Abroo Shah September 22, 2006

Tags: middle-east

href="/tag/God">God has endowed it to them as its original natives – continues to be a vexing and dangerous problem. Over the years, Palestinians and Arabs have tried various approaches – from direct military confrontation to lengthy negotiations – but so far none of these tactics have yielded any significant results. The rise of radical Islam and the intertwining of international terrorism with the Palestinian issue have added additional perilous dimensions to this conflict. The recent Israeli incursion into Lebanon underscores the fact that this conflict could easily lead to a broader war where Muslims in general and Arabs in particular, would bear the brunt of human and material losses.

Even though the United Nations was established to resolve issues of this kind, it has not been successful in implementing its charter. In matters where the interests of major powers are in synch, the UN has carried out its resolutions effectively. However, to the dismay of most progressives, it has totally failed to protect poor and underdeveloped countries against the aggression of powerful nations, especially in the new uni-polar world. In the current world order, the UN has turned into a mere debating society – far from its initial mandate.

Under these circumstances, what is the best approach to resolve entrenched international conflicts? A review of major disputes of the last 50 years – from Abkhazia to Zaire (Republic of Congo) - reveals that unless there is overwhelming agreement between nations, force and violence rarely works to resolve the problem. Multilateral diplomacy is still the best approach for any nation to gain sympathy for its views. The process of settlement of such disputes is invariably drawn out and requires unlimited patience and persistent dialogue between the opposing parties. Gaining and maintaining support for one’s cause definitely helps, but garnering acceptance of the tactics employed to achieve those goals is critically important. Without Nelson Mandela’s moral stand of forgiveness and reconciliation, African National Congress would not have gained the support of the vast majority of the world.

To understand the dynamics and difficulties in dealing with Arab-Israeli problem, we have to look at its history.

With a small percentage of educated population and no experience in liberal democracy, almost all nations that gained independence after the Second World War quickly fell into the hands of autocratic demagogues. The Middle East – which was divided into British and French spheres of influence by the infamous Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916 – was artificially carved into countries and bestowed upon handpicked individuals as imperial domains by these powers. Even after independence, the neo-colonial powers maintained considerable control of the region by keeping these tin-pot rulers in their own spheres of influence.

Soon after their independence, some of the Middle-Eastern states had to deal with the extremely thorny issue of the division of Palestine. Jews under the leadership of David Ben-Gurion, immediately decided to accept the November 1947 UN resolution dividing Palestine into a Jewish and a Palestinian state. Without coherent and competent leadership, Palestinians failed to respond properly. The inept Arab leaders were neither politically equipped nor intellectually capable of helping and guiding their Palestinian brethren in this difficult moment. In fact, they foolishly assumed that a military confrontation with the new Jewish state would result in a quick victory – thus making them heroes a la Salahuddin Ayubi. They totally underestimated the sophistication, commitment and sheer will of the fighting forces of the nascent state of Israel. By the time Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria signed armistices with Israel, it had taken control of 50 percent more area than the UN partition allotted it. The result of that debacle still haunts the entire Muslim world.

Unhappy with the enormous and undue American sway in their region, some Arab leaders were successful in extricating their countries from the US influence. With a renewed sense of pride, they raised the slogan of pan-Arabism but quickly fell into the trap of believing their own false rhetoric. They also lacked the ability to effectively maneuver their countries through the geopolitical tug. Without the savvy of statesmen like Jawaharlal Nehru and Josip Broz Tito they were pulled by the Soviet Union into its own orbit.

From Gamal Abdul Nasser of Egypt to Hafez al-Assad of Syria, Arab leaders miopiclly assumed that adherance to a particular ideology was sufficient to solve their problems. By directly confronting the US and the West, these leaders gained considerable admiration from their people. But rather than using such support to establish democracy and enhance the social, economical, educational and technological capabilities of their nations, it was squandered at advancing dogmatic political idealogies instead. Beligerence against the West became a tool to deal with any and all of their national problems. The infusion of new Soviet military hardware gave these leaders a false sense of strength and in 1967 they got involved in another humiliating confrontaion with Israel.

After repeated failures, some Arab leaders realized that using force to retake the Palestinian territory and their own land lost during various wars was infeasible and unwise. Unfortunately, these non-democratic leaders failed to appreciate that such a major policy shift required public support. With their history of oppression, they lacked the credibility and the finesse to convince their nations that a peaceful political solution was in their best interest.

In the meantime, Palestinians had established a strong resistance movement – the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) – and Yasir Arafat emerged as its sole leader. A large number of Palestinians, having been forced out of their ancestral land, now lived in squalid refugee camps in Jordan and Lebanon and other Arab countries. By now the Palestinian leadership realized that depending on huge Arab armies to liberate their land was a pipe dream. They also understood that the best way to achieve their objectives was through a unified Arab approach. However, they were apprehensive that Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria might make separate deals with the Israelis, to recover their own territories, which would put the PLO in a weak bargaining position.

