ARTICLES

• A COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT – COMMUNITY POLICING APPROACH TO AFGHANISTAN

• THE HOPES FOR OBAMA MAY DIE IN AFGHANISTAN

• THE FRUIT OF DENIAL

• THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT: A NEW PERSPECTIVE

• MS TATNATLUS [ON THE MEANING OF THE ISRAELI ELECTIONS]

• ISRAEL’S BIGGEST DANGER

• THE VIOLENCE AND SETTLEMENTS ANATHEMA (PART 2)

• HOLDING THE WHOLE

• RELIGIOUS ORGANISATIONS ARE THE KEY TO THE MIDDLE EAST

• EGYPT’S STATEGY TOWARD GAZA IS INCREMENTAL, LONG TERM

• HOPING FOR A NONVIOLENCE MOVEMENT IN PALESTINE

• U.S. FACES PARADIGM SHIFT IN RELATIONS WITH LEBANON

• RESPONSIBLE JOURNALISM SERIES: A VITAL MEDIUM

• RESPONSIBLE JOURNALISM SERIES: HUMAN TRADGEDY AS A CATALYST FOR CHANGE

• INTERFAITH HARMONY FOR WORLD PEACE AND HUMAN UNITY

Articles-Credits (Full Text of All Articles Are Below The Credits)

Stephen M. Sachs, “A Community Development-Community Policing approach to Afghanistan“

Marc Pilisuk, “The Hopes for Obama May Die in Afghanistan“

John Bell, “The fruits of denial”

Omar Shaban, “The Palestinian-Israeli conflict: A new perspective”

Uri Avnery, “Ms Tantalus [On the meaning of the Israeli Elections]“

Fareed Zakaria, “Israel‘s biggest danger”

Alon Ben-Meir, “‘The Violence and Settlements Anathema (Part 2)”

Shelley Ostroff, “Holding the whole”

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, “Religious organisations are key to Mideast peace”

Gamal A. G. Soltan. “Egypt‘s strategy toward Gaza is incremental, long-term”

Achmad Munjid, “Hoping for a nonviolence movement in Palestine“

Mona Yacoubian, “U.S. faces paradigm shift in relations with Lebanon“

Subhash Chandra, “Interfaith Harmony For World Peace and Human Unity”

Khaled Diab, “Responsible journalism series: A vital medium”

Yizhar Be’er, “Responsible journalism series: Human tragedy as a catalyst for change”

ARTICLES

A COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT – COMMUNITY POLICING

APPROACH TO AFGHANISTAN

Stephen M. Sachs, “A Community Development – Community Policing approach to Afghanistan” IUPUI, February 19, 2009

I am very concerned that Afghanistan is about to turn into another quagmire, as it has done for centuries for outsiders who have intervened there, once they become conceived of by the population as invaders or occupiers. The Bush Administration’s terrible policies have caused the situation to deteriorate to such a point that a totally new approach is needed, if Afghanistan is to become a reasonably stable and developing nation. A traditional military, security, methodology cannot succeed. Only a community development – community policing approach can now be viable, for which there are some good precedents. What community organizing experienced President Obama should ask is, “what would the great community organizer Saul Alinsky do?”¹

To understand the needs of the current situation, it is important to note that, from the outset, the Bush Administration moved in unfortunate directions. First it may have missed an opportunity to achieve its stated goals of acting against international terrorism by apprehending the leaders of the 9/11 attackers without military action, by failing to follow up on the Taliban government’s offer to have Bin Laden and his top associates tried in a neutral country. The Bush Whitehouse took no action to determine if this was a legitimate proposal that could produce a satisfactory resolution. It simply dismissed the offer, out of hand, and commenced its military operation.

What is now critical, is that after the initial invasion, the U.S. and NATO did not take adequate steps to allow recovery and development of the country to occur. This was a several fold problem that has deteriorated. First adequate security, to allow recovery and development to take place, has never been provided. Second, insufficient resources were provided for recovery, much less meaningful development, while some policies actually undermined the economic situation for many Afghans. For example, sending food aid from abroad, rather than buying as much as possible from Afghan farmers, undercut the country’s agricultural economy, leaving many local farmers little alternative than to grow opium. At the same time, the attempt to eradicate opium growing has largely made enemies of the poor growers. If the U.S. and NATO (or the Afghan government) had instead bought the crop, and helped farmers develop alternative agriculture, drug production reduction would have been much more effective, cost less, denied the Taliban a source of income, and by assisting Afghan people in their development, would have built support for the Afghan government and the international operation, rather than undermining it. Instead, support for the government has eroded significantly, accelerated by its growing corruptness.²

The failure to meaningfully facilitate recovery and development has destroyed support for the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai, and for the international security and development operation, giving the Taliban an opening to return, which has been made easier by lack of a sufficient policing force (including military forces). The increased fighting, particularly attacks on suspected Taliban facilities, have produced a growing number of civilian casualties that have done more to bring the Taliban new support than to weaken them. This has been especially true of long range attacks by drone and manned aircraft. A military approach based almost entirely on the stick is doomed to failure. To be successful, one has to emphasize the carrot, holding the stick in reserve for carefully selected protective action. Only thus can hope be created, which is critical for peacebuilding.

What is needed is in Afghanistan, and in most peace building – peace keeping situations, is a community development-community policing approach. The emphasis has to be on appropriate local development, according to the actual needs and conditions in each area, protected by a policing force working closely with each community. This is essentially a program of community empowerment, combining participatory local development, which because of its success has become the primary approach for UN development, and community policing, for which there are some good recent examples of troops undertaking in peace building situations. Both the development and the policing involve the outside agencies working closely with the communities, in as participatory a manner as fits the local culture, and in ways that are culturally appropriate, to assist local people in meeting their own needs, and facilitating their empowerment. It involves building relationships of mutual respect and trust between community members and their institutions, and the facilitating agencies.

On the development side, the emphasis would be on sustainable economic development over the long term, encompassing whatever social, institutional, infrastructure and appropriate technology advancement is necessary for community development, as defined by the local people. Of course, in those few cases where supporting area values or requests would violate international standards of basic human rights, the external agency would work with the local people to find ways of proceeding that they find acceptable, which are compatible with international standards.

It should be noted that a great deal of external assistance and consulting, across, and within, international borders has been of little value, and at times damaging, because it was either, or both, technically and/or culturally inappropriate for the on site conditions. This includes some major blunders in Afghanistan.³ It is essential that outside consultants or facilitators are open to working with differing circumstances and cultures, and acting collaboratively with the people concerned to move ahead in terms of their client’s wants and needs. Outside facilitators have to do their home work as to what will work technically in the circumstance and as to how best to function in the local culture. This involves careful choice and training of personnel. It may be helpful to bring in émigrés from the area. In the case of Afghanistan, there are many Afghans in the U.S. who, if carefully selected for a particular project, might be extremely helpful. In this author’s own community, for instance, a retired physician, born and brought up in Afghanistan, recently journeyed to his region of origin to work with local people to build a clinic, for which he had largely arranged the financing. Similarly, U.S. personnel often are not experienced in working with tribal cultures such as those in Afghanistan. As there are similarities in most tribal societies that bridge their cultural differences, assistance from American Indians, particularly from the many with international experience, could be most helpful.

On the policing side, the job of troops and police would be to protect wellbeing and development in their areas of jurisdiction. Experience shows that this requires a community policing approach.⁴ Security forces, operating in an area they do not know often, are not present where and when needed, and do not know who is who, and what the context of the situation is in which they are intervening. Thus, they often make serious mistakes, arresting or attacking innocent people. Acting as an occupying army, they turn the populace against them. Militant groups can than manipulate the situation to build support against the security force, and local people with grudges can act to get the police to harm their enemies, unjustly, widening fractures in the community. To be effective, police need to build relationships of trust within the community allowing them to act impartially and effectively to build and maintain the peace, empowering community development to advance.

Somalia, during the UN intervention of the early 1990s, provides an excellent indication of the relative advantage of peacekeeping forces taking a community policing approach.⁵ In the city of Baidoa, the initial peacekeeping force consisted of troops from Australia, who, with sufficient fire power to discourage attack by war lords, took a community policing attitude, establishing close working relations with traditional community leaders (elders) in the city. During this period foreign aid workers reported that the city remained peaceful and quite. After some time the Australians were replaced by regular French soldiers, who following a traditional “watchman” policing style, patrolled the streets almost entirely in vehicles, without establishing strong working relations with the local populace. Not knowing the local people, these forces were ineffective. When they responded to trouble, the lights of their approaching vehicles could be seen from blocks away, allowing perpetrators to flee. When they did arrive on the seen, these French troops often acted inappropriately, further alienating themselves from the community. That left openings for armed groups to function, and violence began to grow in the city. Later, French Legionaries replaced the regulars. As they employed a partial community policing style, but initiating far less in the way of cooperative relations with the local people than had the Australians, the level of violence dropped, but never dissipated to approach the very peaceful conditions attained by the Australians. Baidoa contrasts with the capitol city of Mogadishu, where U.S. forces taking a traditional military occupying approach to policing, and lacking needed support from armored vehicles, became in serious trouble, including suffering the terrible incident that lead to the end of U.S. involvement in Somalia.

The U.S. military mission to Kosovo also illustrated how military forces can be far more effective if they take a community development approach,⁶ The 2^nd Platoon of Bravo Company of the first Battalion of the 77^th Armored regiment, commanded by Lt. James Taumoepeau, were quickly very successful in ending strife between Albanians and Serbs in the village of Gornji Livoc, by working through creative problem solving, peacebuilding, and development facilitating. Prior to the unit’s arrival, the village was plagued by daily mortar and rile fire. That quickly ended, to be followed by a period of declining arguing and name calling between Serbs and Albanians, before a peaceful atmosphere came into being. The Lieutenant, and, to a lesser degree, his men, got to know the 1800 villagers personally, became familiar with their cultures, and directly helped them solve problems. When a Serbian farmer was angry that an Albanian neighbor would not rent him his harvester, to get the Serbs wheat crop in before it rotted, Taumoepeau arranged for a Serb from another village to make his equipment available. The Platoon members facilitated the resolving of disputes, and used their contacts to speed the delivery of badly needed food to all citizens, while applying for international assistance to improve the electric service. Taumoepeau also worked with the villagers to take on self-help projects, such as cleaning up the stream that ran through the municipality. Taumoepeau’s unusually effective reconciliation efforts became widely appreciated, even as far away as the Serbian capital of Belgrade, where the normally anti-American Newspaper, Politica, stated, “He took the UN mandate seriously; he is fair to the people in the village regardless of ethnicity, and wants to help both Serbs and Albanians.”

There are a number of caveats in properly applying community development policing. In focusing on developing good relations with local people and groups, it is very important to take care whom one supports, and how, in order not to create future divisiveness in the country as a whole, or to foster long term problems, for short term advantages. It must be remembered that the Taliban would probably never have come to power if the U.S. had not armed them to fight the Soviets, and then contributed to the country’s post war instability by failing to supply significant humanitarian and development aid.

Preparing police or troops for community policing, as with appropriate development, requires a suitable choice of personnel, and adequate orientation and education. This is a different kind of mission than U.S. military forces are generally trained for, and have experience in undertaking. The widespread implementation of teamwork for evaluating missions, and planning, currently undertaken by U.S. armed services, can help prepare U.S. troops for building collaborative relations with other’s, and the Kosovo example indicates that some in the military have the outlook and ability to work in that way. But to make a peace building approach effective, a considerable amount of retraining and informational support will be necessary.

While what is needed in Afghanistan is something in the way of an appropriate community development-community policing approach, there is a question of who is now able to undertake it. Support for the Karzai government and the U.S.-NATO operation has dropped significantly, to the point where nowhere in the country, including in the heart of the capital, is now safe. Lack of sufficient security forces is an element of the problem, and a properly oriented larger force might provide a shield for development and peace building to proceed. But it needs to be considered whether the U.S. and NATO still have enough potential to build support to be successful, or if they have generated sufficient enmity so that some other entity, such as the UN, or a regional coalition, needs to take the lead in Afghan restoration and development.

