02-05-2020, 11:00 PM
*** 6-Feb-20 World View -- Israeli diplomat reveals Israel's startling new 'pragmatic' foreign policy
This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
****
**** Israeli diplomat reveals Israel's startling new 'pragmatic' foreign policy
****
![[Image: g200205b.jpg]](http://Media.GenerationalDynamics.com/ww2010/g200205b.jpg)
President Obama glares furiously after Benjamin Netanyahu rejects Obama's peace plan and 'lectures' Obama on the reason - in this iconic photo taken at an Oval Office meeting on May 20, 2011 (Reuters)
There was a program on al-Jazeera today that a discussed possible
close relationship between Israel and Sudan. One of the people
interviewed is Alon Liel, a former Israeli diplomat to a number of
different countries.
I found what he said about Israel's strategy to be quite
startling. It described a major change in strategy by Israel's
leadership that occurred 15 years ago:
<QUOTE>"The founders of Israel aimed at political, social,
cultural integration of Israel with the Middle East. The plan was
that this would result in integration with the Arabs and the
Palestinians, and peace.
About 15 years ago this was dropped. Nobody in Israel among the
Jewish politicians is speaking about peace with the Palestinians
today.
The basic assumption is that since we will not have peace with the
Palestinians, the Muslim-Arab world will never accept Israel
politically.
The change is that we are aiming at economic, technological, maybe
some intelligence relations, and supply the arab countries, muslim
african countries, with basic economic needs, in order to improve
relations bilaterally.
This does mean that Israel is aiming to be part of the Mideast.
We forgot about it. We behave as a European country, the
leadership of Israel today sees Israel as a Western country, part
of Europe, if you want, part of the United States, but definitely
not part of the Middle East.
Even with Egypt and Jordan, where we have really stable peace,
it's based on security and some economic technological issues, not
on political support. The public doesn't like us - no in Egypt,
not in Jordan - definitely no cultural relations, no tourism. So
there is a different approach in Israel. We are rich.
If you want, Sudan, if you want, any other poor country on the
globe, we can give you what you need, if you normalize relations
with us economically, because more we cannot give."<END QUOTE>
This could be described as a "very pragmatic" foreign policy.
Israelis and Arabs will always hate each other, but Israel is willing
to spend money to keep the peace.
****
**** Implications of Israel's new 'pragmatic' policy
****
This major change of policy took place about 15 years ago, or about
2004. I can't recall ever reading anything about this change of
policy. I guess I've been fooled as much as anyone else.
It was just a week ago that President Trump announced his "Peace to
Prosperity" Mideast peace plan. In my article, I said that there's no
way that this Rube Goldberg peace proposal is going to survive. ( "29-Jan-20 World View -- Trump announces fantasy 'Peace to Prosperity' Mideast peace plan"
)
So what the hell was all that? Was it just a big show that had
to be put on for international leaders who are always demanding that
the US take a "leadership role" in the Mideast peace process, so that
they can shoot it down. Is that why Trump put forth this farcical
peace plan?
There is one strange thing that I would like to mention. When
Benjamin Netanyahu was at the White House with Trump last week
to announce the "peace plan," I noticed something that was off --
Netanyahu was always had a broad grin on his face, and gave me
the impression that he was laughing at the whole thing. And now,
in retrospect, I would say that he probably was laughing at the
whole thing, because he knew it was just a show. Did Trump know
it was just a show? I don't know.
****
**** Bush, Obama and Trump -- Mideast peace plans
****
This policy change took place 15 years ago, soon after president
George Bush published his "Mideast Roadmap to Peace on May 1, 2003. I
predicted at that time that Bush's peace plan would never succeed,
because Israel and the Palestinians would be re-fighting the bloody
1948 war between Jews and Arabs that followed the partitioning of
Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. ("Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace? (1-May-2003)")
A major policy change like this often is part of a major generational
change, and that seems to be the case here. From the point of view of
generational theory, Israel transited from a generational Unraveling
era, when the public mood strong favors compromise, into a
generational Crisis era, when the public mood becomes more xenophobic
and nationalistic. This occurred in 2006, 58 years after the end of
the bloody 1948-49 Jewish-Arab war, when enough of the survivors
of that war all disappeared (retired or died), all at once, leaving
behind younger, much more belligerent generations.
And recall that 2006 was the time of Israel's disastrous 2006 invasion
of Lebanon to attack Hezbollah. Israel panicked when two Israeli
soldiers were abducted near Lebanon's border, and conducted a highly
emotional, organic and uncontrolled invasion of Lebanon. The war was
a disaster for all involved. After a few months, the war had run its
course, with nothing accomplished except to destroy a lot of Lebanon's
infrastructure in airstrikes, and displace a lot of Lebanese from
their homes.
