Uri Avnery — In One Word: Poof!

April 12, 2014

In One Word: Poof!

POOR JOHN Kerry. This week he emitted a sound that was more expressive than pages of diplomatic babble.

In his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations committee he explained how the actions of the Israeli government had torpedoed the “peace process”. They broke their obligation to release Palestinian prisoners, and at the same time announced the enlargement of more settlements in East Jerusalem. The peace efforts went “poof”.

“Poof” is the sound of air escaping a balloon. It is a good expression, because the “peace process” was from the very beginning nothing more than a balloon full of hot air. An exercise in make-believe.

JOHN KERRY cannot be blamed. He took the whole thing seriously. He is an earnest politician, who tried very very hard to make peace between Israel and Palestine. We should be grateful for his efforts.

The trouble is that Kerry had not the slightest idea of what he was getting himself into.

The entire “peace process” revolves around a basic misconception. Some would say: a basic lie.

Namely: that we have here two equal sides of a conflict. A serious conflict. An old conflict. But a conflict that can be solved when reasonable people of the two sides sit down together and thrash it out, guided by a benevolent and impartial referee.

Not one detail of these assumptions was real. The referee was not impartial.  The leaders were not sensible. And most importantly: the sides were not equal.

The balance of power between the two sides is not 1:1, not even 1:2 or 1:10. In every material respect – military, diplomatic, economic – it is more like one to a thousand.

There is no equality between occupier and occupied, oppressor and oppressed. A jailer and a prisoner cannot negotiate on equal terms. When one side has total command of the other, controls his every move, settles on his land, controls his money flow, arrests people at will, blocks his access to the UN and the International courts, equality is out of the question.

If the two sides to negotiations are so extremely unequal, the situation can only be remedied by the mediator supporting the weaker side. What is happening is the very opposite: the American support for Israel is massive and unstinting.

Throughout the “negotiations” the US did nothing to check the settlement activity that created more Israeli facts on the ground – the very ground whose future the negotiations were all about.

A PREREQUISITE for successful negotiations is that all sides have at least a basic understanding not only of each other’s interests and demands, but even more of each other’s mental world, emotional setup and self-image. Without that, all moves are inexplicable and look irrational.

Boutros Boutros-Ghali, one of the most intelligent people I have met in my life, once told me: “You have in Israel the most intelligent experts on the Arab world. They have read all the books, all the articles, every single word written about it. They know everything, and understand nothing. Because they have never lived one day in an Arab country.”

The same is true for the American experts, only much more so. In Washington DC one feels the rarefied air of a Himalayan peak. Seen from the grandiose palaces of the administration, where the fate of the world is decided, foreign people look small, primitive and largely irrelevant. Here and there some real experts are tucked away, but nobody really consults them.

The average American statesman has not the slightest idea of Arab history, world-view, religions, myths or the traumas that shape Arab attitudes, not to mention the Palestinian struggle. He has no patience for this primitive nonsense.

SEEMINGLY, THE American understanding of Israel is much better. But not really.

 Average American politicians and diplomats know a lot about Jews. Many of them are Jews. Kerry himself seems to be partly Jewish. His peace team includes many Jews, even Zionists, including the actual manager of the negotiations, Martin Indyk, who worked in the past for AIPAC. His very name is Yiddish (and means a Turkey).

The assumption is that Israelis are not very different from American Jews. But that is entirely false. Israel may claim to be the “Nation-State of the Jewish People”, but that is only an instrument for exploiting the Jewish Diaspora and creating obstacles for the “peace process”. In reality there is very little similarity between Israelis and the Jewish Diaspora, not much more than between a German and a Japanese.

Martin Indyk may feel an affinity with Tzipi Livni, the daughter of an Irgun fighter (or “terrorist” in British parlance), but that is an illusion. The myths and traumas that shaped Tzipi are very different from those that shaped Martin, who was educated in Australia.

If Barack Obama and Kerry knew more, they would have realized from the beginning that the present Israeli political setup makes any Israeli evacuation of the settlements, withdrawal from the West Bank and compromise about Jerusalem quite impossible.

ALL THIS is true for the Palestinian side, too.

Palestinians are convinced that they understand Israel. After all, they have been under Israeli occupation for decades. Many of them have spent years in Israeli prisons and speak perfect Hebrew. But they have made many mistakes in their dealings with Israelis.

The latest one was the belief that Israel would release the fourth batch of prisoners. This was almost impossible. All Israeli media, including the moderate ones, speak about releasing “Palestinian murderers”, not Palestinian activists or fighters. Right-wing parties compete with each other, and with rightist “terror-victims”, in denouncing this outrage.

