The Jerusalem Post has published an extremely interesting interview with Israel's Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon. Ya'alon is the former head of Military Intelligence, Israel Defense Forces OC Central Command, and chief of the IDF General Staff. Jerusalem Post interviewers David Horovitz and Herb Keinon point out that Ya'alon speaks about Israel's current challenges vis-à-vis the Palestinians, Iran and the Obama administration from a position of knowledge and experience.
Excerpts from the interview conduced with Ya’alon in his Jerusalem office last week.
US and the peace process:
There is a lack of clarity about what the US is asking of Israel. What are their demands?
The US is Israel’s ally. This is a deep, strategic, alliance, based on common values and interests. But between friends there are disagreements that sometimes become public. On the one hand, there are disagreements, on the other there is a continuing dialogue.
We have different approaches stemming from a different viewpoint about the challenges before us. Each side sees it a bit differently.
We hear there are those in the US Administration who believe the source of the instability in the Middle East is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and that it is therefore important to deal with that first, and bring it to a conclusion as quickly as possible. There are those who think that you can solve this in two years, more or less, based on the Clinton parameters.
Most of us in the government have accompanied the diplomatic process over the last 17 years. We have a different view of the challenges before us, and what the priorities need to be in the Middle East.
We do not think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the heart of the issue. I would even say that if Israel, God forbid, ceased to exist, the US and the West would need to deal with the wave of jihadist Islam. That is the main problem.
When we condense this conflict to a territorial one, either in Lebanon or in Gaza, we see that our withdrawals strengthened jihadist Islam. That is an example of differences in view that we share with the US.
The second difference, obviously, has to do with Iran. We see the Iranian issue as the most important.
If you are looking for a center for instability, it is not the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; it is precisely the Iranian government. It fuels the jihadist Islamic wave.
Does the US not see in Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s refusal to accept Ehud Olmert’s generous offer in 2008 as a lack of willingness on the Palestinian side to come to an agreement?
Apparently not. From the dawn of Zionism there has not been a Palestinian leadership willing to recognize Israel’s right to exist as the national home of the Jewish people. This is the source of the problem, and not what is called the occupied territories since ’67. The opposition to Zionism began before we liberated Judea, Samaria and Gaza; before we established a state.
In order for there to a proper prognosis, you need a proper diagnosis. We are arguing, and not only with them, but with the Israeli Left, about what is the root of the problem. Part of the issue, which influences the US and European positions, is our internal confusion.
I also used to think the solution was land for peace, until I became the head of military intelligence, saw things from up close and my thinking underwent an evolution.
But how do we remain Jewish and democratic? There is a majority who believe we have to separate here.
First of all, we disengaged politically in Judea and Samaria, and physically from Gaza. The policy of the Netanyahu government is that we don’t want to rule over them. But not ruling over them does not mean we have to withdraw to the 1967 borders, which are indefensible borders; or that we have to divide Jerusalem in order to bring Hamas snipers into Jerusalem.
The prime minister has said he is ready for two states. Are you?
What he said is that we don’t want to rule over them … And as he said at Bar-Ilan University, if at the end of the day they will be willing to recognize the right of a national home for the Jews; that refugees will not return into Israel; that their political entity will be demilitarized and we will get international guarantees for that; and that an agreement would mean an end to the conflict, then you can call it what you want – a state, even an empire.
We are willing to move forward in Judea and Samaria with the government of Abu Mazen [Abbas] and Salam Fayyad. But for this we don’t have to return to the ’67 borders or divide Jerusalem; we don’t have to place ourselves in danger again.
There is a general denial – including by Fayyad – of the connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel. He gave a lecture at an interfaith conference in New York two years ago about the sanctity of Jerusalem, and he talked about how it was holy for Christianity and Islam. How is it possible to deny the connection between the Jewish people and Jerusalem? How?
Have you seen any improvement in this attitude recently?
No, there is no change. There is a change in tactics. They understood that terror doesn’t work, especially after 9/11. It is better to characterize this as opposition to occupation, that is more convincing in the postcolonial world, because those who don’t know the details here think we are colonialists, deny that this was our home dating back 3,000 years.
Those who want to continue the Oslo process, who want us to continue to give and give and give, without a Palestinian willingness to recognize our right to a national home, are cooperating with the phased plan for Israel’s destruction.
Before Annapolis, which was not that long ago, Abu Mazen – the head of a government considered moderate – was asked by Olmert to agree at the end of the conference to a declaration saying ‘two states for two peoples.’ He was not willing.
Saeb Erekat was asked why not on Al Jazeera, and said because there is no Jewish people; that Judaism is a religion, and why should a religion get a state.
