Strategic Assessment

The article explores whether unilateral withdrawal is a proper strategy for achieving Israel’s national objectives when it is impossible to reach a suitable political settlement. It presents the rationales and the expectations defined by those who initiated the unilateral withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 2000 and the Gaza Strip in 2005 against the results as these are apparent today. The author argues that in Israel’s  current reality there is no rationale for the strategy of unilateral withdrawal. Rather, territories should be evacuated only on the basis of a stable agreement that is in line with Israel’s long term objectives.