
The main weakness of the movement for Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria is the lack of an agreed upon plan for the integration of the Arabs living there into Israeli society. This is an integration that hardly anyone wants, neither Jews nor Arabs, yet without it no enduring Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria is possible.
A state whose avowed goal is the expulsion of all Jews from Judea and Samaria cannot be trusted with a monopoly of armed force within any area. Unpopular as it may be, integration remains the only path to peace. The Arab so-called "peace plan" calls for the eviction of hundreds of thousands of Jews from their homes in Judea and Samaria and their replacement by the descendants of the Arab refugees fron the fighting in 1948. Israel could not possibly agree to this plan, whose obvious purpose is to motivate sanctions against Israel for failing to accept it. In case anyone missed the point, Abbas has repeatedly stated that not one single Jew would be permitted to live in the future Palestinian state. Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria is the only long term alternative to the Arab plan for the destruction of Israel.
Sovereignty implies responsibility. A plan for the integration of the Arabs in Judea and Samaria into Israeli society requires three components:
(1) Political, There needs to be a path to Israeli citizenship that most Arabs could follow without too much difficulty.
(2) Economic. There needs to be a plan for the economic development of Judea and Samarisa holding out the promie of a substantial improvement in the standard of living of the Arabs living there.
(3) Cultural. There needs to be a program of education in Jewish culture and tradition centered around education in the Hebrew language.
Needless to say, any plan of this kind will face widespread opposition. Jews will see it as a threat to the Zionist character of Israel. Arabs will see it as a repudiation of their right to national self determination. And the entire "international community" will see it as a deviation from its cherished illusion of "two states for two peoples".
The thing is, a "state" is first and foremost an entity that claims a monopoly of armed force within a specific area. A state whose avowed goal is the expulsion of all Jews from Judea and Samaria cannot be trusted with a monopoly of armed force within any area. Israel on the other hand has proved over time its willingness to accept large numbers of Arabs within its borders. Only under Israeli sovereignty is there any chance of mutual acceptance of Arabs and Jews within the borders of the land of Israel.
Mutual acceptance ought to be the goal of an agreed upon plan for how to implement Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria. Without a plan of this kind there is no chance of the movement for sovereignty achieving widespread support There is no escaping the fact that sovereignty implies responsibility for the well being of Arabs and Jews alike. What is needed now is an ongoing process of discussion and debate aimed at adopting the best possible plan for implementing Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria.