Lunch
In Damascus
By Uri Avnery
12 October, 2006
Gush Shalom
Once,
while traveling in a taxi, I had an argument with the driver - a profession
associated in Israel with extreme right-wing views. I tried in vain
to convince him of the desirability of peace with the Arabs. In our
country, which has never seen a single day of peace in the last hundred
years, peace can seem like something out of science fiction.
Suddenly I had an inspiration.
"When we have peace," I said, "You can take your taxi
in the morning and go to Damascus, have lunch there with real authentic
Hummus and come back home in the evening."
He jumped at the idea. "Wow,"
he exclaimed, "If that happens, I shall take you with me for nothing!"
"And I shall treat you
to lunch," I responded.
He continued to dream. "If
I could go to Damascus in my car, I could drive on from there all the
way to Paris!"
BASHAR AL-ASSAD has done
it again. He has succeeded in confusing the Israeli government.
As long as he voices the
ritual threat to liberate the Golan Heights by force, it does not upset
anybody. After all, that only confirms what many want to hear: that
there is no way to have peace with Syria, that sooner or later we shall
have a war with them.
Why is that good? Simple:
peace with Syria would mean giving back the Golan Heights (Syrian territory
by any definition). No peace, no need to give them back.
But when Bashar starts to
talk peace, we are in trouble. That is a sinister plot. It may, God
forbid, create a situation that would compel us to return the territory.
Therefore, we should not
even speak about it. The news must be buried in some remote corner of
the papers and at the end of the news on TV, as just "another speech
of Assad". The government rejects them "on the threshold",
adding that it cannot even be discussed until…
Until what? Until he stops
supporting Hizbullah. Until Syria expels the representatives of Hamas
and the other Palestinian organizations. Until regime change takes place
in Syria. Until a Western-style democracy is installed there. In short,
until he registers as a member of the Zionist organization.
THE RELATIONS between Israel
and Syria have a documented history of at least 2859 years. In the year
853 B.C. Israel is mentioned - for the first time, it seems - in an
authentic document outside the Bible. Twelve monarchs of the region,
led by the kings of Damascus and Israel, united against the growing
threat of Assyria, The decisive battle took place at Karkar (in the
north of today's Syria). According to an Assyrian document, 20 thousand
soldiers and 1200 chariots of Damascus fought side by side with 10 thousand
soldiers and 2000 chariots of Ahab, king of Israel. It is not quite
clear which side won.
But that was a temporary
alliance. For most of the time, Israel and Aram-Damascus fought against
each other for regional supremacy. Ahab died a hero's death in one of
these wars against Aram, just two years after the battle against the
Assyrians.
In modern times, the Syrians
(although then still under French colonial rule) strenuously opposed
the Zionist enterprise right from the beginning. But they also opposed
the Palestinian national movement. That is grounded in history: in the
Arabic language, the name al-Sham ("the North"), as Syria
is called, includes the entire territory between Egypt and Turkey. Therefore,
in Arab consciousness, not only Lebanon, but Jordan, Palestine and Israel
as well are really part of Syria.
When Yasser Arafat created
the independent Palestinian national movement at the end of the 1950s,
the Syrians demanded to be acknowledged as the protectors of the Palestinian
people. When he refused, the Syrians threw the entire Palestinian leadership
into prison. (Only the wife of Abu Jihad, Intissar al-Wazir, remained
at liberty and took over the command of the Fatah fighters - thus becoming
the first woman in modern times to command an Arab fighting force.)
Naturally, all the enemies
of Arafat found refuge in Damascus, and that is the original reason
for the presence of some leaders of Hamas and other organizations there.
They were more of a threat to the PLO than to Israel.
IN THE 1948 war, the Syrian
army was the only Arab army that was not defeated. They continued to
occupy some Israeli territory. Along this border, many incidents took
place (mostly initiated by an officer by the name of Ariel Sharon).
In the end, the Israeli army occupied the Golan Heights in the Six-day
war, for the outbreak of which Syria bears some responsibility.
Since then, all the relations
between Israel and Syria have been centered on this occupied territory.
Its return is a paramount Syrian aim. Israel has applied Israeli law
there (which, contrary to the accepted view, means less than annexation).
