Plan B gives glimpse of Palestine’s future
Yes, there is a connection between the downing Thursday of a Malaysian Airlines jet over eastern Ukraine and the Israeli invasion of Gaza the same day.
And no, it isn’t the inevitable conspiracy theory, the if-it-helps-you-then-you-musthave-caused-it delusion that the Israelis shot down the Malaysian plane in order to divert world attention from their military action, though that is exactly what occurred.
To be honest, a preliminary check of the lunatic fringes found not a whisper of this, which surprises me. It must be on the way.
The Israeli/Palestinian standoff is not an area where rational thought is much rewarded. The Israelis seem content to play jailer to a restive, belligerent and growing population of 4.5 million Palestinians jammed into the West Bank and Gaza. It is a failure of empathy on Israel’s part, which I’d fault them for more except it is enlightened benevolence compared to the Palestinians, nearly a third of whom elected a terror group, Hamas, to lead them, which makes their cries of injustice ring hollow. If Israel is locked in the outdated land-equals-security calculus, Palestinians keep returning to the same tattered 1947 game plan — we fight you and win everything someday — that has been losing for the past 67 years.
Meanwhile the world, which doesn’t give a fig about much, doesn’t give a fig about this, except for those who hate Israel on a good day and really, really hate Israel now that it’s drawing blood, for reasons they vehemently insist have nothing at all to do with it being Jewish. Reading their emails and fielding their phone calls has left me with one thought: You don’t have to be antiSemitic to condemn Israel, but it sure helps.
So while Israel is dismantling Hamas tunnels and accidentally killing civilians — something Hamas is frantically trying to do intentionally — there will be a next month and a next year. Just because there is no hope now, this moment, doesn’t mean nothing will ever happen and this standoff will continue forever. So let’s ask my favorite question, one I like to bring up only because no one else does: How does this end? Everyone has a plan. The Palestinians and their sympathizers expect the Israelis to hand the country over and magically vanish, back to Poland per- haps. (Funny; the same people demanding Israel welcome back descendents of those it displaced in 1948 would recoil in horror if you suggested descendents of the Jews annihilated in 1945 return to claim their ancestral lands. Why is that?) The right wing in Israel is hardly much better; they would like to squeeze the Palestinians into ever-smaller knots of misery as they nibble at the land they feel God Himself gave to them.
Because Israel supposedly is the adult in the room, I believe it should come up with a plan. Announce that Gaza and the West Bank will be an independent Palestinian nation on such and such a date, its borders will be here. It isn’t ideal, Israel will say, but it’s what we’re giving you — a start — and we’ll be happy to discuss specifics later after you’ve shown you are a peaceful neighbor. If China and Taiwan can do it, so can we.
That would never work, on one level, because Hamas would reject it. Great. Let them. On another, it would change everything. I was glad to hear Roey Gilad, Chicago’s consul general from Israel, bring up that very idea last week, calling it “Plan B.” “Israel would like to separate,” he said. “Israel is seriously considering Plan B: unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank.” Support is “stronger than ever.” About time.
The downside is where the Malaysian airliner comes in. Gilad didn’t mention it, but the problem with quitting the territories is the first thing they always do, as their first baby step toward nationhood, is to attack the powerful Israeli military machine. Not the first step I would take, but there you go.
The Israelis know, from hard experience, that they’ll have to go charging back in, as they are doing now, to destroy the military capability being flung at them. They have to. Sneak in a few of those Russian missile launchers and economic life would stop.
But eventually Palestine would get the message, the way Egypt, Jordan, et al., have. They could move on to the next problems.
When you puff away the fog of confusion, either that happens or Israel becomes South Africa. Two choices. I’d pick Plan B.
Yes, Israel would have to go charging back. But if you look at today’s headlines, they’re doing that anyway. Israel is good at defeating aggressive neighbors; not so good at keeping them captive. End the latest carnage. Take a breath. Then implement Plan B. Give Palestinians their country whether they want it or not. It’s worth a try.