On Netanyahu’s choice of ministers, Avnery wrote that “All these appointments look like the desperate efforts of a cynical politician who does not care about anything other than returning to power, and then quickly putting together a cabinet, whatever its composition, paying any price to any party prepared to join him, sacrificing even the most vital interests of the state”.

The worst problem, Avnery stated, is in the political field, “Because there the unpreparedness of Netanyahu meets the overpreparedness of Obama. Obama has a plan for the restructuring of the Middle East, and one of its elements is an Israeli-Palestinian peace based on ‘Two States for Two Peoples’. Netanyahu argues that he is not in a position to respond, because he has no plan of his own yet. After all, he is quite new in office. Now he is working on such a plan. Very soon, in a week, or a month, or a year, he will have a plan, a real plan, and he will present it to Obama. Or course, Netanyahu has a plan. It consists of one word, which he learned from his mentor, Yitzhak Shamir: ‘NO’. Or, more precisely, NO NO NO – the three no’s of the Israeli Khartoum: No peace, No withdrawal, No negotiations. (It will be remembered that the 1967 Arab summit conference in Khartoum, right after the Six-day War, adopted a similar resolution.) The ‘plan’ which he is working on does not really concern the essence of this policy, but only the packaging. How to present to Obama something that will not sound like ‘no’, but rather like ‘yes, but’ … As a taster for the ‘plan’, Netanyahu has already presented one of its ingredients: the demand that the Palestinians and other Arabs must recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’.”

Now, here, Avnery makes a distinction: “Most of the media in Israel and abroad have distorted this demand and reported that Netanyahu requires the recognition of Israel as a ‘Jewish State’. Either from ignorance or laziness, they obliterated the important difference between the two formulas. This difference is immense. A ‘Jewish State’ is one thing, a ‘State of the Jewish People’ is something radically different“.

Avnery explains what he sees as the distinction — though not everybody will agree with him: “A ‘Jewish State’ can mean a state with a majority of citizens who define themselves as Jews and/or a state whose main language is Hebrew, whose main culture is Jewish, whose weekly rest day is Saturday, which serves only Kosher food in the Knesset cafeteria etc. A ‘State of the Jewish People’ is a completely different story. It means that the state belongs not only to its citizens, but to something that is called ‘the Jewish People’ – something that exists both inside and outside of the country. That can have wide-ranging implications. For instance: the abrogation of the citizenship of non-Jews, as proposed by Lieberman. Or the conferring of Israeli citizenship on all the Jews in the world, whether they want it or not. The first question that arises is: what does ‘the Jewish People’ mean? The term ‘people’ – ‘am‘ in Hebrew … – has no accepted precise definition. Generally it is taken to mean a group of human beings who live in a specific territory and speak a specific language. The ‘Jewish People’ is not like that. Two hundred years ago it was clear that the Jews were a religious community dispersed throughout the world and united by religious beliefs and myths (including the belief in a common ancestry). The Zionists were determined to change this self-perception. ‘We are a people, one people’, Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, wrote … The idea of ‘the State of the Jewish People’ is decidedly anti-Zionist. Herzl did not dream of a situation in which a Jewish State and a Jewish Diaspora would coexist. According to his plan, all the Jews who wish to remain Jews would immigrate to their state. The Jews who prefer to live outside the state would stop being Jews and be absorbed into their host nations, finally becoming real Germans, Britons and Frenchmen. The vision of the ‘Visionary of the State’ (as he is officially designated in Israel) was supposed, when put into practice, to bring about the disappearance of the Jewish Diaspora … David Ben-Gurion was a partner to this vision. He stated that a Jew who does not immigrate to Israel is not a Zionist and should not enjoy any rights in Israel, except the right to immigrate there. He demanded the dismantling of the Zionist organization, seeing in it only the ‘scaffolding’ for building the state. Once the state has been set up, he thought quite rightly, the scaffolding should be discarded”.

OK, for what that’s worth. Now, Avnery turns back to Netanyahu, and writes that: “Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’ is ridiculous, even as a tactic for preventing peace. A state recognizes a state, not its ideology or political regime. Nobody recognizes Saudi Arabia, the homeland of the Hajj, as ‘the State of the Muslim Umma’ (the community of believers.) Moreover, the demand puts the Jews all over the world in an impossible position. If the Palestinians have to recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’, then all the governments in the world must do the same. The United States, for example. That means that the Jewish US citizens Rahm Emmanuel and David Axelrod, Obama’s closest advisors, are officially represented by the government of Israel. The same goes for the Jews in Russia, the UK and France. Even if Mahmoud Abbas were persuaded to accept this demand – and thereby indirectly put in doubt the citizenship of a million and a half Arabs in Israel – I would oppose this strenuously. More than that, I would consider it an unfriendly act”.

Now, it’s important to note that the Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel are prime movers behind the Palestinian Authority’s refusal to make a calm, rational consideration of this demand, which has been made by the last two Israeli governments — once before the start of the Annapolis process, in November 2007, and now again recently.

Advice, like Avnery’s, from the Israeli “left” (which has a scattered and varied criticism of the demand, and multiple positions of their own), has most probably only bolstered and reinforced this rigid PA position. But it is far from clear that the interests of the Israeli Arabs coincide with the interests of those Palestinians who will only have the choice of being citizens of some future Palestinian state.

The PA has chosen to support the Israeli Arab position, as a purely political calculation — whether as payback, or as a deposit on some future reciprocal support (or both). However, this political calculation has only let Palestinians (in the West Bank and Gaza at least) off the hook. They haven’t needed to take the time to reflect on what this really might imply for them.

