In the second half of 2002, a
plan known as the Road Map began to take form in Europe and in the United
States. The parties to this plan were: The European Union, Russia, the Secretary
General of the United Nations and the President of the United States (The
Quartet). The support of George Bush for this plan was reserved at first, but it
increased with his need to pay a political price to Britain – his principal and
most consistent partner in the war in Iraq. The plan sets out stages for an
agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, the preliminary stage calling for
governmental reform of the Palestinian Authority and its fight against terror,
in consideration for an unequivocal Israeli declaration of its commitment to the
establishment of a viable, independent Palestinian state; the further stages of
the Road Map include the establishment of an international body to supervise the
implementation of the plan, the removal of Jewish settlers’ outposts which were
established in Judea and Samaria since March 2001 and the freezing of
settlements (including natural growth), in the first phase. The second stage of
the plan deals with the removal of the Jewish presence in Judea, Samaria and the
Gaza district (Yesha), with the object of creating the maximum territorial
continuity of the Palestinian state. Concurrently with Palestinian progress in
stopping terror, the Israeli army is to withdraw from the areas which it seized
in October 2000, and to enable the reopening of Palestinian institutions in East
Jerusalem. The solution of the problems of the refugees and of Jerusalem, and
the conclusion of the dispute are to be discussed in the third stage, within the
framework of an international conference.
The plan rests upon the
Resolutions of the Security Council Nos. 242 and 338 as formulated by the US and
Britain and accepted by Israel (however, not accepted by the rest of the
Security Council Members), and upon other agreements reached by the parties
(including the so-called Oslo Accords). However, the Road Map rests first and
foremost, in a most unusual and one-sided manner, also on the Resolutions of the
Arab League which has adopted the “Saudi initiative”. This initiative calls for
the withdrawal of Israel to the 1967 boundaries and for the “right of return” of
the Palestinian refugees.
The Road Map lay on the Quartet’s
table until the Palestinian Legislative Council chose Abu Mazen as “Prime
Minister” (being part of the governmental reform included in the terms of the
Road Map), and until the war in Iraq ended. The Plan was presented in the
beginning of May 2003 to the government of Israel and to the Palestinian
Authority and proclaimed officially at the Aqaba Summit on June 4, 2003. Within
a few months the Palestinian “prime minister”, Abu Mazen failed to fight
terrorism as promised, and more suicide bombings were supported by Yasser
Arafat. Israel retaliated and no later than September 6, 2003, Abu Mazen
resigned, and his “new and different Palestinian leadership” collapsed. His
successor, Abu Alla, declared he would not fight Hamas, Islamic Jihad
or any other terrorist organization, and, as these lines are being written, the
“Road Map” plan is on hold, although both President Bush and Prime Minister
Sharon declare it is still valid.
In the past, all leaders of the
State of Israel were united in the view that a Palestinian state west of the
Jordan River would endanger the very existence of the State of Israel. A wide
national consensus also opposes the “right of return” of the Palestinian
refugees to the State of Israel. In recent decades, Israel stood fast in its
demand to solve the dispute between herself and her enemies in direct
negotiations, without foreign intervention, or the introduction of an
international force into Israel. All Israel’s leaders since the Six Day War
opposed the withdrawal of Israel to the 1967 borders – borders which were
described by the very dovish Foreign Minister, the late Abba Eban, as “Auschwitz
borders”. About a quarter of a million Jews live today in Judea, Samaria and
Gaza (Yesha) and an additional two hundred thousand Jews reside in the Jerusalem
quarters which were established in areas annexed after the Six Day War. The Road
Map calls therefore for the transfer of close to half a million Jews from their
homes in the Land of Israel. The Quartet sponsoring the plan does not accept any
of Israel’s reservations in respect to the plan. The Road Map endangers the very
existence of the State of Israel. Yet the Prime Minister of Israel has declared
that the vision of President Bush (“Two States for Two Nations”) is acceptable
to him and that the Road Map (with 14 reservations that were not accepted by the
Quartet or the Palestinians) is the current peace plan of Israel.
At the root of the Road Map there
are several principles which deny the right of Jews to dwell in any part of
Eretz Israel (the Land of Israel), and thereby they seek to undermine the
right of the people of Israel to the Land. They recognize the right of another
nation to sovereignty over parts of the country and they confer legitimacy on
the demand which is intended to be negotiated, for the “right of return” of the
refugees. Other destructive elements of the Road Map are international
intervention in the dispute and recognition of the legitimacy of the Arab claim
to Jerusalem, making it one more subject of negotiation. Israel, therefore, dare
not accept the plan “in principle” – not even for tactical reasons, in
the hope that the Arabs will not succeed in keeping their part of the plan.
