In the Absence of Progress toward a Final Status Agreement: Options for Israel

Click here for a translation of the Prime Minister's speech, as issued by the Prime Minister's Office.

Summary of the Prime Minister’s Speech at the INSS Conference:

An Updated Strategic-Security Concept for Israel

On June 29, 2014, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke at the Institute for National Security Studies and outlined hos security concept in face of the challenges facing Israel in the coming years.

The Prime Minister described the historic changes taking place in the Middle East, primarily the dissolution of the borders shaped by the colonial powers (in the Sykes-Picot Agreement) and the release “of all the genies from the bottle—Shiites against Sunnis, tribe against tribe, sect against sect, movement against movement.” The emphasis was on radical Islamic jihadis, who are expanding their influence and control over the Middle Eastern map and pushing out the forces of liberalism. Because the assessment is that the turmoil in the region will continue for a long time, Israel must base its defense concept on four layers:

1. Strengthening the defense of the country’s borders. The Prime Minister emphasized that “we must stop the waves of terror that could arrive from the east and reach the centers of our cities.” Thus, there is a need to place a security fence along Israel’s eastern border, from Eilat to the Golan Heights.
2. Security control and freedom of action on security matters throughout Judea and Samaria in any agreement with the Palestinians. “In any future settlement with the Palestinians, Israel will need continued security control of the territory up to the Jordan River for a very long time.” What is new in this point is the idea of maintaining control over security not only in the Jordan Valley but also in the entire area west of the Jordan River. The Prime Minister noted that given the experience in the region, Israel cannot rely on Palestinian forces. Many times, it has stated that the actual basis for a two-state solution is a demilitarized Palestinian state. Only the IDF and the General Security Services can ensure that it is demilitarized by preventing smuggling and the manufacture of missiles and rockets, stopping suicide terrorists, uncovering tunnels, and so on. If we reach a settlement with the Palestinians, they will be able to establish a state that is independent on political, economic, and civil levels. However, Israel will continue its security operations in the entire territory in order to ensure that the Palestinian state is demilitarized and to prevent it from falling into jihadist hands.
3. Promoting regional cooperation. The turmoil in the region also creates opportunities for cooperation with moderates in the Middle East on the basis of a common interest in restricting the actions of extremist Islamic elements. In this context, Israel is working to strengthen relations with Egypt and Jordan, with which it has peace treaties, and it favors strengthening the Hashemite Kingdom (and hints that it will support Jordan if it is in distress). At the same time, this is the time to establish an independent Kurdish state—“We must support the Kurdish quest for independence; they deserve it”—which is where the vectors of state dissolution lead, complemented by the Kurds’ ability to function effectively and to defend themselves. With this statement, the Prime Minister has marked the Kurdish state as a member of the regional cooperation camp.
4. Preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear capability: The only way to prevent Iran from achieving nuclear capability and establishing itself as a nuclear threshold state is to remove the enriched uranium in the country, just as the chemical weapons were removed from Syria, and to prevent Iran from being able to enrich uranium in its territory. The agreement being formulated with Iran must focus on denying it nuclear capability and not on pushing back the time Iran needs to break out to the bomb, and it must be based on inspection mechanisms. “If the world powers agree to such a settlement, they will leave Iran a nuclear threshold state that will threaten Israel and the region and lead to the rapid nuclearization of other countries in the Middle East. Such an agreement is dangerous for the entire world. We are doing everything we can in order to influence the world powers to avoid this or to improve it.” If Iran were a nuclear threshold state, the meaning of a breakout would be that it could expel the inspectors and achieve a nuclear bomb in a short time—weeks or months.

In conclusion, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chose the Institute for National Security Studies as the appropriate place to present his strategic-defense concept. He laid out four complementary layers as a cohesive national security strategy as a guide for the conduct of the Israeli government, and thus, for preserving the political coalition. His comments had two new emphases: first, the need for continued security control over all parts of the West Bank, even in a two-state solution, and second, Israel’s quest to promote cooperation with regional players who share its interest in stopping the spread and influence of jihadi elements. At the same time, the Prime Minister is broadcasting to the Western world that Israel is the most stable and the strongest player in the region, that it can stop the spread of extremists, and that it is appropriate for the West to support Israel and not to continue to challenge it with diplomatic initiatives and threats of boycotts.