FOOTNOTES

1. For a background on Saul Alinsky and his approach to community organizing, go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky, or http://www.itvs.org/democraticpromise/alinsky.html, or see his works, including Rules for Radicals (New York: vintage Edition Books, 1989); and Reveille for Radicals (New York: Random House, Inc. in 1969).

2. The solution to all these problems is not to replace Karzai. If the experience of Vietnam and other similar situations is relevant, continuing the old approach, while substituting a new national leader, has usually brought in someone worse, while the overall situation continues to deteriorate.

3. See Stephen M. Sachs and Deborah Esquibel Hunt, “Appropriate Consulting with Indian Nations: Facilitating Returning to the Wisdom of the People,” Proceedings of the 2000 American Political Science Association Meeting (Washington, DC: American Political Science Association, 2000).

4. In addition to the standard community policing literature, see, Stephen M. Sachs, “Los Angeles and Somalia: Community Service Policing and Community Empowerment,” The COPRED Peace Chronicle, Vol. 19, No. 2, 1994, reprinted from Nonviolent Change, Vol. VIII, No. 2-3, Winter-Spring 1994; Stephen M. Sachs, “A Kosovo Unit’s Success Shows the Value of a Community Policing Approach to Peace Keeping,” Nonviolent Change, Volume XIV. No. 1, Fall, 1999; Stephen M. Sachs, “Community Policing: A Key To Successful Peace Keeping and Building Peaceful Communities,” Consortium on Peace Research, Education and Development (COPRED)-Peace Studies Association (PSA) Annual Meeting, 2000; and Stephen M. Sachs, “Community Policing: A Key To Successful Peace Keeping and Building Peaceful Communities,” Consortium on Peace Research, Education and Development (COPRED)-Peace Studies Association (PSA) Annual Meeting, 2000. Relevant references to the community policing literature include, James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelly, “Making Neighborhoods Safe,” Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 263, No, 2, February 2989; Jack R. Greene and Stephen D. Mastrofskyi, eds., Crimes and Delinquency (New York: Praeger, 1988); Lee P. Brown, Community Policing: A Practical Guide for Police Officials (Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, 1989); Henry Goldstein, “Toward Community Orienmted Policing: Potential, Basic Requirements and Threshold Questions,” Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 33, PP. 6-30; Robert Trojanowicz and Bonnie Bucqeroux, Community Policing: A Contemporary Perspective (Cincinnati, 1990); Mark Harrison Moore, “Problem-solving and Community Policing,” in Tonry and Morris, Modern Policing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992); Ralph A. Weisheit, Edward L. Wells and David N. Falcone, “Community Policing in Small Towns in Rural America,” Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 40., October 1994, pp. 549-567; and Veronica Coleman, Walter C. Holton, Jr., Kristine Olson, Stephen Robinson, and Judith Stewart, “Using Knowledge and Teamwork To Reduce Crime,” National Institute of Justice Journal, No. 88, October 1999.

5. Sachs, “Los Angeles and Somalia.”

6. Melissa Eddy, Associated Press, “U.S. touch helps calm Kosovo village,” Indianapolis Star, September 5, 1999, p. A17; and Sachs, “A Kosovo Unit’s Success Shows the Value of a Community Policing Approach to Peace Keeping,”

%%%%%%%%

THE HOPES FOR OBAMA MAY DIE IN AFGHANISTAN

Marc Pilisuk*

This article was first published in Common Dreams.
Sometimes we separate foreign policy and national security issues from our domestic agenda, leaving the former inordinately in the hands of experts and officials. Today, we do so at our peril. Secretary of Defense Bob Gates has begun an escalation of the war in Afghanistan while US citizens weigh in on abortion, clean fuels and health coverage. Despite the financial meltdown, hopes abound for major changes in health care, education and the green economy. Sadly, this may all be lost in the inhospitable mountains and desserts of Afghanistan and its Pakistan border. Recent efforts to kill militants are predictably killing civilians and creating enemies. The prospect of widening this war threatens to undo the hopes that have been raised by the Obama presidency.

As a candidate, Obama pointed out, it was not just the vote to allow the invasion of Iraq but the whole mindset encouraging such a policy that was wrong. That same mindset was one that drew the world into adversarial camps in a fight for ultimate victory with unrestricted use of military means. It was a view voiced before by the brightest and the best as the Kennedy and Johnson administrations drew the US into a war in Vietnam. That war was precipitated by false evidence, continued by massive public deception, escalated time and again when each previous promise of victory and each call for escalation proved itself to be wrong. Fear of admitting we were wrong led to one new tactic after another. With military efforts bogged down in unfriendly jungle areas, we resorted to the use of toxic herbicides and “open target area” bombing, burning villages, torturing peasants for information, propping up a succession of puppet governments  – all ineffective against an enemy that disappeared among its supporters and grew increasingly committed to repel the invaders. Efforts to “win the minds and hearts” of people were undermined by military violence and a  nearly universal wish to get the US troops out of their country  The heralded  program of “Vietnamization,” the arming and training of pro-government “pacifiers” proved a costly failure. By the time it ended 58.000 American soldiers and 2 million Vietnamese had died. Many more faced the lasting effects of land mines, agent orange exposure, PTSD, and substance abuse. But for President Lyndon Johnson who was voted in with a landslide on the hope and promise for a “war on poverty” and building “the great society,” the Vietnam war proved to be a huge drain. It was the end of his dream and a closing of the opportunity to be honored in history. And some of the best and the brightest insiders were forced to admit that they had not understood either the culture or the history of Vietnamese resistance against Chinese, Japanese and French invaders. Those who had opposed the war from the start were right but the moment for change had been lost.

Now Secretary of Defense Gates acknowledges that Afghan soldiers and police will have to take the lead to counter the expected Afghan public turning against foreign troops occupying their country. At the same time he announces the sending of three brigades of US troops and Vice-president Biden presses Europe to send more. Predictions of what will happen here are no more realistic than those made by the former Defense Secretary a Rumsfeld and former vice-president Cheney who told us, six years ago, that the invasion of Iraq would be quick and result in a secure and democratic middle East. Instead, the families of more than one million killed and four million displaced Iraqis have learned to despise the US. The argument in Afghanistan, as in Iraq, will be over tactics but the underlying mindset will doom the effort.  Afghanistan through history has been a graveyard for empires that sent military incursions. The mindset is a strategic game called “kill the bad guys.” It begins with naming an enemy as the center for a new war against a new evil and it has led us to military incursions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The planned escalation of war in Afghanistan repeats the mindset and the blindness of the Pentagon and CIA officials who provided the daily briefings to the President during the Vietnam era. Each day they recount acts of military resistance, the bombing of the Khyber pass bridge, new caches of weapons being delivered, the leads provided to a secret intelligence unit that some paid informant was telling us which house to bomb to kill some militant leader. He will hear of  “success” claimed by military authorities in getting the US supported governments in Kabul, or in Islamabad, to cooperate with us at the cost of increased internal strife in their own countries. He will not hear daily reports about how the expanding cost of that war are draining our economy and our soul, with no end in sight.

Afghanistan is a strategic gateway for trade between Europe and India. Its history has been a battle of invaders from Alexander the Great in 328 BC, to the Huns, the Turks, the Arabs, and Imperial Britain.  In 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. The Soviets were met with Mujahedeen resistance fighters who were supported by the U.S., Britain, Pakistan, Sfactors in VietNam. The Afghanistan people are worldly through contacts with traders and conquerors, yet isolated by terrain and a 250 year old agreement permitting self-governance for its tribal leaders. This tribal federalism defies U. S. – led coalition attempts to superimpose a central government. Ten major tribes speak more than 30 languages. Lacking a national identity, Afghans do not refer to themselves as Afghans until they leave Afghanistan. Contrast this reality the US plan to arm and train Afghan soldiers and police.  When this was tried in Vietnam the effort helped to undermine the US supported South Vietnam authority. The military were filled with Viet Cong supporters who transferred military equipment to them. The loyalty of different Afghan soldiers will reside with their family tribal units and not with a central government supported by a foreign power. Setting up a network local units to receive aid in return for turning in Vietcong supporters was tried and failed in Vietnam. It will not work against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Afghans have never left a centuries old agricultural, tribal existence. 85% are farmers and herders of sheep and goats, many nomadic, moving with their herds. Their sparse existence is upon a land that has been destroyed by years of war and drought; 10 million landmines, unsafe drinking water that must be avoided by children and adults, herbicide destruction of crops along with poppy fields, livestock have perished, and rural economies have collapsed. There are few economic options in Afghanistan beyond labor migration, becoming a mercenary or cultivating opium. The global trade in illegal drugs generates billions of dollars in profits for the refiners and distributors. But for the farmers it is their only way to eke out a bare living to feed large families, since other crops yield no profit at all. The only drop in opium cultivation followed a time when a US supported Taliban religious leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar invoked a mandate to stop growing poppies. All that has been reversed since the US military incursion. Now opium is their only tradable commodity.

Liberating Afghanistan

Both the U. S. and Britain saw the drug trade as a threat to Afghanistan’s economy and the burgeoning democracy that they have tried, unsuccessfully, to set up in Kabul. The publicized post-invasion gains in education for girls and voting in elections have affected only a miniscule number of people in the cities. When regions anywhere become highly militarized, the results are worse for women. Rapes, prostitution and trafficking increase sharply. For the rest, war brings disaster and deaths of civilians doom efforts at community outreach. A military occupation is violent and insensitive to the history and culture of the region. It has cast into doubt the idea that either democracy or legitimate economic development can be attained by military force.

The paradox is that war increases poverty, degrades living and incites people to strike back violently. Weapons flow to Afghanistan from the US led coalition and from international traffickers If stabilizing the economy and democracy in Afghanistan are true goals, rural communities will need alternatives to the credit, employment, and cash incomes that opium provides. They do not need US soldiers.

Afghanistan does have the location for a pipeline for oil to the Caspian Sea. But the short booms created by massive construction projects replace what few viable      resources people had before. Contractors lobby for such contracts as props to the           local economy. Such projects, however, do not support small farms, schools or medical facilities. Instead they devastate the ecology leaving people as impoverished as they were before.

The U.S. led war of retaliation against al-Qaeda has killed many more civilians than were killed in the bombing of the World Trade Center. The continuing war and the extreme poverty in Afghanistan have sent more than four million people to take refuge in other countries and several hundred thousand have been displaced within their own country. Many live in refugee camps. They witness                 family members die of starvation, particularly in the winter. Some have fled to join militant Muslim groups across the Pakistan border. Aerial raids kill civilians and makes enemies. Hot pursuit of suspected militants terrorizes civilians and turns them into supporters of terrorist resistance. Whether the Pakistan government officially condones such actions matters little since many civilians in                 Pakistan, some equipped and trained by decades of US military assistance, support the resistance of their tribal relatives in Afghanistan.

The administration has begun spreading the war to Pakistan, a nation with over 100 million people, an historically autocratic military with nuclear weapons at its disposal. The largest tribal group are Pashtun, 40 million strong, who are the most offended by US military incursion.  US  policy, since its encouragement of the Mujhadeen to disrupt the Soviet Union, has assured that Iran on the west border and the ex-Soviet states on the north border will not be helpful to any military effort.

The Change We Need

President Obama on whom so many hopes for change now rest, has said he would send more troops to Afghanistan but he has also pledged not to send troops anywhere without a clearly defined mission and an exit strategy. Afghanistan does need help. It needs help to lessen hunger, to restore lost herds, It needs help in removing land mines and providing medical care. It needs dialogue with how best to preclude terrorist activities by militants in their country and by the coalition forces against suspected enemies. It needs a respectful dialogue with Taliban leaders. They need to hear the leader of the world’s most powerful country saying that collateral damage is illegal, that it is terrorism and not to be US policy — just as it must not be the policy of adversaries. They need to hear Obama repeat to Washington insiders,  the words of British Prime Minster Arthur Gladstone more than a century past to “Remember the sanctity of life in the hill villages of Afghanistan among the winter snows, is as inviolable in the eyes of  Almighty God as your own.” Such actions would do more to protect our security than military measures could ever hope to achieve.