And, if they really were afraid that recognition of Israel’s “Jewishness” in one or another forms would result in either immediate ethnic cleansing (expulsion en masse of Israel’s Arab citizens as well as Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem), as well as of total barring of the return of any or all Palestinian refugees, they could have asked for guarantees from the international community that it would not happen. And they would have gotten such guarantees, which would be worth a lot more than the puffed-up pride they have now in being stubborn and resisting a critical examination of the demand

In any case, Avnery wrote that “The character of the State of Israel must be decided by the citizens of Israel (who hold a wide range of opinions about this matter). Pending before the Israeli courts is an application by dozens of Israeli patriots, including myself, who demand that the state recognize the ‘Israeli nation’. We request the court to instruct the government to register us in the official Population Registration, under the heading ‘nation’, as Israelis. The government refuses adamantly and insists that our nation is Jewish. I ask Mahmoud Abbas, Obama and everyone else who is not an Israeli citizen not to interfere in this domestic debate. Netanyahu knows, of course, that nobody will take his demand seriously. It is quite obviously just another device to avoid serious peace negotiations. If he is compelled to drop it, it will not be long before he comes up with another” …

Along the lines of Avnery’s argument, the Palestinian editor and co-Chairman of IPCRI (the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information) Hanna Siniora proposed the following formula, and asked for reaction: “What about this: Israel is for the Israelis — and in this way we do not disenfranchise miniorities. How do you receive that formula?”

Siniora was speaking in answer to a question from an Israeli (in the audience at IPCRI’s 27 April discussion of the marked expansion in Israeli settlements in the West Bank since the start of the Annapolis process in November 2007) about PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ statement that he would refuse to recognize Israel as a Jewish State. The Israeli questioner did not respond.

Earlier on the same day, 27 April, the Foreign Press Association (FPA) in Israel held its annual General Membership meeting at the King David Hotel in West Jerusalem, and invited Palestinian negotiator Sa’eb Erekat to address the group after the business of hearing the treasurer’s report and the election of a new committee was over. One of the journalists asked Erekat, “What is the problem in accepting Israel as a Jewish State”.

Erekat was, in fact, prepared for the question. “Israel can call itself anything it wants … but when you signed the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, you did not put this as a precondition”.

Then, Erekat pulled out one (1) copy of a letter which he said was a reply from U.S. President Truman to a group of American Jewish leaders who had written, Erekat said, on 14 May 1948 (the eve of — or with the time difference, perhaps even after the proclamation of the State of Israel which happened at midnight) asking that the U.S. should accept Israel, Erekat said, apparently correcting himself as he spoke, as “the state of the Jewish people, or as the Jewish state”.

According to Erekat, the American Jewish leaders proposed this formula: “The U.S. recognizes the provisional government as the de facto government of the new Jewish State.”

But what happened, again according to Erekat, was that President Truman crossed out the words,
“the new Jewish State”, and replaced them with the words, “the State of Israel”.

That’s it, Erekat said, proof that even the United States did not recognize Israel as a “Jewish State”. To conclude his argument, Erekat, said: “Check the UN Charter, and see if the Vatican is recognized as a Catholic State”.

Well, first of all, the Vatican is represented by an observer delegation in the United Nations, and it has not been admitted to membership, so it’s identity has not been subject to any agreement or approval, as happens when states are admitted as full UN members.

And, second of all, it seemed to me that all Harry Truman was doing when he crossed out one phrase and replaced it with another, “the State of Israel”, was correcting the identification of the new entity as it was announced.

A couple of years ago, Uri Avnery, writing on this subject, said that what the name of the State of Israel would be, was not known in advance. In fact, it was not known until right up to the actual announcement.

The New York Times’ Isabelle Kershner, who was present at the FPA meeting, managed to get a look at the actual letter that Erekat gave to the outgoing chairman (Steve Gutkin of AP), and she later also took issue with Erekat’s argument [despite the very chummy "Hi Isabelle" that Erekat said when she asked a question on another subject at the FPA briefing ].

In a piece that had a few non-sequitors in its editing, Isabelle wrote that “Palestinian negotiators have refused to recognize Israel’s Jewish character in the past, contending that it would negate the Palestinian refugees’ demand for the right to return to their former homes and would be detrimental to the status of Israel’s Arab citizens, who make up a fifth of the population. In an attempt to bolster the Palestinian argument, Mr. Erekat on Monday produced a copy of a letter signed by President Harry Truman on May 14, 1948. In its original form, it recognizes the provisional government of the new Jewish state, but the typed words ‘Jewish state’ in the second paragraph have been crossed out and replaced with the handwritten words ‘State of Israel’.
Shlomo Avineri, a professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said Mr. Erekat was misinterpreting the American president’s intention. According to Mr. Avineri, the Truman letter had been prepared hours before Israel declared its independence, before the new country had chosen its name. It was later corrected by a Truman adviser, Clark Clifford, after the declaration of independence to call the country by its name, not to refute its Jewish character, Mr. Avineri said”. This article can be read in full here.

Avnery continued: “He [Netanyahu] also bestowed ministries on all and sundry. This little country will have 27 ministers and six deputy ministers. So what? If necessary, Netanyahu would have given a ministerial chair to each of the 74 members of the coalition. THE PINNACLE of his achievement was the acquisition of the Labor party for his government. In one stroke he turned a government of lepers, which would have been viewed by the whole world as a crazy bunch of ultra-nationalists, racists and fascists, into a sane and balanced government of the center. All this without changing its character in the least … The addition of the Labor Party solves everybody’s problem. If the social democrats are joining the government, all this talk of fascism must be nonsense. Obviously, Liberman has been misunderstood. He has been misrepresented. He is not a fascist at all, God forbid. He is not a racist. He is just a traditional right-wing demagogue who exploits the primitive emotions of the masses to garner votes. Which elected politician could object to that? Indeed, the whole government has been given a kosher certificate by Ehud Barak…