Israelis do not understand the deep emotions evoked by the non-release of prisoners – the national heroes of the Palestinian people, though Israel itself has in the past exchanged a thousand Arab prisoners for one single Israeli, citing the Jewish religious command of “redemption of prisoners”.

It has been said that Israel always sells a “concession” three times: once when promising it, once when signing an official agreement about it and thirdly when actually fulfilling the undertaking. This happened when the time came to implement the third withdrawal from the West Bank under the Oslo agreements, which never happened.

Palestinians know nothing about Jewish history as taught in Israeli schools, very little about the holocaust, even less about the roots of Zionism.

RECENT NEGOTIATIONS started as “peace talks”, continued about a “framework” for further negotiations, and now the talks have degenerated to talks about the talks about the talks.

Nobody wants to break off the farce, because all three sides are afraid of the alternative.

The American side is afraid of a general onslaught of the Zionist-evangelical-Republican-Adelson bulldozer on the Obama administration in the next elections. Already the State Department is frantically trying to retreat from the Kerry “poof”. He did not mean that only Israel is to blame, they assert, the fault lies with both sides. The jailer and the prisoner are equally to blame.

As usual, the Israeli government has many fears. It fears the outbreak of a third intifada, coupled with a world-wide campaign of de-legitimization and boycott of Israel, especially in Europe.

It also fears that the UN, which at present recognizes Palestine only as a non-member state, will go on and promote it more and more.

The Palestinian leadership, too, is afraid of a third intifada, which may lead to a bloody uprising. Though all Palestinians speak about a “non-violent intifada”, few really believe in it. They remember that the last intifada also started non-violently, but the Israeli army responded by deploying snipers to kill the leaders of the demonstrations, and more suicide bombing became inevitable.

President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) has responded to the non-release of the prisoners, which amounted to a personal humiliation, by signing the documents necessary for the Palestinian State to join 15 international conventions.  The Israeli government exploded in anger. How dare th

In practice, the act means little. One signature means that Palestine joins the Geneva Convention. Another concerns the protection of children. Shouldn’t we welcome this? But the Israeli government fears that this is one step nearer to the acceptance of Palestine as a member of the International Criminal Court, and perhaps the indictment of Israelis for war crimes.

Abbas is also planning steps for a reconciliation with Hamas and the holding of Palestinian elections, in order to strengthen his home front.

IF YOU were poor John Kerry, what would you say to all this?

“Poof!” seems the very minimum.

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2 Responses

  1. Poo says:

    It is almost too easy. Avnery is thicker than an Albanian brick and not nearly as useful. Poor John Kerry? The American Socialite of State has as much grasp of the Middle East as his boss, the long winded Community Centre manager from Chicago, which is to say none. At least Kerry can sail. What’s Avnery’s excuse?

    “Poof” is not just the sound of air escaping a balloon. It is the sound of hot air which aptly describes Kerry and Obama who might nominal pass as well-meaning oafs but Avnery should know better. He lives there and cannot even claim to be “well-meaning” as useless an excuse as it may be.

    Like the Palestinians, Avnery prefers the terminology of the oppressed, the down trodden, the losers who cannot get their way so stamp their feet, pout and, in the case of the Palestinians, fire rockets at will. They also rewrite what history they cannot ignore.
    A brief refresher follows below for Kerry and Obama. Avnery doesn’t need it. He already ignores it.

    In 1921 following WWI, the British government offered an elective asse1mbly to the Arabs and Jews. The Arabs would have outnumbered the Jews 9-1. This would have effectively halted further Zionist immigration. The Arabs, naturally, rejected it indignantly as an affront to their delicate sensibilities. What sensibilities?

    The very next year (1922), through a League of Nations mandate for Palestine, the British again proposed a Legislative Council with more elected than appointed members. The Zionists unhappily agreed; the Arabs said “NO” and boycotted the elections. Apparently they objected to the very existence of the Jewish people who trace their roots in the area back some 4,000 years.

    In 1936, a British Royal Commission held 66 meetings to investigate the roots of mob violence and riots. The ever agreeable Arabs boycotted the first 55. The World Zionist Organization did not. The British offered partition with the Zionists getting about a quarter of the land not including Jerusalem. The Zionists sucked it up and said yes. The ever peaceful Arabs swept three quarters of Palestine off the table without discussion and launched a revolt. Naturally, they were crushed by the British.

