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sh'ould be. True , the Israelis are divided. But that is one of the dif–
ficulties faced by democratic nations. However, the Israelis them–
selves, unlike their American critics, have to suffer the consequences
of this fault.
It
seems to me that Jewish intellectuals would be better
advised to look into the history of the Israeli conflict and the larger
forces that make it so difficult to resolve.
I myself have no immediate panaceas, nor do I know of
any
that have been proposed. At the moment , Secretary Shultz's sugges–
tions are worth considering. But so far he has not met with an en–
thusiastic response by any of the Arab states or factions-or
by
Shamir. In any event , Shultz's intervention does not go beyond at–
tempting to bring both sides into meaningful negotiations and to
suspend bloody confrontation in the meantime.
The crucial question is what the content of these negotiations
should be and what results satisfactory to both sides might be en–
visaged . As things stand the basic demands of both sides cannot be
met. The Palestinians - or rather the PLO, since we do not know
what the Palestinians would accept - are demanding a sovereign
state on the West Bank. The Israelis fear that a Palestinian state
would make it infinitely more difficult to defend Israel against an
Arab attack because such a state would eat deeply into Israeli ter–
ritory and could become a military base armed by the Arab coun–
tries and perhaps the Russians. On the other hand, the Palestinians
appear to find the Israeli occupation intolerable (though it is not
clear , as I have suggested, how much of their seemingly uncom–
promising militancy is fomented from outside). In addition , a good
deal of Israeli internal opposition to the occupation stems from the
belief that Israel will lose its own character and integrity if it con–
tinues to rule over the Palestinians . As Aharon Apelfeld said re–
cently in an interview with Philip Roth, Jews are specialists in self–
criticism.
It also has been proposed that Israel should risk the military
disadvantages of a Palestinian state : after all , it is argued , Israel was
able to beat off the Arab invaders in 1967 when it did not occupy the
West Bank . One can understand Israel's reluctance to take such a
gamble, for , as everyone knows , Israel cannot risk a single defeat
without possibly inviting another holocaust in the Mideast.
If
such
a solution should be considered, it is up to the Israelis and not to its
critics to press for it.
What is left? There seem to be only two other possibilities. One
is the much talked of plan to incorporate the West Bank into Jordan,
