JERUSALEM -- A remarkable interview with Dov Weisglass, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's top adviser, by an Israeli newspaper has caused an international sensation. Quotes taken out of context made him appear to be bragging about destroying the Israel-Palestinian peace process. In many cases, his words were twisted in a way to demonize Israel -- or at least its current government -- rather than understand its problems, legitimate interests, and thinking. One result was an even more hostile anti-Israel reaction by the European Union.
Yet Weisglass was not doing what the coverage claimed. Reporters who interviewed me on this issue admitted to not having read the full interview. In fact, his statement is a good, and even dovish, statement placing the Sharon government close to former Prime Minister Ehud Barak's position as well as to U.S. thinking under both Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. Two points, mangled in international coverage, should be clear. Weisglass was not bragging about killing a living peace process but rather trying to cope with a dead one. In addition, far from claiming to have manipulated U.S. policy, he explained why American leaders had reached conclusions close to those of Israel.
Weisglass's argument includes principles describing Israel's mainstream consensus. First, in principle, Weisglass and Sharon accept that an independent Palestinian state ruling all of the Gaza Strip and most of the West Bank will be an inevitable part of any negotiated solution.
Second, however, there is now no partner for peace. Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat will not make a deal any Israeli government could live with -- or Israel could survive with. There is no alternative Palestinian leadership in the offing. When Weisglass stated, "We reached that conclusion after years of thinking otherwise," he speaks not just for Sharon but also for most Israelis and America's leadership.
This is the legacy of the failed Oslo peace process, Arafat's rejection of U.S. peace plans in 2000, the subsequent violence, and hardening of the Palestinian position. After all, in the last four years Israel has suffered 1,000 dead, watched the Palestinian leadership finance terrorism, and viewed incitement to murder Israelis and destroy their country in the official Palestinian media on a daily basis.
Third, there is no sense entering any negotiation in which Israel is pressed for concessions, the Palestinians give nothing, and no solution results. The first step in the Road Map plan is for the Palestinian leadership to end the violence, which it is either unwilling or incapable of doing. The European position seems to approach the idea that the Palestinians should get a state in all the West Bank and Gaza Strip in two or three years even if they do not live up to any commitments whatever and make no concessions.
This is the outcome Sharon seeks to prevent by freezing that type of process. What they have blocked, Weisglass explained, is a Palestinian state posing great security risks to Israel, the evacuation of all settlements, and Jerusalem's partition in the near future. Actually, it was not Sharon but Arafat who achieved this outcome by refusing peace in 2000 and rejecting any moderation of his stance or real ceasefire since then.
Fourth, consequently we are faced with a long interim period. Weisglass explains that Sharon, "thinks rightly that we are still very, very far from the time when we will be able to reach final-status" agreements. Israel will show its willingness for real peace by withdrawing from Gaza and a small piece of the West Bank.
Fifth, Israel believes that eventually most of the West Bank will go to Palestinian rule, while larger settlements and those near the border will be consolidated into blocs and kept by Israel. Until then, virtually all West Bank settlements will continue. Weisglass says, "Their future will be determined in many years when we reach a final (agreement)."
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Sixth, this freeze will continue until the Palestinians change their position and behavior. This step, of course, is up to them. They have the power to defrost the process, end the occupation, and get a state. A Gaza withdrawal, in Weisglass's words, "Thrusts them into a situation in which they have to prove their seriousness." They will no longer have the "excuse" of blaming things on Israel's presence.
The fact that no one expects the Palestinian leadership to create a stable, peaceful zone in the post-withdrawal Gaza Strip shows that the day has not yet come for a comprehensive negotiated settlement.
Finally, the fact that the U.S. government has similar views is of the greatest importance. Weisglass attributes this conclusion to such factors as Arafat's lies to Washington about his involvement in arms' smuggling schemes, proof that he was financing terrorism, the United States' own investigation showing he did not implement promises, plus all the factors arising out of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
Of course, the Weisglass arguments can be criticized from many directions. But he has presented a coherent and reasonable analysis that largely corresponds to the facts. This is not a policy designed to destroy any negotiating process, but rather one emerging from the view that there is no serious negotiating process and there is not likely to be one for a long time.
Even if one disagrees with aspects of this standpoint, it is important to understand that Sharon's government, much less Israel as a whole, is not a warmongering monster. Those discussing Israel and its positions should at least understand what those policies are, how they were reached, and why they make sense.
[Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs Center and co-author of "Yasir Arafat: A Political Biography" and "Hating America"]
