The Palestinians cannot be hammered into submission

The Palestinians cannot be hammered into submission
By Philip Stephens
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010
Published: June 3 2010 21:11 | Last updated: June 3 2010 21:11
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a3936062-6f3d-11df-9f43-00144feabdc0.html


Benjamin Netanyahu’s government sees the world through the prism of force. Only when Israel’s enemies have been crushed will it contemplate talking to them. Power has thus become the enemy rather than an instrument of peace. A rhetorical willingness to negotiate has been emptied of meaning.

This week’s attack on the flotilla of ships carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza fits a familiar pattern. The killing of nine activists by the commandos who boarded the Turkish-flagged lead ship was doubtless unintentional. But the nature of the raid testified to a deep contempt on the part of the Israeli administration for the norms of international behaviour.

The incident has brought back into focus a choice that the international community – above all the US and Europe – would rather put to one side. Israel’s friends can continue to wring their hands in half-condemnation of its military excesses while doing little to advance negotiations with the Palestinians. Or they can set out the terms of a settlement that would guarantee Israel its security and the Palestinians a state.

At first glance, the most startling thing about the assault on the aid convoy was that it was so badly bungled. Yet even that was not entirely surprising. The days when Israel’s military was lauded for precision as well as prowess have long passed. Recent wars in Lebanon and Gaza have been military failures and public relations disasters. The assassination in Dubai of a Hamas leader exposed the carelessness as much as the ruthlessness of Israel’s secret services.

The international outrage at this week’s incident has rightly focused attention on the blockade by which Israel has imprisoned 1.5m Palestinians in the crowded strip of land that is Gaza.

The suffering inflicted by this collective confinement has been well documented by the United Nations and by aid agencies. Palestinians are denied vital medical supplies as well as adequate food and water. An embargo on building materials means that neighbourhoods reduced to rubble during the 2008-09 invasion remain just that – rubble.

The blockade has left Israel in breach of yet another UN resolution and, even before this week, had severely damaged its most important regional relationship. Israel’s ties with Turkey long represented an important strategic bridge to the Muslim world. The bridge has been blown up by the deaths and injuries inflicted on Turkish citizens.

All this, of course, will have made it harder for the US and its allies to secure support in the UN Security Council for more sanctions against Iran. Mr Netanyahu says Tehran’s nuclear ambitions pose a mortal threat to the region. His treatment of Palestinians weakens efforts to curb the Iranian programme.

For what? The punishment of civilians in Gaza in the name of self-defence is nothing if not self-defeating. Its principal purpose is political – to show Mr Netanyahu’s domestic constituency that Hamas is being “punished” for its imprisonment of an Israeli soldier.

To the contrary, Hamas is strengthened by the siege. It continues to get weapons through the tunnels on the Egyptian side of the border. It has been gifted a stranglehold over the economy of Gaza and has seen its political legitimacy rise among Palestinians radicalised by their misery.

None of this is to side with those who want to wage war against Israel; rather it is to point out the consequences of Mr Netanyahu’s policy. To quote Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state: the blockade is “unsustainable and unacceptable”. William Hague, Britain’s foreign secretary, tellingly has chosen the same phrase, arguing the restrictions are inimical to Israel’s security.

But wait, I hear Israeli officials say. The international community should recognise the distinction Israel makes between the Palestinian Authority on the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza. Mr Netanyahu would open talks tomorrow with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president. Hamas refuses to accept the existence of the state of Israel.

These things are true as far as they go. Mr Netanyahu has been dragged, albeit kicking and screaming, into signing up for a two-state solution. But talks are not the same as negotiations.

Mr Netanyahu’s refusal, in spite of intense pressure from the US administration, to halt the colonisation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem speaks to a mindset that views talks as a substitute for, rather than a path to, a peace accord. So too does the heavy emphasis he invariably places on the suffocating control Israel would exercise over any Palestinian state.

Barack Obama has persevered with the effort to get Mr Netanyahu and Mr Abbas to the table. Senator George Mitchell, the US special envoy, shuttles between the two sides in so-called proximity talks.

But the US administration has refused thus far publicly to acknowledge what its senior officials privately concede: that those elements of Hamas willing to forsake violence cannot be excluded from an eventual Middle East settlement.

For its part Mr Netanyahu seems indifferent to isolation – to the fact that by frustrating Israel’s friends it gives succour to its enemies. He appears oblivious to the reality that Israel is weakened by a reflex resort to force; and that his intransigence offers cover to those Palestinians who refuse to renounce violence.

The options of the US and Europe are limited in such circumstances, though they should certainly step up their demands that Israel respect international law. Beyond that, Mr Obama should test the intentions of Hamas – above all the willingness of its leadership to put aside violence. Ostracising Palestinian militants merely provides them with an excuse not to confront such choices.

Most importantly, Washington and its European allies must be ready to put before the UN the outlines of a peace settlement. There would be few surprises in such a document – the basic architecture of two states based around 1967 borders with a shared capital in Jerusalem has not changed in decades.

It is time, though, for Israel’s friends to set out the terms formally and to embed them in a UN resolution. I fear Mr Netanyahu is unlikely to grasp the damage done to Israel’s interests by its shoot-first policy. But there will come a time when Israel has a government that recognises the self-defeating futility of indiscriminate force.

philip.stephens@ft.com

More columns at www.ft.com/philipstephens