jpost.com
THE REGION: This carpet won't fly
By Barry Rubin
(March 20) I'm sure the Bush Administration
thought it was very clever to propose a
resolution recently passed by the UN
supporting a Palestinian state in exchange for a
cease-fire.
Aside from viewing it as promoting the US's
image in the Arab world - as if such a gesture
would change any Arab state's policy in favor
of supporting the war against terrorism or a
US attack on Iraq! - the idea was to tantalize
Yasser Arafat by saying, "Just think! All you
need do is impose a real cease-fire, and you
get a state!"
But that's not the way the resolution will be
read. Instead it will seem to Arafat and many
other Palestinians that if they continue the war
(i.e., keep murdering Israelis in terrorist
attacks) they will get even more concessions.
Let's translate the most common current
Western concept of how to deal with Arafat
into the following terms:
A man steps into the Arafat carpet shop in the
bazaar. He sees a carpet he wants and asks
how much it is. The owner responds,
"$100,000."
"That's a lot of money!" says the man. "Tell
you what, I'll give you $25,000."
"Nope, $100,000."
"OK, I'll make it $40,000."
"No, $100,000," the owner screams.
"That's absurd - but here's my final offer:
$50,000."
The owner punches the customer, who
responds "$60,000."
The owner hits him again.
"Tell you what," says the customer, "I'll let
you join my international coalition against
shopkeepers who charge too much and hit their
customers, and give you $70,000!"
The storeowner kicks the customer and says,
"I'm not even sure $100,000 is enough."
The customer says, "I'll pretend I didn't hear
you say that. I'll still let you join my coalition,
and I'll give you $80,000."
The storekeeper hits the man once more, and
the customer whines, "OK, OK, let's make it
$90,000, if you stop hitting me."
At that point the customer says to himself:
"What a brilliant negotiator I am!"
Guess what the storekeeper expects will
happen next?
The point is that Western concessions,
sympathy, financing and peace offers to Arafat
today do not encourage him to stop the
fighting. They encourage him to continue
fighting.
This is one of four misunderstood factors that
make it so hard for many people to understand
the current nature and long duration of the
Arab-Israeli conflict.
Another point is that since weaker parties
usually don't attack stronger parties because
they expect to lose, the stronger party must
seem the aggressor, the side that believes
violence suits its interests.
Here, though, the weaker party is attacking the
stronger - and has done so many times -
precisely because it does expect to win.
There's a long list of reasons why this is so,
including the belief that God is on their side;
that Muslims and Arabs once won battles
against overwhelming odds; that the
Palestinians are brave and steadfast while
Israelis are decadent and cowardly; and that
the Arab world and the West will come to the
Palestinians' aid and hand them victory.
And let's not forget the extreme distortion of
news in the Arab world. After all, the
Palestinian leadership has many times
portrayed defeats as victories - notably
Lebanon in 1982 - and gotten away with it.
A SECOND broad misconception is that it's
possible and necessary to think up some
perfect plan to end the fighting and conflict.
Whether it's the Mitchell Commission, the
Saudi proposal, some European scheme or
hundreds of op-ed and other "solutions," the
idea is to find some perfect blend of ingenuity,
justice and other elements that will persuade
everyone to lay down their arms.
Have there not already been quite enough
plans in the past half-century?
The problem is not to find some visionary way
to divide Jerusalem or some crackpot way to
please everyone. The difficulty is getting
Arafat to say yes to anything that is not
ridiculously one-sided and intended to lay a
foundation for more violence, instability, plus
a second stage aimed at eliminating Israel
altogether.
Finally, a third mistake - triggered most
recently by the Saudi public relations effort -
is that Arab regimes want to end the conflict
because it is costly, troublesome and they
would benefit from peace. In fact, many of the
ruling dictatorships find the conflict a
tremendous asset in ensuring domestic support
and avoiding the need to implement reforms
that would diminish their wealth or power.
If they can keep "fighting" Israel without going
to war or spending much money, why end the
conflict at all?
That's why trying to sell peace plans to Arab
rulers or hoping they will pressure Arafat "for
their own good" is doomed to fail.
Here's one example: In March 2001,
rank-and-file members of his ruling party
asked Syrian Vice-President Abd al-Halim
Khaddam why the regime did not do more to
solve the problems of corruption, lack of
democracy, economic backwardness and the
slow pace of reform. His answer was that the
Arab-Israeli conflict permitted no changes at
home.
Only in the Arab world - not even in the
Islamic republic of Iran - have dictators come
up with such a good way to persuade their
people to accept endless misrule.
And yet the regime itself had the power to end
the conflict whenever it wanted to. In
exchange for peace Syria was offered the
return of every square meter of the Golan
Heights.
Was the real issue that prevented a diplomatic
resolution Syria's desire for 12 square miles
of land on Israel's side of the international
border, or was an endless state of war really
the government's insurance policy against
domestic problems?
If more people could comprehend these four
points - or even some of them - events in the
region would make far more sense.
Of course, understanding them makes them no
less tragic or senseless. |
