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Some “peace processors” never give up. In the New York Times today, four of them try an old and very bad idea: forget about negotiations, and substitute the views of some un-elected elderly “statesmen” and of the UN Security Council.
In an op-ed piece entitled “Going Directly to Israelis and Palestinians,” Shlomo Ben-Ami, Thomas Schelling, Jerome Segal, and Javier Solana suggest “a new approach” that isn’t new at all. The heart of it is this:
“The U.N. Security Council…will establish a special committee composed of distinguished international figures acting in their own capacity. Possibly it would be headed by a former American statesman or senator.” Their “first task would be to determine if there is any possible peace agreement that would be acceptable to a majority of both the Israeli and Palestinian people.” To determine this, the panel would “go to the region where, over a period of several months, it would conduct a transparent inquiry into the possibility of genuine peace.” It would hold televised hearings and “conduct public opinion research and study the record of past Israeli-Palestinian negotiations — in particular, the Clinton Parameters and the progress made at Taba and in the Olmert-Abbas round.” Then, and this is the key, the panel “would…develop a draft treaty” which the UN Security Council would approve in a resolution, calling for negotiations based upon it as a starting point. If Israel or the Palestinians object, “the process should go forward even if one government, or both, fails to embrace it.” If the parties fail, the Security Council should “pass a resolution which embodies the…plan and calls on Israel and the Palestinians to announce their acceptance.”
The four authors are optimistic: “Agreement may not be immediate. However, an end-of-conflict plan that emerges from this process will have the staying power of historic resolutions such as 181 and 242. Supported by majorities on both sides, it will be an offer that political leaders cannot indefinitely refuse.”
What’s above is the plan as the authors describe it. Here’s my description.
The four men are tired of the fact that neither Israelis nor Palestinians accept peace terms that they, in their wisdom, are sure are right. The fact that Israel is a democracy with an elected government is an inconvenience to be brushed aside; “public opinion research” is much more reliable than elections, I guess. So much for democracy in the year of the “Arab Spring.” The fact that Israel has twice made offers to the Palestinians–Prime Minister Barak in 2000 and Prime Minister Olmert in 2008–that were very generous in the view of the United States is irrelevant. The fact that those offers were withdrawn precisely because Israel did not want to allow the Palestinians to pocket them and start negotiations from those points is also irrelevant; the panel will start by swallowing them and jumping off from there, studying them “in particular.”
The confidence of these four authors in getting “majorities on both sides” to support such a plan is bizarre. It has been tried. The “Geneva Initiative” of 2003, a lengthy, detailed peace plan developed by Israelis and Palestinians who know a lot more about the issues than these four gentlemen, went nowhere. The “People’s Voice Initiative” sponsored by one Israeli and one Palestinian leader, who offered some central principles for a peace deal and asked citizens on both sides to sign up, got 400,000 signatures in a combined population of 11.5 million. To be a bit more specific about the issues, do they think they will get Palestinians to agree to abandon the so-called “right of return,” or Israelis to give up Jerusalem? Will they have security proposals that cope with the Hamas control of Gaza, or ways to handle every territorial dispute? Do they think no dedicated, intelligent American, Palestinian, or Israeli officials have ever addressed these issues and earnestly sought solutions?
Then of course there is the personnel question. Who might the “distinguished international figures” turn out to be? Why, with luck they might be as distinguished as the four authors; maybe three of them (excluding Ben-Ami, an Israeli and former foreign minister) might even comprise three of the four! For other ideas as to who are “distinguished international figures,” look at the group that named itself “The Elders” and even has a web site: http://www.theelders.org/. Consisting of Kofi Annan, Ela Bhatt, Lakhdar Brahimi, Gro Brundtland, Fernando H. Cardoso, Jimmy Carter, Mary Robinson, Desmond Tutu, they have decided to solve the world’s problems and on the Middle East they proclaim that “After decades of peace process, there is still no peace. The Elders are supporting civil society action for an end to the conflict and lasting peace.” Apparently they should knock that civil society nonsense off and simply write up a final status agreement, and mail it in to the UN. What are the Elders up to? In their own words, “The Elders represent an independent voice, not bound by the interests of any nation, government or institution. They are committed to promoting the shared interests of humanity.” (Emphasis in the original, by the way.)
