Live Chat with Shlomo Ben-Ami

Hello everyone –
I am very happy to be here today and to answer your questions, so, let’s get started!

At a recent Harvard-sponsored debate between Noam Chomsky and Alan Dershowitz, a major point of contention emerged concerning the nature of the concessions offered by Israel to Arafat. Dershowitz held up a map, claiming the offer to Arafat was recognized far and wide as extremely generous and offered up Dennis Ross as one source. Chomsky insisted that the map was not accurate and that Ross is an American and therefore his statements should be discarded as untrustworthy out of hand, instead insisting that the Israeli position was giving of nothing more than a series of “Bantustans” that no one would ever agree to.

Could you comment on this dispute and the offer made to Arafat at Camp David and Taba? Was the offer as generous as we’ve heard, or is the word “Bantustan” an accurate description and was there some sort of deal breaker sprung at Taba as Professor Chomsky insisted? – Sol

Noam Chomsky is sometimes somebody who doesn’t like to be confused by facts. I think in this debate Dershowitz is right and his source is fully reliable and, if I may, I can add another source, myself. Because I was at Camp David and was Israel’s chief negotiator in Taba. If you look at my book you will see a map attached on the peace proposals that were put on the table at Taba. You need to stretch your imagination in order to integrate this map as reflecting a state of “Bantustans.’ How can offering 100% of Gaza and 97% of the West Bank, plus safe passage to link the West Bank to Gaza as to make them a viable state, be a state of Bantustans. The simple truth is none other than the Saudian embassador to Washington, Bandar Bin Sultan said in an interview with the New Yorker, “Arafat’s rejection of these peace parameters were a crime against the Palestinian people and the entire Arab world.”

I don’t believe that an Arab diplomat would have said that about a proposal made of ‘Bantustans.’

Many Western politicians such as Secretary of State Rice were reportedly shocked by the election results giving Hamas 76 of 132 seats in the Palestinian parliament. However,this week’s New Yorker magazine has a report quoting a former Israeli military intelligence officer, that claims Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was worried about a “Hamas rout at the polls” and “begged” Rice to postpone the elections. My question is: how surprising were these results, in light of the widely known corruption of the Fatah leadership? And in your opinion (and with 20-20 hindsight) should the elections have been postponed? – B.A.

Be sure that governments will always be surprised and so will their intelligence services. I can’t think of one case where an intelligence service has accurately predicted anything. Examples: 9/11, the Yom Kippur war, the invasion of Kuwait, Pearl Harbor, the Barbarossa operation, the first intifada, the collapse of the Soviet Union…
But, admittedly, elections are not the domain where intelligence services are supposed to have an edge. It should have been clear to all of us that the alternative to the corrupt Palestinian authority was the opposition and the only sizeable opposition there was Hamas. It is therefore, a most natural victory.

What do you think of the Bush Administration’s policy of democracy promotion as the sole prescription for what needs to be done in the Arab world? – D.K.

You need to admit that the Iraq War was not conducted for the sake of democracy. It first meant to destroy the weapons of mass destruction. It is when it was proved that this was a fallacy that the concept of democratization was invented as the rationale for America’s presence in that part of the world. I think that democratization of the Arab world in a commendable objective. And it is a credit to America as the leader of the free world to have embarked on such a titanic enterprise, but there are many flaws in America’s strategy and in the thinking underlying it.

Democracy is not a project one imposes, it is a process and this takes time and you cannot have democracy the way we understand it in the West unless you have a solid middle class, an entrepreneurial middle class and a reasonable educational system. This is the reason why what you see throughout the Arab world is that there is no leap from the current secular dictatorships to a middle class democracy, but rather to Islamic democracies. Two cases in point are Algeria in the early ’90’s where for the first time in the history of that country, free elections were conducted and the result was a victory for the Islamic Front (FIS). The second case is Iraq where America came to depose a secular, bloodthirsty dictator and ended up with what is for all practical purposes, an Islamic republic. Which is what we have today in Iraq where the repressed Shiites are now the masters of the country. Much of the trouble in Iraq today is actually the result of a civil war between Sunnis and Shiites. If President Mubarak had allowed fully free elections it is not the liberal opposition that would have won, but the Muslim Brotherhood. So, the dilemma for America and the West is very painful – we want democracy and free elections, but we don’t want those who will inevitably be elected in power. Maybe the only way to allow a democratic cycle to develop is to let Hamas test its capacity to perform for the well-being of those who voted for them. Only thus, can we move to a new stage in the development of democracy in that part of the world.

The PLO was once considered a terrorist group, but later recognized Israel’s right to exist. And in other parts of the world –for example in Northern Ireland– groups which have a violent history agree over time to lay down arms and negotiate. Do you think Hamas will eventually recognize Israel and denounce violence, or do you think this is a pipe dream? And what would have to happen in order for such a change in worldview on the part of Palestinians to occur? – C.T.

You are absolutely right that organizations that are defined as terrorist groups transform themselves eventually into political bodies recognizing their enemies. I am not that pessimistic with regard to Hamas. Frankly, reading the press coverage of the Hamas victory, I fail to share the sudden nostalgia for Arafat and the PLO. What was so good with these people? They rejected a reasonable peace deal, they engaged in terrorism and they turned the PA into a platform for a plethora of terrorist organizations bent on Lebanonizing the territories.
I think that there is a lot of misunderstanding with regard to Hamas. Their world of religious imagery has always been located within a political context. It is a pipedream indeed to expect they will change their attitude towards Israel from one day to another. And when they change their attitude, this will be as a result of a quid pro quo, just as happened with the PLO. What we need to think today is of a new diplomatic freamework for the peace process, because the old one has collapsed. And within this new framework, Hamas will have to change its covenant, for example, in exchange for an Israeli move that Israel is comtemplating anyway – and that is another unilateral disengagement, this time from the West Bank.

Are we seeing a generational transformation in the Middle East with the passing of Arafat and Sharon from the scene? -P.G.

Well, yes, indeed there is a generational transformation. Both Sharon and Arafat belong to the core generation of the conflict. In their own way, they both transformed their world view and moved from conflict to peace-making. The new generation is in my opinion much more open to compromises. The problem is, however, that it lacks the revolutionary legitimacy of the founding fathers. This may be the case in Israel for example with Ehud Olmert who doesn’t have the charisma and the gravitas of his mentor Sharon. And the new Palestinian generation hasn’t yet shown that it has the capacity to lead their people to a historic compromise with Israel.

But one should not despair because the transition from revolutionary leader to more “gray” leaders is not necessarily negative. One example that may prove the case. In Egypt when Gamal Abdel Nasser died, the entire world laughed at his successor, Anwar Sadat. He was seen as Nasser’s lapdog, but he ended up being one of the most important statesmen of the Middle East. I remember in my youth, when Ben-Gurion the founder of the state of Israel resigned in 1963, I thought that that was the end of the world. But then, the anti-hero that succeeded him, Levi Ashkol, proved to be an extraordinary Prime Minister who won the Six Day War.

Thanks very much for your questions everyone.

Shlomo Ben-Ami