And we in the US need to hear President Obama rise to the stature shown in his candidacy when he spoke about race and how it is used to blame and scapegoat instead of permitting the needed change for economic justice. He now needs to tell the A                merican people that if we allow the military intelligence community to create an exaggerated fear of enemies, we will never make the turn to a society in which hopes can flourish. We need to hear that dialogue is the first measure of the courage needed to protect our lives.

More troops, tanks, helicopters and drones will only widen an unwise and an un-winnable war. That was the path in Vietnam and it doomed the Great Society and Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon as well. Homeless veterans of that war are still pan-handling on our streets. War in Afghanistan will drain scarce funds, divide this country and bury President Obama’s domestic agenda. What a tragic mistake and a loss for all of us!
*Marc Pilisuk, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, The University of California, Professor, Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center, 494 Cragmont Ave., Berkeley, Ca 94708Ph/fax 510-526-0876, mpilisuk@saybrook.edu,
http://marcpilisuk.com/bio.html. He is author of Who Benefits From Global Violence and War: Uncovering a Destructive System by Marc Pilisuk with Jennifer Achord Rountree.  Westport, CT: Greenwood/Praeger 2008.

>>>>>>><><<<<<<<

THE FRUIT OF DENIAL

John Bell*

This article was written for, and distributed by, the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission to publish.

On 5 June 1967, Israel invaded Egypt and conquered the Sinai Peninsula. This victory, alongside the capture of the Golan, the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, led to the concept of „land for peace‰, the idea that Israel could exchange these territories for permanent peace with its Arab neighbours. This bedrock political concept has framed all discussions between the sides, defined an era and resulted in a treaty between Israel and Egypt.

Unfortunately, the reality on the ground in the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem has been very different. Other concepts than ‘land for peace’ have configured the political landscape during those last forty years. Israeli settlement of the West Bank and East Jerusalem alongside the failure to create an independent Palestinian state has threatened the viability of the land-for-peace formula. In parallel, the failure to win the revolution or the peace also led to the demise of Fatah as the political leader of the Palestinian people and the conversion of the Palestinian resistance from Fatah and the PLO to Hamas.

These unfortunate fruits of the political incompetence and mismanagement of the era of land for peace ˆ Hamas and settlements ˆ now represent a serious threat to an end of conflict. With the Palestinians, Israel has missed the opportunity for „land for peace‰ created by the 1967 war. Instead of settling with its neighbours, it created realities that raise serious questions about future borders, state sovereignty and two clearly defined nation-states˜the very notions behind „land for peace‰. Instead, settlements and Hamas ironically presage a new regionalism. Settlements connect Israelis to Palestinians in intricate ways, as does Jerusalem, and Hamas is an Islamic movement ideologically and infrastructurally connected to regional political movements.

Indeed, there is a reality of interconnectivity between the parts of the Middle East. Gaza must be inextricably connected to Egypt, the West Bank, and Israel in order to thrive; and in the West Bank and Jerusalem, Israelis and Palestinians are enmeshed together.

The problem lies in the denial of this interconnectivity and the resort to another form of communication: violence, to resolve disputes. The Middle East is not only about what belongs to whom but about how the sides in fact relate to each other in this interconnected scenario, through violence or other means. Critical issues for life such as water and land, and matters laden with symbolism, such as Jerusalem, are already shared, but terribly ineffectively.

Separate sovereignties will still be necessary conditions to assuage the national appetites of both sides, but these two states will require inventive common arrangements and establishment of links with the rest of the Middle East in order to reflect today‚s realities. The two-state solution, if it ever sees the light of day, will now have to contend with the fact that the two states will require a high degree of permeability to survive and thrive, i.e. to be real.

Movement permeability will mean access for settlers into Israel and access for Palestinians to Jerusalem as well as economic permeability for Gaza. Furthermore, the key to longstanding peace will not be two road systems, concrete barriers and security controls, but a framework of equitability between the two sides to frame their common ground. Intermeshed as they are, Israelis and Palestinians will need to live on terms that are fair and equal to both, which means a very significant shift of mental patterns.

The marathon of talks between Israelis and Palestinians over the past decades may have failed because the option of violence for both sides, fuelled by denial, was always there. The decision to pursue new forms of communication over critical issues was never fully made and the basic denial of the other continued. Unfortunately, in the Middle East, talks cannot succeed unless this bold decision is taken and the limits put on the radicals overruling it. These are not words or vague concepts but the very bedrock on which talks should be based: something more basic than ‘land for peace’ – a recognition of the needs of the other in the current reality. With this lack of recognition, communication through the barrel of a Merkava tank or the trail of a Qassam continues. The denial of a fellow human next door will certainly breed violence, as recognition of his/her needs, and arrangements that meet those needs, can breed calm.

What does this mean practically? Two states still, but with a high degree of labour movement and varied residency status, and a common Israeli-Palestinian political framework on a long list of issues: water, security, Holy Sites, land usage, and the environment, among others.

Whether by war or diplomacy, Palestinians and Israelis will end up with these hybrid arrangements, two states with high permeability under a common equitable framework, which can then even expand to neighbouring states as well. If this road is not taken, the fruits of the last forty years ˆ denial, violence, settlements, and Hamas ˆ are sure to seed neither peace nor stability, but hells currently unimagined. It is up to Israelis and Palestinians to decide whether they come to that destination, like Europe, only after the scourge of war leaves no other answer, or by other more sensible means.

*John Bell is the Director of the Middle East and Mediterranean Programme at the Toledo International Centre for Peace. He previously served as Director of the Jerusalem Office of Search for Common Ground.

-}}}}}}-{{{{{{-

THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT: A NEW PERSPECTIVE

Omar Shaban*

This article was written for, and distributed by, the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission for publication.

Israelis and Palestinians have been prevented from looking deeper into hidden and untapped opportunities, stuck in the limiting perspective afforded by the prolonged conflict, continued Israeli occupation, and failed peace talks. Both sides burn their energy managing and sometimes escalating the conflict rather than solving it. Very few Palestinians and even fewer Israelis know or can imagine that this small place called „the Gaza Strip‰ can provide endless opportunities.

The Gaza Strip is seen by many people as a poor place, full of violence. However, there are many good examples of productive relationships between Israelis and Palestinians, which indicate, without any doubt, the high potential of this area. Unfortunately, the media covers mostly the news of conflict and hatred rather than the good news. Following is but one example of what a just and fair peace could bring to both sides.

For 20 years, the Gaza Strip has become famous for planting and exporting flowers, strawberries and vegetables, like cherry tomatoes. Some years ago, there were more than 1,000 dunams (250 acres) of planted flowers, and 3,000 dunams (750 acres) of strawberries. These cash crops were generating thousands of sustainable, high-quality jobs for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, and revenues of more than 12 million Euros per year. In 2006, when Israel imposed total closure on the Gaza Strip and restricted the movement of goods and people from entering or leaving Gaza, these two crops and many others were negatively affected; while Gaza exported 60 million carnations and 2,000 tons of strawberries in 2005, only 12 million carnations and 103 tons of strawberries were allowed through the border in 2007. Even worse, in 2007-2008, only 55,000 carnations were exported. This caused huge loses to these sectors and pushed farmers to leave their land and look for other jobs.

Surprisingly, in November 2007 Palestinian farmers and their Israeli counterparts appealed together to the Israeli Supreme Court against the Israeli government, urging it to open the crossings. The Supreme Court ordered the Israeli government to do so, which allowed for the export of flowers and strawberries from Gaza into Israel during that month. This was the only export that occurred since the closure imposed on Gaza in June 2007 after Hamas took over the Strip.

Many Israelis would have had great difficulty imagining or even believing that these lovely flowers and sweet strawberries they gave to friends were products of Gaza. Palestinian and Israeli farmers were clever enough to find common ground where both made profits while creating real partnerships.

While the Israeli and Palestinian political leaderships often invest their energy in sustaining the conflict, there are other people who search for opportunities and attempt to pave the road to a better life. There are fewer profits to be made from the occupation and the conflict than could be created from peace and cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians. There are many Palestinian doctors, engineers, singers, artists, educators and skilled workers who have been given the chance to work in Israeli institutions and therefore have been in direct contact with Israeli society. Those Palestinians have learned much, and have become great assets to the Palestinian community.

Those Palestinians were trusted by their Israeli customers or clients. Is it that unrealistic to imagine hundreds or even thousands of professional Palestinians working or being trained in Israeli institutions in the future? It’s time for both sides to see and be seen from a new perspective. Israel would do well to understand that having a fair and just peace with a Palestinian state is much safer and more profitable than sustaining the occupation. Conversely, the Palestinians would do well to see that living in peace with Israel is the only and very best path to prosperity.

*Omar Shaban is a senior economic advisor, with over 15 years‚ experience in management consultancy and private sector development. He established Pal Think for Strategic Studies and serves as board member in various community organisations and initiatives..

|~~~~+~~~~|

MS TATNATLUS [ON THE MEANING OF THE ISRAELI ELECTIONS]

Uri Avnery

Tantalus is punished by the Gods for reasons that are not entirely clear. He is hungry and thirsty, but the water in which he stands recedes when he bends down to drink from it and the fruit above his head continually evades his hand. Tzipi Livni is now undergoing a similar torture. After winning an impressive personal victory at the polls, the political fruit keeps slipping from her grasp when she stretches out her hand. Why should she deserve that? What has she done, after all? Supported the war, called for a boycott of Hamas, played around with empty negotiations with the Palestinian Authority? OK, she has indeed.. But such a terrible punishment?

However the results of the elections are not as clear as they might seem. The victory of the Right is not so unambiguous. Central to the election campaign was the personal competition between the two contenders for the Prime Minister’s office: Livni and Netanyahu (or, as they call themselves, as if they were still at kindergarten, Tzipi and Bibi.)

Contrary to all expectations and all polls, Livni beat Netanyahu. Several factors were involved in this. Among others: the masses of the Left were terrified by the possibility of Netanyahu winning, and flocked to Livni’s camp in order to “Stop Bibi!” Also, Livni – who was never identified with feminism – remembered at the last moment to call Israel’s women to her banner, and they hearkened to her call.

But it is impossible to ignore the main significance of this choice: Netanyahu symbolizes total opposition to peace, opposition to giving back the occupied territories, to the freezing of the settlements and to a Palestinian state. Livni, on the other hand, has declared more than once her total support for the “Two-Nation-States” solution. Her voters opted for the more moderate line.

True, the big winner in the elections was Avigdor Liberman. But his triumph is far from the fateful breakthrough everyone foresaw He did not win the 20 seats he had promised. His ascent from 11 to 15 seats is not so dramatic. His party is indeed now the third largest in the Knesset, but that is less due to its own rise than to the collapse of Labor, which fell from 19 to 13. By the way, not one of the parties won even 25% of the vote. Israeli democracy is now very fragile indeed. The Liberman phenomenon is ominous, but not (yet?) disastrous.

However there is no way to deny the most significant message of these elections: the Israeli public has moved to the right. From Likud to the right there are now 65 seats, from Kadima to the left only 55. One cannot argue with numbers. What has caused this shift? There are several explanations, all of them valid.

One can consider it as a passing phase after the war. A war arouses strong emotions – nationalist intoxication, hatred of the enemy, fear of the Other, longing for unity and for revenge. All these naturally serve the Right – a lesson sometimes forgotten by the left when it starts a war.

Others see in it a continuation of a historical process: the Zionist-Palestinian confrontation is becoming wider and more complex, and such a situation feeds the Right. And then there is, of course, the demographic factor. The rightist bloc attracts the votes of three sectors: the Oriental Jews (a majority of whom vote for Likud), the religious (who mostly vote for the fundamentalists) and the Russians (most of whom vote for Liberman). This is a group vote, almost automatic.

Two sectors in Israel have an especially high birth-rate: the religious Jews and the Arabs. The religious vote almost unanimously for the Right. True, the Orthodox and the National-Religious parties have not increased their strength in the elections, probably because many of their natural voters chose Likud, Liberman or the even more extreme National Union. The Arab citizens almost completely abstained from voting for Jewish parties, as many of them used to in the past, and the three Arab parties together gained one more seat.