Which brings us back to the four authors of this new, old, proposal. They too are sure they represent the “shared interests of humanity.” They will not only not be “bound by the interests of any nation, government, or institution” but are certain they themselves and people like the Elders are much better than messy things like democracy and elected governments.
I don’t know if the current Israeli leadership and the current PLO leadership can make peace; their predecessors obviously could not. But I do know that only Israelis and Palestinians can make peace. Not the UN, not the Elders, and certainly not another “special committee composed of distinguished international figures.”
As one of the co-authors of “Going Directly to the Palestinians and Israelis” I am responding to Elliott Abrams comments. These are my comments alone.
Mr. Abrams offers a variety of criticisms, of which four seem most important:
1. That the proposal to have a UN appointed panel develop a draft treaty that would be supported by majorities on both sides, “brushes aside” Israeli democracy.
2. That the draft treaty offered as a basis for negotiations would be unfair to Israel, using past Israeli concessions as a jumping off point for new ones.
3. That the expectation that a plan can be found that would be supported by majorities on both side is “bizarre,” having been previously tried and having “gone nowhere.”
4. That the distinguished figures to be selected for such a panel, would not be up to the job, that they would be figures such as the Elders.
Let me deal with these in turn:
1. The anti-democratic charge: Contrary to Mr. Abrams contention, our proposal does not ignore elected governments, and it does not seek to impose an outcome on either Israel or Palestine. Rather, what we envision is a way to return to negotiations, but negotiations that would be productive and have a reasonable chance of ending the conflict. It has long been an important part of efforts to end the conflict that third parties (e.g. the UN Security Council, the United States) have put on the table specific parameters for negotiations and then have called on the parties to accept these parameters and undertake negotiations on that basis. Thus UN Security Council Resolution 242 laid down basic principles for a settlement back in 1967, and more recently, the Clinton Administration in 2000 laid down “The Clinton Parameters” which provided considerable detail reflecting the US position on how to resolve the permanent status questions in a balanced manner. Clinton called on both sides to accept his parameters, and to fill in the details through negotiations.
Our proposal is similar but differs from these efforts in several ways:
a. We call for a detailed proposed treaty rather than parameters. There is a trade off here. With more general parameters that have a degree of vagueness, it is easier to get assent, but ultimately it is harder to get agreement in the negotiations. We believe there would be value in having clarity and detailing up front. This idea of a draft treaty document was considered by the Clinton Administration, but they decided in favor of parameters.
b. Rather than looking to the United States provide a proposed treaty, we look to the Security Council. Again there is a trade off. The Israelis are more comfortable with the United States, and the Palestinians with the UN. As noted above, the UN Security Council served well in this respect with Resolution 242. And historically, it was the UN General Assembly that created the first UNSCOP, and that gave rise to a very detailed plan which was embodied in the historic Partition Resolution, a document cited in Israel’s Declaration of Independence.
c. On our proposal, UNSCOP in drafting a proposed treaty would not start out looking for the middle ground between the two governments, rather it would propose to the two governments a plan that was the middle ground between the two peoples.
d. Finally, if negotiations do not ensue, and the UN then adopts, unmodified by negotiations, the UNSCOP plan, the proposal does not call for imposing this proposal. Rather is foresees that if the plan is supported by majorities in both societies, then through democratic forces, the peoples of the two societies will bring about a change in government policy.
Thus the claim that we “brush aside” democracy, is unfounded.
2. The unfair to Israel charge: Mr. Abrams suggests that because UNSCOP would study previous rounds of negotiations and the Clinton Parameters, that its proposals would embody previous Israeli concessions with nothing parallel being demanded of the Palestinians. This is totally unfounded. Indeed, were it the case, the proposed treaty would be completely rejected by the Israeli public and the entire effort would collapse. One example should help clarify. The draft treaty, of necessity, will include a detailed proposal for resolving the refugee issue. While it is very unlikely to ask Palestinians to affirm that they have no right of return, it will propose an end of claims agreement under which the overwhelming majority of the 6 million refugees will not return to Israel. The Palestinian leadership has long known that any treaty would have to leave the right of return “unimplemented.” However, it is politically extremely difficult for them to agree to this. Yet this is what they will be asked, and the fact that it will be the UN that will be doing the asking, will make it easier for them to say “yes.”
3. The “bizarre” expectations claim: Mr. Abrams states that our confidence in getting majorities on both sides to accept a detailed plan is “bizarre.” In support of his view he cites the “Geneva Initiative” which he says, “went nowhere.” The Geneva Initiative is a very helpful reference point. As with our proposal, the Geneva Initiative developed a draft treaty that would be acceptable to both sides. Geneva was actually quite successful in demonstrating that such an agreement could be found. Over the last nine years there have been regular polls of public attitudes towards the Geneva proposals, and they show substantial support among both Israelis and Palestinians. The most recent data show 58% of Israelis and 50% of Palestinians supporting the proposed package as a whole. This data can be found on the website of the Truman Institute. This is quite promising, and we believe it may be possible to craft an agreement that has yet stronger support on both sides than Geneva.
The real problem with Geneva, and why it “went nowhere” was that it was disconnected from a negotiations process. Our proposal seeks to remedy this by having the Security Council call for renewed negotiations based on the draft treaty, and for the Council to be prepared to continue to press for acceptance of the plan even if negotiations do not occur.
4. The personnel issue: Mr. Abrams suggests that the UNSCOP panel would be composed of individuals not fit for the job. He then derides “The Elders,” and suggests that UNSCOP would be made up of its participants. Without commenting on the Elders, there is nothing in our proposal which leads to this conclusion. We suggested that UNSCOP might be headed by a prestigious American. For myself, I am thinking of people of the caliber of Lee Hamilton, George Bush (Senior), or Bill Clinton.
The bottom line is that both the Israeli and the Palestinian people want to end the conflict, and most are ready to make major compromises to do so. We have had standard negotiations for nineteen years. It is time to learn from the past and consider a new approach.
Jerome M. Segal, director
Peace Consultancy Project
University of Maryland
I appreciate this thoughtful reply, but it is not persuasive.
Two examples of why it is not:
–If the Security Council adopts this new peace plan, it is not quite right to say that Israel is free to reject it. Formally it is, but rejecting it will do great damage to Israel in an institution where it is already subjected to terribly unfair treatment. This would be true even if the PLO also rejects the treaty, for it is never held to very high standards and is anyway distinct from the Palestinian Authority.
–The annexes to the Geneva Initiative are more than 500 pages. If this proposal is for an equally detailed peace plan rather than “parameters,” who will write this plan? Staff. Who will they be, who will choose them, whom will they represent? The distance from elected and therefore responsible and responsive officials will grow even greater. And if the panel is composed of people who like Hamilton are 81 or like Bush are 87, it is obvious that the staff will run things. That’s not reassuring.
Really great to read the measured and informed discussion above.
My punt: another high level, third party initiative would be unlikely to work for all of the above reasons. It would be much better to effect change on the ground and support the likes of Fayyad (who being shamefully sidelined at present)- a position I think Mr Abrams might support.
An interesting debate, but the argument for this mystical negotiated treaty to be brought forward by the United Nations Security Council with public support in both Israel and Palestine is dubious for two key reasons of public opinion:
1. If the populations of either Israel or Palestine either fully understood the Geneva Initiative, or really agreed with it, then this would translate in terms of elections. While this would only be demonstrable in Israel which does have a democratic system, the Israeli public have clearly not supported political parties that would seek compromise in the spirit of Geneva. These polls are all well and good, but why do they not translate at election time?
2. If for the sake of argument we accept that a majority of both Israelis and Palestinians not only want an agreement, but decide to support the plan by the margins suggested (58% Israelis, 50% Palestinians), that is clearly an insufficient mandate to carry it through. Perhaps one could make such drastic constitutional decisions in Israel with 58% support, but one would still be making a deal with a majority only guaranteed by what one assumes is rock solid support from the Israeli-Arab community. That is clearly a problem but workable.
The idea however, that with only 50% of Palestinians supporting it that the Geneva Initiative is encouraging is not persuasive. Firstly that requires only a minute change in public opinion to make it a minority view, and secondly evidence from the last 10 years suggests that a hardcore of Palestinian militants can derail the hopes of any peace deal. Those terrorist elements will always be a concern, but if they have the support of half the Palestinian population (or for the sake of argument only 20-30%), their capacity to act as spoilers will undermine any efforts.
Negotiations belong between the legitimate representatives of each people, not Bill Clinton or George Bush who would have little to no actual authority to force progress.