Salom now!
Mobilising the untapped power of Arab and Israeli
peaceniks
Khaled Diab
August 2006
Part I – Silent world
Peace begins
at home
In the stalemate-prone
Middle East, people are accustomed to the idea of looking to the outside world
to provide the missing momentum for a resolution to their conflicts. But, yet
again, the international community as a whole has presented a woefully
inadequate and pitiful response to the ongoing fighting.
The United
States is busy waging its own wars in the Middle East and American foreign
policy is geared, for numerous reasons, towards backing Israeli belligerence.
In addition, Washington’s top neo-con strategists seem to be convinced that a
new Middle East can only be born out of the smoking rubble of the existing one.
Destruction is construction. Peace is war. Civilisation
is savagery.
Meanwhile,
Europe – which arguably is the only major world player with a realistic chance
of making a difference, if only it had the will – has been unable to overcome
its internal inertia and exercise the ‘soft power’ of its massive political and
economic clout to help dissipate the crisis.
The only
action Arab leaders – who have kept a low profile throughout this crisis –
could manage was to decline politely a visit from US Secretary of State
Condoleeza Rice to their capitals, preferring to meet her and other western
leaders in the distant anonymity of Rome, where, again, the international
response was notable only for its absence.
This reflects
that it is perhaps time for Arabs and Israelis to realise that the only answer
to their problems is direct dialogue.
Joint
umbrella against the storm
The fighting sparked a great deal of popular disquiet
across the region: anger in Arab countries and a creeping sense of ‘Are we
doing the right thing?’ in Israel. Since governments are failing so dismally to
resolve the underlying conflicts and make a difference, it is time for ordinary
people to make their voices and wishes heard.
Of course, there have already been anti-war
demonstrations in most Arab countries and in Israel, but they have been small
and characterised by a certain despondency and despair. But more needs to be
done. I believe that Lebanese, Palestinian and Israeli peace activists need to
join forces to amplify their calls for a halt to the current violence – and
pave the way to a comprehensive settlement.
Together, they should forge a single
trans-national Arab-Israeli civil alliance. Imagine the symbolic potency, if
during a crisis such as the one in Lebanon, thousands of Arabs and Israelis had
come out at the same moment on to the streets of cities across the Middle East
chanting the same slogans, or joining together in a peace chain stretching
across the border.
Under this umbrella, peace activists, rather
than being lone voices in the wilderness, can, in stereo, condemn the recent
violence, call for a laying down of arms, demand the withdrawal of troops and
the breaking of the siege around Gaza, and even call for the resumption of
peace talks.
For Arab activists, being part of such an
umbrella group would help them demonstrate that not all Israelis are pro-war
and that many have misgivings about their government’s actions. For the
embattled Israeli peace movement, it would provide them with some ammunition to
show critics that Arabs are humans, too, and not all are would-be ‘terrorists’.
Making the
pieces fit
There are already several small groups and
movements attempting to cross the lines and engage in joint action with the
other side, particularly on the Israeli-Palestinian front. One is Combatants for Peace, which is
made up of Israeli and Palestinian refuseniks.
“We no longer believe that the conflict can be
resolved through violence,” the group’s mission statement states. “We believe
that the bloodshed will not end unless we act together to terminate the occupation
and stop all forms of violence… We will use only non-violent means to achieve
our goals and call for both societies to end violence.”
Other groups include Gush Shalom (Peace Bloc), set up
in 1993 by veteran Israeli journalist and peacenik Uri Avnery, which held
numerous anti-war demonstrations – albeit smaller ones than in the past –
during the recent crisis bringing together Israeli Jews and Arabs. “Jews and
Arabs refuse to be enemies,” demonstrators chanted at one rally. “We shall not
die nor kill in the service of the USA!”
Women have been particularly active in the
effort to build bridges. Since it was founded in November 2000, the Coalition of Women for Peace has
been a vocal advocate of “a just and viable peace between Israel and
Palestine”. It is made up of independent women and nine Israeli and Palestinian
women’s peace groups, including the world famous Women in Black movement.
Obstacles on
the path to a people’s peace
In the current climate, forging even a
loose-knit alliance of peace activists from across the Arab world and Israel
would be a challenge, since the people involved would be open to charges of
being ‘traitors’ by their own societies. But it is at times like these that
such a coalition of the peaceful is most needed.
