Posted on 10/26/2003 8:34:28 AM PST by anotherview
Oct. 26, 2003
The people want a plan
By NACHMAN SHAI
Yosef (Tommy) Lapid, the justice minister, has sharp instincts, possibly going back to the time he was a journalist and later a television commentator in the early days of the television shoutfest Popolitica. As a panelist he always knew how to find the right word, the right reaction. It is very possible that those qualities, and others, are what carried him to the peaks of politics. He became a minister and head of the second-biggest party with 16 seats.
Last week, he unexpectedly stood up and admitted: We made a mistake (referring to his party). We should not have left the negotiating arena to Yossi Beilin and his friends. We must issue a political initiative immediately.
Lapid's intention of presenting, offering and maybe even leading a political initiative at this time proves that his sharp instincts have not abandoned him.
He feels the same way as the 40 percent of Israelis who told a Yediot Aharonot poll they support the Geneva initiative. They did not know much about it beyond general reports that pointed to exceeding Israeli generosity. These Israelis wished to say they are ready for an agreement that would concede various Israeli "red lines."
Yossi Beilin and his friends on the Left read the mood and drew a new road map – this time, without US President George W. Bush.
But the story actually starts much earlier. Once upon a time we had a grand, noble cause – to build a state. That goal was achieved. Then came the achievement of other goals: there was settlement and development; there was a nuclear plant and a national water carrier. We conquered the wilderness and absorbed immigrants, created the Israel Defense Forces, launched a satellite into space and so on, successes that would make any society proud.
One by one, the hundreds of thousands and then the millions living in this tough country made their dreams come true through diligence, perseverance and long-term vision.
New countries in the world looked to Israel and wished to learn from it. There was something thrilling in the way Israel tackled its national goals and made them come true.
SOMEWHERE ALONG the way things began to change. Though we are accustomed to viewing the wars of 1967 and 1973 as such watersheds, I leave the identification of the pivotal moment to the historians of modern Israel.
What interests me is the result of this change, the most significant in our history as a society. It is a political-social change of the first order. Somewhere along the line Israeli governments and ministers shrunk their vision from the future to the present. There are no more long-term plans based on national goals, but rather short-term plans to be implemented quickly, if possible within a short term in office.
Since Israeli politics became personal, competitive and harsh, it developed a new variety of politicians who adjusted themselves to the new arena – the arena of the "primaries." One election campaign comes on the heels of the next.
I've seen up close how ministers get stressed and act out of compulsion. Sometimes they have no choice: the state budget, the key tool of government which is supposed to direct government actions, changes frequently, forcing government ministries to behave hastily and recklessly.
The public, too, learned to adjust to the new dimensions of public management. The result is that we as individuals, as families, as communities living together reached the conclusion that the present is what counts, that we must take advantage of the here and now.
We stopped planning and looking ahead. How can you plan, anyway, in a state of economic, security, political and social instability? In stable countries and societies people save, plan the next stages of their lives, and look forward to retirement and the quiet life that lies ahead. Here, we live hand-to-mouth, expecting instant compensation and gratification at every stage.
In that respect there is a perfect match between the way the public behaves and the way our government leads it. That is how we got into the Oslo Accords. We were coming out of the first intifada and we thought it was time to realize the old dream of a long-term agreement. We were pushed into far-reaching concessions and within a short time we found ourselves in a new war, worse than the previous one.
Three years of this war, with a record number of 900 dead, currently reinforce our feeling that it is time for a new agreement, even if conditions are not yet ripe.
Yossi Beilin and the negotiators in Geneva succeeded in reading that public wish to see an immediate achievement. The government was slower. It was waiting for conditions to ripen. The military pressure and the difficult economic reality were meant to create the circumstances in which the Palestinians would be forced to surrender and accept the road map. But before we reached that point, the Israeli wish reawakened.
The government is in distress. It wants to continue this battle to reach a decision, but is also reading the writing on the wall: the public expects direction. The public wants hope.
The Beilin initiative may very well lead nowhere, both because it has not ripened and because the public will not want it. But there is no doubt that the Geneva agreement forces a new reality on the government from this point on, and it cannot be indifferent to this reality. It must present a goal, like in the olden days. It must present it to the public and say where we are going. That is the leadership needed at this moment.
The writer is director-general of the United Jewish Communities-Israel and former chairman of the board of the Israel Broadcasting Authority.
I agree with one point the writer makes: Prime Minister Sharon needs to articulate a clear vision for the future, one that doesn't depend on the Palestinians suddenly deciding they actually want peace.
No, that is only the MINOR half of the problem. The major problem with the Geneva initiative is that it pre-supposes that nothing of Israel is sacred for the Israelis. It might as well go back to the rejected 19th century concept of establishing the Jewish homeland in Uganda.
To the leftists, of course, the only thing that is sacred is Leftism.
It is important to point out that the vast majority of the Israeli public is NOT willing to pay "any price for peace". If you do not make that distinction, then when you correctly assert that "the conflict will continue", you then get folks like the State Department and the UN trying to change your mind with "international guarantors" that promise you a "final solution" to the conflict.
I would like to believe that most Israeli and American voters and lawmakers are too smart to fall for these tricks, but past history does not make that a safe bet.
Exactly. That's it in one sentence.
May Israel awaken so no Jewish child will ever have to do this again.
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