Ami Isseroff

The above is a fitting epitaph for the Oslo peace process. While the Oslo process has failed, the peace process between Israelis and Palestinians, and between Israelis and Arabs must continue. The Oslo agreements were only a small part of a larger historical picture. We must understand the reasons for failure to prepare the way for future success, and we must admit the truth, however distasteful and discouraging it may be, both for our hopes for peace, and for our respective national self-images.

As a means to achieve peace, the agreements were poor and the process worse. This was not due to the incompetence of the framers. It was a reflection of underlying political and social realities.

The goal of dismantling Israel through armed conflict is still explicitly the basis of the constitution of the Fateh, the chief constituent of the Palestine Authority and of the PLO, and it remains their announced goal. Article 12 of the Fateh Constitution states as a goal of Fateh, "Complete liberation of Palestine, and eradication of Zionist economic, political, military and cultural existence." PNA Chairman Yasser Arafat and others continued to promise a Palestinian state in all of Israeli territory, and Palestinian refugee groups encouraged sentiment for right of return of refugees to Israeli cities.

The Israelis want to maximize Israeli territory, and view the possibility of a Palestinian state with distrust. Israeli governments, left and right, built thousands of housing units in the occupied territories throughout the peace process. Addressing the Knesset, Shimon Peres, Foreign Minister in 1995, promised that the agreements would not necessitate withdrawal from settlements or a Palestinian state.

Neither side made any attempt to ready their people for peace or compromise during the Oslo years. Constant terror attacks and political backlash forced postponement of critical deadlines. The terror forced closures and other punitive measures, embittering the Palestinians, and it helped to shore up Israeli distrust as well. Israeli and Palestinian leaders were faced with the necessity of reaching an agreement in 2000, and at the same time, the impossibility of reaching any agreement that would satisfy the other side, and also be acceptable to their own people. Palestinian leaders recognized that they would be unable to present to their people any deal that did not include right of return of the refugees and total Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza. Since anyone giving up right of return would be branded a traitor, the Palestinians chose to present nothing at Camp David II.

Israeli negotiators came to Camp David ready to defend vital interests in water and security, and in areas of the West Bank where Israel had managed to establish a majority. Israeli negotiators believed, based on the record, that a Palestinian state would become a haven for terrorists who would see it as a base for continuing to the next stage of "liberating" Palestine, Israelis could not offer the Palestinians real sovereignty.

The Israelis played a percentage game. The percentages were meaningless, because the Palestinians would not have real control over its land, and would never get the 92% or 97.5% or 99.44%. The percentages included about 20% of the land, a large desert area in the Jordan valley, on the "back" of the mountain ridge that runs along the eastern part of the West Bank. The land would be turned over after a number of years, conditional on Palestinian compliance with other stipulations. The Israelis expected that the Palestinians would not comply, and therefore, they would never get the land. From the Israeli point of view, that was perfectly legitimate. It would be unthinkable to allow a hostile state to control this area. For the Palestinians, this was unacceptable, and they were perfectly justified in their own suspicions.

The stands of the negotiators were more moderate than those of their constituencies. According to a 1999 JMCC Poll, 60% of Palestinians support return of the refugees as opposed to limited repatriation as essential to peace.. A poll released in December 2002 shows that 47% of Palestinians believe the goal of the intifada should be total liberation of Palestine. Polls show that overwhelming majorities of Israelis rejected right of return and compromise on Jerusalem during the Camp David negotiations. A plurality of Israelis thought that Ehud Barak had gone too far at Camp David, and a majority would have rejected the Clinton Taba proposals.

The violence that accompanied the end of the negotiations was an inevitable consequence of the incompatibility of the positions of the sides. It was anticipated, it was encouraged and it was planned, as admitted in detail by Imad Faluji, Marwan Barghouti and others, and in line with earlier proclamations in Fateh pamphlets and public speeches by Fateh activists. The Oslo accords failed because Palestinians and Israelis still have national goals that are incompatible with each others' existence as free peoples, and with peace. This situation should not be viewed as static and unchangeable however. The consensus created around intractable positions is supported by powerful lobbies on each side, operating within Palestine and Israel and in the Diaspora, as well as by foreign powers and Islamist extremist groups. These groups still have not internalized the idea that destroying the other side is impossible, much less accepted the idea that living with the other side can be desirable. The peace process will succeed if, and only if, the coalitions and organizations created to thwart it are dismantled or neutralized, and the consensus goals of both societies are changed.

Ami Isseroff

Rehovot, Israel