Israel's failed iron wall strategy

By Paul Tate
YET AGAIN we hear an Israeli prime minister blaming Palestinian intransigence
and violence for the lack of progress in the peace process. Ariel Sharon has stated that he has no option but to press ahead with his disengagement plan "in light of the absence of a peace partner on the Palestinian side".
The notion that all Palestinians are fanatical suicide bombers hell-bent on destroying Israel and incapable of reasoned discussion is, of course, aimed at a US audience, in order to maintain support for Sharon''s aggressive policies. However, it bears no relationship to the historical record.
Throughout the history of the state of Israel, successive Israeli leaders have used this excuse as a means to deflect attention from their own policies and in order to uphold the strategy of the "iron wall" in their relations with the Arab world.
The architect of the iron wall school of thought was the founder of Revisionist Zionism, Ze''ev Jabotinsky. Jabotinsky was the first Zionist leader to acknowledge that the Palestinians were a nation and that they could not be expected to renounce voluntarily their right to self-determination.
His solution was to erect an iron wall of Jewish military force. However, unlike his followers, Jabotinsky did not believe that the strategy of the iron wall was an end in itself, but rather as a means to break Arab resistance, with a view to a final settlement. Jabotinsky, unlike Sharon, believed that peace with the Arabs was desirable, possible and ultimately inevitable.
The iron wall theory, however, always carried within it an inherent danger. The danger was that successive Israeli leaders would adopt this theory and refuse to negotiate even when there was someone to talk to on the other side. Paradoxically, the politicians on the Israeli right, the heirs to Jabotinsky, including Yitzhak Shamir, Benjamin Netanyahu and Sharon, adopted the iron wall theory not as a means to an end, but as a permanent way of life. These leaders, bolstered by US military largesse, have used the iron wall as a bulwark against change and as a means of keeping the
Palestinians in a permanent state of subservience to Israel. By adopting this approach, they have squandered numerous opportunities to reach a peaceful resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
History teaches us that far from being intransigent enemies of peace, numerous Arab leaders over the years tried hard to come to a peaceful resolution with the Israeli state, despite domestic opposition and the significant risks involved. The Israeli excuse for political impasse and the claim that there is no one to talk to on the other side goes as far back as the creation of the state of Israel itself.
According to the Israeli version of events, following the 1948 war, Israel's leaders (like Sharon states today) were desperate to achieve peace, but there was simply no one to talk to on the other side. Revisionist Israeli historians, however, now believe that post-war Israel was far more intransigent than the Arab states. The question that has always plagued Israel''s leaders is not whether peace with the Arabs is possible, but at what price?
Israel''s first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion refused numerous opportunities to reach a settlement with his regional neighbours. He, just like Sharon, understood that in order to arrive at formal peace agreements, Israel would have to yield territory and agree to the return of a substantial number of Palestinian refugees. He decided that the price was not worth it and that Israel''s position could only improve with time, therefore, all peace feelers were rejected. Ben-Gurion rejected King Farouk''s peace
initiative in 1948 and Husni Zaim''s offer in 1949. The Syrian leader Zaim was desperate for dialogue, but complained bitterly that there was no one to talk to on the other side. The Gaza raids of 1955 put an end to the secret negotiations between Israel and Egypt and were described by Jamal Abdul Nasser as an event which destroyed his faith in the possibility of a peaceful resolution of the conflict with Israel. The method of ending negotiations through the use of military force is a proven Israeli strategy
and that is particularly relevant today with the Sharon government.
However, the iron wall policy also led to significant failures, the most pronounced being Israel''s failure to resolve the conflict with the Palestinians.
Although Jabotinsky never meant for military power to be an end in itself, unfortunately his heirs, such as Sharon, do not share the same view. By calling off the planned summit between him and the Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia, and by continually insisting that he is forced into unilateral action due to the absence of a partner for peace, Sharon is signalling his adherence to the iron wall theory which translates into a reliance on military strength and a reluctance to make territorial concessions for peace.
Therefore, history reveals that when Sharon talks about the impossibility of negotiating with the Palestinians, what he really means is a resumption of military aggressions and forced solutions.