    The British tried again in 1939. They offered an Arab-dominated unitary state, full independence in a decade as well as significant restrictions on Jewish immigration and land purchases. The Arabs, figuring they would do even better after another World War, scorned the offer. By 1941, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem (Haj Amin) had skedaddled for Germany to support Hitler. He helped raise Bosnian Muslim SS troops and urge the Nazis to bomb Tel Aviv. Ho hum. Another peaceful effort thwarted.

    The hapless UN created Israel in 1948. It was bigger than the British offer of 1937 but still did not include Jerusalem. It was deemed to be economically unviable. The Arabs, unable to wait for it to collapse, told the Palestinians to flee. The Arab League then launched what they called “a war of extermination.” True to form, they lost. This time they lost not only the war but more land including part of Jerusalem. Israel sued for peace. The Arabs stopped whining and became deaf and dumb.

    By 1967 they were ready for war again. They uttered their usual threats of annihilation and worse before rolling over to play dead. Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem then sued for peace once more. The deaf and dumb Arabs ignored them.

    Any and all Arab negotiations for peace, Kerry or no Kerry, include no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel. This just might explain the lack of progress. Avnery knows this. Perhaps he could pass it on to the Socialite and the Community Centre leader.

    In 1973 the Arabs, respectful and cheerful as always, launched the Ramadan War on the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. They are nothing if not consistent. They lost again. Egypt, fed up with the repetitive and destructive nonsense made peace. It was and is a very cold peace but it has held.

    At Oslo in 1973, the Palestinians were offered independence in basically the pre-1967 borders. There was the Intifada instead. At Camp David in 2000 they were offered 86% of the West Bank and Gaza. They launched the second Intifada. In 2005 Israel gave back Gaza unilaterally. The Palestinians promptly elected Hamas and began to launch over 1,000 rockets a year from Gaza.

    As incompetent as Kerry and Obama are, it is not them holding up the peace process. Avnery knows this too. He also knows that Obama’s credibility on the world stage is lower than Putin’s who, for worse and worse, at least does what he says. America is at the table to supply money only. Kerry’s opinion has no value at all.

    The balance of power Avnery fails to recognize is that between fantasy and reality. Let the 120 members plus 17 observer countries that make up the “non-aligned” members of the useless UN support the Palestinians with their dollars and armies if they wish. For now, they do so mostly with monies supplied by the west in any case.

    Few care about the UN and even fewer obey it. See Russia, Syria, Iran, Iraq, North Korea to name but a few. Those self-serving bureaucrats who feather their lofty nests at the UN fancy themselves to be the next rulers of the world in charge of finance, weather and anything else they deem to know better than the rest of us. I hope to live long enough to see it disbanded, failing that, Canada’s complete withdrawal. Modern methods of communication will still allow us to talk to those we choose at a much better price. The UN has become a rather pricey club. In my club days, I joined where I had friends and associates. The UN is no longer such a place.

    Avnery claims that, “A PREREQUISITE for successful negotiations is that all sides have at least a basic understanding not only of each other’s interests and demands, but even more of each other’s mental world, emotional setup and self-image. Without that, all moves are inexplicable and look irrational.” Tell me where the extinction of Israel figures into that? This is from from a self-proclaimed “expert”?

    I have no doubt that the Americans misunderstand both the Israelis and the Palestinians. Successive American Presidents have attempted to negotiate an expensive peace not for the Israelis and Arabs but for themselves and their legacies.

    I have little doubt that the Israelis and the Palestinians distrust each other. The politics on both sides makes any kind of agreement a sign of weakness for one or the other. Still, there is more in their historical connections than rockets and settlements. They once got along and shared the land like neighbors. The Israelis demand their settlements as buffers and homelands for an increasing population. The Palestinians see themselves as victims in need of money and terrorist “heroes.” Maybe it is time for both sides to talk alone without outside do-gooders and legacy seekers. Maybe they could reach back through their combined history to lay out a format from which a mediator could work. Even management/labor negotiators do not require a mediator right from the outset. That puts another agenda on the table. Too many egos spoils the deal. Perhaps a mediator might start alone by reading Israeli and Arab history books as taught in their schools. Might make a good start if they each sang from historically correct hymn sheets, so to speak.

    Israel need not fear the UN, boycotts, International Conventions or the International Criminal Court. Both the U.S. and Canada to name but 2 democratic countries will stand by them. The 120 plus 17 can stand with the others when not fighting amongst themselves. I like Israel’s chances.

    Avnery became unelectable a long time ago in Israel. He is now unreadable everywhere.

  2. Uri Avnery = Freudian analysis.

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