Israel must reject the Road Map in its entirety. Any entry into negotiation on
the basis of “the plan” will result in surrender, at least to an extent and most
likely to the majority of the terms of the plan. That is what happened with the
Madrid Conference on October 30, 1991, so it was at Camp David in the peace
discussions with Egypt on September 18, 1978, where Israel agreed to withdraw
from the whole of Sinai “down to the last grain of sand”, to destroy and uproot
the settlements of the Yamit District and was even shamefully expelled from the
narrow strip of coast at Taba. The outcome of these concessions to Egypt did not
bring any peace with Egypt, but rather to a state of “cold war” with this state.
The same happened in the Oslo Accords on September 13, 1993 and in the
arrangements (that led to the current war for the past three years) which
followed the withdrawal of the Israeli Army from Lebanon on May 24, 2000 (which
led to the installation of more than 10,000 missiles and rockets by the
Hizbullah along Israel’s northern border). Entry into negotiation on the basis
of the Road Map will inevitably result in acceptance of most of the terms of the
plan. Only a total rejection of the plan by Israel can make it irrelevant and
will bury it in the pile of political plans which endeavored to bring about the
destruction of Israel in the course of the last 55 years.
Concurrently, Israel must present
an alternative plan. This plan can be proposed during the crisis which will
result from the failure of the Road Map.
*
The alternative plan is based on
the fact that the Palestinians already have a state of their own, Jordan, which
was established after the territory which was allotted for the Jewish National
Home in Mandatory Palestine was divided into two parts, three-quarters given to
the Arabs. Palestinians today already constitute 75% of the population of
Jordan. Our alternative plan presents the need for a regional solution to the
refugee problem by settling the refugees in Jordan; the rate of natural increase
of the Palestinians prevents the solution of their problem within the areas of
Yesha wherein they live at present, not to mention the three million
Palestinians and Palestinian refugees that currently are living in other Arab
countries and might be expelled to the territory of “Palestine” if such a state
is established according to the Road Map plan. Any genuine solution of the
problem must include all Palestinian refugees, living these past 55 years in
refugee camps in Yesha, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. The definition of Jordan as a
Hashemite-Palestinian state will enable the Arabs of Yesha who are not refugees
to obtain Jordanian citizenship, to vote for the Jordanian Parliament in Amman
as the Parliament representing the Palestinian nation, and will enable them to
express their national identity. Arabs who will not move to Jordan within the
framework of the resettlement of the refugees, will be able to administer their
civil needs in seven cantons, solely with autonomous municipal authority without
territorial continuity. They will have authority to run their affairs in the
spheres of trade, health, education, transportation, religion, agriculture and
municipal matters. Israel will be sovereign over the entire area west of the
Jordan and shall have exclusive authority in respect to security and defense in
the entire area of its sovereign rule. The State of Israel cannot agree to
the existence of an additional armed state west of the Jordan with air
sovereignty and with control of its external borders. Nor can the State of
Israel agree to a Palestinian territorial continuity which will cut the State of
Israel into separate parts. On the other hand, in Jordan, a
Hashemite-Palestinian state will have full governmental rights with no
restraints on negotiation of treaties, on air space and no obligations of
demilitarization. Such a state will have territorial continuity and viable
economic independence.
The plan which is hereby
presented, is of the integration of a number of ideas which have already been
raised in the past: “Jordan is Palestine”, “the canton program” and “transfer by
consent”, for the solution of the refugee problem.
Historical Background
The people of Israel came into
being and was formed in Eretz Israel 3,800 years ago. Our forefathers
dwelt in the Land of Canaan, particularly in the Negev and in the mountain range
west of the Jordan. The borders of “the land that was promised to Abraham” and
the Jewish people in the book of Genesis were wide, from the Nile to the river
Perat. Upon the conquest of Canaan by Joshua, the territories of the tribes were
established. The Eastern bank of the Jordan was also conquered. The borders of
the Kingdom of Israel during the reigns of David and Solomon (see map 1) reached
almost to the limits of the “Promised Land” of the Book of Genesis. Upon the
destruction of the Second Temple and the crushing of the Bar Kochba revolt 1,900
years ago, the majority of the Jewish population in Eretz Israel was
exiled. Thereafter, the land saw many conquerors and was occupied by many
rulers: Romans, Byzantines, Muslims, Mamelukes, Crusaders, Turks and British.
