‘Peace Process’? Bombs Say More Than Words Do

By Robert L. Pollock
Wall Street Journal, 31 July 1997

BRUSSELS — The Middle East is
endangered, and not primarily by
terrorist bombs. The fundamental problem
may be the woolly thinking of the
politicians and journalists pushing the
peace process. Yasser Arafat showed up
here in Brussels last week for his first
meeting with an Israeli official–Foreign
Minister David Levy–since construction
of a controversial Israeli housing
project in Jerusalem began last spring.

“Mr. Arafat,” I thought to
myself as I formulated questions during
the press conference, “how can you
consistently refer to Jews as ‘cousins’
yet support the death penalty for selling
land to them?” Or I might simply
have asked, “Were you able to reach
any substantive agreements during your
discussion?” But I was never able to
get the floor, and the three questions
fielded by Mr. Arafat and Mr. Levy
concerned only when the two sides would
be meeting again.

There was no apparent recognition in
this assemblage that were enormous
differences here that would be difficult
to overcome; these people had faith in
the “process.” Nor was there
any acknowledgment that these differences
might be irreconcilable. Most of the
journalists seemed to think that an
accommodation can be reached if the
parties kept talking, even though the two
sides are firmly entrenched, to cite just
one example, in claiming the same
city–Jerusalem–as their rightful
capital.

* * *

Yesterday’s bloody bombing in
Jerusalem seems to have done little to
introduce a note of realism into the
international discussion. “We were
just on the verge of getting the talks
back on track,” complained United
Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who
stressed the need to “get back to
the negotiating table.” A spokesman
for German Chancellor Helmut Kohl
declared that “there is no
alternative to the peace process.”
And President Clinton, although he
postponed the impending trip of special
envoy Dennis Ross, demanded “a
deepened determination by both
Palestinians and Israelis to pursue
peace.”

In other words, the Israelis will get
a few days to mourn the dead, but by no
means are they entitled to conclude that
the so-called peace process isn’t
working. The faith in the power of speech
by Israel’s would-be mentors is
astounding. All they seem to be able to
contribute is tautologies and platitudes,
sometimes even in the same sentence:
“Only when a lasting and secure
peace is achieved will the enemies of
peace be defeated,” offered Mr.
Clinton.

Herewith, some facts: Since the
signing in September 1993 of the Oslo
accords, Palestinian terrorists have
claimed responsibility for at least 14
major attacks, killing at least 140
people and wounding at least 471.
Yesterday’s attack added to those totals
at least 14 dead and 150 maimed.

Only hours before the blast, diplomats
here and in Washington were aglow with
self-satisfaction that the Israelis and
Palestinians were coming back to Mr.
Annan’s “table.” Privately,
they probably were delighted at having
intimidated the “intransigent”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into
opposing construction by a Miami
businessman of housing on Jerusalem land
he rightly owns and for which he had all
the necessary permits. Mr. Netanyahu’s
decision was bound to be treated not as a
welcome concession but as a sign of
weakness. Moreover, by reasserting the
government’s prerogative in determining
land use instead of leaving such issues
to the market, the prime minister
guaranteed that such issues would remain
a matter of violent political dispute. It
took only a day for Mr. Netanyahu’s most
lethal enemies to demonstrate violently
how little they were impressed by his
flexibility.

If the peace processors would only
listen to what those enemies of Israel
are saying, they would realize that an
unsettling number of Palestinians will
not be satisfied with a compromise.
“The Muslims say to Britain, to
France and to all the infidel nations
that Jerusalem is Arab; we shall not
respect anyone else’s wishes regarding
her,” preached Ikrama Sabri, a
Palestinian Authority mufti and Arafat
appointee, in a recent sermon at
Jerusalem’s holiest mosque. The
Palestinian Authority makes open use of a
map depicting its future state
encompassing all of present-day Israel.

* * *

That doesn’t mean that Mr. Arafat
himself would have chosen yesterday’s
bomb attack to assert his claim to
Jerusalem. Although he continues to
exhort Palestinians to oppose Israel by
“any means necessary,” he needs
international support to pursue his
goals. With his reputation at home in
free-fall, he may have welcomed a
temporary return to talks.

But Hamas, which claimed
“credit” for yesterday’s
attack, apparently didn’t agree. And Mr.
Arafat’s enemies are getting stronger all
the time. The Palestinian legislature
demanded on Tuesday that his cabinet
resign over corruption charges. But the
hostility of many Palestinians toward Mr.
Arafat by no means makes them friendly to
Jews. Astonishingly large numbers of
Palestinians tell pollsters they support
violence against Israelis, and wild
myths–like the one about Israel
distributing chewing gum spiked with sex
hormones to destroy Palestinian
fertility–circulate among the population
and are even sometimes expounded by
officials.

One the few sensible responses to
yesterday’s tragedy came from Mr.
Netanyahu, who said that the Palestinians
must be “educated” against
terror. But judging from words and deeds,
that, if it ever starts, will be a long
“process.” It certainly won’t
move according to today’s diplomatic
timetables.

Mr. Pollock is an editorial page
writer for The Wall Street Journal
Europe.