How the World Enabled 25 Years of Palestinian Decline

One of the saddest comments I’ve ever heard was Gaza resident Ziad Ashour’s statement to the New York Times last week. Ever since the first intifada erupted in 1987, the 43-year-old butcher said, “things have steadily declined in Gaza.”

Think about that for a moment: After 25 years of fighting Israel in every possible way–“popular resistance,” suicide bombings, rockets, diplomatic warfare, boycott/divestment/sanctions efforts–all the Palestinians have to show for it is 25 years of steady decline. Indeed, the facts bear out Ashour’s assessment: Despite massive international aid, Gaza’s per capita GDP has remained virtually flat, totaling $817 in 1987 and $876 in 2010. Unemployment, which was generally under 5 percent in the 1980s, had soared to 45 percent by the end of 2010. And to add insult to injury, neither the terror nor the diplomatic warfare succeeded in preventing Israel from flourishing over those 25 years.

But the sadder part of the story is that none of this has managed to persuade the Palestinians that such tactics are self-defeating. As Steven Erlanger’s report shows, Hamas is riding high in Gaza; even a desperately poor woman who describes her life as one of “depression and deprivation” proclaims pride in Hamas’s ability to launch rockets at Israel. And Gazan political science professor Mkhaimar Abusada tells Erlanger this is a never-ending story:

He remembered a similar burst of Hamas popularity in October 2011, after the release of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, whom Hamas held for five years and exchanged for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. “But a month later the Palestinians woke up to the same problems: poverty, mismanagement, siege, unemployment, little freedom of movement,” Mr. Abusada said.

Yet if Palestinians are primarily to blame for their addiction to such counterproductive tactics, the international community has played a crucial role as enabler. First of all, the massive international aid–more than four times as much per capita as any other nation receives–has cushioned them from the consequences of their bad decisions. Gaza’s situation may not be rosy, but it’s better than that of many other countries: As Michael Rubin noted, Gaza outranks more than 110 countries worldwide in terms of both life expectancy and infant mortality. And as long as international aid is keeping them relatively comfortable, Palestinians feel little incentive to change their tactics.

Far worse, however, is that by offering the Palestinians almost unstinting diplomatic support while relentlessly criticizing Israel, the world feeds Palestinian fantasies that these tactics will someday succeed–that eventually, the world will force Israel to its knees. The recent farce at the UN was a classic example: 138 countries voted to recognize “Palestine” as a state in gross violation of the Palestinians’ own signed commitments, even though it meets none of the criteria for statehood. But the world then went into a frenzy of condemnation when Israel responded by advancing planning processes–not even actual construction–in an area that every peace plan ever proposed has assigned to Israel in any case. So why would Palestinians conclude that they are the ones who need to change their behavior?

A few sober-minded Palestinians do know better. “Gaining the support of the Israeli authorities in West Jerusalem for a Palestinian state is more important than the support of 138 countries that voted for Palestine at the UN,” Ibrahim Inbawi, a Fatah activist from East Jerusalem, told the Jerusalem Report last week.

Unfortunately, the world seems unwilling to tell his countrymen the same thing. For all its vaunted concern for the Palestinians, it seems the international community would rather let them suffer another 25 years of steady decline than try to wean them from their failed strategies.

Nakba, a self-inflicted catastrophe; Why is it that the Arabs do not accept that it was the war that they began in 1948, which is the cause of their suffering? By Moshe Arens |

Many catastrophes occur in this cruel world. Some are caused by nature, and over them humans have no control. Some are man-made - catastrophes caused by wars of aggression and wars of oppression by one people against another. Such was World War II, an attempt by Germany to conquer the world, oppress the non-Germanic peoples and exterminate the Jews. It took more than five years to roll back the conquering German armies, at great sacrifice to the Allied armies that defeated Germany. On May 8, V-E Day, the world celebrates the victory in Europe, the day on which Germany surrendered unconditionally in 1945. It was a victory of light over darkness.

The German people suffered during that war. More than 5 million German soldiers were killed during the fighting, and more than 2 million German civilians died during the war. In addition, millions were left homeless and millions became refugees as eastern Germany was turned over to Poland and the Sudeten region was returned to Czechoslovakia after the war. German cities were destroyed by aerial bombardments. Thirty-nine square kilometers of Dresden's city center were destroyed. Greatly damaged were the cities of Hamburg, Cologne and Berlin, in addition to many other German cities, in an aerial campaign to disrupt the German war effort and force Germany to surrender.

Yet the German people do not commemorate V-E Day as their day of catastrophe, as the German Nakba. No demonstrations are held in Germany on that day. The German people know that they brought the catastrophe upon themselves. They know there is no reason to shift the blame for their catastrophe onto others; they have only themselves to blame.

There is another day on which the world celebrates victory in World War II. It is V-J Day, August 15, the day in 1945 when Japan, Germany's ally, surrendered unconditionally to the Allied forces. The Japanese people suffered grievously during the war - a war in which they tried to conquer China, the Philippines, Burma and Indonesia. More than 2 million Japanese soldiers were killed in the war and more than 3 million Japanese civilians perished. Tokyo was firebombed, and two atomic bombs devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

But the Japanese people do not commemorate their suffering during the war on V-J Day as the Japanese Nakba. They know that they brought that catastrophe upon themselves. They know that the blame for their suffering cannot be shifted onto others.