“The 2000 withdrawal from Lebanon
demonstrated the power of activism. Israeli peace activists played an important
role in accelerating the pullout but it was ultimately a military affair,”
maintains the ICG’s Rabbani.
However, he believes the chances
of joint Arab-Israeli activism, particularly on the Lebanese front, slim. “I
can’t see the prospect of co-operation between Israeli and Lebanese activists.
The dynamic between Lebanon and Israel is completely different to that between
the Israelis and the Palestinians. In many ways, Lebanese civil society is more
hostile towards the Israelis.”
But my inquiries reveal that
Lebanese civil society is not necessarily averse to the idea of working
together with like-minded Israelis and other Arabs. “I myself support such an
initiative. I am even ready to be an effective team member,” Habbouba Aoun of Balamand University
in Lebanon, who is also a prominent NGO leader, told me.
“Yet evidence has taught me that the civil
society in our part of the world cannot do much,” she tempers. “The problem is
not in or with the civil society. It is
in the formatting of the young generations and the brainwashing that is taking
place. I am afraid what was planned… at the political level is what is going to
take place despite any aspirations or dreams of peace.”
Brainwashing and demonisation are problems that
have afflicted Arab-Israeli relations
For decades. “We need to find ways to confront
simplistic stereotypes,” Sherman Rosenfeld, director of Israel’s National
Centre for Project-based Learning at the Weizmann Institute of Science, told
me. “I know that many Israeli Jews think that all Arabs are (potential)
terrorists. I'm sure – from the other side – there are many Israeli Arabs
who think that all Jews are (potential) oppressors.”
Rosenfeld has been involved in several
educational projects which have sought to build trust between Israel’s Jewish
and Arab citizens. “I think that the work we’ve done with project-based
learning is a promising direction, but of course, there are other possibilities
as well. Such projects would break down barriers and establish more connections
between Israeli Arabs and Jews.”
Power to the
peaceful
To overcome the pitfalls ahead, the Arabs and
Israelis involved in my proposed alliance would not need to agree on the causes
of the current crisis, and they most certainly would not need to agree on
historical narrative, all they would have to agree on is that violence is not
the answer and that common ownership of a peaceful future is a desirable
outcome.
Over time, the players involved can negotiate
the terms under which they will co-operate further. Aoun outlines what she
believes are the pre-requisites of such common action. These include forging a
common mission and vision, sharing expectations and gaining the commitment of
the international community that it will back these grassroots efforts.
Once a common platform has been established, I believe
that leading peaceniks on both sides can come together and negotiate a
comprehensive ‘people’s settlement’ to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The traditional top-down approach to ‘peace
making’ has failed miserably for decades. It is high time for the people of the
Middle East to take their destiny into their own hands and show their leaders
how things should be done.
Part II – Silent world
From the
archives
Crisis
in
From
complete failure to comprehensive solutions
July 2006 – Israel ’s
massive onslaught against Lebanon
– and before that Gaza
Getting to the grassroots of the Middle
East conflict
By Khaled Diab and Katleen Maes
April 2006 – The new Kadima party’s election
victory in
Part I: Getting to the grassroots of the
Middle East conflict
Part II: The end of the road for
unilateralism?
The EU’s new Palestine
February 2006 – It may be better for the EU to
provide more carrots and fewer sticks for Hamas, writes Khaled Diab. Read on
Dressed
to kill –
Under
the cloak of Bush’s foreign policy
December 2005 – Jeff Sommers, Khaled Diab and Charles
Woolfson expose what lies beneath the cloak of US President George W Bush’s
foreign policy. Read on
Time
to rethink the EU’s role in the Middle East
January 2005 –
If Yasser Arafat’s death is to signify anything more than the symbolic start of
a new era, the European Union must radically rethink its role as a mediator in
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to persuade the two peoples to work towards a
new dawn. Read on
Commission
wants closer EU-Israeli ties
January 2005
– The European Commission and the EU’s former envoy to the Middle East have
both come out in favour of enhancing economic and political ties with
ă2006 K. Diab. Unless otherwise stated, all the content on this website
is the copyright of Khaled Diab.