Avnery then wrote: “So what will this government do? What can it do? As far as the most important matter is concerned, there is complete unanimity. Liberman, Netanyahu, Barak, Ellie Yishai of Shas and Danny Hershkovitz of the ‘Jewish Home’ [Yisrael Beitenu] party are in total agreement about the Palestinians. All of them agree on the need to prevent the establishment of a real Palestinian state. All of them agree not to talk with Hamas. All of them support the settlement enterprise. During Barak’s stint as Prime Minister, the settlements grew even faster than during Netanyahu’s tenure. Liberman is himself a settler, Hershkovitz’s party represents the settlers. All of them believe that there is no need for peace, that peace is bad for us … So what will be the real platform of this government? In four words: Deception for the fatherland.
ON THIS government’s chosen path there lies a huge rock: the United States of America.
While Israel made a big leap to the right, the US has made a big leap to the left. One can hardly imagine a greater contrast than that between Binyamin Netanyahu and Barack Obama … Obama wants to create a new order in the Middle East. He knows that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict poisons the atmosphere against America in the Arab, and indeed in the entire Muslim world. He wants a solution to the conflict – exactly what Netanyahu and his partners want to prevent at any price, except the price of a breach with the US … Now the task is to present to the world, and especially the US and Europe, a false picture, pretending that our new government is yearning for peace, acting for peace, indeed turning every stone in search of peace – while doing the exact opposite. The world will be submerged by a deluge of declarations and promises, accompanied by lots of meaningless gestures, conferences and meetings … BUT DECEIVING, like dancing the tango, takes two: one who deceives and one who wants to be deceived. Netanyahu believes that Obama will want to be deceived. Why would he want to quarrel with Israel, confront the mighty pro-Israel lobby and the US Congress, when he can settle for soothing words from Netanyahu? … Is Obama ready to play, like most of his predecessors, the role of the deceived lover? The Biberman/Bibarak/Bibiyahu government believes that the answer is a resounding yes. I hope that it will be a resounding No”.
This statement can be found in full here.

“There is no escape from the historic fact: Israel’s Independence Day and the Palestinians’ Naqba (Catastrophe) Day are two sides of the same coin. In 60 years we have not succeeded – and actually have not even tried – to untie this knot by creating another reality.

That can be our objective for the next 60 years”.

“WE ISRAELIS live in a world of ghosts and monsters. We do not conduct a war against living persons and real organizations, but against devils and demons which are out to destroy us. It is a war between the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness, between absolute good and absolute evil. That’s how it looks to us, and that’s how it looks to the other side, too.

Let’s try to bring this war down from virtual spheres to the solid ground of reality. There can be no reasonable policy, nor even rational discussion, if we do not escape from the realm of horrors and nightmares.

After the Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections, Gush Shalom said that we must speak with them. Here are some of the questions that were showered on me from all sides:

-  Do you like Hamas?

Not at all. I have very strong secular convictions. I oppose any ideology that mixes politics with religion – whether Jewish, Muslim or Christian, in Israel, the Arab world or America.

That does not prevent me from speaking with Hamas people, as I have spoken with other people with whom I don’t agree. It has not prevented me from being a guest at their homes, to exchange views with them and to try to understand them. Some of them I liked, some I did not.

-  It is said that Hamas was created by Israel. Is that true?

Israel did not ‘create’ Hamas, but it certainly helped it along in its initial stages.

During the first 20 years of the occupation, the Israeli leadership saw the PLO as its chief enemy. That’s why it favored Palestinian organizations that, it was thought, could undermine the PLO. One example of this was Ariel Sharon’s ludicrous attempt to set up Arab “village leagues” that would act as agents of the occupation.

The Israeli intelligence community, which in the last 60 years has failed almost every time in forecasting events in the Arab world, also failed this time. They believed that the emergence of an Islamic organization would weaken the secular PLO. While the military administration of the occupied territories was throwing into prison any Palestinian who engaged in political activity – even for peace – it did not touch the religious activists. The mosque was the only place where Palestinians could get together and plan political action.

This policy was, of course, based on a complete misunderstanding of Islam and Palestinian reality.

Hamas was officially founded immediately after the outbreak of the first intifada at the end of 1987. The Israeli Security Service (known as Shabak or Shin Bet) handled it with kid gloves. Only a year later did it arrest the founder, Sheik Ahmad Yassin.

It is ironic that the Israeli leadership is now supporting the PLO in the hope of undermining Hamas. There is no better evidence for the stupidity of our “experts” as far as Arab matters are concerned, stemming from both arrogance and contempt. Hamas is far more dangerous to Israel than the PLO ever was.

-  Did the Hamas election victory show that Islam was on the rise among the Palestinian people?

Not necessarily. The Palestinian people did not become more religious overnight.

True, there is a slow process of Islamization throughout the region, from Turkey to Yemen and from Morocco to Iraq. It is the reaction of the young Arab generation to the failure of secular nationalism to solve their national and social problems. But this did not cause the earthquake in Palestinian society.

-  If so, why did Hamas win?

There were several reasons. The main one was the growing conviction of the Palestinians that they would never get anything from the Israelis by non-violent means. After the murder of Yassir Arafat, many Palestinians believed that if they elected Mahmoud Abbas as the new president, he would get from Israel and the US the things they would not give Arafat. They found out that the opposite was happening: No real negotiations, while the settlements were getting larger every day.

They told themselves:  if peaceful means don’t work, there is no alternative to violent means. And if there be war, there are no braver warriors than Hamas.

Also: the corruption in the higher Fatah echelons had reached such dimensions, that the majority of Palestinians were disgusted. As long as Arafat was alive, the corruption was somehow tolerated, because everybody knew that Arafat himself was honest, and his towering importance for the national struggle overrode the shortcomings of his administration. After Arafat, tolerating the corruption became impossible. Hamas, on the other hand, was considered clean, and its leaders incorrupt. The social and educational Hamas institutions, mainly financed by Saudi Arabia, were widely respected.

The splits within Fatah also helped the Hamas candidates.

Hamas, of course, had not taken part in previous elections, but it was generally assumed – even by Hamas people themselves – that they represented only about 15-25 percent of the electorate.

-   Can one reasonably expect the Palestinians to overthrow Hamas themselves?

As long as the occupation goes on, there is no chance of that. An Israeli general said this week that if the Israeli army stopped operating in the West Bank, Hamas would replace Abbas there too.

The administration of Mahmoud Abbas stands on feet of clay – American and Israeli feet. If the Palestinians finally lose what confidence they still have in Abbas, his power would crumble.

- But how can one reach a settlement with an organization that declares that it will never recognize Israel and whose charter calls for the destruction of the Jewish state?

All this matter of ‘recognition’ is nonsense, a pretext for avoiding a dialogue. We do not need ‘recognition’ from anybody. When the United States started a dialogue with Vietnam, it did not demand to be recognized as an Anglo-Saxon, Christian and capitalist state.

If A signs an agreement with B, it means that A recognizes B. All the rest is hogwash.

And in the same matter: The fuss over the Hamas charter is reminiscent of the ruckus about the PLO charter, in its time. That was a quite unimportant document, which was used by our representatives for years as an excuse to refuse to talk with the PLO. Heaven and earth were moved to compel the PLO to annul it. Who remembers that today? The acts of today and tomorrow are important, the papers of yesterday are not.

-  What should we speak with Hamas about?

First of all, about a cease-fire. When a wound is bleeding, the blood loss must be stemmed before the wound itself can be treated.

Hamas has many times proposed a cease-fire, Tahidiyeh (‘Quiet’) in Arabic. This would mean a stop to all hostilities: Qassams and Grad rockets and mortar shells from Hamas and the other organizations, ‘targeted liquidations’, military incursions and starvation from Israel.

The negotiations should be conducted by the Egyptians, particularly since they would have to open the border between the Gaza Strip and Sinai. Gaza must get back its freedom of communication with the world by land, sea and air,

If Hamas demands the extension of the cease-fire to the West Bank, too, this should also be discussed. That would necessitate a Hamas-Fatah-Israel trialogue.

-  Won’t Hamas exploit the cease-fire to arm itself?

Certainly. And so will Israel. Perhaps we shall succeed, at long last, in finding a defense against short-range rockets.

-  If the cease-fire holds, what will be the next step?

An armistice, or Hudnah in Arabic.

Hamas would have a problem in signing a formal agreement with Israel, because Palestine is a Waqf – a religious endowment. (That arose, at the time, for political reasons. When Caliph Omar conquered Palestine, he was afraid that his generals would divide the country among themselves, as they had already done in Syria. So he declared it to be the property of Allah. This resembles the attitude of our own religious people, who maintain that it is a sin to give away any part of the country, because God has expressly promised it to us.)

Hudnah is an alternative to peace. It is a concept deeply embedded in the Islamic tradition. The prophet Muhammad himself agreed a Hudnah with the rulers of Mecca, with whom he was at war after his flight from Mecca to Medina. (By the way, before the Hudnah expired, the inhabitants of Mecca adopted Islam and the prophet entered the town peacefully.) Since it has a religious sanction, its violation by Muslim believers is impossible.

A Hudnah can last for dozens of years and be extended without limit. A long Hudnah is in practice peace, if the relations between the two parties create a reality of peace.

- So a formal peace is impossible?

There is a solution for this, too. Hamas has declared in the past that it does not object to Abbas conducting peace negotiations, on condition that the agreement reached is put to a plebiscite. If the Palestinian people confirm it, Hamas declared that it will accept the people’s decision.

- Why would Hamas accept it?

Like every Palestinian political force, Hamas aspires to power in the Palestinian state that will be set up along the 1967 borders. For that it needs to enjoy the confidence of the majority. There is no doubt whatsoever that the vast majority of the Palestinian people want a state of their own and peace. Hamas knows this well. It will do nothing that would push the majority of the people away.

- And what is the place of Abbas in all this?

He should be pressured to come to an agreement with Hamas, along the lines of the earlier agreement concluded in Mecca. We believe that Israel has a clear interest in negotiating with a Palestinian government that includes the two big movements, so that the agreement reached would be accepted by almost all sections of the Palestinian people.

-  Is time working for us?

For many years, Gush Shalom was telling the Israeli public: let’s make peace with the secular leadership of Yasser Arafat, because otherwise the national conflict will turn into a religious conflict. Unfortunately, this prophecy, too, has come true…

“WHICH OF the two men is the leader of the greatest power on earth and which is the boss of a small client state? A visitor from another planet, attending the press conference in Jerusalem, would find it hard not to answer: Olmert is the president of the great power, Bush is his vassal. Olmert is taller. He talked endlessly, while Bush listened patiently. While Olmert anointed Bush with flattery that would have made a Byzantine emperor blush, it was quite clear that it is Olmert who decides policy, while Bush humbly accepts the Israeli diktat. And Bush’s flattery of Olmert exceeded even Olmert’s flattery of Bush. Both, we learned, are ‘courageous’. Both are ‘determined’. Both have a ‘vision’. The word ‘vision’, once reserved for prophets, starred in every second sentence. (Bush could not know that in Israel, ‘vision’ has long become a jocular appellation for highfaluting speeches, usually in combination with the word ‘Zionism’.) The President and the Prime Minister have something else in common: not a word of what they said at the press conference had any connection with the truth … BUT ONE cannot fool all of the people all of the time, to quote another American President who was slightly more intelligent than the present incumbent. And so, after Olmert and Bush repeated the mantra about removing the outposts and freezing the settlements, one of the journalists popped an innocent question: How does this fit together with the announcement about the building of a huge new housing project at Har Homa? If anyone thought that this would embarrass Olmert, he was sadly mistaken. Olmert just cannot be embarrassed. He simply answered that this promise does not apply to Jerusalem, nor to the ‘Jewish population centers’ beyond the Green Line. ‘Jerusalem’ – since the time of Levy Eshkol – is not only the Old City and the Holy Basin. It is the huge tract of land annexed to Israel after the Six-Day War, from the approaches to Bethlehem to the outskirts of Ramallah. This area includes the hill that was once forested and called Jebel Abu-Ghneim, now the site of the big and ugly Har Homa settlement. And the ‘population centers’ are the big settlement blocs in the occupied Palestinian territories, which President Bush so generously presented to Ariel Sharon. This means that almost all the extensive building activities that are now going on beyond the Green Line are not covered by the Israeli undertaking to freeze the settlements. And while Olmert publicly announced this, President Bush was standing at his side, smiling foolishly and painting on another layer of compliments. The following day, Bush visited Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah and told the shocked Palestinians that the innumerable Israeli roadblocks in the West Bank, which turn the life of the Palestinians into hell, are necessary for the protection of Israel and must remain where they are – until after the establishment of the hoped-for democratic Palestinian state. Condoleezza Rice was quick to remind him in private that this was not very wise, since he was about to visit half a dozen Arab countries. So Bush hastened to call another press conference in Jerusalem, talking about the ‘core issues’: there would be a ‘contiguous’ Palestinian state, but the 1949 borders (the Green Line) would not be restored. He would not speak about Jerusalem. Also, the refugee problem would be settled by an international fund – meaning that none at all would be allowed to return. Altogether, much less than Bill Clinton’s 2000 ‘parameters’, and less than most Israelis are already prepared to accept. It amounts to 110% support for the official Israeli government line…”

