Yosef Evron, a long-time Israeli journalist who has specialized in military matters, offers his view of the political background of the surprising left-wing diplomatic plan proposed this week by former Defense Minister Sha’ul Mofaz.
Mofaz announced his plan this past Sunday, and has been invited to present it again next Thursday before the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in New York City. The event is billed as Mofaz’s discussion of his “new plan for Israeli-Palestinian peace.”
The main points of Mofaz’s plan are: Recognition of and negotiations with Hamas, “if it changes its behavior;" immediate establishment of a Palestinian Authority state on some 60% of Judea and Samaria; and a national referendum regarding further concessions, such as negotiations on the future of Jerusalem, Arab refugees, the establishment of a permanent PA state on 92% of Judea and Samaria, and the expulsion of some 65,000 Jews from their homes in those areas.
Mofaz began his political career in the Likud, but then moved left-ward to Kadima just two days after announcing he would never quit the Likud.
Evron: Despair in the Opposition
Analyzing the Mofaz situation for the Arutz-7 Hebrew website, Evron notes that many in both Kadima and Labor are in despair over the resilience of the Netanyahu government and its continued existence. (A group of Laborites has never fully accepted Labor's membership in a Likud-led government.) Many in both parties are resentful of their respective leaders, Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak, but have no real political options at this point.
Mofaz Wanted to be Defense Minister
Some of the more bitter elements in both parties continued joining together to form a true “fighting opposition,” Evron writes, but then, “Mofaz got involved. He is still somewhat frustrated at the fact that his Kadima party did not join the government, because he could have been the Defense Minister… Now that his hope to wage an internal party revolution and topple Livni has failed, he has apparently decided to skip the party business, and crown himself directly the new prime minister.”
Mofaz said, at the original press conference in which he announced his diplomatic plan, that he will implement it “when I become prime minister.”
Evron continues: "Mofaz knows, however, that one cannot strive to be prime minister without a diplomatic plan – and a surprising one, at that: It has to be something unexpected from one who is considered the right-wing marker in his party; something that will turn him into a hero in the crumbling left-wing circles, and will make the Americans happy, too.”
Evron sums up the Mofaz plan as calling for the afore-mentioned points, as well as “gradually expanding the borders of the new PA state into all of Judea and Samaria, by evacuating and relocating Jewish towns and thus forming Palestinian contiguity, and opening permanent-status negotiations without ruling out losing Jerusalem neighborhoods to the new PA state.”
The Right-Wing Mofaz Plan of 2005
For the sake of contrast, Evron reminds his readers of a Likud party meeting held on October 24, 2005, at which then-Defense Minister Mofaz made the following festive announcement: “There will be no more unilateral withdrawals, including in the Jordan Valley, as there was in Gush Katif… Israel will keep and strengthen the large settlement blocs in Judea and Samaria... We will fight for territorial contiguity between Jerusalem and Maaleh Adumim, and to this end I am working to issue more construction permits in Maaleh Adumim…”
Evron asks, “Which one of his two plans is the real Mofaz plan? The answer is, neither; both were formulated on the backdrop of his attempt to survive politically.”
After Ariel Sharon quit the Likud, in late 2005, Mofaz announced that he would never do the same. “Sharon’s joining the leftists who support Oslo and a return to the pre-1967 borders is liable to be very dangerous,” he said at the time. Just a short while later, after polls showed he would lose the race to become Likud party leader, he quickly jumped to Kadima, saying, “The Likud has turned towards the extreme right, and that’s not my path.”
Asked about his zig-zags, Mofaz said, “I see no problem or issue with trustworthiness.” The question is, Evron concludes, whether the public agrees.