So what is the Palestinian Nakba all about? Those who promote the commemoration of the "Palestinian catastrophe" have chosen May 15 - the day in 1948 on which the Arab armies invaded Palestine in order to destroy the infant Jewish state - as Nakba Day. The Arabs intended to destroy the Jewish community in Palestine, were confident that they were going to win, but in the end lost the war. That is the origin of the Palestinian catastrophe, a catastrophe the Arabs brought upon themselves.

So why is it that the Arabs do not accept that it was the war that they began, the catastrophe that they intended to inflict on the Jewish community in Palestine, which is the cause of their suffering? That their catastrophe is self-inflicted? Why don't they recognize their own responsibility for their catastrophe, as do the Germans and the Japanese following World War II, and instead try to place the blame on Israel?

The difference is that the Germans and Japanese were forced to surrender unconditionally, and when the war was over they harbored no hope and had no intentions of overcoming the powers that had defeated them. The Arabs, however, did not surrender; they were prepared for an armistice - no more. Israel had neither the power nor the intention to force them to surrender unconditionally. And unlike the Germans and the Japanese after World War II, many Palestinians and their Arab supporters harbor hopes of ultimately defeating the State of Israel and destroying the Jewish state.

For them the Nakba demonstrations are one more stick with which to beat Israel. With a total disregard for the facts, they are out there demonstrating on May 15, blaming Israel for a catastrophe they brought upon themselves.

And those Jews in Israel and abroad who join the Nakba demonstrations year after year, waving Palestinian flags? The Jewish students at Tel Aviv University who join their Palestinian colleagues in blaming Israel for the "Palestinian catastrophe"? They are what Lenin called the "useful idiots" who are so important when a lie is to be spread.

The Palestinians Are the Real Obstacle to Peace When will they finally accept the Jewish people's right to their historic homeland? BY MOSHE YA'ALON

The Middle East peace process is once again stalled, while Palestinian leaders sadly continue to propagate the myth that Israeli construction impedes progress. Only last Friday, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in Washington that "the Israeli government had a choice between settlements and peace, and they chose settlements."

Unfortunately, what stands between the Palestinians and eventual statehood is their insincerity when it comes to real peace. Israel has repeatedly proposed the independence that the Palestinians ostensibly desire. But instead of concluding a deal with Israel, they have demonstrated a total unwillingness to compromise, often favoring terrorism, as witnessed in the barrage of terrorist attacks that followed the Camp David negotiations of 2000. Is it any wonder Israelis find it ever more difficult to trust the Palestinians?

If there is to be a stable and lasting peace, Israel's recognition of the Palestinians' right to self-determination -- which successive Israeli governments have affirmed -- cannot go unreciprocated. The Jewish people are no less entitled to a state in their homeland, the land of Israel, or to their right to defend it.

The fundamental problem is that the Palestinians continue to reject these inherent rights of the Jewish people. That's indeed why we do not yet have two states for two peoples: The Palestinians remain steadfast in their refusal to accept that there even exists a Jewish nation that lays legitimate claim to its land. They reject the entire premise of a state for the Jewish people -- not only beyond the pre-1967 lines of the state of Israel, but even within its original 1948 boundaries. This, of course, explains why the Palestinians did not pursue independence prior to 1967, when Israel was within the 1949 Armistice lines.

This fact becomes perfectly clear when observing how Palestinian leaders educate their own people. The language of hate is the vernacular of choice for the official Palestinian media, which indoctrinates its audience with the narrative that Jews have usurped their land and have no business being here -- and not just in Hebron or Ariel, but even in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Palestinian television is notorious for broadcasting what amounts to classic incitement -- parading about children who glorify the use of weapons to destroy Israel and accusing Jews of "stealing" cities such as Haifa, which even the U.N. Partition Plan of 1947 included as part of the Jewish state.

There is no chance that peace can come to the region as long as the Palestinians continue to spew this sort of vitriol. The only way forward must involve a bottom-up approach in which Palestinians develop the type of civil discourse that is a prerequisite to reconciliation. Schoolchildren in the Palestinian Authority must be taught to respect the human dignity of their Jewish neighbors, just as Israeli youths are instructed to be tolerant of others -- including Palestinians -- with whom they may not agree. And all Palestinians must come to terms, once and for all, with the fact that the Jewish people will continue to exercise their historical right to sovereignty in their homeland, a sovereignty that guarantees equal rights for all of Israel's citizens.

As for the Jewish communities over the 1967 lines, their fate should be decided in permanent status negotiations, as agreed in the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement of September 1995. In the meantime, Israel has committed not to authorize any construction outside these neighborhoods in the areas under its control since 1967. It's worth noting that in the past, Israel's presence in areas under dispute proved not to be an obstacle to the achievement of peace with Egypt.

The fanciful "virtual reality" in which the Palestinians operate -- and which they dispense for public consumption -- obscures their basic responsibility for the current predicament. And it illustrates why Israel must insist on its security requirements in any future peace agreement. Israel must be able to protect itself against not only physical attack, but also the political, cultural, and strategic assault on its very legitimacy. It would simply be impossible to have a fruitful discussion concerning borders without both addressing the issue of comprehensive security and recognizing Israel's right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

Israel remains committed to the cause of peace. We have no desire to govern the affairs of another people. But our acceptance of a viable Palestinian state awaits a similar Palestinian acceptance of the rights of the Jewish people in the land of Israel. Erekat, the Palestinian negotiator, recently wrote that such a step would require a modification of the Palestinian narrative. He's absolutely right. But until this happens, there can be no chance for peace.