Today's Situation

Diplomatic lessons Thursday, June 01, 2006

Not that there is much enthusiasm in Israel about the possibility of the U.S. speaking directly with the Iranians. The attitude here seems to be that even if they talk, which is doubtful, and even if they reach an agreement of some kind, which is doubtful, the Iranians will do their best to make sure they get a bomb and there’s only one way to prevent that, a way best left unmentioned, hint, hint. As if to prove the point of Israeli pessimism (or cynicism), the Iranian foreign minister announced that while Tehran is ready to negotiate with the Americans, Iran will not give up its right to enrich uranium, an American condition for talks. For almost all the commentators, by the way, the American move was something like what Olmert is promising that he’ll do with the Palestinians -- engage in talks to prove that there is nothing to talk about with them.

None of the commentators made the direct connection, but the analysis was strikingly similar -- the Americans want to be able to say to the Europeans, Japanese and particularly the Russians and Chinese that they did all they could to engage the Iranians diplomatically. At the end of the diplomatic path (which won’t work) are sanctions or force. For the Israelis, at the end of the diplomatic path (which Olmert said today will lead to talks with PA President Mahmoud Abbas at the end of June), is the unilateral ‘convergence,’ a withdrawal from about 90 percent of the West Bank.

Israel, however, might not be as ‘lucky’ as the Americans, when it comes to the Palestinians -- the Abbas ultimatum to Hamas comes to a head next week, and while Hamas is still not speaking with a uniform voice in favor of the so-called Prisoners’ Document, which implicitly recognizes Israel by calling for a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, the polls show that prisoners’ initiative is supported by 80 percent of the Palestinians in the territories. If the Hamas accepts the Prisoners’ Document, it will likely pave the way for a complete breakdown of the so-far united international front isolating the Hamas government, particularly since the Prisoners’ Document explicitly calls for a national unity government, which would ‘dilute’ the Palestinian government with Fateh ministers. If the international front breaks down, pressure will quickly mount on Israel to engage the PA government, and not just Abbas, in dialogue -- and to release the $150 million it presumably has collected in customs and VAT on behalf of the PA since Hamas took office and Israel began its economic siege of the PA.

But that’s internal Palestinian politics, and Israel is starting a long weekend holiday today, the last holiday until the fall New Year holidays. It is Shavuot, Pentecost, marking the delivery of the Torah to the Israelites at Mt. Sinai. It’s a harvest holiday, and traditionally celebrated by dining on dairy foods. One incident has already marred the holiday -- nationalist-religious yeshiva students at Yitzhar, one of the more radical of the settlements in the West Bank -- attacked police withy sticks and stones when the police showed up at the Samarian settlement yesterday to examine the security arrangements there. One of the students’ rabbi was called in for questioning, on suspicion that he encouraged his students to battle the police, and three of the students have so far been arrested.

Considering the tensions between the radical elements in the settlement movement and the political establishment, which seems determined to move ahead with the convergence plan, the incident could be a harbinger of what is on the horizon, particularly if Defense Minister Amir Peretz presses ahead with his plan to finally remove the ‘illegal outposts’ that have proliferated in the territories over the last five years, when Ariel Sharon first promised the Bush administration he would remove them.

The problem is that the police cannot bring themselves to treat a Jewish settlement as ‘hostile,’ as one police spokesman said today on Israel Radio. But there is no doubt that at many of the more ideological settlements, there are now groups of more or less organized settlers who are indeed hostile to the police and army, especially since the Amona evacuation, which ended with some 200 people, both settlers and police requiring medical attention.

The settlers, of course, are blaming the police for the incident yesterday -- the settlers say that one of the policemen fired into the air and calling that an example of police antagonism toward the settlers. ‘The police didn’t shoot at the Sakhnin football stadium,’ said a settler spokesman, Rabbi Yehuda Litman, to Israel Radio, referring to a riot at the end of an Arab team’s game several months ago. ‘But the fact they shot yesterday proves that they are hostile to us, that they want to expel us and uproot us.’ Asked if it will happen again, he said, ‘it all depends on the police.’ And the spokesman, a rabbi, said that ‘if Amir Peretz thinks we are the enemy … that outposts and settlers are the problem and not Katyushas and Qassams, then he should not be surprised … by what happens.’

The police point out that they were not at the settlement with riot gear, but just to see that the security conditions were appropriate for a school. The police also point out that they were under a barrage of rocks when the policeman fired. But the police seem unable to impose law and order on the settlers, wherever they are in the territories and in particular in the radical settlements, like Yitzhar, Hebron, and others. That’s a recipe for much worse violence if and when the removal of the outposts -- or the convergence -- finally begins. In any case, there won’t be just a tearful evacuation like at Gush Katif last summer. The radical settler leadership has already promised that.

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