An Alternate Option for Israel Given the Impasse in the Path to a Permanent Settlement with the Palestinians 

Presented by Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amos Yadlin, Director of INSS
This evening we would like to speak of some strategic directions we would do well to adopt. Our recommendations are the result of in-depth research and analysis conducted over the last two years at INSS. We hope that the proposals raised here this evening will form the basis for a broad public discussion as well as the preferred direction in which to manage the conflict with the Palestinians and progress towards a resolution.

While the INSS is an apolitical body, it is charged with making recommendations for national policy and strategy that will help advance the objectives of the State Israel, namely a state for the Jewish people that is Jewish, democratic, secure, and legitimate.

Over the past two years, we have estimated that the chances for reaching an agreement with the Palestinians were very low. The gaps between our minimum and the Palestinian minimum were too great. The concessions necessary to achieve a permanent settlement remain inconsistent with historical narratives, national aspirations, religious beliefs, the sense of historical justice, and the practical lessons learned by both sides from the management of events in the last generation. A permanent settlement is harder to achieve today than it was in either 2008 or 2000.

One may assume that the Palestinians will not give up on the so-called right of return, recognize an end to the conflict and claims, accept a Jewish nation-state, and allow Israel security control of the Jordan Valley and/or the airspace. It is important to understand that the Palestinians have barely budged from their basic positions since Camp David, Annapolis, and certainly this last round, if it can even be called “a round.”

The Palestinians have an attractive Plan B, whose core is to condemn Israel and delegitimize it in international institutions, and thereby obtaining approval for all problematic parameters of the future settlement from the international community in moves that bypass Israel. There are clear signs that going the international route was, in fact, Abbas’s Plan A and that this is the reason the Palestinians were so rigid at the start of the talks and through their duration.

It is important to understand that the continuation of the status quo is, for the Palestinians, also a positive strategic trend leading, in the long term, to the demand for equal rights in one state. Indeed, the Americans and the Europeans as well as parts of the Israeli public all issue repeated warnings that Israel “is lost” should the status quo continue. Therefore, at the heart of the Palestinian approach is a firm assumption that the failure of the talks is good for them.

Israel must therefore have an alternate plan that is not the continuation of the status quo, even if the status quo sustainable, because it is undesirable and because it is liable, if we do not act with care, to lead to the delegitimizing of Israel and to a single state whose Jewish and democratic components are liable to suffer gravely.

Of the following four states of affairs we prefer a peace agreement based on Israel’s parameters (IP). We are unwilling to accept an agreement based on Palestinian parameters (PP). We must therefore create an Israeli Plan B that is preferable to the status quo (PSQ).

At the core of Israel’s Plan B lies Israel’s willingness to formulate its future borders despite the inability of being able to reach a settlement, on the basis of maximizing the following four parameters: creating a Jewish, democratic, secure and legitimate/just state.

This would mean an independent, intentional, and reality-fashioning move that would not subject the nature of the State of Israel to Palestinian agreement. However, the move would also be coordinated, to the extent possible though not as a precondition, with the United States and the international community, leaving open the possibility of returning to the negotiating table at a moment’s notice to talk about a permanent settlement or interim agreements. It is worth repeating: a move for independent formulation of a new reality is not an alternative that renders negotiations or interim agreements or a permanent settlement redundant. But if we cannot reach our strategic goal with an agreement, we will move towards it independently.

Key features of the move:
Israel would propose a plan with Israel’s parameters for peace: a moderate, generous plan when it comes to borders, but one that also demands that the Palestinians compromise on issues of security, Jerusalem, and return of Palestinian refugees. On the basis of such a plan, another attempt to arrive at an agreement.

There would be an attempt to involve the moderate Arab nations, led by Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan, in an effort to arrive at a permanent settlement. Such an attempt may be based on the Arab Peace Initiative, though without the imposition of preconditions of the “take it or leave it” kind; it is important to decouple the Palestinian issue from the Syrian question and apply a different format to resolve the refugee problem other than the right of return.

