JustASC

Gidi Grinstein, president of Israel’s non-partisan strategy group the Reut Institute, has a memo offering advice for the Obama administration. We exchanged emails this week, in which I put to him some of the issues and preconceptions bandied about most often these days among Jewish organizational types

ASC: Is the window fast closing on the two-state solution, as Tom Friedman argued this week?

The two-state solution is increasingly perceived as irrelevant. But this paradigm will only collapse when a new paradigm is ripe to take its place. There is no such paradigm in sight. So the two-state solution will be around for a while and will probably frame the Obama administration’s Mideast strategy.

ASC: American Jews have been wondering if Israel has “won” the war, even as we disagree on what victory would even look like. To me the only “stronger” position is the one that gets Israel and Palestinians to some sort of deal, while others think “victory” is defined by vanquishing Hamas and anyone else who calls for Israel’s destruction. How close if at all did the war get in achieving either end? Is there another I’m missing?

GG: For Zionism, peace is victory. For the some Palestinians, peace would be acknowledging defeat. Also, victory has become a very elusive concept in spite of Israel’s obvious military superiority. The reason is that Israel does not want to take the Palestinian territories over so there is a de facto glass ceiling to our willingness to use force.

ASC: Was the rocket fire from Gaza and the war it necessitated a refutation of the Gaza settlement pullout? Did it mortally undermine the idea of dismantling settlements in the West Bank?

GG: There are two powerful schools regarding Israel’s national security: the first says Israel must leave the Palestinian areas and deal with the consequences. For this school, leaving Gaza was very important and they don’t want to see Israel returning to Gaza. The second school says we should stay and deal with the implications of staying. For them, the withdrawal has been a mistake from inception.

ASC: Some American Jews, including Abe Foxman, dread the idea of “even-handedness” on the part of George Mitchell, or any American envoy. His argument is that with so many countries lined up against Israel, Israel needs a “dishonest” broker to right the balance. Is there merit in this argument? How do you view even-handedness?

GG: Israel needs to remain America’s leading strategic partner in the area. This does not necessarily mean that America cannot be an honest broker. Remember that most Israeli p.m.’s invited American pressure to push through difficult decisions.

ASC: Is it feasible to think of Hamas playing any sort of a constructive role in the peace process or a Palestinian unity government? David Grossman has written of the need to engage Hamas. Can that be done? Should it?

GG: The last war represents a de facto Israeli recognition of the reality of Hamas control of Gaza. The next logical and inevitable step is to engage it primarily on issues relating to the border regime.

ASC: American Jews have, I think, a weak understanding of the necessary roles other regional powers like Saudi Arabia and Egypt have in any peace process. What positive role can they play from Israel’s perspective, if any?

Check out Tom Friedman’s recent piece on that. It covers everything.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 30th, 2009 at 10:40 am and is filed under JustASC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.