And, it should be recalled that Olmert’s spokesman Mark Regev said, in a wrap-up press conference on Friday morning, that Israel, too, should have “contiguity” with its “large population centers” that just so happen to be in occupied Palestinian West Bank territory...

Avnery wrote: “THE ‘SETTLEMENT BLOCS’ provide a glaring example. It was Beilin who invented this term a dozen years ago. It was included in the unofficial understanding that became known as the ‘Beilin-Abu-Mazen agreement’. The intention was good. Beilin believed that if most settlers were concentrated in several limited areas near the Green Line, the settlers as a whole would agree to a withdrawal from the rest of the West Bank. The actual result was disastrous. The government and the settlers jumped at the opportunity. The permit of the ‘Zionist peace movement’ was displayed like a Kosher certificate on the wall of a butcher shop selling pork chops. The settlement blocs were enlarged at a frantic pace and became veritable towns, like Ma’aleh Adumim, the Etzion Bloc and Modi’in Illit. For dozens of years, the United States had insisted that all the settlements violate international law. But the approval granted to the ‘settlement blocs’ enabled President George W. Bush to change this stance and approve Israeli ‘population centers’ in the occupied territories. Haim Ramon, who in the past had been Beilin’s partner in the group of ‘eight doves’ within the Labor Party, went even further: he initiated the ‘Separation Wall’, which in practice annexes the ‘settlement blocs to Israel. But Beilin’s brilliant idea did not in the least diminish the opposition of the settlers to a withdrawal from the rest of the West Bank. On the contrary: they continue to prevent by force the dismantling of the settlement outposts, even a single tiny one. Nothing good came out of this idea. The result was totally bad”.

Avnery added: “After the 2006 elections, Beilin had another brilliant idea: to invite Avigdor Liberman to a well publicized friendly breakfast. The intention was no doubt good (even if I can’t fathom what it was) but the result was calamitous: it gave Liberman a ‘leftist’ Kosher certificate which enabled Ehud Olmert to include him in his government. After that, Meretz announced that it would not, under any circumstances, sit in a government that included Liberman. But one cannot return Rosemary’s baby to the womb of its mother. Liberman stays in the government, Meretz remains outside. Now Olmert explains to the Americans that he cannot dismantle even one settlement outpost, nor negotiate about the ‘core issues’ of the conflict, because Liberman would then bring the government coalition crashing down“.

And on and on. Avnery is horrifyingly convincing. His latest weekly column can be found in full here.

Uri Avnery has just written one of his weekly articles, this time suggesting that any Hamas cease-fire offer should be snapped up.  The bottom line, Avnery writes, is that “The inhabitants of Sderot would probably have been glad to accept a cease-fire.  But then, who bothers to ask them”.

Avnery’s latest article is entitled: “Help! A Cease Fire!”

