Israel's land-for-peace policy is a gamble, at best - opinion
While those on the Left are usually more willing to compromise than those on the Right, we have to look at the facts and see what is practical rather than idealistic.
By AVI KUMARISRAELI SECURITY FORCES evacuate an opponent of the Disengagement plan from Kfar Darom in the Gush Katif settlement bloc in August 2015.(photo credit: NIR ELIAS / REUTERS)
Israel has a policy of trading land in exchange for peace treaties. This policy is highly controversial, its feasibility is uncertain, and it has yielded mixed results. Just like Nazi Germany’s Sudetenland agreement with Czechoslovakia in 1938, a bad trade can have negative consequences for Jews – even today.From a practical standpoint, compromising strategic land is a gamble at best. It can either:A) Improve safety, or,B) Give the enemy an edge, if they don’t honor their end of the bargain.The idea has been proven to have mixed results in a modern scenario wholly dependent on the Arab sides’ willingness to uphold “their end of the bargain.” While those on the Left are usually more willing to compromise than those on the Right, we have to look at the facts and see what is practical rather than idealistic.1) The only time the compromise actually worked was when Israel gave the Sinai to Egypt. This, however, seems to be an exception rather than the rule. In 1982, Israel returned an area twice as large as itself that it captured in 1967 in exchange for peace. The Egyptians kept their end of the bargain and Egypt and Israel have been at peace since. Israel abandoned large towns such as Yamit with a population of 2,500. Many civilians were seen forcibly dragged out by Israeli soldiers in an effort to make peace. The cost of such a population exchange had to come with a solid guarantee or it wouldn’t have been in the best interest of survival.2) The compromise did not work after the Lebanese Civil War (1973-2000). Israel held onto a small strip of land south of the Litani River, dubbed “South Lebanon State.” It was practically the last Christian nation in the Middle East after that war ended. Some 150,000 people, mostly Christians, lived free from persecution by Palestinian and Hezbollah militias. Then, when Ehud Barak announced a hasty withdrawal in 2000, it came as a shock to all. Videos on BBC showed many Christians crying when Israel abandoned them hastily. Today, South Lebanon is ruled by Hezbollah, which has attacked Israel in 2006 and continues to push for its destruction. They continue to dig tunnels to infiltrate, as well as use said land as a platform to launch their missiles.3) Another instance that did not work was in Gaza. In 2005, Israel withdrew all settlements from the Gaza Strip. Today, not a single Jew lives there, Hamas has de facto independence and it still continues to harass Israel, sending incendiary balloons to burn forests and farms, and firing rockets, among other tactics.ISRAEL’S RESOLVING minor border issues with Jordan in the 1990s, and today’s ongoing ratification of maritime boundaries with Lebanon are not as significant in terms of area as the above three cases, since they did not include large cities and swaths of inhabited land being changed and did not see any significant population transfers.Another instance when Israel offered such a trade was Oslo with Yasser Arafat in 1992, but he did not agree. Had he taken the deal, the Palestinians would have probably been better off. Probably, mind you. It’s a hypothetical situation that never materialized. Israel proposed to withdraw completely from the West Bank (except Jerusalem), but the deal fell apart because Arafat refused to compromise. Would Israel have been better off?Today, Syria demands that Israel return the Golan Heights, an area Israel captured in 1967 during the Six Day War, along with the Sinai, Gaza and the West Bank, which are also subject to this policy. Given the nature of Syria’s alliance with Iran and seeing as the Assad regime is another Iranian proxy like Hamas and Hezbollah, the prospect of Syria keeping its end of the bargain is up for debate, at best.Final verdict: The land-for-peace formula has worked one out of three times so far. Two more regions are being proposed: the Golan and West Bank (Judea and Samaria). The best gamble was with Egypt, which is no doubt a more powerful entity than Hezbollah or Hamas, and arguably a bigger threat to Israel now than Iran (minus nukes) is today. Hence, the practicality of such a policy is wholly dependent on the enemy keeping its end of the bargain – for which there are no guarantees.Given the other Middle East nations’ current political instability in the wake of the Arab Spring, unending wars and corruption, and that some of Israel’s opponents still refuse to accept Israel’s legitimacy as a state, a land-for-peace strategy seems to be unlikely to work.In addition, the media and the international community have an anti-Israel bias. This means they could misreport any aggression or breaking of treaties by Arab nations as “Israel’s fault.” This almost always happened during the Gaza conflicts.Still, the policy is not a complete failure because Egypt, which was arguably a bigger threat then than Iran is now, has been on good terms with Israel since a peace treaty was signed. Also, the recent Abraham Accords with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain show that it is not necessary to trade land for peace when there is no shared border.Therefore, we see that a land-for-peace policy by Israel is dictated by external factors, is always a gamble, and ultimately depends on the trustworthiness of the other side. Anyone who believes that Israel should not be dismantled – unlike what the Iranian ayatollahs and their proxies have repeatedly expressed – has to agree with this.The writer is a historian of Sri Lankan origin living in New York.
