(Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies-Bar-Ilan University) Efraim Inbar - In March 2017, Jason Greenblatt, President Trump's Special Representative for International Negotiations, was sent to Jerusalem and Ramallah to test the waters for a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians. The Israeli consensus is that there is no peace partner in Ramallah and/or in Gaza. Yet, in the absence of a Palestinian peace partner, there is some merit to engaging in a "process" that lowers tensions in the region and removes a sticky, if increasingly marginal, issue from the diplomatic table. Greenblatt stressed how important it was to President Trump to stimulate the Palestinian economy and improve the quality of life for Palestinians. However, it is odd to offer carrots to the Palestinians before they have committed to returning to the negotiations table they left in March 2014. The impulse to give out carrots displays the conventional wisdom that the Palestinians must be well fed to prevent their erupting into violence. However, short-term calculations of this kind only prolong the conflict. Indeed, the campaign of terror that started in September 2000, dubbed the Second Intifada, took place after several years of economic progress during which the Palestinian standard of living was the highest in history. The carrots awarded the Palestinians indicate that their intransigence and unwillingness to compromise have no correlation to the level of support they receive. They will never change if their poor decisions never exact a cost. The Palestinians are still committed to unrealistic goals like Jerusalem and the "right of return." Yet without tacit and/or manifest threats, there is little chance that their behavior will improve. The writer is professor emeritus of political studies at Bar-Ilan University and the founding director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (1991-2016).
2017-03-21 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive