Thursday, 20 June 2002
.....
People on either side of the Israel/US/Palestine conflict are at odds. Israel wants the suicide bombings to stop, and Palestinians want the right of return and for Israel to pull out of the west bank. Palestinians either condemn suicide bombings but are powerless to stop them, or support them as a last resort to keep Israel from dominating without consequences. Israelis often equate the right of return with the destruction of Israel, and refuse to risk pulling out of the West Bank, fearing giving more power to anti-Israeli forces.
On the Israeli side, the argument is usually that any action taken to help the Palestinians could undermine the very existence of Israel. While pulling out of the West Bank tout-a-coup or allowing the millions of Palestinian refugees to return all at once would lead to chaos, and a worse situation for everyone, there remain many steps that Israel could take which do not risk destabilization or make security more lax, but nonetheless result in substantial improvements to the current situation. These improvements could make life much better for both Israelis and Palestinians in the long run, and provide for the eventual possibility of real and lasting peace.
Israel could put an end to bulldozing Palestinian homes and buildings without warning, for instance. They've been doing this since at least 1967, when they flattened the Moroccan Quarter in East Jerusalem (though forced removal of Arabs from their homes started in 1948). The most recent example of this practice has been in the Jenin refugee camp, where 1/3 of the houses were destroyed. But what catastrophic effect would ending this most unjust of practices have? It would mean a diminishment in Israel's ability to intimidate Palestinians, but would it mean that police activity against terrorists or suicide bombers would be less effective? Surely arrests can be made and even battles fought without the gratuitous destruction of civilian homes.
Such a move on Israel's part could also result in a small but crucial unwillingness on the part of more Palestinians to tolerate suicide bombings and the organizations which commit them. Furthermore, it would be the first step on the long road to creating a situation stable enough that Palestinians might have a political life with an agenda that extends beyond mere survival. While the possibility of such a political life is not in the interests of people who feel that Israel's complete domination of the region is necessary for Israel to exist, it does make up the only possible basis for competent and just negotiations.
If Israel took that first step, a truly massive effort would still remain in order to arrive at anything resembling justice. In the interests of not destabilizing, however, the next step could be to stop the systematic harassment and humiliation that Palestinian civilians are regularly subjected to by the occupying forces.
While not as easy as stopping the bulldozing, ending the roadblocks where Palestinians are made to wait for hours to travel only a few miles, the interrogation, the beatings, denial of medical treatment and the shoot-to-kill curfews would be an improvement in a grim situation, and would not cause any sudden upset or result in turmoil. If anything, these improvements would cause just the opposite, by allaying another small part of the unnecessary burden that Palestinians carry every day. Similarly, simply stopping the construction of the "security fence" would save Israel $350 million, and would end the cantonization of what have become Palestinian enclaves, reminiscent of (if not identical in function to) South African bantustans.
Israel could also end the use of torture on Palestinian "detainees". While some will argue that lives are saved when a torture victim gives up crucial information, it is difficult to argue for official sanction of torture, much less its use at all. So why not withdraw at least the official endorsement?
Another improvement, no more destabilizing than the others, would be to declare the intention of granting equal rights for non-Jewish citizens of Israel. Currently, non-Jewish citizens of Israel get much less funding for schools and public works than do Jewish citizens. Non-Jewish citizens also find it nearly impossible to buy land in certain areas, much less build on it (unpermitted buildings are subject to the aforementioned bulldozing), and other rights granted to Jewish citizens are withheld from them.
All of these steps could be consistent with any Israeli intention to eventually live in peace with the non-Jewish Palestinians who make their home close by. However, such a willingness could just as easily be a politically expedient embracing of gradualism, akin to that espoused by segregationists in the old American south. As Marting Luther King wrote in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, "Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, 'Wait.'"
It is hard to see how any of these steps would threaten Israel's immediate security, but it is as difficult to imagine their actual implementation. Taking these steps would necessitate a confrontation with the practice of conquest and colonization which currently frames Israel's stance towards Palestinians -- a confrontation not easily brought about.
King's Letter brings out a few suggestions for the Palestinian side. He writes, "We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed." If Palestinians were, as Edward Said and other have repeatedly urged, to adopt non-violent tactics similar to those used by black South Africans or US civil rights protesters, then perhaps these simplest of steps could be accomplished.
The success of non-violent confrontation, however, is at least partially conditional on the willingness of the US press to cover it. As it stands, recent non-violent protests led by independent Palestinians were covered widely by Arab and European journalists, but all but ignored by the US media.
If, through political pressure and sustained effort, it were possible to accomplish any of the things discussed here, it would surely be only a minor part of what is required for justice in the region. Even making small, tangible steps can be both encouraging, and uncover new possibilities for both sides. Sensible Israelis and Palestinians can agree, if to nothing else, then to these minor things. From the example that would be set (with little risk taken), the Palestinians could find their own ways to improve the situation.
A similar list could be made for Palestinians, and perhaps it should be. But Palestinians do not have access to the same democratic framework which exists for Israelis (the democracy which is "vibrant" and progressive for many, with the glaring exception of equal status for Arab non-Jews). Indeed, it is only after these and many other steps have been taken that Palestinians can have elections free of intimidation, and a government that is interested in more than the benefit of those in power.
This is Small Peaces <http://monkeyfist.com/articles/818>