The demographic development is ominous. Kadima, Labor and Meretz are identified with the old-established Ashkenazi sector, whose demographic strength is in steady decline. Also, many young Ashkenazis gave their votes – at least four seats worth – to Liberman, who preaches a secular fascism. They hate the Arabs, but they also hate the religious Jews. The conclusion is quite clear: if the “center-left” does not succeed in breaking out of its elitist ghetto and striking roots within the Oriental and Russian sectors, its decline will continue from election to election.

Now Ma Tantalus must choose between two bitter options: to retire to the desert where there is neither water nor fruit, or to serve as a fig-leaf for an obnoxious coalition.Option No. 1: to refuse to join Netanyahu’s coalition and to go into opposition. That is not so simple. The Kadima party came into being when Ariel Sharon promised its members – refugees from right and left – power. It will be very hard for Livni to hold the lot together in opposition, far from the seat of power, far from the posh ministers’ offices and from luxurious official cars.

That would give us a rightist government which includes open fascists, pupils of Meir Kahane (whose party was banned because of his racist teachings), the advocates of ethnic cleansing, of the expulsion of Israel’s Arab citizens and the liquidation of any chance for peace. Such a government would inevitably find itself in confrontation with the United States and in worldwide isolation.

Some people say: that’s good. Such a government will necessarily fall soon and break apart. Thus the public will be persuaded that there is no viable rightist option. Kadima, Labor and Meretz will stew in opposition, and perhaps a real center-left alternative will come into being.

Others say: too risky. There is no limit to the disasters that a Netanyahu-Liberman-Kahanist government can bring upon the state, from the enlargement of the settlements that will torpedo any future peace, to outright war. We can’t stake everything on one card, when the chip is the State of Israel.

Livni’s option No. 2: to swallow the bitter pill, give in and join the Netanyahu government as a second, third or fourth wheel. In that case, she must decide at once, before Netanyahu establishes a fait accompli with an extreme-right coalition which Livni would then be invited to join as a junior partner.

I shall not be surprised if President Shimon Peres takes the initiative unofficially and promotes this option – before starting, in a week’s time, the official process of consulting with the Knesset factions and entrusting one of the candidates with the task of forming a government.

Could such a government move towards peace? Conduct real negotiations? Agree to the dismantling of settlements? Accept a Palestinian state? Recognize a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas? Hard to imagine. In the best case, it will go on with the charade of meaningless negotiations, quietly enlarge the settlements, lead Barack Obama by the nose and mobilize the pro-Israel lobby in order to obstruct any real American moves towards peace. What was will be.

Can Israel change course? Can a real peace-oriented alternative arise? The two “Zionist Left” parties have been decisively beaten. Both Labor and Meretz have collapsed. Their two leaders who called for the Gaza War and supported it – Ehud Barak of Labor and Haim Oron of Meretz – have received the punishment they richly deserve. In a normal democracy, both would have resigned the day after the elections. But our democracy is not normal, and both leaders insist on staying on and leading their party to the next disaster.

Labor is a walking corpse – the only “social-democratic” party in the world whose leader’s sole aim is to stay on as war minister. When Barak spread the mantra “there is no one to talk with” he overlooked the logical conclusion “therefore we don’t need anyone to talk with them”.

The Labor Party has no party, no members, no political program, no alternative leadership. It will fail in opposition as it failed in government. Barring a miracle, it will end up in the junkyard of history. It will find Meretz already there. A socialist party that lost its way a long time ago: a party without any roots in the classes at the foot of the socioeconomic ladder, a party that has supported all our wars. Some believe in easy solutions: a union of Labor and Meretz, for example. That is a union of the lame and the blind. No reason to expect that they would win the race.

The real task is far more difficult. A completely new building must be erected in place of the one which has collapsed. The need is for a new Left that will include new leaders from the sectors that have been discriminated against: the Orientals, the Russians and the Arabs. A new Left that will express the ideals of a new generation, people of peace, advocates of social change, feminists and greens, who will all understand that one cannot realize one ideal without realizing all of them. There can be no social justice in a military state; no one is interested in the environment while the cannons are roaring, feminism is incompatible with a society of machos riding on tanks, there can be no respect for Oriental Jews in a society that despises the culture of the Orient.

The Arab citizens will have to leave the ghetto in which they are confined and start to talk with the Jewish public, and the Jewish public must talk with the Arabs on equal terms. The Liberman slogan “No Citizenship Without Loyalty” must be turned around: “No Loyalty Without  Real Citizenship”.

As Obama has done in the US, a new language, a new lexicon must be created, to replace the old and tired phrases. Much, much must be changed if we want to save the state.

As for Ms. Tantalus: she can contribute to this process of change, or her torture will continue. Echoing Pyrrhus, king of Epirus and Macedon, she can well say: Another such victory and we are undone.

->>>>>>+<<<<<<-

ISRAEL‘S BIGGEST DANGER

Fareed Zakaria*

Source: Newsweek (www.newsweek.com), February 14, 2009. Distributed by Common Ground News with permission for republication.

Even before a new coalition could emerge, Israel‚s latest election was historic. It marked the collapse of Labour, the party that can plausibly claim to have founded Israel and produced its most celebrated prime ministers, from David Ben-Gurion (as head of Labour’s predecessor, Mapai), through Golda Meir to Yitzhak Rabin.

The last vestige of old Labour is Shimon Peres, who – with fitting irony – is the country‚s president only because he quit the party. Israel‚s political spectrum is now dominated by three right-wing groups: Likud, Kadima (the Likud offshoot founded by Ariel Sharon) and Yisrael Beytenu, a party of Russian immigrants. But while most commentators focus on the future of the peace process and the two-state solution, a deeper and more existential question is growing within the heart of Israel.

It’s a question posed by the election‚s biggest winner: Avigdor Lieberman. His Yisrael Beytenu party won 15 seats, placing third but gaining enormous swing power in the Israeli system. Whether or not the new government includes him, Lieberman and his issues have moved to centre-stage. As fiercely as he denounces the Palestinian militants of Hamas and Hizbullah, his No. 1 target is Israel‚s Arab minority, which he has called a worse threat than Hamas. He has proposed the effective expulsion of several hundred thousand Arab citizens by unilaterally re-designating some northern Israeli towns as parts of the Palestinian West Bank. Another group of several hundred thousand could expect to be stripped of citizenship for failing to meet requirements such as loyalty oaths or mandatory military service (from which Israel‚s Arabs are currently exempt).

The New Republic‘s Martin Peretz, a passionate Zionist and critic of the peace movement, calls Lieberman a “neo-fascist a certified gangster the Israeli equivalent of [Austria‚s] Jörg Haider.” No liberal democracy I know of since World War II has disenfranchised or expelled its own citizens.

Today’s Arab Israelis are descendants of roughly 160,000 Arabs who stayed in the lands that became Israel in 1948. Their number now stands at 1.3 million, 20 percent of Israel’s total population, and demographers predict that by 2025 they’ll be a quarter of the country’s people. Aside from their military exemption, they have the same legal rights and obligations as all other Israeli citizens. But they face discrimination in many aspects of life, including immigration, land ownership, education

and employment.

“This inequality has been documented in a large number of professional surveys and studies, has been confirmed in court judgments and government resolutions, and has also found expression in reports by the state comptroller and in other official documents,” retired High Court justice Theodor Or concluded in an official investigation of the second Intifada. “Although the Jewish majority‚s awareness of this discrimination is often quite low, it plays a central role in the sensibilities and attitudes of Arab citizens. This discrimination is widely accepted as a chief cause of agitation.”

The antipathy is mutual. “The people who stayed here did not immigrate here, this is our country,” declared Azmi Bishara, a former Arab member of the Knesset, after being charged with sedition for his expressions of support for Hizbullah. “That is why you cannot deal with us on issues of loyalty. This state came here and was enforced on the ruins of my nation. I accepted citizenship to be able to live here, and I will not do anything, security-wise, against the state. I am not going to conspire against the state, but you cannot ask me every day if I am loyal to the state. Citizenship demands from me to be loyal to the law, but not to the values or ideologies of the state. It is enough to be loyal to the law.”

For decades Israel‚s Arabs remained loyal to the law˜and loyal to the country during its many wars with its neighbours. Now that loyalty is waning. Israeli Arabs – even those who are Christian, rather than Muslim – no longer vote for Israel‚s mainstream parties. Despite low turnout, the Arab parties fared well in this election, winning some 11 seats in the Knesset. The Arab parties have never been invited into the government, which limits the influence of the Arab population in Israeli politics.

For Israel, handling the relationship with its Arab minority is more crucial even than dealing with Hizbullah or Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Israel needs to decide how it will deal with the Arabs in its midst. As extreme as it may sound, Lieberman‚s call to disown them seems to have resonated with many of his fellow Israelis. Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Israel‚s Arabs constitute a demographic time bomb. He calls it unacceptable.

Benny Morris, the once dovish historian who chronicled the forced expulsion of most Palestinians from the Jewish state in 1948, has turned to arguing that Israel needs to protect itself from the Arabs now living within its borders. “They are a potential fifth column,” he warned five years ago in an interview with Ha’aretz. “In both demographic and security terms they are liable to undermine the state … If the threat

to Israel is existential, expulsion will be justified.”

It’s a dangerous spiral: the worse the distrust gets, the less loyalty Israel‚s Arabs feel towards their country˜and vice versa. Last week‚s election has brought the issue into the open. Its resolution will define the future of Israel as a country, as a Jewish state, and as a democracy.

*Fareed Zakaria is Editor of Newsweek International and author, most recently, of The Post-American World.

((((((0))))))

THE VIOLENCE AND SETTLEMENTS ANATHEMA (PART 2)

Alon Ben-Meir,* February 9, 2009

(This is part two of a two-part analysis on violence and the settlements in Israel and the Palestinian territories.)

To make serious progress toward a final status agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, George Mitchell must first work on restoring confidence in a peace process that years of havoc and destruction have all but destroyed. To that end, he needs to address the two core sensitive issues that both Israelis and Palestinians place tremendous importance on – ending the violence and fundamentally shifting the settlements policy.

The settlements issue has been contentious not only between Israel and the Palestinians but within Israel itself. No issue has eroded the Palestinian’s confidence in the peace process more than the settlements. For the Israelis, the settlements and their expansion are a highly emotional and politically charged national subject. Any future Israeli government will face vehement opposition from the settler’s movement, which exercises disproportionate power on the government’s policy toward its activities.

Ideally, building a structure of peace and instilling trust in the negotiating process would require a complete freeze of all settlement activities including the settlement blocks that Israel wishes to incorporate into Israel proper in exchange for a land swap to compensate the Palestinians for the territory. But that may be easier said than done. To provide some practical suggestions, it is necessary to break down the settlers’ movement into its three basic constituencies. In so doing some possible interim solutions can realistically be made to demonstrate to the Palestinians that Israel intends on changing its settlements’ policy and evacuating the vast majority of the West Bank.

The quality-of-life settlers are those who moved to the West Bank primarily for economic reasons, the majority of whom live in the block of settlements located closer to the green line. According to Peace Now statistics, there are about 190,000 residents in these settlements, several of which are no longer considered settlements and officially have been named as cities, home to more than 30,000 people each including Ma’ale Adumim, Modi’in and Beitar. The routing of the security fence leaves most of these settlements on the Israeli side of the fence. The pressure on the government to allow for natural growth in these settlements is enormous and no government is likely to freeze completely their natural expansion even under intense American pressure.

The ideological settlers use mainly religious arguments to justify the settlements and their presence in the West Bank. They view the return of the Jews to the land of Israel as a fulfillment of God’s will. They occupy settlements located for the most part deep inside the West Bank very close to and often in the heart of Palestinian populated areas. It is quite evident however that the public support for these settlements is declining. A growing majority of Israelis tend to accept the fact that the Israel will need to evacuate most of these nearly 100 settlements that dot the West Bank.

The Ultra-orthodox settlers in the West Bank are a function almost exclusively of cheap and segregated housing close to the Green Line. They are descendents of devoutly religious Jews who oppose change and modernization. They have historically rejected active Zionism and continue to believe that the path to Jewish redemption is through religious rather than secular activity. There are eight ultra orthodox settlements that were built in the eighties and nineties with roughly 80,000 residents, all of which are located within the settlement blocks that Israel wants to incorporate into Israel proper. These settlements are currently expanding more rapidly than other settlements due primarily to a higher birth rate.

Based on the settlers’ ideological leanings and the location of the settlements, Mr. Mitchell should focus on four possible areas where he can persuade the next Israeli government to take action, considering the political constraints under which any future Israeli coalition government operates.

First Mitchell should push for the dismantling of all new illegal outposts; the government can take this action without losing much political capital and it can certainly justify it by citing American pressure. The mushrooming of new outposts has been a terrible source of Palestinian frustration as they signify further entrenchment rather than disengagement.

Second on the agenda should be removing small clusters of settlements occupied by ideological activist settlers in places such as Nablus and Hebron that are troublesome and heavily tax Israel’s security forces. All of these settlements are deep in the West Bank and most Israelis agree that they must eventually be evacuated for any peace deal.

Third, Israel must create a program of diminishing incentive that will provide settlers who are willing to relocate voluntarily with equal housing an extra incentive of say $100,000 if they leave within the first year from the initiation of the program. (This amount is compelling based on the Israeli standard of living.) The incentive will then be reduced by $25,000 every six months thereafter. The idea is to create reverse migrations to Israel proper while psychologically preparing the Israeli public and the Palestinians for the inevitability of ending the occupation. While many settlers will not accept the compensation and try to hold out for a better deal, the government must be resolute and not give into blackmail; these settlers must eventually be forcefully evacuated with no incentive.

Lastly, whereas a complete moratorium on expansion of settlements may be untenable, the United States can exert sufficient pressure on Israel to be sensitive to Palestinian sensibilities and not commence major development projects at sensitive moments in the negotiations. Meanwhile, the negotiations on the final borders should be accelerated to reach an agreement on the settlements that Israel could incorporate into its own territory. Such an agreement with the Palestinians would greatly facilitate the movement of ideological settlers from their current locations to these settlements while still fulfilling their ideological mission.

The new Israeli prime minister, including Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu, is likely to be under intense American pressure to make meaningful concessions for advancing the peace. Although Netanyahu as a Prime Minister will be a tough negotiator and will demand full compliance in return from the Palestinians for any concession he makes, he may also prove to be the more worthy interlocutor and more trusted by the public. It should be noted that the largest territorial concessions–the Sinai, Hebron and Gaza were all made by Likud leaders Begin, Netanyahu and Sharon respectively.

Mr. Mitchell concluded his report of the Sharm el-Sheikh Fact-Finding Committee with the following words, “Israelis and Palestinians have to live, work, and prosper together. History and geography have destined them to be neighbors. That cannot be changed. Only when their actions are guided by this awareness will they be able to develop the vision and reality of peace and shared prosperity.”

No American president has taken such a keen and immediate concern with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict this early in his term as President Obama, and no agreement between Israel and the Arab states has been achieved without direct American involvement. If time, circumstances and leadership matter, there may not be a better time to push for a solution than now.

*Alon Ben-Meir is a professor of international relations at the Center for Global Affairs at NYU. He teaches courses on international negotiation and Middle Eastern studies, alon@alonben-meir.com, www.alonben-meir.com.

XXXX|XXXX

HOLDING THE WHOLE

Shelley Ostroff*

This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews www.commongroundnews.org), who distributed it with permission for publication.

Israel’s military power and diplomatic efforts are crucial to its survival, but at this point they are clearly insufficient for ongoing security. Since the recent Cast Lead operation, and the concomitant reported rise in anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism around the world, it is not only the people in the South of Israel who feel threatened, but also Israelis and Jews living in other parts of the globe. Legitimate or not, our current strategies are creating more and more enemies and less and less places where we are safe. Something in what we are doing is painfully counterproductive. We have triggered even more rage, revenge and damage to our long-term security. Our actions and policies are based on the premise that we have no choice because we clearly have no partner for peace. Our challenge is to creatively find choices even in the face of a reality that seems to be increasingly threatening and limited.

In the face of threat and chaos, people crave reassurance and order. Statements such as, “We have no partner,” or “All they understand is force,” provide a sense of order but also deny windows of opportunity offered by different perspectives. There are enormous ramifications to how we define reality and where we choose to put our attention. Very different policies will emerge from the question, “How do we weaken or destroy our enemy,” than from the question, “How do we promote a culture that reduces enmity and in which peace and cooperation thrive”. We focus primarily on the first and severely neglect the second. Hitting the enemy even harder this time will only go so far in creating a lull in the ongoing battle which will only be intensified the next time round.

Peace can rarely last in cultures where there is a sense of injustice, exclusion or disenfranchisement. Peace generally thrives in a situation where everyone has benefit from it. Given the fact that the real threat is the psychological enmity and distrust between the nations, it is shocking that so few financial and brain resources in Israel have been invested in the psychological dimension of peace building in comparison with those invested in reactive defensive military options. The military action addresses only the symptom, but does not heal the culture that forges the symptom of violence. It does not work towards the active building of trust and goodwill.

Diplomacy of negotiations around land and prisoners is insufficient in building lasting peace. It needs to be supplemented by a diplomacy that emphasises the real gains for both sides from mutual cooperation, and that works towards building trust and goodwill. It needs to work on undoing stereotypes and generalisations, increasing opportunities for meaningful relationships and financial and social cooperation around common interests. It needs to address the deeper issues of dissent and instil the promise of a future where all people will feel they have hope and opportunity.

Not only are our relations with the Palestinians based on a domination-submission paradigm, Israel‚s internal policies are also plagued by paradigms of power over the other: win and lose, privilege and disenfranchisement, inclusion and exclusion. Such mind-sets and policies can only engender resentment, rage and conflict. Locally parties appeal to the electorate on identity parameters such as religion, socio-economic status, political affiliation, country of origin, as well as, of course, nationality. Even within Israel, we bunker ourselves into smaller ghetto-like identity groups, and there are many rifts between them. We have not yet matured enough to bring forth a non-partisan leader who is willing to serve all the people to whom he or she is ultimately responsible and over whom he or she has inordinate power. This means that whatever the outcome of the elections, certain groups will feel included and others excluded.

US President Barack Obama is beginning to offer the world a different path. He is trying to move beyond habitual fear-driven modes of blame, threat and divisiveness in the face of conflict, to a peace-building, inclusive, trust-engendering model of security and mutual accountability, with the stated intention of prosperity and well being for all. Americans, who were until recently becoming more and more unpopular in many countries due to their politics, were able in a historic moment to transcend old paradigms, prejudices and fears and to make a bold choice. In doing so, within days they went from being hated by many to being hailed as courageous and generous citizens who offered the world new inspiration and hope. Clearly it will not be easy for Obama to promote these values in a world that is steeped in divisive paradigms, but this is perhaps the opening of a new global path.

One can dismiss the relevance of Obama‚s type of leadership in the Israeli context by emphasising the differences in the political realities of the two countries – but that would be too easy. It is worthwhile to learn what is relevant from the processes that contributed to his world-wide radical success in a time of threat and crisis. Only actions based on a true vision of respect and inclusivity can contribute in a serious way to reversing the trauma vortex, healing the past and building the social, psychological and material foundations for a different future. Such a future must be based on mutual accountability, interdependence and social responsibility in the widest sense of the terms. These are the cornerstones of real discussions and actions towards a constructive and lasting peace within Israel and with our neighbours.

*Shelley Ostroff, PhD is a consultant living in Jerusalem.

-))))))+((((((-

RELIGIOUS ORGANISATIONS ARE THE KEY TO THE MIDDLE EAST

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf*

Source: McClatchy Washington Bureau (http://www.mcclatchydc.com), February 23, 2009, and is distributed by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission to republish.

Welcome back from the Middle East, Ambassador George Mitchell. If there was any doubt in your mind before you left, you must now know how complex any negotiation toward a comprehensive peace between the Israelis and Palestinians will be. You have been on the job only a few weeks, and already factions in the region are complaining that you represent warmed-over Bush administration policy with a new face.

But there is a growing consensus among moderates in both Israel and Palestine that peace is not only achievable, but essential to building a strong and eventually unified economy in the region. Instead of endless cycles of destruction and recrimination, the Middle East can be a vibrant engine of economic development. The latest round of Hamas rockets firing into Israel and Israeli retaliation accomplished little besides sinking the region into greater despair.

Now that you’ve returned, we want to offer a few things for you to think about. A peace agreement signed reluctantly by secular governments will have a hard time succeeding. Any agreement must be built from the ground up by engaging civil society groups, especially religious organisations, to provide a broad base of support.

Religion is often seen as the root cause of the conflict. We hear again and again that “radical Islamic fundamentalists” want to destroy Israel. And we hear that Jews believe they have a God-given right to control all of the Holy Land. We hear very little about the underlying fundamentals of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. These are three faiths based on the Abrahamic principle that the purpose of humankind is to praise God and to help each other. The tenets of each religion provide common ground to work out the underlying issues of power and control that actually are at the root of the conflict.

Your appointment to this delicate job is encouraging because of your experience in negotiating peace in Northern Ireland. Some of the issues there were the same. That conflict appeared to be rooted in religious strife between Protestants and Catholics. But you were able to work with both religious groups to bring about a settlement.

Religious organisations of all faiths in the Middle East recognise their importance to the peace process and are ready to do their part. Last November, the Council of Religious Institutions of the Holy Land, representing Jewish, Muslim and Christian leaders, called for their inclusion in the peace process. Rabbi David Rosen said a political solution cannot be achieved unless the underlying religious dimension is addressed. And Patriarch Michel Sabbah insisted, “We are not the problem, we are part of the solution.”

Just last month, the Community of Religious Leaders associated with the World Economic Forum meeting in Switzerland issued a statement saying religion must be part of the solution in the Middle East. It called on the political leadership, especially Ambassador Mitchell, to engage Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders.

A peace based on the will of leaders is fragile because leaders are changeable and subject to popular passions. A true peace requires reconciliation among peoples. Reconciliation and forgiveness are at the core of all three religions.

So please, Ambassador Mitchell, include the mosques, include the temples, and include the churches as you lay the groundwork for a lasting peace. There you will find allies you need to overcome the fears and bitterness that now permeate the Holy Land.

*Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is chairman of the Cordoba Initiative, an independent, non-partisan and multi-national project that works with state and non-state actors to improve Muslim-West relations. He is the author of “What’s Right with Islam is What’s Right With America.”

////|||\\\\

EGYPT‘S STATEGY TOWARD GAZA IS INCREMENTAL, LONG TERM

Gamal A. G. Soltan*

Distributed by Commmon Ground News Service with permission to publish.

The Gaza war was seemingly an inevitable conflict. The pre-war reality was unacceptable to any of the concerned parties. Hamas was not satisfied with a ceasefire that kept the tiny Gaza Strip isolated from the world. Palestinian suffering in besieged Gaza challenged Hamas’ claim of effectiveness as an elected government capable of providing for the wellbeing of its people. Nor did the terms of the ceasefire allow Hamas to pursue the program of resilient resistance that is so central to the movement’s identity. The war was Hamas’ way out of this entrapment.

Israel, on the other hand, didn’t feel comfortable with its Palestinian arch-enemy taking refuge behind a fragile ceasefire while continuing to build up an arsenal of primitive but annoying rockets. Israel’s concern was not exactly about these barely lethal rounds of rockets fired from Gaza at the towns of the Negev. Israel’s concern was more about the long-term implications should this situation be allowed to continue. This was particularly the case since the Israeli policy of tightening the screws on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip did not prove effective in softening Hamas’ stand. Hence Israel, like Hamas, had to go to war to escape the entrapment of the six-month ceasefire that Egypt had tamed them both into.

Egypt is squeezed between Israel and Hamas. In Egypt’s view, there is no lasting formula for reconciliation between today’s Hamas and Israel. Only interim arrangements such as the six-month truce can be reached within these constraints. Egypt’s strategy toward the situation in Gaza is an incremental, long-term one, whereas the two direct parties to the conflict are rushing to achieve immediate results.

Egypt has multiple concerns regarding the situation in Gaza. Its main concern is to prevent the de facto separation between the West Bank and Gaza Strip from developing into a de jure second partition of Palestine. Egypt is also keen not to starve the people of Gaza. Their suffering places Egypt under unbearable domestic and regional pressures; the Gazans might break into Egyptian territory or treat Egypt as the instigator and therefore a legitimate target for reprisals.

Egypt believes that Hamas is a genuine force in Palestine that can neither be ignored nor eliminated. However, Egypt also believes that Hamas, as an integral part of the radical destabilising forces in the Middle East, should be gradually contained. While Israel shares with Egypt the goal of containing radicalism, it shows indifference to Egypt’s gradualist approach. The recent war on Gaza testifies to Egyptian-Israeli differences in this regard.

Egypt’s dilemma stems from the fact that it is neither happy with Hamas nor capable of pressuring it beyond a certain limit. Egypt’s long-term policy had sought to guide Hamas toward a safe landing in the realm of moderation and pragmatism, but the Gaza war disrupted this endeavor. While that war is also likely to help accelerate Hamas’ moderation, the cost incurred by Egypt has been heavy and risky; it could have been avoided if it were not for the confrontational policies pursued by both Hamas and Israel.

The conflict in Gaza is another inconclusive war in the Middle East. It is inconclusive regarding the future of relations between Israel and the Palestinians and it is also inconclusive regarding relations between Egypt and Israel. The irony of the Gaza war is that its high human cost does not qualify it to be a turning point in the politics of the Middle East. The many questions left unanswered by the end of the war create a great deal of uncertainty. By the same token, the Gaza war does not look like a turning point in Egypt’s relations with Israel, which are likely to be clouded by regional uncertainties.

Three sources of such uncertainties should be watched very closely in the months to come: the nature of the new ruling coalition in Israel, Hamas’ post-war strategy, and the regional divide between radicals and moderates in the Middle East. Egypt’s attitude toward Israel is likely to be governed by an overall policy of balancing the uncertain contending forces of the region.

The prolonged negotiations regarding consolidation of the fragile ceasefire in Gaza already convey a sense of how relations among Egypt, Hamas and Israel are likely to look in the future. Egypt will be walking a tightrope between Hamas, Israel and the Middle East radicals for months to come. Even though Egypt was able to upset radical attempts to corner it during the conflict in Gaza, it is also interested in repairing the damage caused to its image among segments of the Arab public by the radicals’ propaganda war. And Egypt still needs to win Hamas’ cooperation in order to pursue a policy of Palestinian reconciliation.

Renewal of the peace process is the safe exit out of the current quagmire in the Middle East. The key to the peace process is in the hands of Israel’s next ruling coalition. The inconclusive results of the recent Israeli elections are not likely to help. A calculated and measured attitude toward Israel is likely to be Egypt’s approach in the months to come. The deep doubts regarding the very cause of peace that the Gaza war instilled among the Arab public make such a guarded approach inevitable.

*Gamal A. G. Soltan is a senior research fellow at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo, and a visiting professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.

VAVAVAVAV

HOPING FOR A NONVIOLENCE MOVEMENT IN PALESTINE

Achmad Munjid*

Source: The Jakarta Post (thejakartapost.com), January 18, 2009. This article is distributed by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission to republish.

Since I was a small child, I have been taught that the powerless party always deserves ‘affirmative action’ in any unbalanced conflict before a true resolution can be settled. As a Muslim who now lives in the West, I keep trying very hard to understand why so many in the mainstream West assume that the much more powerful Israel is the ‘good guy’, while the less powerful Palestinian is the ‘bad guy’ in the Palestinian crisis.

Is it compensation by the West for their ‘guilty feeling’ over the Holocaust? Is it more about the power of Jewish money? Is it related to skin-colour? How are we to understand that 200 ‘home-made’ rockets sent by Hamas to Israel during the first week of the crisis deserve more attention, as a proof of terrorism, than over 700 lives, mostly Palestinian civilians, taken by sophisticated Israeli weapons in the same week?

Many of my fellow Muslims and I have never agreed with Hamas which perceives every single Jew as the villain whose blood is halal (permissible by God) and therefore can be shed. We also disagree with some Muslims, including members of Hamas and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who want to wipe Israel from the map. A true „two-state‰ solution is the most reasonable option.

Moreover, I completely understand that any attack on Jews should remind all of us of the Holocaust which was the most horrible crime against humanity. Everyone should work to prevent that from happening again in our history, not only to Jews, but also to every human being. And surely, let us acknowledge that since 1948 the Palestinians have been suffering from a deep wound as a displaced and dispossessed people from their land.

However, in this satanic circle of violence, arguments for justified killings by either side, or why people should support one party rather than the other, are both endless and useless, or worse – are creating an even larger crisis. Clearly, the situation in Gaza today is much more complicated.

The temptation to continue to use weapons on both sides is terribly strong, either in the name of self-defence, justice, dignity, revenge or even God. I have no capacity whatsoever to tell them what is the right thing to do. For over 60 years, the use of weapons by the Palestinians has only provided justification for the Israelis to kill more and to occupy more Palestinian land.

If the Palestinians ceased using weapons, if Arab leaders and the Muslim world in general could help Hamas and other radical groups to stop the shooting, then Israel‚s justification to kill would cease to exist.

Let friends of Israelis argue the same point. Only when Israel, as the more powerful party stops using weapons, will those Muslim radicals, including Hamas that was created by Israel, have no legitimacy and lose Palestinian support. Israel must stop calling Hamas „ a terrorist organisation‰ and the Palestinians must stop defining Israelis as the „evil people‰. Peace can be made if they learn to talk and work together.

World leaders need to take every possible step towards peacemaking, and we – common global citizens – need to share in the responsibility. Beside the various efforts made thus far, from prayer to humanitarian efforts, we Muslims especially, need to react strategically. So far, many Muslims around the world have reacted in ways that increase the violence.

Yes, we have been sharing responsibility through prayers, fundraising, press releases, discussions, protests, art works and news exchanges. However, most of our actions stem from a „justification argument‰. For example, in my home country, Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world, Muslim protesters shut down the only synagogue last week because they assumed an automatic connection between Israel and Judaism. Some Indonesian Muslim groups, such as the Islamic Defender Front, (FPI) are even ready to send untrained voluntary troops to Gaza to fight.

Instead of helping the crisis, these reactions only magnify the waves of hate, vengeance and atrocity that extend from Gaza to the outside world. With Gaza as the epicentre of this violence, many Muslims worldwide identify with the oppressed Palestinian who wants to fight the enemy – the „evil Israeli‰.

Condemnation of the killing and helping victims, in whatever form, are very important. It is also equally important for Muslim leaders around the world to present the Gaza crisis not primarily as a conflict between „us‰ Muslims against „them‰ Jews. Both the Israeli government and Hamas deserve condemnation and both sides are responsible for the increasing number of casualties, many of whom are children, women and the elderly.

We need to speak out and act, not as a particular national or religious group, but as an inter-religious global community. We Muslims outside of Palestine need to collaborate with each and every morally concerned individual ˜ Muslim, Jew, Christian, black, white, female or male˜ to take care of the victims and work effectively for the same purpose: Peace.

By working together, not only can we isolate the Gaza violence, but, through our sympathy, support and hope, we can also disseminate a message of peace.

*Achmad Munjid is President of Nahdlatul Ulama Community in North America and a PhD candidate in Religious Studies at Temple University, Philadelphia. with permission from the author.

>>><><><><<<

U.S. FACES PARADIGM SHIFT IN RELATIONS WITH LEBANON

Mona Yacoubian*

Source: The Washington Times (www.washingtontimes.com), January 23, 2009. This article is distributed by the Common Ground News Service (CGNews) with permission for republication.

Following the recent violence in Gaza, the complex challenge posed by grassroots militant organisations such as Hamas in the Gaza Strip is poignantly clear. In Lebanon, the militant Shi’ite group Hizbullah, which fought another war with Israel in 2006, presents a similar conundrum for the Obama administration.

Hizbullah is certain to fare well in upcoming parliamentary elections, possibly echoing the January 2006 Palestinian elections when Hamas won a commanding majority.

Hizbullah hardly resembles a liberal-minded force for change. The inherent contradiction of an armed militia winning free and transparent elections is obvious. Hizbullah’s democratic tendencies and its commitment to political reform are certainly suspect.

Moreover, Hizbullah has benefited from Lebanon’s weak central government, showing little apparent interest in strengthening state institutions. Meanwhile, many Lebanese take great issue with Hizbullah’s reckless decision-making, taking Lebanon into a war with Israel and two years later turning its arms on fellow Lebanese.

And, of course, Hizbullah’s arsenal ˆ maintained in violation of UN resolutions 1559 and 1701 ˆ constitutes a key point of contention.

Yet, Hizbullah, with its deeply-entrenched grassroots support, is the most credible representative of Lebanon’s Shi’ites, the largest community in Lebanon’s volatile confessional mix.

Hizbullah’s dual nature as both an armed resistance group and a popular political and social movement underscores the ambiguities. Its supporters view it as both clean ˆ devoid of corruption ˆ and competent, providing key social services in the absence of an effective Lebanese state. It is, in effect, the most powerful representative of Lebanon’s largest community. As such, Hizbullah cannot simply be ignored, ostracised or replaced.

Hizbullah’s continued ascendance – particularly since the Israeli and Syrian military withdrawals in 2000 and 2005, respectively – suggests that the tectonic plates have shifted, reflecting a new demographic and political reality. Unfortunately, Lebanon’s power-sharing agreements – first in the 1943 National Pact and later with the 1989 Ta’if Accord – have not always reflected dynamic population trends. So far, attempts to recalculate Lebanon’s power-sharing formula have largely been achieved through violence, most notably the 1975-1990 Civil War.

Policies bent on disenfranchising or quashing any one community ˆ Christian, Sunni, Shi’ite, or Druze ˆ will insure the continuation of violence and instability.

The June 2009 elections provide an opportunity to address these issues peacefully and, if accompanied by appropriate reforms, could help put Lebanon on a path of peace and stability. As such, the key question is “How to integrate Hizbullah politically and turn it away from its resistance mode toward being a fully-vested political player in the Lebanese arena, while integrating its armed faction into the national security apparatus?”

From a US perspective, the answer to this question requires nothing short of a complete paradigm shift vis-à-vis policy in Lebanon.

Following the euphoria of Lebanon’s 2005 Cedar Revolution, Washington fell far short in helping the Lebanese to build on that momentous achievement by focusing its efforts on defeating Hizbullah at any cost.

After months of political paralysis and violence, Lebanon came to the precipice of civil war last May, only to pull back with the Doha Accord. Looking ahead, the United States needs to move away from policies that promote particular factions within Lebanon’s fractious political arena and instead seek to build consensus for reform and reconciliation among all Lebanese parties.

Specifically, the Obama administration should consider the following recommendations:

1. Gain a more nuanced understanding of Lebanon’s political and demographic realities. Well-crafted policy originates from nuanced, rigorous analysis. US policy must address Lebanon’s evolving confessional makeup, including Hizbullah’s role in the Shi’ite community, its intentions and long-term objectives. Under what conditions might Hizbullah evolve into a fully political actor and integrate its arms? To what extent can US policy and actions encourage this shift?

2. Stay above the political fray. Washington should resist the temptation to take sides and avoid getting sucked into the morass of Lebanese politics. Such policies have never yielded positive results and often exacerbate Lebanon’s volatility.

3. Focus on state institution-building and broad-based political reconciliation. US policy should seek to strengthen state institutions including parliament, the judiciary and the army. The US should assist government ministries in improving basic services and promote reforms that undermine corruption by establishing accountability and transparency. Washington also should facilitate reconciliation among Lebanon’s rival political factions by supporting the current National Dialogue.

4. Finally, the US should engage with Syria to help promote stability in Lebanon. Ultimately, Syria’s longstanding interests in Lebanon must be acknowledged, although such recognition does not translate to ceding Lebanese sovereignty. Specifically, the US should encourage the ongoing normalisation of ties between Lebanon and Syria. Damascus recently opened its embassy in Beirut, a historic milestone. The next, more important steps will be to demarcate the borders and address the numerous treaties governing relations that were signed during Syrian control over Lebanon.