He writes: “FORGET THE Qassams. Forget the mortar shells. They are nothing compared with what Hamas launched at us this week:  The chief of the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip, Ismail Haniyeh, has approached an Israeli newspaper and proposed a cease-fire … A total cease-fire. And not only in the Gaza Strip, but in the West Bank, too.  The military leadership exploded in anger. Who does he think he is, that bastard? That he can stop us with such dirty tricks? … Generals in uniform and out of uniform, military correspondents, political correspondents, commentators of all stripes and genders, politicians from left and right – all are attacking the Haniyeh offer.  The message is: it must not be accepted under any circumstances! It should not even be considered! On the contrary: the offer shows that Hamas is about to break, and therefore the war against it must be intensified, the blockade on Gaza must be tightened, more leaders must be killed – indeed, why not kill Haniyeh himself? What are we waiting for?  A paradox inherent in the conflict since its beginning is at work here: if the Palestinians are strong, it is dangerous to make peace with them. If they are weak, there is no need to make peace with them. Either way, they must be broken … In the Gaza Strip and around it, a cruel little war is being waged. As usual, each side claims that it is only reacting to the atrocities of the other side.   The Israeli side claims that it is responding to the Qassams and mortars. What sovereign state could tolerate being bombarded by deadly missiles from the other side of the border?  True, thousands of missiles have killed only a tiny number of people. More than 100 times as many are killed and injured on the roads. But the Qassams are sowing terror, the inhabitants of Sderot and the surrounding area demand revenge and reinforcement for their houses, which would cost a fortune.  f the Qassams were really bothering our political and military leaders, they would have jumped at the cease-fire offer. But the leaders don’t really care about what’s happening to the Sderot population, out on the geographical and political ‘periphery’, far from the center of the country. It carries no political or economic weight. In the eyes of the leadership, its suffering is, all in all, tolerable. It also has an important positive side: it provides an ideal pretext for the actions of the army.  THE ISRAELI strategic aim in Gaza is not to put an end to the Qassams. It would still be the same if not a single Qassam fell on Israel.  The real aim is to break the Palestinians, which means breaking Hamas.  The method is simple, even primitive: to tighten the blockade on land, on sea and in the air, until the situation in the Strip becomes absolutely intolerable.  The total stoppage of supplies, except the very minimum necessary to prevent starvation, has reduced life to an inhuman level. There are effectively no imports or exports, economic life has ground to a standstill, the cost of living has risen sky-high. The supply of fuel has already been reduced by half, and is planned to sink even lower. The water supply can be cut at will.  Military activity is gradually increasing. The Israeli army conducts daily incursions, employing tanks and armored bulldozers, in order to nibble at the margins of the inhabited areas and draw the Palestinian fighters into a face to face confrontation. Every day, from five to ten Palestinian fighters are being killed, together with some civilians. Every day, inhabitants are being abducted in order to extract information from them. The declared purpose is attrition, to harry and wear down, and perhaps also to prepare for the re-conquest of the Strip – even if the army chiefs want to avoid this at almost any price.  One after another, the Palestinian leaders and commanders are being killed from the air. Every point in the Strip is exposed to Israeli airplanes, helicopter gunships and drones … The army chiefs hope that by tightening all these screws they can push the local population to rise up against Hamas and the other fighting organizations. All Palestinian opposition to the occupation will collapse. The entire Palestinian people will raise their hands in surrender and submit to the mercies of the occupation, which will be able to do as it pleases – expropriate lands, enlarge settlements, set up walls and roadblocks, slice up the West Bank into a series of semi-autonomous enclaves.  In this Israeli plan, the job reserved for the Palestinian Authority is to act as subcontractors for Israeli security, in return for a stream of money that will safeguard its control of the enclaves.  At the end of this phase of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Palestinian people are supposed to be cut to pieces and helpless in face of the Israeli expansion. The historic clash between the unstoppable force (the Zionist enterprise) and the immovable object (the Palestinian population) will end with the crushing of Palestinian opposition.  IN ORDER to succeed in this, a sophisticated diplomatic game must be played. Under no circumstances may the support of the international community be lost. On the contrary, the entire world, led by the US and EU, must support Israel and look upon its actions as a just struggle against Palestinian terrorism, itself an integral part of ‘international terrorism’.  The Annapolis conference, and afterwards the Paris meeting, were important steps in this direction. Almost the whole world, including most of the Arab world, has fallen into step with the Israeli plan – perhaps innocently, perhaps cynically.  Events after Annapolis developed as expected: no negotiations have started, both side are just playing with images. The very first day after Annapolis, the Israeli government announced huge building projects beyond the Green Line. When Condoleezza Rice mumbled some words of opposition, it was announced that the plans had been shelved. In fact they continue at full speed.  How do Olmert and his colleagues fool the whole world?  …
At long last, there now exists a world-wide consensus that peace in our region must be based on the co-existence of the State of Israel and the State of Palestine. Our government has slipped into it and is exploiting this agreement with another aim altogether: the rule of Israel in the whole country and the turning of the Palestinian population centers into a series of Bantustans. This is, in fact, a One-State-Solution (Greater Israel) in the guise of the Two-State Solution … The battle of Gaza is in full swing. In spite of the huge military superiority of the Israeli army, it is not one-sided. Even the Israeli commanders point out that the Hamas forces are getting stronger. They train hard, their weapons are getting more effective and they show a lot of courage and determination … [But] it seems that the great majority of the Palestinian public wants national unity in order to fight together against the occupation. They do not want religious compulsion, but neither will they tolerate a leadership that cooperates with the occupation.  The government may be very mistaken in counting on the obedience of Fatah.  Competing with Hamas, Fatah may surprise us by becoming a fighting organization once again.  The stream of money flowing into the Authority may not prevent this.  Ze’ev Jabotinsky was wiser than Tony Blair when he said 85 years ago that you cannot buy a whole people.  If the Israeli army invades Gaza in order to re-conquer it, the population will stand behind the fighters. Nobody can know how it will react if the economic misery gets worse. The results may be unexpected. Experience with other liberation movements indicates that misery can break a population, but it can also strengthen it.  This is, simply put, an existential test for the Palestinian people – perhaps the most severe since 1948″ …

“When the first bullet was fired, the possibility of creating the joint, united single country was shattered … I am proud of my ability to adapt rapidly to extreme changes. The first time I had to do this was when Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany and my life changed abruptly and completely. I was then nine years old, and everything that had happened before was dead for me. I started a new life in Palestine. On November 29, 1947, it was happening again – to me and to all of us. As the well-known saying has it, one can make an omelette from eggs, but not eggs from an omelette. Banal, perhaps, but how very true. The moment the Hebrew-Arab war started, the possibility that the two nations would live together in one state expired. Wars change reality. I joined the ‘Haganah Battalions’, the forerunner of the IDF. As a soldier in the special commando unit that was later called ‘Samson’s Foxes’, I saw the war as it was – bitter, cruel, inhuman. First we faced the Palestinian fighters, later the fighters of the wider Arab world. I passed through dozens of Arab villages, many abandoned in the storm of battle, many others whose inhabitants were driven out after being occupied. It was an ethnic war. In the first months, no Arabs were left behind our lines, no Jews were left behind the Arab lines. Both sides committed many atrocities. In the beginning of the war, we saw the pictures of the heads of our comrades paraded on stakes through the Old City of Jerusalem. We saw the massacre committed by the Irgun and the Stern Group in Deir Yassin. We knew that if we were captured, we would be slaughtered, and the Arab fighters knew they could expect the same. The longer the war dragged on, the more I became convinced of the reality of the Palestinian nation, with which we must make peace at the end of the war, a peace based on partnership between the two peoples. While the war was still going on, I expressed this view in a number of articles that were published at the time in Haaretz. Immediately after the fighting was over, when I was still in uniform convalescing from my wounds, I started meeting with two young Arabs (both of whom were later elected to the Knesset) in order to plan a common path. I could not have imagined that 60 years later this effort would still not be over. NOWADAYS, THE IDEA appears here and there of turning the omelette back into the egg, of dismantling the State of Israel and the State-of-Palestine-to-be, and establishing a single state, as we sang at that time: ‘from the sea to the desert’. This is presented as a fresh new idea, but it is actually an attempt to turn the wheel back and to bring back to life an idea that is irrevocably obsolete. In human history, that just does not happen. What has been forged in blood and fire in wars and intifadas – the State of Israel and the Palestinian national movement – will not just disappear. After a war, states can achieve peace and partnership, like Germany and France, but they do not merge into one state [n.b., this is not, however, true of civil wars, such as the one in the U.S.A., or the one in Nigeria, for example] … By the middle of the 40s, the situation of the two peoples had changed decisively. There was no escaping from the partition of the country … Even after 60 years, in which they have suffered catastrophes which few other peoples have ever experienced, the Palestinian people clings to its country with unparalleled fortitude. True, the dream of living together in one state is dead, and will not come to life again. But I have no doubt that after the Palestinian state comes into being, the two states will find ways to live together in close partnership. The walls will be thrown down, the fences will be dismantled, the border will be opened, and the reality of the common country will overcome all obstacles. The flags of the country – the two flags of the two states – will indeed wave side by side. The UN resolution of November 29, 1947, was one of the most intelligent in the annals of that organization. As one who strenuously opposed it, I recognize its wisdom”.

Avnery’s weekly article, which will be published in a number of places, was received by subscription to an email list.

“…As the saying goes: One fool throws a stone into the water, a dozen wise men cannot retrieve it. Once the ‘meeting’ had been announced, it became an important enterprise. The experts of all parties started to work frantically on the undefined event, each trying to steer it in the direction which would benefit them the most … The three poker players are going to sit down together, pretending to start the game, while none of them has a cent to put on the table …
First the participants were to deal with the ‘core issues’. Then it was announced that a weighty declaration of intentions was to be adopted. Then a mere collection of empty phrases was proposed. Now even that is in doubt. Not one of the three leaders is still dreaming of an achievement. All they hope for now is to minimize the damage – but how to get out of a situation like this?

“As usual, our side is the most creative at this task. After all, we are experts in building roadblocks, walls and fences. This week, an obstacle larger than the Great Wall of China appeared. Ehud Olmert demanded that, before any negotiations, the Palestinians ‘recognize Israel as a Jewish state’. He was followed by his coalition partner, the ultra-right Avigdor Liberman, who proposed staying away from Annapolis altogether if the Palestinians do not fulfill this demand in advance. Let’s examine this condition for a moment: The Palestinians are not required to recognize the state of Israel. After all, they have already done so in the Oslo agreement – in spite of the fact that Israel has yet to recognize the right of the Palestinians to a state of their own based on the Green Line borders. No, the government of Israel demands much more: the Palestinians must now recognize Israel as a ‘Jewish state’.

“Does the USA demand to be recognized as a ‘Christian’ or ‘Anglo-Saxon state’? Did Stalin demand that the US recognize the Soviet Union as a ‘Communist state’? Does Poland demand to be recognized as a ‘Catholic state’, or Pakistan as an ‘Islamic state’? Is there any precedent at all for a state to demand the recognition of its domestic regime? Te demand is ridiculous per se. But this can easily be shown by analysis ad absurdum.

“What is a ‘Jewish state’? That has never been spelled out. Is it a state with a majority of Jewish citizens? Is it ‘the state of the Jewish people’ – meaning the Jews from Brooklyn, Paris and Moscow? Is it ‘a state belonging to the Jewish religion’ – and if so, does it belong to secular Jews as well? Or perhaps it belongs only to Jews under the Law of Return – i.e. those with a Jewish mother who have not converted to another religion? These questions have not been decided. Are the Palestinians required to recognize something that is the subject of debate in Israel itself?

“According to the official doctrine, Israel is a ‘Jewish and democratic state’.  What should the Palestinians do if, according to democratic principles, some day my opinion prevails and Israel becomes an ‘Israeli state’ that belongs to all its citizens – and to them alone? (After all, the US belongs to all its citizens, including Hispanic-Americans, African-Americans, not to mention ‘Native-Americans’.)

“The sting is, of course, that this formula is quite unacceptable to Palestinians because it would hurt the million and a half Palestinians who are Israeli citizens. The definition ‘Jewish state’ turns them automatically into – at best – second class citizens. If Mahmoud Abbas and his colleagues were to accede to this demand, they would be sticking a knife in the backs of their own relatives. Olmert & Co. know this, of course. They are not posing this demand in order to get it accepted. They pose it in order that it not be accepted. By this ploy they hope to avoid any obligation to start meaningful negotiations”…

With all due deference to the great, the very great, Uri Avnery, three comments here:
(1) It is clearly true that there are differing “visions” in Israel about what is a Jewish State. The Palestinians are not obliged to say they prefer one, or the other. That is up to the Jewish citizens of Israel to decide. I wish it would be de-linked from the very ugly issue of numbers — from “demography”. In my view, this would remove any further necessity for anxious and fearful Israelis to fantasize about population transfer, or worse. And, if Israel then acts as though being a Jewish state means it can expel all non-Jews who are its citizens and residents, it will not only have international public opinion to deal with (something to which Israel has been exceedingly sensitive), it will also have international law. This will not happen. The Palestinians could, moreover, explicitly seek international guarantees that this will not happen — and those international guarantees would almost certainly then be forthcoming.

(2) As to Avnery’s suggestion that Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state would suddenly mean that Israel’s 1.25 million Arab citizens would then consequently become second class citizens — well, I can only say that this is the case already, and has been so since 1948. It is a problem that Israel NGOs and civil society have been increasingly attempting to address in a very concerted way over the past year or so.

(2a) While, as Avnery says, it is doctrine that Israel is (both) a Jewish and democratic state, it is not law.  The proclamation of the establishment of the State of Israel in May 1948 says only that Israel will be a Jewish state.

