Comments on: One or two states? The status quo is Israel’s rational choice

By: Dick Mulliken

Dick Mulliken — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 20:39:37 +0000

Yes, exactly. So, you see, the problem is solved. There is no Palestine Israeli conflict

By: Y.

Y. — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 17:20:58 +0000

@Lisa, XYZ

Sorry for being late (was very busy), but I did promise to get back on this.

See for example:

http://www.mattrees.net/2009/08/15/west-bank-settlers-and-memories-of-sharon/

“It’s strange to see the photo now. When this interview took place, Sharon was under attack from the kind of extreme settlers featured in the Details piece. That’s because he’d just pulled Israeli settlers out of the Gaza Strip. He told me his plan was to do the same thing in the West Bank, difficult though it might be. Then he had his stroke, and his replacement wasn’t strong enough to continue that path.”

Well, that’s pretty clear, though I wished I could get the text of the interview, but something like the ‘hitkansot’ was definitely planned…

By: Sydney

Sydney — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 20:49:40 +0000

“I will address the desirable ways to change the Israeli decision-making equation in a separate post”

Nu?

By: Kubrikon

Kubrikon — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 06:04:55 +0000

Joel, very interesting. Thanks for the link, though it is a bit too far into political economics for me to read it.

Basically what you are describing is that both sides are caught in that mutually suboptimal quadrant of a long-term prisoner’s dilemma and steps towards a more optimal arrangement are sabotaged by the other side due to lack of trust that they will be followed through till the end.

I have to agree that this is an interesting way to look at it. I also agree with you and Dan that actions by both sides are very strongly related to their internal politics.

By: PetraMB

PetraMB — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 22:29:41 +0000

Lisa Goldman, thank you for the link, but it is as I thought: What Noam claims Sharon “himself” said is actually a Weissglass quote, and in the article you link to, Sharon only reaffirms his commitment to the Roadmap. So, in other words, the Sharon quote Noam claims exists — doesn’t exist.

By: Joel

Joel — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 12:42:48 +0000

@Dan: Ps. So, I agree with you completely, I think the same rational definitively apply to the Palestinians as well.
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Further support for this (on both sides) is that the policies towards the other party is so strongly related to internal policies (of power and cohesion).

By: Joel

Joel — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 12:38:45 +0000

@Dan, Tom and Kubrikon: Interesting discussion!
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I also think (and have for some time) that the conflict dynamics here support the status quo or a “low intensity conflict.” The fact that both sides benefit most by staying away from all out war and real pace also leads to a perverted negative feedback loop; which is to say, that when one side moves towards peace the other side counters by moving away from it, to maintain the status quo and vise versa.
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One of the studies supporting this kind of negative feedback loop between public opinion of one side in relation to the action of the other side’s leadership is here: http://www.polisci.umn.edu/~freeman/BCF20070718.pdf

By: DAN

DAN — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 15:31:43 +0000

Maybe the same analysis applies to the Palestinians as well – for them as well maintaining the status quo is for now better than the alternatives (such as giving up on the refugees’ “rights”) at least in terms of internal politics, that would also explain why the situation is stuck.

By: Kubrikon

Kubrikon — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 19:20:07 +0000

Dan, The Palestinians making an effort to hurt Israel can increase the costs of the status quo but it also undermines any willingness to grant the Palestinians additional territory or power.

Tom, you provide an interesting parallel. The history of Southern Africa is really fascinating. I agree with your position that the Palestinians are undermining their own argument for a two state solution by not explicitly, permanently and clearly accepting such a solution a priori.

I would also argue that the geographic scale and the potential security threats faced by South Africa and Israel are vastly different. South Africa was the undisputed military superpower in that region with no challengers. South Africa is also about 50 times the size of Israel. As such, the withdrawal from Namibia was a threat to South Africa only in the possibility of terrorist camps springing up on that border rather than as a potential existential military danger acting if it acted in concert with its neighbors.

By: Tom Mitchell

Tom Mitchell — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:39:09 +0000

South Africa faced a similar situation with Namibia. Like the territories, Namibia was captured in what the South Africans considered to be a defensive war (WWI) but as international conditions changed (decolonization in Africa) pressure increased to withdraw. One American analyst, Robert S. Jaster, claimed that Pretoria had no fixed policy but that the policy was a function of domestic politics. P.W. Botha was more interested in domestic reforms of apartheid resulting in neo-apartheid, which was rejected by both Africans and Afrikaner nationalists. After the ruling National Party split and a domestic insurrection was defeated, South Africa agreed to withdraw from Namibia in exchange for a peace agreement that gave it more security than the status quo ante. Such an agreement was possible because the liberation movement in Namibia, SWAPO, and the liberation movement in South Africa were separate. For the Palestinians having liberation movements that encompass both the territories and the refugees makes it much more difficult to convince Israel that it will be more secure without the territories. SWAPO also had the Cuban presence to trade away.