One more memory -- 2005 was the year when Israel withdrew from Gaza
and turned it over to the Palestinians as a gesture of peace,
something it now regrets. The was perhaps the last major decision of
Israel's Unraveling era, prior to the beginning of the Crisis era, and
the disastrous 2006 invasion of Lebanon.
The next event of note occurred in May 2011, when President Obama
offered his own Mideast "peace plan." ( "20-May-11 News -- Obama and Netanyahu in sharp disagreement after speech"
)
You may recall the picture at the beginning of this article, which was
taken on May 20, 2011, just after Obama presented his peace plan to
Netanyahu and the public. It became famous because Obama was glaring
at Netanyahu as the latter was rejecting Obama's plan, and was lecturing
Obama why it wouldn't work.
What's interesting about this today is that, just as I wasn't aware
that Israel had had a major change of policy five years earlier,
apparently Obama hadn't gotten that memo. Hadn't Obama bothered
to inform the Obama administration of Israel's new policy?
Which brings us back to Trump's "Peace to Prosperity" peace plan,
presented by Trump to Netanyahu in the White House last week.
Netanyahu didn't lecture Trump the way he had lectured Obama.
Instead, he was grinning broadly the whole time, and seemed to
be enjoying the joke. Did Trump get the joke? Had Trump
gotten the memo?
One way of looking at it is that Trump did get the memo, and the plan
was consistent with Israel's new "pragmatic" regional policy. In
particular, Trump promised $60 billion to Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt to
spend on Palestinians to implement the rest of the policy. That
certainly is consistent with the pragmatic approach.
Unfortunately, we get back to the other problems that I raised in my
January 29 article. The average in the Palestinian territories is
around 20, which means that most of the Palestinians are literally
children. And those children will not accept the "pragmatic"
proposals, even if their geezer leaders so.
Sources:
Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu,
Alon Liel, Sudan, Egypt, Jordan, George Bush, Barack Obama
Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal
John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe
This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
- Israeli diplomat reveals Israel's startling new 'pragmatic' foreign policy
- Implications of Israel's new 'pragmatic' policy
- Bush, Obama and Trump -- Mideast peace plans
****
**** Israeli diplomat reveals Israel's startling new 'pragmatic' foreign policy
****
President Obama glares furiously after Benjamin Netanyahu rejects Obama's peace plan and 'lectures' Obama on the reason - in this iconic photo taken at an Oval Office meeting on May 20, 2011 (Reuters)
There was a program on al-Jazeera today that a discussed possible
close relationship between Israel and Sudan. One of the people
interviewed is Alon Liel, a former Israeli diplomat to a number of
different countries.
I found what he said about Israel's strategy to be quite
startling. It described a major change in strategy by Israel's
leadership that occurred 15 years ago:
<QUOTE>"The founders of Israel aimed at political, social,
cultural integration of Israel with the Middle East. The plan was
that this would result in integration with the Arabs and the
Palestinians, and peace.
About 15 years ago this was dropped. Nobody in Israel among the
Jewish politicians is speaking about peace with the Palestinians
today.
The basic assumption is that since we will not have peace with the
Palestinians, the Muslim-Arab world will never accept Israel
politically.
The change is that we are aiming at economic, technological, maybe
some intelligence relations, and supply the arab countries, muslim
african countries, with basic economic needs, in order to improve
relations bilaterally.
This does mean that Israel is aiming to be part of the Mideast.
We forgot about it. We behave as a European country, the
leadership of Israel today sees Israel as a Western country, part
of Europe, if you want, part of the United States, but definitely
not part of the Middle East.
Even with Egypt and Jordan, where we have really stable peace,
it's based on security and some economic technological issues, not
on political support. The public doesn't like us - no in Egypt,
not in Jordan - definitely no cultural relations, no tourism. So
there is a different approach in Israel. We are rich.
If you want, Sudan, if you want, any other poor country on the
globe, we can give you what you need, if you normalize relations
with us economically, because more we cannot give."<END QUOTE>
This could be described as a "very pragmatic" foreign policy.
Israelis and Arabs will always hate each other, but Israel is willing
to spend money to keep the peace.
****
**** Implications of Israel's new 'pragmatic' policy
****
This major change of policy took place about 15 years ago, or about
2004. I can't recall ever reading anything about this change of
policy. I guess I've been fooled as much as anyone else.
It was just a week ago that President Trump announced his "Peace to
Prosperity" Mideast peace plan. In my article, I said that there's no
way that this Rube Goldberg peace proposal is going to survive. ( "29-Jan-20 World View -- Trump announces fantasy 'Peace to Prosperity' Mideast peace plan"
)
So what the hell was all that? Was it just a big show that had
to be put on for international leaders who are always demanding that
the US take a "leadership role" in the Mideast peace process, so that
they can shoot it down. Is that why Trump put forth this farcical
peace plan?