(3) The Palestinians have recognized Israel since well before the Oslo Accords. The Palestinians have also already recognized Israel as a Jewish State. This was officially done in the 1988 Palestinian Declaration of Independence, which recognized UN General Assembly Resolution 181 that partitioned the British Mandate of Palestine into two states — one Jewish and one Arab.

On Saturday evening, at the Saban Forum, Livni told the glitterati that attended that “Today, the Palestinians understand that terrorism harms their own interests. At the same time, there are problems with implementing the vision, given the current situation. There are problems with their ability to deliver, and we must strengthen the moderate leadership in order to improve the situation on the ground … We cannot turn a blind eye to the reality and the terrorism in the Gaza Strip. Therefore, we have decided to adopt a dual strategy – to isolate Hamas, to take steps against terrorism and, at the same time, to look for a vision and a common denominator with the Palestinian leadership and together to change the situation on the ground. The change must be on the ground and not just in theory. I believe that we must send a message to the Palestinian people that the situation does not have to be this way, that there is a choice. The duality must become reality. [emphasis added] However, as we try to find a common denominator, Israel’s security needs and the reality on the ground must be addressed. The formula we have chosen is the Roadmap. The Roadmap is based on the understanding that the path to establishing a Palestinian state passes through ensuring Israel’s security.

Livni continued, in her speech to the Saban Forum: “This formula was adopted by the entire international community, including Israel and the Palestinians. The original idea was to create a continuum of security – dialogue – permanent arrangement. We could have waited until the end of the first stage’s implementation, but we chose not to, because we believe in dialogue with the Palestinians. However, we still have to provide a solution to the problems of security. Therefore, we decided to begin a dialogue now and to return to security before the agreements are implemented. [emphasis added] Now the implementation of the first stage is beginning, by both sides. We are continuing the dialogue but must remember our security needs; we owe that to ourselves and to both peoples …. It is not true that Israel is avoiding in advance discussion of the sensitive issues. We are not holding a dialogue for the sake of dialogue [n.b., and Condoleeza Rice insists that the U.S. is not proposing to convene the Annapolis peace conference, or "meeting", just to have a photo-op]. We must learn from past experience, and it is our responsibility to draw conclusions and to do the right thing. We must see if it is possible to reach understandings on these topics, to see if we can proceed; this is a process that we will understand in the near future [emphasis added]. We have already experienced failure in the past and we don’t want to go there again. … The Arab world must lend its support to the process, without taking the place of the Palestinians in the negotiations. If a conference supporting the process is convened [emphasis added -- and note the conditional tense], they must go to it and support it, not place obstacles before it. They as well as the international community must help bridge the gap between the willingness and intentions of the Palestinian government and its ability on the ground“. [Livni's speech to the Saban Forum was distributed Sunday by email.]

Veteran Israeli peace activist Uri Avnery wrote the following in his latest column, “Say it with flowers“, published on 3 November: “In preparation for the Annapolis meeting, the Prime Minister has put the Foreign Minister in charge of negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. You might well ask: Isn’t it natural for the Foreign Ministry to deal with foreign policy? Well, it may be natural in other countries. In Israel, it is not natural at all … Throughout the years…The important issues in foreign relations were handled by the Prime Minister’s Office and the Defense Ministry, with the assistance of the Mossad. Our ambassadors around the world heard about it on the news … In our country, this is especially pronounced, because of the central role the army plays in our national life. In the Israeli card game, one general outweighs ten ambassadors. The evaluations of Army Intelligence and the reports of the Mossad trump all the papers of the Foreign Office – if anyone reads those at all … The Israeli Foreign Minister…speechifies, declares and announces, but it is not clear where she would be leading our foreign policy, if she were indeed allowed to lead it … One time she tries to outflank Olmert on the left, another time on the right. One day she speaks about the necessity to deal with the ‘core issues’, another day she says that the time is not ripe for a final settlement. She supported the recent Lebanon war, but now she criticizes it severely. After the publication of the Winograd commission’s interim report, she called for Olmert’s resignation, intending to replace him herself, but when that little putsch-attempt collapsed, she remained in his government and continues to bear responsibility for his actions and omissions …
“Livni detests Olmert, and Olmert detests Livni. True, both come ‘from the same village’ – Ehud’s father and Tzipi’s father were both senior members of the Irgun. Both were raised in the same right-wing political atmosphere, both drank from the same fountain. When Livni’s mother died a few weeks ago, they stood next to each other at the funeral and sang the Betar anthem … [But] Israel’s foreign policy emanates from domestic considerations: Olmert is determined to survive at any cost. Since his government includes extreme right-wing and even fascist elements, any real movement towards peace would lead to its dissolution.
“If a government has no long-term aim, how does it conduct policy? Kissinger does not seem to give an answer to this. I do have one: When there is no conscious aim, an unconscious one takes control, a pre-existing aim that provides a direction as if by itself, by force of inertia. The genetic code of the Zionist movement leads it to struggle with the Palestinian people for the possession of the whole of historical Palestine and the expansion of Jewish settlement from the sea to the river. As long as it is not supplanted by a national resolution to adopt another aim – a clear, open and long-term decision – it will go on following this course. No such resolution has matured and been adopted. The ministers speak about other possibilities, babble about the ‘Two-State Solution’, toss around diverse slogans, make declarations and issue statements, but in reality, on the ground, the old policy continues unabated, as if nothing has happened. If another decision had been adopted, the change would have been far-reaching – from the ‘body language’ of the government to the tone of its voice. At present, the tones that make the music are still those of the Betar anthem …
“Is there any evidence of Olmert’s intention not to take any serious step towards peace? Indeed there is. It is his decision to put Tzipi Livni in charge of the contacts with the Palestinians. If Olmert wants to achieve a historic breakthrough, he will make sure he himself gets full credit for the achievement. If he turns it over to his rival, that means it has no chance at all.”
Uri Avnery’s column can be found here.