Only a few of these empires annexed Eretz Israel to their territory.
During this period, the land was always held by an invader. It was never an
independent state nor the dwelling place of one nation which maintained its
national identity therein. The Jewish population in the country never ceased to
exist, although at times it was sparse. At the end of the 19th
century, the Return to Zion commenced with waves of immigration of Jews. The
population of the country at that time consisted of some tens of thousands of
Jews, Muslims and Christians. At the commencement of the Return to Zion,
Eretz Israel was a remote corner of the Ottoman Empire. The Jewish
immigration and the development of the country which followed, attracted waves
of Arab immigrants from neighboring countries. The conflict between Jews and
Arabs was the main characteristic of life in Eretz Israel in the last
century. The Balfour Declaration, towards the end of the First World War, called
for the establishment of a national home for the Jews in the Land of Israel.
After the War, the League of Nations granted Britain the Mandate over Eretz
Israel west and east of the Jordan, to implement in this region the plan of
the Jewish national home. Violent Arab opposition together with international
political pressures and British commitments to the ruling Bedouin families
during World War I, resulted in the British issuing the Churchill White Paper
which tore the whole of the eastern bank of the Jordan River from the Jewish
national home (1922) (map 2). Thus, the Kingdom of Trans-Jordan was created.
However, this division of the country which had been promised to the Jews in the
Balfour Declaration and in the Mandate, and which was then in great measure
given to the Arabs, failed to satisfy Arab demands and they carried out waves of
bloody riots in 1929 and in the years 1936 to 1939. Each wave of such
“disturbances” was followed by a plan for the further partition of western
Eretz Israel and by a further proposal to hand over additional areas to the
Arabs (Lord Peel’s committee 1936), all being rejected by the Arabs. On November
29, 1947, the United Nations resolved to divide western Eretz Israel into
two states, Jewish and Arab. The War of Independence commenced on the morrow of
the United Nations resolution, and immediately upon the Declaration of
Independence on the 5th of Iyar 5708 (May 14, 1948), the
armies of the Arab states invaded Israel, with the object of conquering it. In
the course of the War of Independence, some hundreds of thousands of Arabs left
their homes, whether as a result of the call of their leaders temporarily to
evacuate the battle areas in order to enable the annihilation of the Jews
unimpeded, or fled for fear of the battles. Their exact number is disputed and
will probably never be known. In accordance with a number of calculations, it
cannot have exceeded 420,000, since, according to the last British census,
560,000 Arabs lived in the area, and after the War of Independence there
remained in the State of Israel about 140,000 Arabs who did not flee. Other
estimates indicate that 750,000 fled and that several additional hundreds of
thousands remained in their homes “but suffered as a result of the war”, and
they were therefore added to the lists of those who were entitled to support by
the United Nations Relief Association which was established for them.
At the end of the War of
Independence (map 3), Egypt controlled the Gaza Strip including its refugee
camps. The Kingdom of Trans-Jordan which invaded the west bank of the Jordan
occupied the areas of Judea and Samaria (“the West Bank”) and the refugee camps
therein. Additional refugee camps were created in Lebanon and in Syria. Many of
the refugees who could do so emigrated to other Arab countries and also overseas
(“the Palestinian Diaspora”). Those who remained in the refugee camps received
support from the funds of the United Nations agencies, and they refused to
settle in the area even when alternative housing proposals were made by various
international bodies. These people became the only refugee population in the
world which perpetuated its own refugee status, rejecting all offers of
permanent housing. The United Nations agencies employ scores of thousands of
Palestinians and the perpetuation of this situation is clearly in the interest
of these Palestinians.
In the refugee camps throughout
the Middle East, various terror organizations have been active during the past
50 years. The Palestinian educational system in the refugee camps has, for three
generations, been cultivating the dream of the return to Palestine and the
destruction of Israel and all its Jewish citizens. These refugee camps are the
foundation and infrastructure of the terror. They are a gigantic reservoir of
manpower for the murder gangs which compete with each other in the only
negotiable currency common to all Palestinians: who can succeed in killing more
Jews, in carrying out more grievous attacks. The Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO) was created in 1964 (!) – three years before the liberation
by Israel of the Sinai Peninsula and of Judea and Samaria (“the West Bank”)
(map 4). The constitution of the PLO calls for the annihilation of Israel as a
Jewish state, the official maps of the PLO show only one state, “Palestine”,
stretching from the Jordan to the Mediterranean. Whoever claims that the object
of the Arabs is “ending the occupation” (of 1967), ignores the facts and the
truth. Whoever proposes “a solution” to the Jewish-Arab dispute in the Middle
East without solving the refugee problem, simply offers a partial and temporary
solution and ignores the prime cause of the continuation of the war.
The Political and Legal Situation of the Judea,
Samaria and Gaza Areas
The borders of the “Green Line”
do not have the status of an international boundary. These borders were the
cease-fire lines of 1949. They might have become recognized international
borders had they fulfilled two conditions:
-
the states bordering the other
side of the “Green Line” would be recognized by international law as the legal
sovereigns of the areas they held, and
-
an agreement would have been
reached between the states for the determination of this border.
The legal position of the areas
of Judea and Samaria (“The West Bank” in Jordanian terminology) had been defined
merely as territory occupied by the Kingdom of Jordan. Similarly, the Gaza Strip
was territory occupied by Egypt. Proof thereof is that both these states do not
make claim in respect to these areas today. In the Peace Treaty, Egypt insisted
on receiving “the last grain of sand” of Egyptian territory, but did not make
any claim in respect to sovereignty over the Gaza Strip. The Kingdom of Jordan
granted Jordanian citizenship to all the Palestinians who lived within its
borders, but though Jordan took great interest in the areas of Judea and
Samaria, and for a period it claimed to be the patron of the Palestinian cause,
nevertheless Jordan waived all rights to these areas, and in the Peace Treaty
with Israel, Jordan made no claim regarding this territory. Israel was the sole
source of authority in this area until the Oslo Accord, and Israel delegated
part of this authority to the Palestinians, in Areas A and B. Until the
liberation of Yesha by Israel in the Six Day War, no claim for the establishment
of an independent state was made by the Palestinians vis-à-vis Jordan or
Egypt, and the Palestinians made no military or political struggle to liberate
their “occupied territory” from these states.
National borders are determined
in agreements between states. In most cases in history, these borders were fixed
in wars or in their aftermath. The United Nations Resolution of November 29,
1947, attempted to outline the borders of the partition of Eretz Israel,
but this offer was rejected by the Arab states, which invaded Israel and
declared a war of annihilation upon the newborn state. The cease-fire lines at
the end of the War of Independence were not recognized by the Arab states, and
the Six Day War followed with large numbers of the Egyptian troops being moved
into Sinai and with the closure of the Straits of Tiran, the shelling of western
Jerusalem and destructive shelling from the Golan Heights of the villages of the
Hula Valley. Therefore, the line arrived at following the last war has binding
status, as long as no different international border has been reached by
agreement between the states. Waiver by Israel of its rights to part of these
areas was not made by virtue of “international law”, and Israel has not broken
any law by retaining these areas under its control.
The Solution: Two States for Two Nations on Two
Banks of the Jordan
The Return-to-Zion War has been
going on for one hundred and twenty years. Since the birth of Zionism, the Arabs
have been at war with us. Whoever claims that the Palestinians have been
fighting against “the occupation” which began with the liberation of Judea,
Samaria and the Gaza Strip in the Six Day War, is ignorant of the history or
deliberately twists it to suit his purposes. What has Zionism not done to end
the war? The whole of Eretz Israel belongs to the people of Israel by
virtue of every historical right and of justice: The Divine Promise of the God
of Israel to the people of Israel, historical right, all that Israel has created
in its Land and has given to the whole world. Eretz Israel belongs to the
people of Israel in accordance with international law and by the laws of war.
Israel was prepared to give up these rights, to share the land with the Arabs if
only were it allowed to live in peace in part of Eretz Israel. The
nations of the world were quite agreeable to divest Jews of all these rights and
they divided the land again and again. Eretz Israel of the Mandate and of
the Balfour Declaration was cut in two by the Churchill White Paper, and the
larger part east of the Jordan River was given to the Bedouin “King”, creating
the “Kingdom of Jordan”. Numerous plans sought again and again to divide western
Eretz Israel, and failed time and again. The Partition Plan which was
approved by the United Nations on November 29, 1947, was rejected by the Arabs
because they wanted everything. All the attempts of the Jewish nation to
live with the Arabs failed, be they as a “National Home”, being less than an
independent state, or as a divided country with its capital carved in two, or as
a democratic state granting equal citizenship rights although without equal
obligations to its Arab citizens – no solution was acceptable to the Arabs;
their object remained to destroy the existence of the Zionist Jewish entity. No
power deterred the Arabs from repeated attempts to exterminate the Jews, to
drive them out of this land. This is the local symptom of a global disease, a
wider collision between western civilizations and the Muslim civilization, so
well described in Samuel Huntington’s work, The Clash of Civilizations.
Even the attempted national
suicide which we have witnessed during the last decade, called the Oslo Accords,
did not satisfy the Palestinians, not even the agreement to surrender Judea,
Samaria, the Gaza District and half of Jerusalem (Camp David Summit 2000) – this
present war proves the point. All proposals to divide western Eretz Israel
between the Jewish people and the Arabs have resulted in war and
destruction. The time has come to present a solution to the bloodshed which has
been continuing for 55 years. We must find another solution.
There is no geopolitical logic to
partitioning western Eretz Israel. Nor is there any demographic logic. It
is not logical and it is not economically viable. There cannot be two
independent states with military power and with rights of development and of
sovereignty west of the Jordan. Even were it a case of two friendly European
nations, it would not be possible to lock into this prison cell area two
independent sovereign states. And such a situation is unthinkable here after
generations of incitement to hatred and murder. In a situation in which the
Palestinian educational system “educates” generations of murderers and suicide
killers and pronounces that on the map of Palestine, Israel does not exist, it
is incomprehensible that two states can exist alongside each other, bearing in
mind all the vast differences in standards of living and also the huge chasm in
standards of human rights. The security of Israel would be imperiled by the
presence of a foreign army west of the Jordan River and by a state which
sponsors terrorism.
The Kingdom of Jordan which was
born in sin – the separation of Trans-Jordan from the Jewish national home – has
become over recent years a de facto Palestinian state, 75% of its
population being Palestinians. Some of them still live in the refugee camps
where they were installed willingly or by force after the War of Independence.
Some of them became citizens of this vast empty kingdom and “solved the refugee
problem” on their own, just as millions of other refugees did throughout the
world, and just as hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees from Arab countries
have done. Jordan is in fact Palestine as proven by its demography. “Jordan is
part of Palestine” in accordance with the claims of Palestinians who tried to
get control of the Kingdom (and failed). The Palestinians are delaying a further
such attempt until they succeed in establishing another Palestinian state west
of the Jordan. Jordan is Palestine and there is in Jordan a real chance to solve
the Arab refugee problem. But Jordan is not yet Palestine because the present
rulers of Jordan do not want it and because the Bedouin minority hates the
Palestinians far more than any Jew in Israel is hostile to the Arabs.
This truth and this solution were
proposed also by (Israel’s then-Minister of Foreign Affairs and wise Prime
Minister) Yigal Alon and by Ariel Sharon. Alon stopped preaching this solution
because of the sharp objection of King Hussein and because of the “historic
alliance” with him. Another reason for objection to the plan was the estimation
that a friendly Jordanian kingdom constitutes an important strategic barrier
between Israel and Iraq. As a dominant power in the east, Iraq threatening
Israel, is gone even if temporarily. If the “Jordan is Palestine” program is
indeed the realistic solution which can give the Palestinians a state and can
ensure the existence of the State of Israel as a Zionist Jewish state capable of
self-defense, the obstacle of the objection of the Hashemite royal house ruling
Jordan can be overcome, when international, as well as Israeli guarantees are
given to this regime, that the new Hashemite-Palestinian state is needed by the
international community, as the only way to stabilize the region.
Is it a realistic plan to settle
the refugees in Jordan and to make it Palestine also de jure? Is the plan
feasible economically? Is there sufficient water in Jordan for all Palestinians?
Can international support be enlisted for this plan? How can the possible
refusal of the refugees to leave the refugee camps and to give up the dream of
their return to Jaffa, Jerusalem, Haifa and Safed be overcome?