There is one strange thing that I would like to mention. When
Benjamin Netanyahu was at the White House with Trump last week
to announce the "peace plan," I noticed something that was off --
Netanyahu was always had a broad grin on his face, and gave me
the impression that he was laughing at the whole thing. And now,
in retrospect, I would say that he probably was laughing at the
whole thing, because he knew it was just a show. Did Trump know
it was just a show? I don't know.
****
**** Bush, Obama and Trump -- Mideast peace plans
****
This policy change took place 15 years ago, soon after president
George Bush published his "Mideast Roadmap to Peace on May 1, 2003. I
predicted at that time that Bush's peace plan would never succeed,
because Israel and the Palestinians would be re-fighting the bloody
1948 war between Jews and Arabs that followed the partitioning of
Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. ("Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace? (1-May-2003)")
A major policy change like this often is part of a major generational
change, and that seems to be the case here. From the point of view of
generational theory, Israel transited from a generational Unraveling
era, when the public mood strong favors compromise, into a
generational Crisis era, when the public mood becomes more xenophobic
and nationalistic. This occurred in 2006, 58 years after the end of
the bloody 1948-49 Jewish-Arab war, when enough of the survivors
of that war all disappeared (retired or died), all at once, leaving
behind younger, much more belligerent generations.
And recall that 2006 was the time of Israel's disastrous 2006 invasion
of Lebanon to attack Hezbollah. Israel panicked when two Israeli
soldiers were abducted near Lebanon's border, and conducted a highly
emotional, organic and uncontrolled invasion of Lebanon. The war was
a disaster for all involved. After a few months, the war had run its
course, with nothing accomplished except to destroy a lot of Lebanon's
infrastructure in airstrikes, and displace a lot of Lebanese from
their homes.
One more memory -- 2005 was the year when Israel withdrew from Gaza
and turned it over to the Palestinians as a gesture of peace,
something it now regrets. The was perhaps the last major decision of
Israel's Unraveling era, prior to the beginning of the Crisis era, and
the disastrous 2006 invasion of Lebanon.
The next event of note occurred in May 2011, when President Obama
offered his own Mideast "peace plan." ( "20-May-11 News -- Obama and Netanyahu in sharp disagreement after speech"
)
You may recall the picture at the beginning of this article, which was
taken on May 20, 2011, just after Obama presented his peace plan to
Netanyahu and the public. It became famous because Obama was glaring
at Netanyahu as the latter was rejecting Obama's plan, and was lecturing
Obama why it wouldn't work.
What's interesting about this today is that, just as I wasn't aware
that Israel had had a major change of policy five years earlier,
apparently Obama hadn't gotten that memo. Hadn't Obama bothered
to inform the Obama administration of Israel's new policy?
Which brings us back to Trump's "Peace to Prosperity" peace plan,
presented by Trump to Netanyahu in the White House last week.
Netanyahu didn't lecture Trump the way he had lectured Obama.
Instead, he was grinning broadly the whole time, and seemed to
be enjoying the joke. Did Trump get the joke? Had Trump
gotten the memo?
One way of looking at it is that Trump did get the memo, and the plan
was consistent with Israel's new "pragmatic" regional policy. In
particular, Trump promised $60 billion to Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt to
spend on Palestinians to implement the rest of the policy. That
certainly is consistent with the pragmatic approach.
Unfortunately, we get back to the other problems that I raised in my
January 29 article. The average in the Palestinian territories is
around 20, which means that most of the Palestinians are literally
children. And those children will not accept the "pragmatic"
proposals, even if their geezer leaders so.
Sources:
- White House on 'We can't go back': Israeli PM rejects 1967 border proposal Face to face, Netanyahu says Obama vision for Mideast peace unrealistic (NBC News, 20-May-2011)
- Trump’s Middle East peace plan ‘will die’ before president, Iran’s top leader says (Fox News, 5-Feb-2020)
- Palestinians say Trump's deal is racist. But their leaders are bereft of ideas on how to fight it (CNN, 5-Feb-2020)
- Palestinians push UN Security Council to condemn Trump plan, Israel (Jerusalem Post, 5-Feb-2020)
Related Articles:
- Trump announces fantasy 'Peace to Prosperity' Mideast peace plan (29-Jan-2020)
- Obama and Netanyahu in sharp disagreement after speech (20-May-2011)
- Channeling Sisyphus, Trump and Abbas say Mideast peace not as hard as it looks (04-May-2017)
- Palestinian 'Oslo Generation' relationship with Israel extremely toxic and explosive (18-Oct-2015)
- Obama administration ends effort to pressure Israel on settlements (08-Dec-2010)
- Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace? (1-May-2003)
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu,
Alon Liel, Sudan, Egypt, Jordan, George Bush, Barack Obama
Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal
John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe
