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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: paul_philp who wrote (32242)	6/13/2002 12:21:23 AM
From: Nadine Carroll	Respond to of 281500

Good analysis as per usual from Ze'ev Schiff: Shorten the lines By Ze'ev Schiff Many Israel Defense Forces officers agree that it would be better to shorten the lines in the territories - that is, to give up on isolated settlements and withdraw from certain areas. But I have not found a single senior officer with any influence on the decision-making process who thinks that we should do this in the current situation, because the Palestinians, and the Arabs in general, would interpret it as a military victory. In this context, the withdrawal from Lebanon is always mentioned. We viewed this as a move that would have a calming influence on the military conflict - but the Arabs saw it as a victory, and that influenced them to support the Palestinians in a military confrontation with Israel. It is no surprise that the evacuation of isolated settlements is not currently being discussed by the general staff. Even former prime minister Ehud Barak, who led the withdrawal from Lebanon and supports separation as a strategic necessity, now says that for the time being, all we should do is decide which isolated settlements should someday be evacuated - primarily so that their residents can be informed, and will be ready to be evacuated when the time comes. There are also Palestinian personalities who say it would be a mistake for Israel to implement a unilateral evacuation today, because such a step would strengthen the extremists and give great encouragement to Hamas and all the others who want to continue the military confrontation. Evacuation without an agreement is thus liable to result in stepped-up military pressure by the Palestinians. But despite all this, it is clear that Israel is approaching the stage at which it can no longer postpone a crucial decision on this issue. The decision to build a fence along the border was also deferred for many months for fear that it would be viewed as a retreat under pressure to the 1967 borders. But just as it did with the fence, the moment will come when we will have to choose a certain path even though it is not an ideal response to every operational problem. In the case of the isolated settlements, it will be necessary to decide which consideration outweighs the others, while taking into account the psychological effect on the Arabs and the negative impact evacuation is liable to have on negotiations. The defense establishment must first of all weigh the operational considerations. For the IDF, which is crying out for more operational manpower, this is the critical issue. In Gaza, for instance - where there is a shortage of forces in reserve - every isolated settlement requires a battalion. There are more soldiers than settlers. One phenomenon that is bringing the day of decision closer is the tricks the settlers are using in order deceive, not the Arabs, but the defense establishment - to wit, the illegal outposts. These outposts (which admittedly are not always isolated, but are often set up near a large settlement) are constantly being reestablished, until in the end, the army is forced to defend them even though they are illegal. The settlers, who view refusing to build a fence around their towns as a show of ideological muscle, are thereby intensifying the tragic conflict. The cat-and-mouse games with the settlers, who circumvent the law and the army's orders, are contemptible - and they also make the military struggle more difficult. Yasser Arafat had a chance to create a situation in which Israel would have been compelled to freeze the settlements in the framework of the Mitchell plan. But the continuation of the violence was more important to Arafat than a settlement freeze, even though he would have enjoyed broad American and international support on this issue. Today, the chances of a comprehensive agreement with the Palestinians, within whose framework we could deal with the settlements, including the isolated ones, are slim. In this situation, there are two alternatives that have yet to be thoroughly discussed. One is to evacuate civilians from isolated settlements and put the army in their place until comprehensive negotiations are opened. The evacuees could be absorbed into settlements that are part of the settlement blocs outlined in former U.S. president Bill Clinton's bridging proposal, or they could accept compensation and relocate in Israel. The second possibility depends on the start of negotiations. In this case, it would be possible to reach an understanding at the outset on coordinated unilateral moves: Israel would evacuate certain isolated settlements, and the Palestinians would turn illegal weapons over to international observers. But it is clear that such coordinated unilateral steps have no chance of becoming reality if the fighting continues in its current form. haaretzdaily.com

To: paul_philp who wrote (32242)	6/13/2002 1:10:09 AM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi paul_philp; I agree that economic advancement to the point where there is a large and healthy middle class is what will (eventually) calm down the Middle East. The problem is that no one is pursuing those policies. Certainly Israel isn't doing a damn thing to pacify the region. Here's a quote from Blackhawk Down that perfectly expresses what I see going on over there: Blackhawk Down Mark Bowden, (page 334-5, paperback) ... Mogadishu has had a profound cautionary influence on U.S. military policy ever since. "It was a watershed," says one State Department official, who asked not to be named because his insight runs so counter to our current foreign policy agenda. "The idea used to be that terrible countries were terrible because good, decent, innocent people were being oppressed by evil, thuggish leaders. Somalia changed all that. Here you have a country where just about everybody is caught up in hatred and fighting. You stop an old lady on the street and ask her if she wants peace, and she'll say, yes, of course, I pray for it daily. All the things you'd expect her to say. Then ask her if she would be willing for her clan to share power with another in order to have that peace, and she'll say, 'With those murderers and thieves? I'd die first.' People in these countries -- Bosnia is a more recent example -- don't want peace. They want victory. They want power. Men, women, old and young. Somalia was the experience that taught us that people in these places bear much of the responsibility for things being the way they are. The hatred and killing continues because they want it to. Or because they don't want peace enough to stop it." -- Carl P.S. This gets back to my comments that the Germans loved Hitler (see #reply-17552983 ) Let me expound on that. Not only did most Germans adore Hitler, but I think that most of them approved of his actions against the Jews. Not because of anything different or special about Germans (or Jews), but instead simply because of the natural human tendency to organize together for brutal bloodshed. For the same reasons, having Arafat (or Sharon) removed from power will not significantly pacify the region. To get real peace, the people (on both sides) have to want peace more than revenge (or retribution, or "defense", or "martyrdom", or whatever they want to call their violence). And what good would it do to push over the regime in Saudi Arabia? (Or Iraq, for that matter.) Does anyone really think that a peace loving democracy is going to grow out of the ruins? And beating the Saudis into submission is not an option. Under international law, beating another state's public into submission (as opposed to military) is termed "genocide", and is universally frowned upon. We were lucky in Afghanistan because they'd already beaten themselves into submission. But the next time the big guys go at each other (may it not happen in this century), you can expect to see some populations beaten down. Or maybe by then they'll have a non fatal way of making humans submit. You could tickle the other side until they realize that they have been forever bested and agree to fight no more forever.

To: paul_philp who wrote (32242)	6/13/2002 9:49:32 AM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I think a meaningful (no IMF) economic reform process for Saudi Arabia could get much accomplished. It could stabalize the support for the House of Saud. It could lay the groundwork for a real economy. It could have a real middle class emerge. While I think few would quarrel with this, Paul, the problem seems to me to be just how to get from here to there. I gather from some of the qualifiers in your sentences that you mean an economy not so reliant on oil and one with a better distribution of rewards--growing middle class, economic gains less concentrated among the elite. Not an easy task. Particularly when the US is going in the opposite direction, that is more wealth concentrated at the top.