The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: brave peace
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the crucial
conflict in the Middle East that has been feeding all rancour, revolution and
extremism for more than sixty years! It is the mother-crisis of all the
regional crises that feed on these revolts and disappointments engendered by
abortive peace negotiations or rather still-born preliminaries.
Yet, if we only make the effort to shake off our
prejudices and accept to listen to others in complete empathy with their wishes
and non-negotiable demands, we quite simply discover that room can be found for
negotiations and even room for possible, viable peace between these
well-defined and in principle non-negotiable positions.
Palestinians and Israelis each have the right to have
and to live in a sovereign State with secure borders. And no-one will dispute
for either of them this inalienable right of peoples to arrange their own
affairs.
Israelis cannot betray either their faith or their
nationalism. According to the Bible, the State of Israel – the national
territory of the Kingdom of Israel – is the whole of Palestine. From the
perspective of faith Palestine is the Promised Land of the chosen people and
the national Homeland of the nationalist dream of Judaism.
Hence we can understand that any Prime Minister, Member
of Parliament or other Israeli leader who proposes a solution that fails to
take into account those two requirements – of faith and nationalism – would be
seen as a traitor to his faith and nation.
The decision to decree that Israel is a Jewish country
originates in this duality that underlies the State of Israel, a duality that, obligatorily,
leads into an impasse every attempt at negotiations even if they are not
still-born. Anyway, as at Masada, this is Jewish suicide.
Each of the parties, Israelis and Palestinians, are
facing the wall of certainties raised by the other side. Only the intervention of
a third party can get them and us out of this impasse.
This intervention would be that of an international
moral force. As the UN sponsored the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, let
the international community, the influential countries, have the courage today
rather than tomorrow to force Israel to accept the creation of two viable
States with secure borders, living side by side as good neighbours.
This moral pressure must be considered as a support
for the Jewish people. Indeed, strengthened by sincere friendship not devoid of
respect for the identity of the Jewish people, this pressure should consist in
persuading the Israeli political class to renounce the strict, literal
application of the two foundations of Israel: that of religion and Jewish nationalism.
Thus compelled by the international community, Israeli leaders will no longer
then be considered as traitors to the party but “having yielded to overwhelming
international pressure,” including that of their closest, most unconditional
allies.
This pressure has no link – and should especially not
be linked – with the bilateral treaties of co-operation and development aid and
the alliances that Israelis or Palestinians have with this or that other
country. On the contrary, this pressure, and in particular the acceptance of
this solution by the Israelis, must be accompanied by international
co-operation and support multiplied for both States. True peace feeds on
development and prosperity without forgetting that the peoples must see in
reality the beneficial effects of peace on their daily lives so that they can
believe in it and begin to look at the others differently. They will then begin
another kind of relationship – that of good neighbourliness, even if that will
need time.
The question of the status of Jerusalem must be dealt
with differently. Let’s be realistic. Modern Israel has already made Tel Aviv its
economic and administrative capital and Ramallah is already the seat of the
Palestinian Authority. Jerusalem is everyone’s. Jerusalem is the holy city and
must have a particular status so that everyone can come and live their faith
there. We discussed at great length the question of the status of Jerusalem during
our talk at the Sant’ Egidio Meeting in Barcelona from 3 to 6 October 2010 [see
appended document.]
So the international community, in all its
institutions and through its influential members, must be that moral authority
that fosters this project of two States living side by side in peace. Today, as
in 1948, but this time in the service of peace!
Gregorios III
Patriarch of Antioch and All the East
Melkite Greek Catholic Church