Wednesday, November 12, 2014

The thin green line - Dr. Eyal Levin



by Dr. Eyal Levin


During the first few days of Operation Protective Edge in the summer, Israeli troops were told they should avoid driving through Wadi Ara with their military vehicles. For those who didn't catch that, let me explain: The state told its armed forces they must not assert Israel's sovereignty in the area, in the nation's heartland, whose Hebrew name is Nahal Iron.

The political wisdom behind this decision may have to do with past events in that region. This includes the violent Arab protests over the expropriation of land in the 1970s (what has become known has Land Day, marked on March 30 each year with demonstrations) and the Al-Aqsa Intifada 25 years later. It turns out Israeli Arabs -- as we have labeled them -- perceive themselves first and foremost as Palestinian. We have also realized that their potential for violence is just as high as that of their brethren beyond the Green Line (the pre-1967 border with Jordan). 

The logic behind the tactical decision to maintain a low-key presence in Wadi Ara is simple: The Arabs want to hold demonstrations and cut Israel's main arteries; if Israeli forces stay out of that area, the entire rationale for holding the protests becomes void. 

But this political wisdom means that Israel is burying its head in the sand. For the past several decades, we have fooled ourselves into believing that our conflict with the Palestinians involves only those Arabs who have orange identification cards and live beyond the Green Line. According to that logic, the other Arabs, those who hold the blue identification cards of Israeli citizens and permanent residents, are different. The "blue card Arabs" live among us in the Israeli democracy; they attend our universities; they are exposed to the Western values that we, the Jews, proudly espouse. It is not surprising, then, that they have tried to assert themselves as a distinct group in the only democracy in the Middle East. 

The artificial distinction between the Palestinians who want statehood and the Israeli Arabs, who see their fate inextricably linked to that of the Jewish state, has had the Left try to redraw the Green Line. In the first few decades following the Six-Day War, the Green Line became increasingly blurred. But in the late 1980s, and later when the Oslo Accords were signed, it made a comeback. 

The line was elevated to a whole new level when Israel decided to construct a security barrier that essentially followed its route. Anytime Israeli authorities have tired to deviate from the original Green Line -- even if this was a minor tweak -- the High Court of Justice intervened and ordered a rerouting. 

Ironically, those who should have welcomed Israel's renewed embrace of the Green Line as Israel's future border are the very people who blur the distinction between the Arabs on both sides of the Green Line. The on-and-off riots in the heart of Jerusalem, the stabbing attacks in Gush Etzion and Tel Aviv, the lynch that almost killed a Netanya man -- all these attacks make it painfully clear to anyone who has preferred to turn a blind eye: The conflict is not just about the fate of Judea and Samaria. Our adversaries are here; they live among us and near us. They speak Hebrew and hold blue identity cards. And, above all, they have refused to recognize Israel's sovereignty, on either side of the Green Line. 

Thus, the two-state solution is just a ruse for another arrangement that should be called "two states for three peoples." The first people, the Jews, would stay within the Green Line; the second people, the Palestinians, would live beyond the Green Line; and the third is made up of the Palestinians who have tried, by means of another spate of violence, to do away with the Green Line as a future border and who refuse to recognize Israel's sovereignty on either side. 

Perhaps Israel will finally realize that it cannot afford to relinquish its sovereignty when it discovers that there is no Green Line to separate the mountainous regions from the coastal plain and the Samaria hills from the pastoral meadows lying to the west. Perhaps the recent terrorist attacks will make Israel revert back to its simple modus operandi that has safeguarded the land and its people: maintaining a high profile when terrorism strikes; asserting Israel's sovereign rights without equivocating, even where there are resurgent elements who want to challenge Israeli authority, and cracking down uncompromisingly on those who hurl rocks, even if the particular rock they have thrown has yet to kill someone. 


Dr. Eyal Levin is a lecturer at the Department of Israel and Middle Eastern Studies at Ariel University.

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=10545

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

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