100
Developing an Israeli Grand Strategy toward
a Peaceful Two-State Solution
of the negotiations and thus can be expected not to honor
the agreement. The rifts and divisions among the various
factions of Palestinian society heighten the concern that
signing understandings with one faction will only herald the
start of fighting with another. The Fatah leadership, many
Israelis believe, cannot guarantee that the other Palestinian
organizations will also carry out the agreements. This may
partly explain why public opinion surveys have repeatedly
demonstrated a significant gap, both in Israel and among
the Palestinians, between the percentage of people that
support a peace agreement and the percentage of those
who believe that such an agreement is feasible.
6
Do those
sitting across the negotiating table also speak for their rivals
in the field? With whom, if anyone, can we sign a sustainable
agreement?
One possible answer lies in the Arab peace initiative, which
includes a proposal to the Israeli public to view a peace
agreement with the Palestinians as a step whose significance
goes beyond the relations between the two peoples, and
that would lead to full regional normalization, which would
change Israel’s broad geopolitical status in the Arab expanse
and Middle East as a whole. However, given the changes
in our region, tying the Palestinian issue to the Arab region
as a whole would likely have the opposite effect on Israelis.
The transition from the hope of the Arab Spring to what
commentators and columnists now call the “Islamic Winter”
has reversed the impact of the regional prism, and instead
of offering the promise of guarantees, it confirms our fears.
The fear that Islamic organizations will take over Palestinian
politics the day after an agreement is signed appears to be
supported by the regional trend, whereby state power is
undermined by radical religious movements.
Doubts about the stability of the states in the region shift
the focus from the Arab League to Islam, from the region
to the religion. Those who seek to enlist support in Israel
for a peace agreement would do well to recognize the
challenges they face – not just to get Israelis to trust that
the Palestinian leadership sincerely desires peace, but also
to have confidence in the ability and willingness of political
Islam to support this peace, or at the very least, to enable it.
As a senior Yesha Council official put it: “Abu Mazen is not
the story. Let’s assume that he indeed intends to establish
a friendly neighboring country that will live alongside Israel
in peace and cooperation. Why assume that the Palestinian
Authority even has the power? The real power, from Gaza
to Qatar and Saudi Arabia, is in the hands of the Islamists
[...] You want to know what awaits us? Go see what they’re
teaching in the mosques, and not just here, but in all the
Arab countries. All the talk about peace is a fantasy, as long
as the Arabs remain unwilling to accept a Jewish state in
6 See „The peoples survey – the joint Palestinian-Israeli poll“ by the
Israel Democracy Institute and Palestinian Center for Policy and
Survey Research, June 2016:
/
ממצאי-סקר-משאל-עמים
.pdf
Israel. And they will never be able to, because their religion
does not allow it.”
7
If it is at all possible to increase the belief in the possibility
of peace among the Israeli public, it is only by refuting this
essentialist view of Islam as a monolithic, unchanging,
violent and intolerant culture. Significant processes involving
reflection and interpretation by the most important religious
leaders, Muslims in Palestinian society as well as from the
wider Islamic world,
8
along with Jews from Israel may vitiate
the presumption that an insurmountable religious barrier
renders all the diplomatic efforts futile. When those who
are generally considered opponents of conciliation become
allies and take responsibility for its success, a new degree
of trust becomes possible.
“Ask me what God wants of me, not where
the borders should be” – What religious
language can offer
Situated in the heart of Jerusalem – as well as at the heart
of the conflict – the Temple Mount – or al-Haram al-Sharif
– is the focus of aspirations, dreams and desires, as well
as tensions, hostility and the potential for escalation. While
most arbiters of Jewish law prohibit Jews from ascending
to the Temple Mount at this time, there are those that allow,
recommend and even mandate it. The eyes of the Arab
world and Israel’s Muslim minority are on this small group
and scrutinize its actions, which are often interpreted as
a challenge to the very right of Muslims to worship on the
holy mountain.
What do those Jews who focus their political-religious
activities on the Temple Mount really want, and how can
they fulfill their yearning for it? Different religious leaders will
give different answers to this question. Some wish to visit
the Temple Mount, to be allowed to pray there freely and
hold Jewish ceremonies. Others seek to rebuild the temple
atop the mountain – some to actually build it with their own
hands and in the foreseeable future, and others by means
of indirect endeavors at some hoped-for eschatological time
that lies ahead. Another group wants the Muslims on the
Mount to recognize that it was once the site of the Jewish
temple, and that it is the source of its sanctity. Very few
would consider their intense religious longings fulfilled by the
fact that the secular State of Israel enjoys legal sovereignty
over a piece of land.
9
Nevertheless, a considerable part of
7 Interview, Gush Etzion, June 2016.
8 Another aspect of the religious perspective is the lack of importance
of internal borders within the Islamic “Ummah.” As noted by a
prominent sheikh, a member of the Islamic Movement in Israel
(interview, Umm al-Fahm, February 2016): “We do not have states,
we have one Ummah (nation), and the arbiters of religious law in
Palestine do not decide on their own. We speak first because we
live here and are familiar with the complexity of living among Jews,
but it is a matter for all Muslims, not just for us.”
9 Although some religious groups consider the secular institutions
of the State of Israel to contain an inherent sanctity, there is little
overlap between them and those who ascend to the Temple Mount.