Israel’s critics say enlarging settlements helps Palestinian extremists and ruins any efforts to get the Palestinians to recognize our right to be here.
The prime minister said before the elections he was willing to accept the commitments of the previous government, among them the understanding between [George] Bush and [Ariel] Sharon, that no new settlements would be built in Judea and Samaria, and that construction in the settlements would be allowed [to enable] normal life, not exactly natural growth. That was the understanding, and construction continued through the Olmert and Sharon governments.
More than that, he [Netanyahu] said we accept our commitment regarding dismantling 23 outposts that were defined by the Sharon government as illegal. He accepted that, until it became clear that the US administration does not accept the commitments of the previous administration.
Secondly, we completely reject the argument that the settlements are the reason there is no peace. I think Arafat was willing to go to Oslo because of the settlements. When he saw the [massive Russian] aliya, and the settlements, he thought he was going to lose everything.
But if we are talking about coexistence and peace, why the insistence that the territory they receive be ethnically cleansed of Jews? Why do those areas have to be Judenrein? Don’t Arabs live here, in the Negev and Galilee? Why isn’t that part of our public discussion? Why doesn’t that scream to the heavens?
Do you really want Jews to live there under Palestinian authority? Is that realistic?
First, we are very far from that. I am not talking about that. I am talking about Jews living in Judea and Samaria under Israeli sovereignty and citizenship. Why is it impossible to get to that solution if we are really headed toward peace and coexistence?
Do you really think Jews will be allowed to live there under Israeli sovereignty in a future Palestinian entity?
In Judea and Samaria, if you are talking about peace, there is enough place for Jews and Arabs. If you are talking about war, it is more complicated. How much open space do you have in Judea and Samaria? Quite a bit. What percentage of the territory do the Jews control? Five percent. That is what everything hinges on?
Obama and Jerusalem:
We tried to prevent a conflict with the [US] administration. The [settlement housing start] moratorium was an attempt on one hand not to give in – we did not go for a complete not-even-one-brick freeze – and on the other hand to avoid a conflict. But now we see that this did not succeed.
But here there is also an issue of trust between us and them [the US]. We heard from the secretary of state after we declared the moratorium that it was unprecedented, and that the ball was now in the Palestinian court.
What have the Palestinians done since then to enter the negotiations? What have they done? For a full year they did nothing to get into the process, and all of a sudden the ball is back in our court because of the excuse of 1,600 apartments that went through a bureaucratic process in Jerusalem?
Does that not reflect deep gaps with the Administration?
I am not hiding the conceptual gaps, there are differences.
And is the Administration’s direction now not toward imposing something on us?
If someone really thinks they can impose peace just like that, then they are detached from reality. I hope we will not get to that. This is an existential issue that we have to be insistent about. We need to talk, continue with the dialogue, but there are significant differences in how we view things.
What will happen if Obama stands up in September and says this is our plan? How do you react?
There have been so many plans in the past, so many proposals, and none of them were implemented. I hope we don’t get to that.
If the Arab world feels that the US has given Israel a cold shoulder, then the likelihood of an outburst of violence will increase. Therefore, we need to do continue to talk [to the Administration], share with them our thoughts, and prevent the types of situations that we have been reading about over the last few days in the papers.
You talk about the possibility of a renewed outburst of violence. Do we have the internal solidarity to withstand it when you have people saying the government’s polices on settlements are leading to problems with the US and perhaps to war?
The internal challenge is indeed a challenge. When people ask me what is the greatest internal challenge, I say one word – confusion. We have seen that when there is internal unity and consensus, there is no external pressure. We saw that after the Bar-Ilan speech. On the settlement issue there is no consensus, so it is no coincidence the Americans jumped on that issue.
In Jerusalem there is a consensus, but still the Americans are applying pressure.
You hear different voices from the Labor Party [on Jerusalem inside the government] and that causes us great damage.
Many of our internal disagreements end with us blaming ourselves. Many say that Oslo failed because of us, because we didn’t give enough.... This is a Western phenomenon, especially a Jewish one. And it is dangerous.
Most people in the country don’t feel Oslo failed because of us. But there are many who believe that not stopping the settlements is complicating our situation.
That is the role of leadership, and the job of education. We need to explain the challenges we are facing, what we are up against, and what we are willing to fight and struggle for.
This is an existential struggle – the War of Independence has not ended. From a historical perspective, all the wars we fought, from 1948 and even before the establishment of the state, up until now, are part of a War of Independence for the existence of a national home for the Jewish people after 2,000 years of exile.