The area of Jordan (90,000 sq.
kms.) is 13 times the area of Yesha and is 4.3 times the area of the State of
Israel within the “Green Line”. Whoever proposes to constrict the “Palestinian
state” within Areas A and B, in accordance with the interim phases of the failed
Oslo Accords, misleads and deceives himself and the world. The natural increase
of the Arab population in Eretz Israel is the greatest in the world. The
natural increase in the Arab state of Egypt has been restrained. Even in an
extremely Islamically orthodox country like Iran, it has been limited by
intensive action of the Muslim authorities. But the Palestinian population is
“exploding”, this being part of a deliberate demographic policy of its spiritual
leadership – defeating the Zionist entity with the aid of the Palestinian
mother’s womb. Whoever suggests locking up a population increasing at this rate
in a portion of the area west of the Jordan condemns Israel to death. The
Palestinians will always try to get into Israel and to gain control over it from
within, for the lack of any other demographic course open to them. The present
economic condition of the Palestinian refugees is bad. Their average income per
person is one of the lowest in the world. If there is any intention of improving
this situation, investment of tens of billions of dollars from outside sources
will be necessary. Such investments, if they were to be channeled to Jordan,
could turn it into a state capable of supporting all the Arab refugee
population. These investments could also be a lever to enable Jordan to interest
a wider international community in support of the program, since in the course
of time these investments would be likely to bear fruit. On the other hand, any
investment in the rehabilitation of refugees in their present locations is risk
capital par excellence which will eventually go down the drain, in the next war.
Jordan is an arid land. Already
at present it is dependent on water supply from Israel in order to irrigate the
agricultural plantations in the Jordan Valley. A plan which will seek to settle
some two million Palestinian refugees in Jordan will demand the solution of the
water problem in the region. Such a solution can be reached by means of nuclear
or conventional desalination installations, their source of energy being the
natural gas reserved on the Mediterranean coast. A large desalination plant can
be established also in the Jordan Valley itself, its source of energy being a
hydroelectric station exploiting the differences in height between the
Mediterranean and the Dead Sea which is gradually drying. The cost of building
such plants is great, but it is lower even than the resources which the United
States was prepared to invest in Turkey in exchange for the right of passage
during the Iraqi War (about $20 billion). Therefore, the problem of the basic
infrastructure which might have prevented the settling of Palestinian refugees
in the wide areas of Jordan is both soluble and attractive.
The two principal objections to
the project are likely to come from the Jordanians and from the Palestinians
themselves. Can these objections be overcome?
Jordan will become Palestine
sooner or later. Sooner – if it will be wise enough to navigate this change to
satisfy Israel’s needs. Later – if Israel will consent to the establishment of a
Palestinian state west of the Jordan. The Palestinians’ next step would be
obtaining control over the Kingdom of Jordan and the creation of a Greater
Palestine, one further phase in their plan for the destruction of Israel and the
establishment of Palestine over the whole of Mandatory Eretz Israel. The
Hashemite Kingdom also fears this intention of the Palestinians. This intention
was displayed in the summer of 1969. The determination of King Hussein in his
war against the Palestinians, and the intervention of the State of Israel on his
behalf in blocking the Syrians, rescued the Hashemite royal house and prevented
the establishment of a Palestinian state in Jordan. This was one of Israel’s
most historic and serious mistakes. Had the Palestinians achieved a state
already thirty years ago, their claim “a nation without a land” would have been
groundless, and it would have been much simpler then for the international
community to accept the solution of two states for two nations on both sides of
the Jordan River. The Jordanian royal house is therefore fully aware that it is
surviving on borrowed time, and that if a Palestinian state were to come into
being west of the Jordan, it would become the principal base of the effort to
enable the Palestinian majority in Jordan to take over the Kingdom. The sole
chance of the Hashemite royal house is to adopt the plan of converting the
Kingdom into a Hashemite-Palestinian state enjoying international support, and
benefiting from vast development budgets for desalination and industrialization.
Only a continuing Israeli guarantee of the stability of the regime in Jordan, by
prevention of the establishment of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan – a
state which would constantly threaten Jordan – only such an Israeli guarantee,
i.e. a joint interest in restricting the power of the common enemy, only this
can assure the long-term survival of the Hashemite regime and therefore secure
the support of Jordan for this process.
