by Gershon Baskin
Even before the latest Israeli invasion of the Palestinian
territories following the Passover suicide bombing in Netanyah two
weeks ago, the work of peacemaking between Israelis and Palestinians
has been a Sisyphus type task. The frustrations far outweigh the
feelings of success and everyday is a new struggle to find hope to
feed the motivation to continue. Many articles have been written over
the past 19 months in newspapers around the world about those of us
who have continued to work for peace in Israel and Palestine. Always
these articles contain the question: Can they continue? (or How can
they continue?).
After a brief holiday abroad for Passover I came back to face
the staff of IPCRI, our colleagues and friends, many of them living
under curfew, in the midst of a brutal war, their families and
themselves under risks of imprisonment or even more violent fates. I too
followed the news by the hour from thousands of miles away, checking my
email and the internet at least four times a day, being glued to the 24
hours a day news programs on American television. One morning I woke at
7:00 am to put a video movie on the television for one of my children.
The TV was set to CNN. In the background I saw a picture from Israeli
television - it was my supermarket, 100 meters from my home that had
been bombed. It seemed that each morning we were greeted by more and
more bad and worsening news from home. I spent additional hours each
day phoning friends and colleagues in the West Bank to find out how they
were. Many friends and family members suggested to my wife and to my
children that maybe we should stay in America for a while - a year or
two or more. No one apparently had the courage to offer me the same
advice. I felt too far away and I was anxious to come home.
But coming home isn't easy. What should we do now? How can we
be effective to change this awful reality. I spoke with some
Palestinian leaders and asked them for advice - how can we help, what
difference can we make. One senior Palestinian official told me that
the most important thing to do is to find the way to get the Palestinian
medical services functioning once again. People are dying because of
lack of functioning hospitals, doctors are under curfew, ambulances are
shot at, supplies are finished, blood is running out, no electricity, no
water, etc. Thinking that perhaps the Israeli Minister of Health, MK
Nissim Dahan
from Shas, might be willing to raise his
voice, I phoned another MK from Shas, a
Deputy Minister who had been involved in some of IPCRI's back-channel
talks in the past. In the past, MK Yitzhak Cohen had even come to
IPCRI's office in Bethlehem to meet Marwan
Barghouthi and other senior Tanzim
officials. I thought that if I use the Jewish term "pikuah nefesh" - for the sake of human lives, I
might be able to convince him to speak with his fellow
Shas MK, Minister of Health
Dahan. I called Yitzhak at home on this
past Friday morning. I was told by him that the only "pikuh nefesh"
that he was concerned with were of Jewish origin. He said to me "Do you
want an IDF soldier to be killed by a terrorist hiding in an
ambulance?". As ambulances have already been used for the purpose of
transporting terrorists, I had little to say to him. I suggested that
they should at least let the doctors get to the hospitals and allow
medicine to enter the Palestinian territories. My requests fell on deaf
ears. He told me to speak to the army. Knowing that it was a ridiculous
notion, but for the sake of "pikuh nefesh", I did call the IDF, but they
too seemed less than interested in helping.
In our staff meeting yesterday in IPCRI with those members of
the staff who could come to our office, located on the border between
Jerusalem and Bethlehem, we held a discussion for several hours trying
to figure out what we should/could be doing now. From our office, we can
hear the shooting in Bethlehem just one hundred meters away. The tanks
are moving in and out along the road adjacent to the entrance to our
place. We have two members of our staff under siege in Bethlehem, one in
a refugee camp, visible from our office, and another one further inside
the city - her house had been in the middle of the fighting the night
before and seven bullets penetrating their windows into their salon. We
began the meeting by having each person express what they felt and
thought about their own personal situation and experiences and their
more general view of the situation. Most people spoke about being
attacked by friends and family for continuing to work with people from
the other side and continuing to believe in peace with them. Everyone
also spoke with an overwhelming sense of pessimism and despair, all of
them looking at me with the hope that I would provide the message of
hope and a bit of optimism. Not an easy task these days.
I said that perhaps the most important thing that we
could/should do during these days is to keep our own personal contacts
and lines of communication open and encourage all of our colleagues and
friends to do the same. Our message must be one of solidarity with
those people on both sides who still want peace. We know that there are
still people on both sides who believe in peace. We must try to provide
humanitarian aid wherever and however possible. Yesterday I helped a
shipment of donated food supplies to get to a refugee camp. These small
elements of help can provide some small relief from the suffering. We
must also continue to help in the development of public policy options
particularly at this time when public thinking has become so one
dimensional. Our ability to communicate with people in positions of
leadership and power on both sides is perhaps unique and essential,
maybe even more than ever right now.
I believe that the possibility of a bi-lateral
Israeli-Palestinian solution is further away than ever and therefore we
must turn to the international community to help. We need imposed
solutions that require the United States to play a much more responsible
leadership role. There are initial signs that this is beginning to
happen, but it must not be too little because it is already too late.
Civil society, locally, in Israel and in Palestine, and internationally
must become much more aggressive and determined in making demands to end
the conflict first by ending the siege of Palestine and getting the
Palestinian leadership to retake control of its territory and its
people. Terrorism must end, but Israel must understand that the root
reasons for the terrorism must be addressed and not only the symptoms.
The occupation must end and if the leaders and people of Israel are
incapable of seeing that just now because of the threats that they face,
the international community, at the political level and at the civil
society level must drive that point home in determined and in
unambiguous language. The days of constructive ambiguity are far behind
us.
The people of Israel and the Government of Israel must
understand that they are waging a war that cannot be won. The occupation
will end and an independent State of Palestine will be established. The
current destruction of the basis for future understanding between
Israelis and Palestinians can and must be repaired by individual
Israelis and Palestinians together. We must overcome the hatred, the
anger, the fear and the despair. That is the true task of peacemakers
today. At a time when our leaders have stopped thinking about tomorrow,
me must provide the tomorrow. We must create the hope through our
expression of human concern for each other's welfare. We must demand
that our relations be humanized when all around us tells us to
dehumanize the other.
When my Palestinian friends are under siege, when they have no
water, no food, are living under curfew and risk being killed, my
expression of outrage is a message of my humanity and my belief that
this is not being done in my name. When many Palestinians call me to
express their outrage after a suicide bombing in Israel, I too know that
this was not done in their name and their expression of outrage is a
witness to their humanity. I will not accept that there are no partners
on the other side. I know that there are many as I know that there are
many in Israel.
We in IPCRI have decided that we are not canceling any of our
work plans. We may have to delay them for reasons beyond our control.
We will not accept "no" as an answer from people who yesterday were
willing to meet and talk and today have changed their mind. We will
continue to provide the venue and the means for people to meet and talk
and plan together a better future. We will continue to oppose the use
of violence and force as a means of conflict resolution - this resolves
no conflicts and can solve no problems.
We all live in great fear today. We all have no real idea what
is in store for us each and every day. We have to remain firmly
committed to our principles and to our visions. And if reality doesn't
fit our vision right now, we must not accept the new reality, we must
reject it and we must change it. When I first became politically
involved in this conflict some 27 years and I supported the two-State
solution - the creation of an independent State of Palestine alongside
of Israel in the 1967 borders, I was called a traitor and a self-hating
Jew. There may still be those who continue to say that, but I know that
the majority of the people of Israel still recognize that that is what
will emerge, if only we are wise enough to accept it. People might think
that we are crazy and naïve. I believe that I am neither. The
positions that we represent and stand by are the only sane and the most
un-naive positions possible. When the entire area has gone insane,
remaining sane can sometimes seem like insanity, but there is a clear
and coherent difference. Recognizing that difference is the first step
in reclaiming our roles as peacemakers.
Gershon Baskin, Ph.D., is
Co-Director of
Israel / Palestine
Center for Research and Information (IPCRI), a
joint
Palestinian-Israeli public policy think-tank,
founded in Jerusalem in 1988.
Source:
