Down from the Summit, in the Shadows of History:

A Time for Realistic, Step-by-Step Actions

Despite all that has been achieved—above all, the commitments to end the violence and to move toward a two-state solution, as well as the reference by President Bush to Israel as a “vibrant Jewish state,” and the equally important reference by King Abdullah of Jordan to the need for compromise on both sides—there was also much in the summits of Sharm el-Sheikh and Aqaba which could be described as “underwhelming” or, frankly, disappointing:

·        Above all, the negative Palestinian position on the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, which should have come as a matter of course, side by side with our recognition of their right to a Palestinian state, is not only disappointing: It is deeply troubling as a portent for the future. Perhaps this is just too much vinegar for Mahmoud Abbas’s salad right now: He simply does not have the authority to address the key issues while Arafat keeps breathing down his neck. This must, however, remain an open issue—and a moral wound—until the new political leadership on the Palestinian side is ready to address it.

·        Almost as troubling was the Arab refusal, despite a focused American message, to move toward normalization of relations with Israel—again, an issue that should have been dealt with as a natural part of the aspirations for peace and reconciliation, not as a manipulative political tool.

·        Finally, the position on Arafat remained dangerously ambiguous. He was not there, and the Arabs consented to his absence; but the various Arab participants continued to regard him openly as the Palestinian leader. Perhaps there is some hope implicit in the Egyptian references to the need for “democratic institutions.” This is a meaningful hint, to those in the Arab world who are familiar with the distinction between “dawlat mu’assasat,” an “institutional” state (with civil society, separation of powers) on the one hand, and “dawlat za’amah,” a “leadership” state, i.e., a dictatorship dominated by a “Za’im,” a leader and boss or a “Qa’id,” revolutionary commander, on the other. Arafat—the “leader and symbol”—has modeled himself on the latter; Abu Mazen, insofar as he stands for anything, represents the former. Sadly, his type of leadership has yet a long way to go before it takes hold in the Palestinian public domain.

Should this somewhat weak tea, brewed in the two summits, discourage us as we look to the future? Not necessarily—and perhaps, the opposite is true. This time as we move forward, we should put behind us the grand, dramatic gestures and focus on much more mundane matters: security measures on the ground, humanitarian steps to relieve Palestinian suffering, and the piecemeal evacuation of outposts here and there. No grand breakthroughs, no dramatic transformations, no “poetry”: These are, and will be, prosaic people doing prosaic business, avoiding the long shadows of the past.

Indeed, the date for the trilateral summit in Aqaba, which took place yesterday, may have been chosen, to some extent, so as to avoid—at least by a day or two—the many military memorial days that crowd our calendar at this time of the year:              

·        Fifty-nine years ago, less one day, the Allied landings in France, “Operation Overlord,” finally marked the impending victory over Nazi Germany and its allies (which at the time included the Palestinian leader, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who was busy recruiting volunteers for the SS from among the Balkan Muslims).

·        Thirty-six years ago to the day, the IDF, facing a tightening Arab siege, a Syrian radical regime that had committed itself to supporting Fatah terrorism, and a burst of hateful, Nazi-like promises by Arab propagandists across the region to put all Jews to the sword, swiftly destroyed the Arab air forces and then proceeded, within six days, to take all of Sinai, the Golan, and our ancestral landscapes in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza Strip—thus launching the never-ending debate as to the future of “the territories.”

·        Twenty-one years ago—again, less one day—the IDF moved across Israel’s border, this time in a bid to destroy the Soviet-backed Palestinian terrorist “state within a state” in Lebanon. The advance was dramatic, but following the siege of Beirut and the massacre of Palestinians by our allies, the Lebanese forces, in the Sabra and Shatila camps in September 1982, this strategic blow against the global threat of terror soon turned into a controversial,  messy affair—some would say, Israel’s own Vietnam.

·        Just two months ago, American and allied forces brought to a dramatic end one of the cruelest regimes on earth, certainly one that caused more death, torture, and destruction than any other in the region. For the foreseeable future, the United States itself has become a Middle Eastern presence. Or rather, a U.S.-led administration in Iraq has become the direct neighbor of both Syria and Iran.

Dramatic actions, even more dramatic expectations: Twists and turns of such dimension as to make our chapters of human history look, sometimes, as if they were but the stage for a grandiose and stirring morality play. All of these have come upon us in conjunction with our own powerful messianic traditions. Small wonder that the Zionist movement nearly lost its practical bearings and was swept up—left and right—by essentially messianic movements, from “Greater Israel” to “Peace Now.” It is certainly understandable that even for the non-Orthodox, such as our great poets Uri Zvi Greenberg and Natan Alterman, the notion that we are living and enacting the fulfillment of the ancient prophetic visions, ranging from revenge to redemption, came to override more realistic readings of the world we live in. On the left, a similar willful refusal to see the world as it is gripped all debate about the true nature of our “partners.”

These visions, or illusions, are understandable, but no longer relevant. Once the princes and presidents depart, the time will come to leave aside the intense debates about this or that formulation of words, and about aspects of the permanent status agreements, such as the “right of return,” that might cloud our far horizon, but do not (and should not) prevent short-term progress. Soldiers and administrators, security professionals and intelligence officers, should then get down to the much-less-than-messianic business of moving away from violence, step-by-step and area-by-area. This will take time and patience.