Hafez al-Assad re-conquered it in the 1973 war, but in the end was pushed
back to the approaches of Damascus. Since then, the Syrians have been
trying to harass Israel mostly by means of Hizbullah.
Once upon a time, the idea
of an "Eastern Front" - a coordinated attack by Jordan, Syria
and Iraq - used to cause nightmares in Israel. The prophecy of Jeremiah
(1, 14), "Out of the north an evil shall break forth upon all the
inhabitants of the land", echoed through the war-rooms of the army
High Command. Since then we have made peace with Jordan, Iraq has been
blown to smithereens by the Americans, with the enthusiastic support
of Israel and its American lobby. But the Syrians are still considered
a menace, because they are allied with Iran and connected with Hizbullah.
Is it worthwhile for us to
live in this situation in order to keep the Golan Heights? Common sense
says no. If we reach a peace agreement with Syria, it will automatically
entail an agreement with Hizbullah, too. Without Syrian consent, Hizbullah
cannot keep an efficient military force, since practically all Hizbullah's
arms have to come from Syria or pass through Syria. Without Syrian support,
Hizbullah will become a purely Lebanese party and cease to constitute
a threat to us.
Moreover, Syria is a thoroughly
secular country. When the Muslim Brotherhood rebelled against Assad
Sr, he drowned them in blood. Also, the great majority of Syrians are
Sunni. When Syria makes peace with Israel, it will have no reason to
remain allied with the fanatical Shiite Iran.
So why don't we make peace
with Syria?
AT THIS time, there are two
reasons: the one domestic, the other foreign.
The domestic reason is the
existence of 20 thousand settlers on the Golan Heights, who are far
more popular than the West Bank settlers. They are not religious fanatics,
and their settlements were set up under the auspices of the Labor Party.
All Israeli governments have been afraid to touch them.
That is the real reason for
the failure of all the attempts to negotiate with Syria. Yitzhak Rabin
thought about it and drew back. He argued that we should first of all
concentrate on settling the Palestinian issue. Ehud Barak almost came
to an agreement with Syria, but escaped at the last moment. The only
question that remained open was almost ludicrous: should the Syrians
reach the shoreline of the Sea of Tiberias (the situation prevailing
before the Six-day war) or stay at a distance of a few dozen meters
(according to the border fixed between the British, then ruling Palestine,
and the French, then ruling Syria). In popular parlance: will Assad
dangle his long feet in the water of the lake? For Assad Sr. that was
a question of honor.
Is it worthwhile to risk
for this the lives of thousands of Israelis and Syrians, who may die
in another war?
Until Israel has a government
ready to answer this question and to confront the settlers, there will
be no agreement with Syria.
The second reason for rejecting
peace with Syria is connected with the United States. Syria belongs
to George Bush's "axis of evil". The American president doesn't
give a damn for the long-range interests of Israel, what is important
to him is to achieve some sort of victory in the Middle East. The destruction
of the Syrian regime ("a victory for democracy") will compensate
him for the Iraq fiasco.
No Israeli government - and
certainly not that of Olmert - would dare to disobey the American president.
Therefore, it is self-evident that all peace feelers from Assad will
be rejected "on the threshold". Tsipi Livni, who last week
opened a new front against Olmert and presented herself almost as a
peace-lover, opposes the start of negotiations with Syria as well.
THIS AFFAIR throws some light
on the complex relations between Israel and the United States: who is
wagging who - does the dog wag its tail or the tail its dog?
Olmert says that we must
ignore Assad's peace offers, because we must not help him to escape
Bush's wrath. Let's dwell on this utterance for a moment.
An Israeli patriot would,
of course, have said exactly the opposite: If Assad is ready to make
peace with us - even if only because he is afraid of the Americans -
we should jump at this opportunity and exploit this situation to achieve
at long last peace on our northern front.
Last week Olmert made a remarkable
declaration: "As long as I am Prime Minister, we shall not give
up the Golan for all eternity!" What does that mean? Either Olmert
believes that his term of office coincides with God's term of office,
and he will rule in eternity - or in Olmert's world, eternity extends
to four years, at most.
Anyhow, until then, my taxi-driver
and I shall have to wait for our lunch in Damascus.
Leave
A Comment
&
Share Your Insights