If the gaps for a permanent settlement cannot be bridged, Israel will present a proposal for interim agreements aimed at a two-state solution and propose to change reality on the ground together with the Palestinians on a string of partial agreements, under the formula of “everything that is agreed on is implemented on the ground.” A sequence of limited successes that will anchor the two-state solution without agreeing on all the issues is better than another failure in an attempt to reach a comprehensive permanent agreement in one fell swoop.

If it becomes clear that the Palestinians will not change their “all or nothing” policy and are opposed to interim agreements, partly on the basis of the concern that there is nothing as permanent as that which is temporary, and the paths to both a permanent settlement and interim agreements are blocked Israel must formulate a long-term plan to define its borders independently with maximal coordination with its allies and, if possible, even with the Palestinians.

Main points of the plan:
• Ceding sovereignty of 80-85 percent of the West Bank, beyond the security fence, not including the Jordan Valley, Hebron, and Jerusalem.
• Transferring Area B and much of Area C to Palestinian authority.
• Stopping construction in the Jewish settlements beyond the line that is to be determined.
• The relocation, preferably voluntary, of the residents of Jewish settlements in a long term process of resettlement in Israel, with preference given to the Galilee and the Negev and the settlement blocs.
• Leaving IDF security control of the West Bank in place, similar to its responsibility there today, while reserving the right to take preemptive action, hot pursuit, control of the border envelope and the airspace, though reducing the IDF’s current signature to the absolute minimum possible.

The concept of a unilateral move has negative connotations in Israel, especially  given the difficult results of the 2005 disengagement from the Gaza Strip. Nonetheless, I have yet to meet anyone who would rather go back to control one and a half million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. An analysis of the unilateral move made by Ariel Sharon’s government shows four primary errors. During the process of formulating Israel’s eastern borders, it will be necessary to correct those errors to elicit better results:

a. The first error was to carry out the move without sufficient international and domestic legitimacy. The unilateral move should be preceded by a generous peace agreement offered to the Palestinians. When it becomes clear that a settlement with the Palestinians is difficult to achieve, it will be necessary to share with the United States, at the right time, that we are prepared to transition to an independent formulation of the two-state solution.
b. The second error was leaving an open corridor for smuggling weapons to the Gaza Strip that allowed it to become an Iranian outpost flooded with arms of all types imported from Iran and Libya. Under no circumstances must Israel repeat the mistake of leaving the Philadelphi corridor open. In an independent, coordinated move, the Jordan Valley will remain in Israel’s hands to prevent arms smuggling into Judea and Samaria and the infiltration of terrorists and jihadists into the area under Palestinian Authority control.
c. The third error was withdrawing from the entire area, a move that was intended to earn legitimacy for ending the occupation. But even though Israel withdrew from the entire area, it did not receive any recognition for ending the occupation. We propose making preparations for the security fence line or nearby, leaving in place the main settlement blocs as well as other strategic areas, some of which could serve as bargaining chips in future negotiations.
d. The fourth error was the complete disconnection between the leadership and the people who were being evacuated. The lack of planning at the national level has led to the failed handling of the evacuees that continues to this day, nine years after the disengagement. In order to rebuild trust, we need a serious preliminary domestic discourse, possibly a general election or referendum in Israel that would ensure domestic legitimacy throughout the move. Similarly, it is imperative to manage the process gradually over some time, while constructing suitable solutions for the evacuees.

Conclusion
A new paradigm to promote and preserve the two-state concept is required in order to stop the erosion of Israel’s political and economic status. A unilateral formation of the borders is second in desirability to a permanent settlement or interim agreements with the Palestinians, but it is better than the continuation of the status quo and certainly better than a settlement based on the parameters demanded by the Palestinians, without security, without recognition of a Jewish state, without concession of the right of return, and without agreement to end their claims. It is necessary to change the concept that time is our enemy, to retake the initiative, and to recharge the legitimacy battery.

Determining Israel’s borders is in Israel’s best interests so as to ensure it remains a Jewish, democratic, secure, and legitimate state. This move would be done from a position of strategic strength precisely at a time of regional upheaval. We are talking about a long-term plan that would safeguard the two state solution. It would change the trends and facts on the ground that would seem to prevent such a solution. The move would be made while leaving the door open for returning to the negotiating table to produce a permanent settlement, interim agreements or a regional debate.