*Mona Yacoubian directs the Lebanon Working Group at the US Institute of Peace. The views expressed here are her own and do not reflect the views of the Institute, which does not take policy positions. Yacoubian also serves on Search for Common Ground’s Middle East Advisory Board.

.///////|\\\\\\\.

RESPONSIBLE JOURNALISM SERIES: A VITAL MEDIUM

Khaled Diab*

This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews, www.commongroundnews.org) who distributed it. With for publication.

Although the Israeli-Palestinian media battlefield is bitter and deeply entrenched, journalists have a responsibility to venture into the no-man‚s-land between the two sides, even if it means getting caught in the crossfire. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one of the most protracted and bitter in the world. The acrimony and polarisation associated with the conflict has transformed the media itself into a veritable battlefield. In fact, the question of bias itself has become its own theatre in the media wars, with one camp accusing the media of possessing an anti-Israeli slant, while the other alleges an anti-Palestinian bias. The exchange of fire over this issue became particularly heated during the recent war in Gaza.

Faced with such hostility, even the most well-intentioned and balanced journalist can get caught in the cross-fire. Nevertheless, it is crucial that more journalists, particularly Israelis and Palestinians, abandon the narrow “us and them” dichotomy and pursue a line that is fair to both sides. While the power of the media should not be overstated, it has the potential either to fuel the conflict by entrenching and confirming negative stereotypes, perpetuating hostility and beating the drums of war˜or to advance the quest for peace by challenging and changing people‚s perceptions, building understanding and mending fences.

So, what can the media do to be more constructive? The media should highlight positives and not just fixate on negatives. In the western media it often seems that the Middle East produces little but violence. We all know that violence makes headlines, but non-violence and grassroots peace efforts should also be given prominent coverage. The Palestinian, Arab and Israeli media all need to dedicate more coverage to positive stories from the other side and not always view the other through the prism of the conflict. They also need to dedicate more space to building a deeper understanding of the cultural and social make-up of the other side.

The media should be a channel for creative and novel approaches to the conflict, as well as a conduit for debate. Online forums and social networking sites are playing a crucial role in this respect by enabling Arabs and Israelis to cross geographical and political divides and communicate directly. Opinion writers and columnists can also exercise significant influence. Column writing is about opinion and opinion is essentially subjective. But subjectivity, if coupled with balance, can be extremely helpful.

Personally, I try to use my Guardian column as a platform to: humanise both sides of the conflict; uphold consistent values when judging actions; challenge perceptions; think outside the box; and reflect the complex human, social and cultural reality of the two peoples in order to give space to those who dare to cross „enemy lines‰. In one series of articles I tackled head-on the stereotypes and misperceptions Arabs and Israelis have of each other. I have also explored alternative routes to peace, such as non-violence and a civil rights movement.

More creatively, I once wrote a column where I imagined a fictional and peaceful future in 2048, which led a reader to point-out an essay-writing contest (sponsored by the One Voice organisation and published by the Common Ground News Service) in which Israeli and Palestinian kids imagined their own peaceful futures. I was so moved by their visions for the future that I used another column to urge the adults to “let the children take over the peace process and bring to it the sensibility and competence of childhood.”

My approach has come under fire from both pro-Israelis and pro-Palestinians, often in reaction to the same text. Despite the entrenched hostility, such an approach does pay dividends. It is heartening to see that reaching common ground is possible. As one reader pointed out: “One-sided historical narratives are toxic. In attempting a unified narrative, you’re doing good work.” Another wrote: “Thanks for this encouraging article that can positively challenge everybody’s perceptions of this conflict.” I am often pleasantly surprised by the maturity of the debate that develops between readers of my articles. It is truly inspiring to see how constructive the voices of the ‘silent majority’ can be when brought into the debate. That is why a more balanced, media is essential if we want to see a positive outcome to this conflict.

*Khaled Diab is a Brussels-based journalist and writer who contributes a regular column to The Guardian in the UK.

^^^^^^^^

RESPONSIBLE JOURNALISM SERIES: HUMAN TRADGEDY AS A CATALYST FOR CHANGE

Yizhar Be’er*

This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews, www.commongroundnews.org), who distributed it with permission to publish.

Almost every violent national conflict is retained in the public consciousness through an emblematic image which captures the essence of the story. The first Gulf war brought us the pictures of the poor oil-coated cormorants trapped in a slick in the waters of the Persian Gulf. In the second Intifada it was the boy, Mohammed al Dura, who was caught in the crossfire between Israelis and Palestinians at Netzarim junction and killed in front of a French television camera. Etched in our memory from the most recent war in Gaza is the figure of Izzeldin Abuelaish, the Gazan doctor whose three daughters were killed by Israeli tank fire.

These images shape our consciousness thanks to one technological invention – the television camera. The ability to capture reality as it unfolds and immediately send it across the world has created a revolution, the full implications of which are still unknown. As the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu has said, television not only changes the way we see the world but also the world itself. In the battlefield, victory is no longer determined solely by the balance of power, the number of soldiers or the efficacy of their weapons. In fact, one can argue, the television camera is becoming increasingly as important as weapons of destruction in determining the outcome of war.

Countries, governments and armies fear an independent press in the battlefield and will do everything they can to prevent free access to the conflict zone, especially if the battlefield is located in a built-up civilian area. It should come as no surprise then, when each of the parties at war tries to monitor and restrict the movements of the press in an attempt to exploit it for propaganda purposes or at least prevent it from interfering with the proceedings.

Take, for example, the war in Iraq. It was conducted in a „sterile‰ fashion – almost entirely without the intervention of an independent press. And more recently, after the second Lebanon war, Israelis reached the conclusion that journalists roaming the battlefield contributed to the sense of failure that became associated with that war. In the Gaza war, Israel took the American approach to a new level by preventing local and foreign journalists from entering the zone altogether and only allowing limited access to a handful of military correspondents.

The results were predictable. Most Israelis were not exposed to the ‘harsh’ images from inside Gaza and the foreign press had no access to sources of information other than the IDF spokesman and Arab networks such as Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya. The result, no doubt, undermined the capacity of the public in Israel and across the world to know, understand and judge what was fully happening in that war.

Let us now return to the case of the Gazan doctor who lost three daughters in the war. The case unfolded live on Israel‚s Channel 10. Other TV channels and newspapers in Israel continued to follow the story and interview the doctor in the days that followed. The heart-rending image of Doctor Abuelaish entered every living room in Israel at a time when viewer ratings for news broke all records. Never before had a Palestinian received such empathetic coverage by the mainstream media in Israel. His was the figure of a modern day Job: a pacifist, a doctor who speaks Hebrew and a human being who continues to speak the language of peace even after his daughters were killed.

After the broadcast, many Israelis came to the hospital inside Israel where the doctor‚s other wounded children were being treated in order to console and encourage him. Others were moved to organise humanitarian aid missions to Gaza. The change in atmosphere was tangible even in the media. Reporters and programme hosts began challenging military spokesmen with tougher questions. Some people argue that this brought about an early end to the war. While it is not possible to prove this, there is no doubt it was a pivotal moment that left a deep mark on the Israeli psyche.

True, there were also antagonistic responses reflected in rumours and disinformation, such as the claim that the doctor‚s house was hit by Palestinian, not Israeli, fire. But the bottom line is that the story of Dr. Abuelaish humanised the suffering of the Palestinians in Israeli eyes more than anything else in this war.

Television made this phenomenon possible. The nature of the medium is that it leaves editors with little choice. In an era of competition between television stations, no editor can afford to miss out on such dramatic coverage. This is both good and bad. On the one hand, television can air superficial, tabloid, even pornographic content that incites hatred and encourages violence. But on the other hand, television‚s lack of inhibition can also open the medium, enabling it to present the other side with a human face.

How do we preserve the good and minimise the bad? The first step is to purchase video cameras and distribute them amongst people living in conflict zones. Success is guaranteed. This model was adopted by different organisations working in conflict areas. B‚tselem for example, distributed cameras to Palestinians in the West Bank who used them to document injustices and the violence of the occupation from within – pictures that were then screened on Israeli television over and over again. This, in turn, gave rise to investigations and charges against particular officers and soldiers.

People engaged in a protracted national conflict tend to reject, ignore and deny the narratives of the enemy. Television can help achieve the opposite. By broadcasting the tragic truth of conflict we personalise and humanise the other. Television coverage of this sort can increase tolerance, empathy and heightened awareness that might, in turn, enable us to come to the aid of a civilian population more effectively. Perhaps it will also help shorten the duration of wars and, when necessary, warn against their recurrence.

*Yizhar Be‚er is Executive Director of Keshev – The Center for the Protection of Democracy in Israel, and previously served as Executive Director of B’Tselem – The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. During the first Intifada, Be’er was a Ha’aretz correspondent in the Occupied Territories. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews, www.commongroundnews.org), who distributed it with permission to publish.

*Yizhar Be‚er is Executive Director of Keshev – The Center for the Protection of Democracy in Israel, and previously served as Executive Director of B’Tselem – The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. During the first Intifada, Be’er was a Ha’aretz correspondent in the Occupied Territories.

>><><>+<><><<

INTERFAITH HARMONY FOR WORLD PEACE AND HUMAN UNITY

Subhash Chandra*

This article was first presented as a Paper for ‘A Global Congress on “World’s Religions after September 11 – An Asian Perspective” In New Delhi from January 17-20, 2009 at New Delhi, India, in Session 5: Theme: Religion, Conflict and Peace (Grassroots Initiatives) on 18^th Jan.2009

Introduction:

We are living in extremely explosive times where the context of human life is changing every moment. Our society is crumbling; the wave of destruction is constantly taking over the way of life. In spite of the remarkable material progress made by the human being due to advancement of science & technology, mankind is still facing the following challenges:

• Increase in Violence;
• Increase in Stress & Tension;
• Increase in Frustration & Depression;
• Increase in Violence ;
• Decrease in Human values due to cultural pollution; and
• Decrease in quality of life & finally
• Decrease in Peace & Happiness in human life.

With the advent of the year 2001, we have entered into new century- with the assault on the twin towers on September 11, 2001 which has created ripples not only in USA but in the whole world. At the dawn of the new millennium, what is required most is ‘Peace & Spirituality ‘. Religions play an important role in building peace & harmony and also developing nonviolent global sustainable society

Many wars have been fought with religion as their stated cause, and with peace as their hoped-for end.

• War: wrong or just?
• The pacifist view: all violence and killing is wrong.

To meet these challenges & to save the humanity from further destruction we have to change our attitude from  ‘ Culture of violence  ‘ to ‘Culture of Peace’ & we have to change our consciousness from ‘Impure (Violent) Consciousness’ to   ‘Pure (Peace) Consciousness’

.

Human Conflicts & Culture of Violence

More than five thousand years ago the civilization was smoldering in the violent inferno of hatred. Great War was fought between Kauravas (dark forces) & Pandavas (peaceful forces). Sri Krishna, as a ‘Shanti Doot (Messenger for Peace) tried his best to see that there was a peace between the Kauravas & the Pandavas. Sri Krishna even pleads: “If you, O King, will not give the Pandavas half the kingdom, which is theirs by right and by agreement, give them any five villages you like.” But Duryodhana is adamant & full of egoistic feeling he says: “I will not give them so much even as the space of a single needle.”  Duryodhana even disregards the advice given him ‘Bhishma & Drona’ (his senior minister & Guru) and he rejected peace offers.

The Kauravas were eager for battle; the Pandavs desired peace.

“Blessed are the peacemakers”, said Jesus

Human Conflicts in 20th Century:

The nuclear age begins on a quiet stretch of desert in Alamogordo, New Mexico on July 16, 1945.On that day humanity took a long step on the road to its own demise.

Robert Oppenheimer, a principal scientist in the effort to create the atomic bomb, is reported have recalled this line from the Bhagvad Gita,”I am become death the shatterers of worlds.” Just three weeks after the first test, a second atomic bomb was exploded, this time over the city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, Hiroshima became death.

Three days later, on Aug.9, 1845, Nagasaki became death. Opppenheimer and its fellow scientists were, indeed, shatterers of worlds.

