-to-Jerusalem-515730
What should I say to Shinzo Abe, Theresa May and all our actual enemies who pretend to be friends? Nothing good.
The piecemeal slicing process of Israel is over.
I agree with this article so perhaps a good start would be to tell them we have had enough of their lies, and the truth is now to be applied. Palestine is not a nation, never was, their narratives are false and as such they have no legitimate claim to anything between the Jordan and the Med.. If they choose to wage-a-rage they will be met with military action and be kicked out of Gaza, Judea and Samaria and their Arab brothers can pick them up at the Jordanian border. if Jordan wants a war about this then Israel will kick the whole lot of them, so-called Palestinians and Jordanians all the way into Saudi Arabia and apply the Mandate for Palestine the way it was supposed to be applied and the way the Almighty decreed their boundaries. (From the Euphrates to the Med). Oh boy! what it would take to apply the truth is tough to contemplate after there has been so much capitulation to the lies but how long must accepting lies be forced upon Israel as a basis for negotiations that have always led to nothing but more lies, blood libel, false narratives, unrealistic demands, false claims, tantrums, rage and terrorism from their enemies? The only way to overcome lies is to face them with the truth.