With each Arab leader disdainful of other’s point of view and anxious to put his individual mark on a solution, it was impossible to devise a coherent joint strategy to address the problem. Realizing the improbability of a total solution, Egyptians and Jordanians made their own peace agreements with Israel; Syria took a no war – no peace stance. While some governments were making deals with Israel and others were making anti-Israeli statements, Islamic fundamentalism was spreading all over the Muslim world.

Direct hostilities between Israel and major Arab states seized after the Israel-Syria disengagement of May 1974, but the conflict continued. Despite the cessation of war, Arab leaders failed to improve the socio-economic conditions of their countries and the life of an average citizen deteriorated – even in those countries, which were endowed with enormous natural resources. This decline in quality of life combined with the psychological effects of humiliating defeats made ordinary citizens desperately angry.

Oppressed by their rulers and victimized by major powers, Arab people have lost their sense of pride and long to regain their self-respect. Even a glimmer of victory - be it cultural, political or military – over their opponents, has considerable resonance. Under such a scenario, it is very easy for demagogues to exploit this helplessness with the bombast that provides immediate emotional gratification.

Enter fundamental Islam – having tried all kind of “isms” without any tangible success, Arabs were ready and willing to revert back to religion with the hope to regain past glory. Saudis – intent on aligning the Muslim world with its dogmatic views by making their austere sect the template for Islam - supported and bankrolled the spread of Wahabism. The US became an eager and willing contributor to the spread of fundamentalism, as long as its wrath was directed towards the “evil” empire. Both the US and Saudi Arabia failed to realize that Wahabism mixed with Syed Qutb’s ideology would create a deadly force bent upon spreading anarchic terror around the world.

The rise of fanatic fundamentalism, the increased popularity of parties like Hizbullah and Hamas and the election of Mahmood Ahmedinejad as president of Iran, gave the ideology of confrontation a considerable boost. The unwarranted American invasion of Iraq and the continued killing of Iraqi civilians gave more credibility to this ideology within the Muslim world.

This has created a fundamental dilemma for the Arab people - follow the incompetent secular leaders who have been entirely ineffective or accept the leadership of religious groups like Hamas and Hizbullah who seem to thrive on confrontation. Neither of these choices would yield any results so long as Arabs are not willing to pragmatically evaluate the situation and align their desires with feasible goals.

An honest assessment of this conflict highlights the fact that the only time Arabs have been able to score a military victory against Israel was during the first Lebanon war. Hizbullah was able to push the Israeli army out of southern Lebanon because it had a limited achievable goal, it followed a well-defined strategy, and its forces fought with incredible valor. This, however, does not indicate that the entire problem can be resolved with force and violence.

Violent confrontation, suicide bombings and kidnappings definitely make Israeli life miserable, but it will not force them to make major compromises. Muslims can gripe about America’s one-sidedness, complain about Israeli arrogance and aggression and decry the plight of Palestinians. Such protestations, even though necessary to keep the world aware of these problems, is not sufficient to force the American or Israeli hand into an agreement.

The American unabashed and biased support of Israel is a matter of fact. The security of the Jewish state and its inhabitants is the most critical component of American foreign policy in the Middle East. To expect that the US will act against the wishes of its singularly important ally is unrealistic. Israel has shown that its military power is without match in the region. Israel also does not abide by international norms when it comes to killing and kidnapping its adversaries anywhere in the world. On the other hand, we have seen that Israelis are willing to make some adjustments to their view of the two-state solution.

Most Arab and Palestinian efforts – military as well as diplomatic – failed because they were based on unrealistic objectives. If the same approach is continued, Arabs will remain snared in self-delusions and fight quixotic battles that might result in fleeting feel-good victories but an independent and viable Palestinian state will stay an elusive dream. In the current terror-infused, fearful geo-political environment, a major miscalculation on either side could result in catastrophic events. Palestinians and Arabs have to look at all aspects of this conflict without bias and look reality in the eye. They need to assess their approach and accomplishments dispassionately, outline a realistic solution taking into consideration ground realities, and work towards its fulfillment through diplomacy and accepted tactics for national liberation.

History shows that Arabs and Palestinians repeatedly made gross errors of judgment in their dealings with Israel. Everyone talks about reverting back to the 1967 borders, but Arabs declined a better solution in 1948. Today they are far from any solution that is even close to the general understandings of the Taba negotiations of 2001. If they persist on coddling mythic fancy, fifty years from now they might not get half of what can be gained today.