by Dr. Eyal Levin
During the first few
days of Operation Protective Edge in the summer, Israeli troops were
told they should avoid driving through Wadi Ara with their military
vehicles. For those who didn't catch that, let me explain: The state
told its armed forces they must not assert Israel's sovereignty in the
area, in the nation's heartland, whose Hebrew name is Nahal Iron.
The political wisdom
behind this decision may have to do with past events in that region.
This includes the violent Arab protests over the expropriation of land
in the 1970s (what has become known has Land Day, marked on March 30
each year with demonstrations) and the Al-Aqsa Intifada 25 years later.
It turns out Israeli Arabs -- as we have labeled them -- perceive
themselves first and foremost as Palestinian. We have also realized that
their potential for violence is just as high as that of their brethren
beyond the Green Line (the pre-1967 border with Jordan).
The logic behind the
tactical decision to maintain a low-key presence in Wadi Ara is simple:
The Arabs want to hold demonstrations and cut Israel's main arteries; if
Israeli forces stay out of that area, the entire rationale for holding
the protests becomes void.
But this political
wisdom means that Israel is burying its head in the sand. For the past
several decades, we have fooled ourselves into believing that our
conflict with the Palestinians involves only those Arabs who have orange
identification cards and live beyond the Green Line. According to that
logic, the other Arabs, those who hold the blue identification cards of
Israeli citizens and permanent residents, are different. The "blue card
Arabs" live among us in the Israeli democracy; they attend our
universities; they are exposed to the Western values that we, the Jews,
proudly espouse. It is not surprising, then, that they have tried to
assert themselves as a distinct group in the only democracy in the
Middle East.
The artificial
distinction between the Palestinians who want statehood and the Israeli
Arabs, who see their fate inextricably linked to that of the Jewish
state, has had the Left try to redraw the Green Line. In the first few
decades following the Six-Day War, the Green Line became increasingly
blurred. But in the late 1980s, and later when the Oslo Accords were
signed, it made a comeback.
The line was elevated
to a whole new level when Israel decided to construct a security barrier
that essentially followed its route. Anytime Israeli authorities have
tired to deviate from the original Green Line -- even if this was a
minor tweak -- the High Court of Justice intervened and ordered a
rerouting.
Ironically, those who
should have welcomed Israel's renewed embrace of the Green Line as
Israel's future border are the very people who blur the distinction
between the Arabs on both sides of the Green Line. The on-and-off riots
in the heart of Jerusalem, the stabbing attacks in Gush Etzion and Tel
Aviv, the lynch that almost killed a Netanya man -- all these attacks
make it painfully clear to anyone who has preferred to turn a blind eye:
The conflict is not just about the fate of Judea and Samaria. Our
adversaries are here; they live among us and near us. They speak Hebrew
and hold blue identity cards. And, above all, they have refused to
recognize Israel's sovereignty, on either side of the Green Line.
Thus, the two-state
solution is just a ruse for another arrangement that should be called
"two states for three peoples." The first people, the Jews, would stay
within the Green Line; the second people, the Palestinians, would live
beyond the Green Line; and the third is made up of the Palestinians who
have tried, by means of another spate of violence, to do away with the
Green Line as a future border and who refuse to recognize Israel's
sovereignty on either side.
Perhaps Israel will
finally realize that it cannot afford to relinquish its sovereignty when
it discovers that there is no Green Line to separate the mountainous
regions from the coastal plain and the Samaria hills from the pastoral
meadows lying to the west. Perhaps the recent terrorist attacks will
make Israel revert back to its simple modus operandi that has
safeguarded the land and its people: maintaining a high profile when
terrorism strikes; asserting Israel's sovereign rights without
equivocating, even where there are resurgent elements who want to
challenge Israeli authority, and cracking down uncompromisingly on those
who hurl rocks, even if the particular rock they have thrown has yet to
kill someone.
Dr. Eyal Levin is a lecturer at the Department of Israel and Middle Eastern Studies at Ariel University.
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
No comments:
Post a Comment