The Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics has just published its annual statistical yearbook. The bad news is that the Israeli economy is shrinking. The good news is that it will shrink only by 0.8 percent this year, following a 0.9 percent decline in 2001.
Bearing in mind that in the last two years Israel has been under attack by Palestinian terror, which has practically destroyed its tourism industry, the results might have been worse.
Another report, about patterns of consumption, shows that Israelis this year have spent roughly the same as last year, even slightly more. They went to the movies, they dined out, they traveled abroad.
I didn't need to wait for these reports to ascertain my feeling that Israelis were coping with the situation. In my neighborhood, there is a kosher Chinese restaurant. Whenever I pass by, I see that there is a lot of business going on there. Recently, the owner hung a huge banner, resembling the blue and white flag of Israel, saying "Our spirit will not be broken." I suspect that most clients come for the food -- but also as an act of defiance: They won't let terror disrupt their lives.
That is the crux of the matter. After two years of suicide bombing and other kinds of terror, Israelis persevere. Palestinian violence has failed to bring them to their knees. If the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were a zero-sum-game, some kind of hand wrestling, then Israel's victory would have been the Palestinians' defeat; their loss would have been our gain.
But things are not that simple. Israelis are proving that the Palestinians will never wrest anything from Israel by force. We have made that point already. If the Palestinians mistook Israel's choice in 2000 to withdraw from Lebanon as a sign of weakness, then they were in for a bitter surprise. Israeli deterrence has been fully rehabilitated in the last two years -- and is to be maintained, preferably by using Teddy Roosevelt's dictum: ?Speak softly but carry a big stick."
However, there is no point in turning the lesson the Palestinians have learned into a humiliating defeat. Humiliation and defeat breed only desire for revenge. And unlike a zero-sum-game, there are no winners and losers here: There are only those who lose a little and those who lose a lot.
Israelis and Palestinians are doomed to live next to each other as neighbors. The only chance of creating some stability in their relationship is by avoiding a situation in which one side vows to dismantle the existing order and take revenge. Yes, Palestinians should know that violence will bring them only disaster. Yet they should always be given a chance to opt for peace, and gain a lot by doing so, without pushing them into a corner and driving them into acts of despair and hate.
One thing is clear: Yasser Arafat cannot and should not play any role in any future agreement. He has shown time and again that whenever he is given a chance, he resorts to violence, regardless of the calamities he brings upon his own people. There are signs that Palestinians are starting to realize the damage that his irresponsible leadership has caused them.
Palestinians don't need to read the writing on the wall of the Chinese restaurant in my neighborhood. They know perfectly well that the scheme to force Israel's hand has failed and that the Israelis have turned out to be much tougher than they had thought. It's up to the the Palestinians to make their move -- and step forward into a peaceful, post-Arafat phase in the Israel-Palestinian conflict. The ball lies squarely in their court.
----------------------------------------------
Uri Dromi is publications director at the Israel Democracy Institute in Jerusalem. He can be reached at
Dromi@Idi.org.il
Bearing in mind that in the last two years Israel has been under attack by Palestinian terror, which has practically destroyed its tourism industry, the results might have been worse.
Another report, about patterns of consumption, shows that Israelis this year have spent roughly the same as last year, even slightly more. They went to the movies, they dined out, they traveled abroad.
I didn't need to wait for these reports to ascertain my feeling that Israelis were coping with the situation. In my neighborhood, there is a kosher Chinese restaurant. Whenever I pass by, I see that there is a lot of business going on there. Recently, the owner hung a huge banner, resembling the blue and white flag of Israel, saying "Our spirit will not be broken." I suspect that most clients come for the food -- but also as an act of defiance: They won't let terror disrupt their lives.
That is the crux of the matter. After two years of suicide bombing and other kinds of terror, Israelis persevere. Palestinian violence has failed to bring them to their knees. If the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were a zero-sum-game, some kind of hand wrestling, then Israel's victory would have been the Palestinians' defeat; their loss would have been our gain.
But things are not that simple. Israelis are proving that the Palestinians will never wrest anything from Israel by force. We have made that point already. If the Palestinians mistook Israel's choice in 2000 to withdraw from Lebanon as a sign of weakness, then they were in for a bitter surprise. Israeli deterrence has been fully rehabilitated in the last two years -- and is to be maintained, preferably by using Teddy Roosevelt's dictum: ?Speak softly but carry a big stick."
However, there is no point in turning the lesson the Palestinians have learned into a humiliating defeat. Humiliation and defeat breed only desire for revenge. And unlike a zero-sum-game, there are no winners and losers here: There are only those who lose a little and those who lose a lot.
Israelis and Palestinians are doomed to live next to each other as neighbors. The only chance of creating some stability in their relationship is by avoiding a situation in which one side vows to dismantle the existing order and take revenge. Yes, Palestinians should know that violence will bring them only disaster. Yet they should always be given a chance to opt for peace, and gain a lot by doing so, without pushing them into a corner and driving them into acts of despair and hate.
One thing is clear: Yasser Arafat cannot and should not play any role in any future agreement. He has shown time and again that whenever he is given a chance, he resorts to violence, regardless of the calamities he brings upon his own people. There are signs that Palestinians are starting to realize the damage that his irresponsible leadership has caused them.
Palestinians don't need to read the writing on the wall of the Chinese restaurant in my neighborhood. They know perfectly well that the scheme to force Israel's hand has failed and that the Israelis have turned out to be much tougher than they had thought. It's up to the the Palestinians to make their move -- and step forward into a peaceful, post-Arafat phase in the Israel-Palestinian conflict. The ball lies squarely in their court.
----------------------------------------------
Uri Dromi is publications director at the Israel Democracy Institute in Jerusalem. He can be reached at
Dromi@Idi.org.il