Can Palestinian support for
this process be obtained? During the 1970s, Yasser Arafat considered that
Jordan was Palestine. He changed his demand and claim under pressure of the Arab
League. Today the Palestinians are convinced that they should avoid any step
towards taking over Jordan before they (the Palestinians) have secured an
independent state at Israel’s expense west of the Jordan. The absolute
prevention of such a scenario will once again channel the pressure to obtain an
independent state, in the direction of Jordan, as in the 1960s. There is no
doubt however that the likelihood of the Palestinians choosing this course of
their own will, is remote. The settlement of refugees in Jordan is contrary to
their understanding of their sole chance to realize the “right of return” to
Israel. If this “right” will be totally blocked, there is a possibility that the
population of the refugee camps will see no further purpose in their continued
dwelling in the camps, since it will no longer be able to yield to them the
fruit of return. Wide international support for the settlement of the refugees
in Jordan, backed by large investments in water desalination, housing and
establishment of work places, could be attractive to many of them as
individuals, even if their leadership prefers to pursue a harsh and extreme
line. The forcible removal of this leadership would also bring about the
solution of the refugee problem.
The Arabs who live in Yesha and
are not defined as “refugees” in the list of refugees of the United Nations Work
and Relief Agency, who will opt to stay where they are, will, as part of a
long-term and agreed process, receive Hashemite-Palestinian citizenship. They
will vote for the Parliament in Amman, and will be entitled to manage their
social, municipal, commercial, agricultural, transportation, education and
religious affairs in seven cantons, not connected territorially (two in the Gaza
District and one each in Jenin, Shechem, Ramallah, a Christian canton in
Bethlehem, and a canton in the Hebron Hills). The residents of these areas will
enjoy the standing of “Resident” (without Israeli citizenship) without the right
of moving their place of residence outside of their cantons (avoidance of
“infiltration”). In the Peace Treaty it will be made clear that, like the
Israeli Arabs, they will not have the right of political organization as an
independent entity. The Arabs of Yesha will have a limited policing authority in
their areas, with no authority at international sea, air or land border controls
and they will not be entitled to enter into international agreements or
covenants. Israel will have complete air, sea and electromagnetic authority, and
it will be the sole legal authority also in the areas populated by Arabs. Israel
is the exclusive sovereign west of the Jordan.
International Support
United States support for this
plan can be obtained with greater ease than the support of the Europeans. There
is already a majority of Senators and Representatives who condition agreement to
the establishment of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan upon the fulfillment
of far-reaching restrictions, and these therefore make such a state impossible
to achieve. The fact that Americans throughout the world have become targets of
Muslim terror places the Americans in a position which is unwilling to
compromise with any form of terror. It seems that the sole objection in the
United States to this scenario is at the Department of State which is the prime
supporter of the Road Map.
The Europeans, on the other hand, are
traditional warm supporters of the Arab position. This results from a
combination of motives: economic (dependence on Arab oil) plus
political-international motives (the desire to create for themselves an
independent stand differing from that of the United States), in order to become
an international power. This attitude was particularly evident on the eve of the
Iraqi War when France, Germany and Russia strongly opposed the policies of the
United States and Britain. In recent years, this equation has been influenced
also by the growing Muslim minorities in some of the European countries.
Moreover, an emotional subconscious anti-Semitic attitude is also bound up with
this behavior, under a diplomatic cloak in accordance with traditional European
nicety. Therefore, Europe almost always supports the Arab position, because it
pays them and because it blends with the traditional European anti-Jewish stand.
A change in this stand can occur if the
rules of the game of the world oil economy were to change, or if other plans –
such as the Road Map – were to reach a dead end, and Europe were no longer able
to be a contributor of any worth to the advancement of Arab aspirations. The
Road Map plans presented to the international community and to the parties in
the Middle East, demand enormous concessions of Israel, and do not offer it any
real advantages. These plans place the security and peace of Israel within the
close range of the Palestinians. They will not fight terror for Israel’s sake,
they will even initiate and operate it. These plans will place Israel’s security
in the hands of an international force which will enter Israel to supervise and
guarantee the implementation of the plans and will prevent Israel from taking
any measures in the war on terror. They also include elements which threaten the
very existence of Israel in the medium and long term, and destroy the moral
basis of the existence of the state. These schemes enjoy Arab support and the
support of Europe and the Department of State in Washington. Unless these plans
are completely removed from the table, no alternative plan, like the one
presented here – has any chance to materialize. It seems that the world will
need a colossal demonstration of the failure of the Road Map plan, in order to
abandon it. If this plan were to continue on its current course – the
unavoidable war that will follow could give the world such a demonstration. It
is very unfortunate that such proofs are still needed.