We cannot fold on Jerusalem. What is Jerusalem? It is Zion. Why did my mother come here after the Holocaust, why did my grandparents come here in 1925? They came to Zion. From my wife’s side, her grandparents left Morocco and came in 1897 after walking here for two years. Another predecessor came here in the 1600s. Why here?
Excerpts from the interview conduced with Ya’alon in his Jerusalem office last week.
US and the peace process:
There is a lack of clarity about what the US is asking of Israel. What are their demands?
The US is Israel’s ally. This is a deep, strategic, alliance, based on common values and interests. But between friends there are disagreements that sometimes become public. On the one hand, there are disagreements, on the other there is a continuing dialogue.
We have different approaches stemming from a different viewpoint about the challenges before us. Each side sees it a bit differently.
We hear there are those in the US Administration who believe the source of the instability in the Middle East is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and that it is therefore important to deal with that first, and bring it to a conclusion as quickly as possible. There are those who think that you can solve this in two years, more or less, based on the Clinton parameters.
Most of us in the government have accompanied the diplomatic process over the last 17 years. We have a different view of the challenges before us, and what the priorities need to be in the Middle East.
We do not think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the heart of the issue. I would even say that if Israel, God forbid, ceased to exist, the US and the West would need to deal with the wave of jihadist Islam. That is the main problem.
When we condense this conflict to a territorial one, either in Lebanon or in Gaza, we see that our withdrawals strengthened jihadist Islam. That is an example of differences in view that we share with the US.
The second difference, obviously, has to do with Iran. We see the Iranian issue as the most important.
If you are looking for a center for instability, it is not the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; it is precisely the Iranian government. It fuels the jihadist Islamic wave.
Does the US not see in Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s refusal to accept Ehud Olmert’s generous offer in 2008 as a lack of willingness on the Palestinian side to come to an agreement?
Apparently not. From the dawn of Zionism there has not been a Palestinian leadership willing to recognize Israel’s right to exist as the national home of the Jewish people. This is the source of the problem, and not what is called the occupied territories since ’67. The opposition to Zionism began before we liberated Judea, Samaria and Gaza; before we established a state.
In order for there to a proper prognosis, you need a proper diagnosis. We are arguing, and not only with them, but with the Israeli Left, about what is the root of the problem. Part of the issue, which influences the US and European positions, is our internal confusion.
I also used to think the solution was land for peace, until I became the head of military intelligence, saw things from up close and my thinking underwent an evolution.
But how do we remain Jewish and democratic? There is a majority who believe we have to separate here.
First of all, we disengaged politically in Judea and Samaria, and physically from Gaza. The policy of the Netanyahu government is that we don’t want to rule over them. But not ruling over them does not mean we have to withdraw to the 1967 borders, which are indefensible borders; or that we have to divide Jerusalem in order to bring Hamas snipers into Jerusalem.
The prime minister has said he is ready for two states. Are you?
What he said is that we don’t want to rule over them … And as he said at Bar-Ilan University, if at the end of the day they will be willing to recognize the right of a national home for the Jews; that refugees will not return into Israel; that their political entity will be demilitarized and we will get international guarantees for that; and that an agreement would mean an end to the conflict, then you can call it what you want – a state, even an empire.
We are willing to move forward in Judea and Samaria with the government of Abu Mazen [Abbas] and Salam Fayyad. But for this we don’t have to return to the ’67 borders or divide Jerusalem; we don’t have to place ourselves in danger again.
There is a general denial – including by Fayyad – of the connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel. He gave a lecture at an interfaith conference in New York two years ago about the sanctity of Jerusalem, and he talked about how it was holy for Christianity and Islam. How is it possible to deny the connection between the Jewish people and Jerusalem? How?
Have you seen any improvement in this attitude recently?
No, there is no change. There is a change in tactics. They understood that terror doesn’t work, especially after 9/11. It is better to characterize this as opposition to occupation, that is more convincing in the postcolonial world, because those who don’t know the details here think we are colonialists, deny that this was our home dating back 3,000 years.
Those who want to continue the Oslo process, who want us to continue to give and give and give, without a Palestinian willingness to recognize our right to a national home, are cooperating with the phased plan for Israel’s destruction.
Before Annapolis, which was not that long ago, Abu Mazen – the head of a government considered moderate – was asked by Olmert to agree at the end of the conference to a declaration saying ‘two states for two peoples.’ He was not willing.
Saeb Erekat was asked why not on Al Jazeera, and said because there is no Jewish people; that Judaism is a religion, and why should a religion get a state.
Israel’s critics say enlarging settlements helps Palestinian extremists and ruins any efforts to get the Palestinians to recognize our right to be here.