Reflections of Twentieth Century:

“The twentieth century was perhaps the deadliest in human history, devasted by innumerable conflicts, untold sufferings, and unimaginable crimes. Time after time, a group or a nation inflicted extreme violence on others, often driven by irrational hatred and suspicion or by unbounded arrogance and thirst for power and resources. In response to these cataclysms, the leaders of the world came together at mid -century to unite the nations as never before. A forum was created – the United Nations- where all nations could join forces to affirm the dignity and worth of every person and to secure peace and development for all people.” -

Said Kofi Anan – Secretary General of United Nations in 2001

Human Conflicts in 21^st Century:

Mankind in the third millennium seems fated to repeat the pattern of the last five centuries in terms of continued recurrence of wars and conflicts.

With the advent of the Year 2001, we have entered into new century and new millennium, eight years into the third millennium, this state of affairs shows no sign of change despite the experience of the twentieth century- a conflict ridden century in which wars became total and horrendous in their destruction.

New Century & new millennium begins with Terrorist attack on World Trade Center, NY, USA on Sept.11, 2001- hijacked planes crashed into World Trade Center & Pentagon leaving over 3000 dead. It was the biggest terrorist attack not only World Trade Center, but it was attack on Humanity around the world. In the same year on Dec.13, 2001 Indian Parliament House was attacked, this was an attack on biggest democracy of the world, and 9 people were killed .There after the Twin Towers came down, the deadly dance of conflict, violence and destruction Continues to range around the globe.

“We have entered the third millennium through a gate of fire. If today, after the horror of Sept.11, we see better and we see further we will realize that humanity is indivisible. New threats make no distinction among races, nations, or regions. A New insecurity has entered every mind, regardless of wealth or status. A deeper awareness of the ties that bind us all – in pain as in prosperity – has gripped young and old.”-

Said Kofi.A.Anan, Secretary General, United Nations

Role of Religions:

Today we all are at the verge of atomic destruction and when every body is busy in the mad rat race of materialistic pursuit, interfaith harmony will be a relief. We should make an effort to peep into the prominent religions of the world and find out a secular message for the man kind. Our aim should be to enlighten and educate the masses about all the religions, so that the message of universal brotherhood is spread throughout the world.

Religion as a social force plays an important role to achieve oneness of humanity in modern civilization

Why Interfaith Harmony?

Religions are different roads converging to the same point. It does not matter if we take different roads, so long as we reach the same goal. Ram, Rahman, God are all attempts on the part of man to name that invisible force which is greatest of all forces. Islam is a religion of peace in the same sense as Christianity and Hinduism are. Every religion of the world desires for Peace, Unity & Happiness. Basically, all religions believe in peace, equality and helping the less fortunate. To live in peace one must respect all religions

The crisis humanity faces today is a spiritual crisis, and it can only be resolved by interfaith harmony.

Interfaith Harmony

Throughout history, God has revealed Himself to humanity through a series of divine Messengers, whose teachings guide and educate us and provide the basis for the advancement of human society. These Messengers have included Abraham, Krishna, Zoroaster, Moses, Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad. Their religions come from the same Source and are in essence successive chapters of one religion from God.

Interfaith harmony is Unity of minds, & unity of culture & unity of all mankind through Truth, Love & Compassion.

Interfaith harmony is a philosophy which includes the basic truths of all religions. It preaches a universal message, a message of harmony, and a message of unity & peace.

Baha’u'llah said, “The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens,” and that, as foretold in all the sacred scriptures of the past, now is the time for humanity to live in unity.

Shanti (Peace) & Shanti Chakra?

Shanti Chakra

World Peace & Human Unity

The ‘Chakra’ is the Sanskrit word for “Wheel”. The ‘Chakra (Wheel)’ is the symbol of Life and “Shanti Chakra is Wheel of Peace. The eight spokes of the Shanti Chakra represent the eight major religions of the world meeting at the hub or center of the wheel for Religious harmony.

Every medium or religion is an extension of the foot denoting a reaching out to the people with a message of peace & harmony. The center of Shanti Chakra represents ‘Unity’.

The Search for Global Peace:

‘Shanti’ is a Positive Cosmic Energy, which is a state of mind which produces Balance, Peace & Harmony

Peace is not just the absence of war. Peace is a way of life. ‘Peace is a balance, a state of mind in which we feel good about our lives, our Families, our friends, our communities, our future, and ourselves’

The ‘World Peace’ implies ‘Global Peace’ and not a restricted one confined to one Country or one Nation.

God has many different names because there are many different religions but essentially, it is the same God. As there is only one God who created the whole universe, then there should be no difference from one person to another. Major world religions involved are Bahaism, Buddhism Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Judaism, Buddhism they all teach about universal peace & Human unity through Love & compassion.

Basically, all religions believe in peace, equality and helping the less fortunate. To live in peace one must respect all religions.

Unity of All Religions:

Unity for Humanity is ‘leading to respect for each individual, society and organization, and project and their synthesis for greater purpose of unity for humanity.

Unity is built from a shared vision, a cherished hope, an altruistic aim, or a cause for the common good. Unity for humanity can be achieved through Unity of religions. Unity of Religions can be achieved through Unity of Minds; and Unity of minds can be achieved when minds are elevated to higher consciousness.

Bahaism – All humanity is one family

The Bahá’í teachings emphasize that all of us, ‘as creations of one God, are part of one human family.’

Baha’u'llah said, “The tabernacle of unity hath been raised; regard ye not one another as strangers. Ye are the fruits of one tree, and the leaves of one branch.”

Buddhism- One Humanity: One Meadow

“All the races and tribes in the world are like the different coloured flowers of one meadow. All are beautiful. As children of the creator they must all be respected”.-

-His Holiness of the Dalai Lama

Christianity

“The Pope spoke of the pluralism faiths and called for an inter-religious dialogue to build a better world free of nuclear danger, the arms race, poverty, ignorance, discrimination, persecution and suffering, ensuring development, dignity and justice for all.”

Hinduism – “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam”-The world is one family

The “BHAGVAD GITA” synchronizes peace in all things leading to ETERNAL PEACE.

“The peace in the sky, the peace in the mid air, the peace on earth, the peace in waters, the peace in plants, the peace in forest trees, the peace in all gods, the peace in Brahman, the peace in all things, the peace in peace, may that peace come to me. (Rig Veda X)”

Islam- Islam is a religion of peace.

The word ISLAM and the Arabic word for Peace “Salaam” both have the same origin, “Salima”. The Muslims are taught to greet each other by saying ‘Salamun Alaykum – Peace be upon you.’ In Islam, one of the names by which God is known is “Salaam” which means peace.

Islam seeks to promote peace at the following levels:

1.       Peace within one’s self.

2.       Peace with others.

3.       Peace with everyone including past enemies.

4.       Ensure that we always apply justice and never transgress against others even if they are our enemies. and

5.       Repel evil actions with good actions, in order to replace hatred with an intimate friendship.

Sikhism & World Peace

Sikhism is a believing only in One God who is a Creator, Sustainer and Destroyer of the Universe. He is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient.

In Sikhism everyone is expected to lead an honest truthful life under the concept of fatherhood of God and brotherhood of mankind. Sikhism rejects idolatry, caste system, ritualism, asceticism, concept of chosen people, celibacy, superstitions, austerities etc.

Jainism

Man should subvert anger by forgiveness, subdue pride by modesty;

Overcome hypocrisy with simplicity, and greed by contentment.

- Samanasuttam, 136

Jainism assumes that the universe, with all its components, is without a beginning or an end, being everlasting and eternal.  The wheel of time incessantly revolves like a pendulum.

Jainism is a religion of love and compassion to all living beings.

World Peace & Human Unity

Every culture, every religion & every nation has its own beliefs & values. The integration of culture is required which can be achieved by interfaith & harmony. The sense of differences & separateness is the fundamental problem in the minds of the people. However we have to live with differences and we have to understand the differences by elevating the level of consciousness.

We have no choice but to work with people with different cultures, different religions & different values than us. Peace & Human unity can be achieved by understanding & accepting the people despite the differences.

Five Principles of Unity of Religions:

1.       Principle of Cooperation & Respect: Human unity is cooperation and respect for each other. “Accept all religions & respect them as we respect our own religion”.

2.       Principle of dialogue: Peace can be achieved through dialogue. Dialogues among religions foster mutual respects and deeper understanding of faiths.

3.       Principle of Understanding & Tolerance: Understanding & Tolerance improves the relationship between the people & unity of religions.

4.       Principle of Love: “Love & Compassion for others open the doors for unity of people & unity of religions.”

5.       Principle of Universal responsibility:

“To me human unity is having deep roots of universal responsibility in your heart. And universal responsibility means that you feel the sufferings as well as the happiness of the people all across the world, without considering the barriers of gender, ethnicity, religion or nationality.” – said H.H.Dalai Lama

Human Transformation:

Human transformation is the process of inner revolution of the individuals of the society from the culture of violence to culture of peace.

Society exists for the individual, and not the other way round. Society is always becoming static, and individual is always dynamic. The transformation of the outer, the society, can not take place without inner revolution of the individuals. We need to keep in mind that peace is not merely the absence of war. Peace develops from inside the individual. It cannot be imposed on anyone from the outside; education is not merely based upon culture but also upon spirituality. We can only have lasting and solid peace when people are trained from early childhood to be kind, charitable, humble, patient, concerned for the needs of others.

Self-transformation leads to world transformation.

Paradigm shift:

The present crisis is a signal for humanity that warns us of the need for transformation of consciousness. A profound transformation is required in our thought system, value system & consciousness system.

Fear, hatreds and greed are the main components of human conflict & division of humanity, which leads to violent social order. To achieve culture of peace & oneness of humanity fear has to be substituted by confidence, hatred by compassion and greed by sharing through the Principles of Tolerance, Truth and Non-violence.

Culture of Peace can be established through unity of all religions & the principles of Human Unity, which are the main pillars of Global Peace and Oneness of humanity

• From division of Humanity to Unity of Humanity;
• From Culture of Fear to Culture of Freedom;
• From Culture of hatred to Culture of Heart;&
• From culture of violence to Culture of Peace

Culture of hatred has to be converted into Culture of heart through Principle of Love and Compassion.

Conclusion: Global Peace & Oneness of Humanity.

The basis for Global Peace is ‘self-transformation’ and ‘self-transformation leads to world transformation.’

We are part of a global whole, everything in the universe are interconnected & interdependent through the principle of integration.

‘Vasudhaiva Kuttumbhkam’ – The world is one family has been expressed in our scriptures. The oneness of humanity has been a fundamental belief of Indian Civilization. Global Peace is Oneness of Humanity. Oneness of Humanity can only be achieved through interfaith harmony.

Universal Responsibility for World Peace.

“I believe that to meet the challenges of our times, human beings will have to develop a greater sense of universal responsibility. Each of us must learn to work not just for one self, one’s own family or one’s nation, but for the benefit of all humankind. Universal responsibility is the key to human survival. It is the best foundation for world peace.” – H.H.Dalai Lama

The 21st century will not be a century of violence and conflict but of a century of peace and religion which will set the standards of life how we live with nature, what kind of society we develop, and how to make united world. People will be the nerve centers with cosmic (peace) consciousness. They will set the cultural norms for oneness of humanity. They will create the advances in civilization that determine how we respond to the human conditions over the next century and beyond.

“No Peace among the nations without peace among the religions;

No Peace among the religions without unity among the religions;

No Unity among the religions without Human unity of peoples; and

No Human Unity among the people without unity of minds.”

Dr. Subhash Chandra is ‘Ambassador for Peace – Universal Peace Federation (UPF), India, Honorary Associate Professor at the Intercultural Open University (IOU), The Netherlands, President- World Peace & Cultural Centre (WPCC), Ujjain (MP), India, and   Project Director- Global Peace & Humanity Project. Presently actively involved in Peace & Values Education for Leadership programs in India and associated with ‘Interfaith Harmony for Peace’ programs in India & abroad. Contact No.M- 91-09910241586; E-mail: scpeace2000@yahoo.com.

}—->>>——-+++<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<==+++==>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>+++——-<<<—-{