The prime minister said before the elections he was willing to accept the commitments of the previous government, among them the understanding between [George] Bush and [Ariel] Sharon, that no new settlements would be built in Judea and Samaria, and that construction in the settlements would be allowed [to enable] normal life, not exactly natural growth. That was the understanding, and construction continued through the Olmert and Sharon governments.
More than that, he [Netanyahu] said we accept our commitment regarding dismantling 23 outposts that were defined by the Sharon government as illegal. He accepted that, until it became clear that the US administration does not accept the commitments of the previous administration.
Secondly, we completely reject the argument that the settlements are the reason there is no peace. I think Arafat was willing to go to Oslo because of the settlements. When he saw the [massive Russian] aliya, and the settlements, he thought he was going to lose everything.
But if we are talking about coexistence and peace, why the insistence that the territory they receive be ethnically cleansed of Jews? Why do those areas have to be Judenrein? Don’t Arabs live here, in the Negev and Galilee? Why isn’t that part of our public discussion? Why doesn’t that scream to the heavens?
Do you really want Jews to live there under Palestinian authority? Is that realistic?
First, we are very far from that. I am not talking about that. I am talking about Jews living in Judea and Samaria under Israeli sovereignty and citizenship. Why is it impossible to get to that solution if we are really headed toward peace and coexistence?
Do you really think Jews will be allowed to live there under Israeli sovereignty in a future Palestinian entity?
In Judea and Samaria, if you are talking about peace, there is enough place for Jews and Arabs. If you are talking about war, it is more complicated. How much open space do you have in Judea and Samaria? Quite a bit. What percentage of the territory do the Jews control? Five percent. That is what everything hinges on?
Obama and Jerusalem:
We tried to prevent a conflict with the [US] administration. The [settlement housing start] moratorium was an attempt on one hand not to give in – we did not go for a complete not-even-one-brick freeze – and on the other hand to avoid a conflict. But now we see that this did not succeed.
But here there is also an issue of trust between us and them [the US]. We heard from the secretary of state after we declared the moratorium that it was unprecedented, and that the ball was now in the Palestinian court.
What have the Palestinians done since then to enter the negotiations? What have they done? For a full year they did nothing to get into the process, and all of a sudden the ball is back in our court because of the excuse of 1,600 apartments that went through a bureaucratic process in Jerusalem?
Does that not reflect deep gaps with the Administration?
I am not hiding the conceptual gaps, there are differences.
And is the Administration’s direction now not toward imposing something on us?
If someone really thinks they can impose peace just like that, then they are detached from reality. I hope we will not get to that. This is an existential issue that we have to be insistent about. We need to talk, continue with the dialogue, but there are significant differences in how we view things.
What will happen if Obama stands up in September and says this is our plan? How do you react?
There have been so many plans in the past, so many proposals, and none of them were implemented. I hope we don’t get to that.
If the Arab world feels that the US has given Israel a cold shoulder, then the likelihood of an outburst of violence will increase. Therefore, we need to do continue to talk [to the Administration], share with them our thoughts, and prevent the types of situations that we have been reading about over the last few days in the papers.
You talk about the possibility of a renewed outburst of violence. Do we have the internal solidarity to withstand it when you have people saying the government’s polices on settlements are leading to problems with the US and perhaps to war?
The internal challenge is indeed a challenge. When people ask me what is the greatest internal challenge, I say one word – confusion. We have seen that when there is internal unity and consensus, there is no external pressure. We saw that after the Bar-Ilan speech. On the settlement issue there is no consensus, so it is no coincidence the Americans jumped on that issue.
In Jerusalem there is a consensus, but still the Americans are applying pressure.
You hear different voices from the Labor Party [on Jerusalem inside the government] and that causes us great damage.
Many of our internal disagreements end with us blaming ourselves. Many say that Oslo failed because of us, because we didn’t give enough.... This is a Western phenomenon, especially a Jewish one. And it is dangerous.
Most people in the country don’t feel Oslo failed because of us. But there are many who believe that not stopping the settlements is complicating our situation.
That is the role of leadership, and the job of education. We need to explain the challenges we are facing, what we are up against, and what we are willing to fight and struggle for.
This is an existential struggle – the War of Independence has not ended. From a historical perspective, all the wars we fought, from 1948 and even before the establishment of the state, up until now, are part of a War of Independence for the existence of a national home for the Jewish people after 2,000 years of exile.
We cannot fold on Jerusalem. What is Jerusalem? It is Zion. Why did my mother come here after the Holocaust, why did my grandparents come here in 1925? They came to Zion. From my wife’s side, her grandparents left Morocco and came in 1897 after walking here for two years. Another predecessor came here in the 1600s. Why here?