{"id":71380,"date":"2019-07-04T17:00:34","date_gmt":"2019-07-04T15:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=71380"},"modified":"2019-06-28T07:21:32","modified_gmt":"2019-06-28T05:21:32","slug":"04-00-37","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=71380","title":{"rendered":"Israel\u2019s Ex-US Envoy Says Jewish State at \u2018Special Time in History\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>Israel\u2019s Ex-US Envoy Says Jewish State at \u2018Special Time in History\u2019 Due to \u2018Very Good Relationship\u2019 With Trump Administration<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

BENJAMIN KERSTEIN<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Ex-Israeli Ambassador to US Zalman Shoval answers a question at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, Feb. 1, 2001. Photo: Jessica Persson \/ Reuters.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Former Israeli Ambassador to the United States Zalman Shoval has lived the Jewish state\u2019s short history as fully as almost any man. Born in Danzig in 1930, he made aliyah with his family to what was then British Mandatory Palestine when he was eight years old. After studying at, among other places, the University of California Berkeley, Shoval served in Israel\u2019s Foreign Ministry and later the Knesset, where he helped found not one but two political parties: David Ben-Gurion\u2019s Rafi, and then the far more successful Likud, which created an upheaval in Israeli society when in 1977 it broke Labor\u2019s decades-long hold on power.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shoval\u2019s career hit its peak during his two terms as Israel\u2019s ambassador in Washington, DC, always a prestigious and coveted position given the importance of the alliance with the US. He held the post during the administrations of Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, and took part in the high-profile and contentious Madrid Conference in 1991 between Israel, Arab states and the Palestinians; as well as the equally-controversial Wye River Conference in 1998<\/span><\/p>\n

In his new book,\u00a0Jerusalem and Washington: A Life in Politics and Diplomacy<\/em>, Shoval gives the inside story of these and many other extraordinary events in his life and career.<\/span><\/p>\n

Seated in his spacious office in the heart of Tel Aviv, Shoval has the air of a man far younger than his almost 90 years. He is quick-witted, energetic, humorous and cautiously analytical, drawing on his extraordinary lifetime of experience to assess Israel\u2019s present and future.<\/span><\/p>\n

Both of these, Shoval believes, are at a pivotal point, brought about in part by Israel\u2019s relationship with the Trump administration, giving the country a unique opportunity to advance its interests.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a very special time in history,\u201d he says. \u201cI don\u2019t like to use the term, \u2018This is fateful,\u2019 or whatever, but we have a very good relationship with the present American administration. I don\u2019t know how long it will last.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a special favorable situation now internationally, because of America, Russia, the Arab states and so on,\u201d he observes. \u201cIf we God forbid should waste these remaining two years, let\u2019s say, and not try to move forward what must be basically Israel\u2019s most important aim \u2014 strengthen Israel\u2019s security, militarily and diplomatically and politically \u2014 at a very fortunate time, which could change in two years, for different reasons, I\u2019m not just speaking about American politics, I think that would be a great mistake.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Asked whether Trump is, as some have claimed, the best friend Israel has ever had in the White House, Shoval notes, \u201cI think there\u2019s no such thing as absolute friendship or absolute enmity when you talk about relations between countries. I think that Trump has certain inclinations and views on the global scene which support the way Israel sees the situation in the world and its own situation in the Middle East. And as long as there is this commonality of views, it\u2019s a good thing for Israel.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Regarding the future post-Trump era, Shoval looks back at his old mentor, the late legendary soldier and statesman Moshe Dayan, and states, \u201cIf there were another leader, another president, and one day there will be, I would once again follow what Dayan used to say \u2014 and there were confrontations at that time too \u2014 try to avoid a confrontation with America except on very vital issues, because with a country like America, a democratic country like America, you can always try to postpone decisions and try to work out a compromise, therefore you should play it by ear.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I\u2019m saying this now because I believe that right now the situation is very favorable to Israel, which doesn\u2019t mean that if there is a change in America it must be completely negative,\u201d he emphasizes. \u201cWe\u2019ll have to wait and see.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Regarding the Trump administration\u2019s emerging Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative, kicked off this week at the Bahrain economic workshop, Shoval is pessimistic, something he bases on his experience as a diplomat, particularly at the Madrid Conference, where he recalls, \u201cIt was clear that the Palestinians, who were not official representatives of the PLO, but we knew that they got instructions from Tunis, that they made it very clear that they were not interested in any sort of accommodation with Israel.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat became doubly clear later on after the change of government, after I had left my position, the so-called second Camp David conference with [Yasser] Arafat, at the end of which both President Clinton and then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak said that it became clear to us that we had no partner for peace,\u201d he remembers. \u201cAnd that\u2019s probably still the situation today.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if you look at the Trump \u2018plan of the century,\u2019 basically the Palestinian attitude is, \u2018We don\u2019t want anything which would ipso facto lead to us recognizing the right of the Jewish people to a state,\u2019\u201d he notes. \u201cAnd that\u2019s the main issue why they oppose it. Not because of what they say, \u2018We don\u2019t want to talk about economics before there\u2019s\u2026\u2019 It\u2019s nonsense. You can talk about economics without giving up your political aims. On the contrary, it would help them to advance their political aims if they had a stronger economy. But they don\u2019t want it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so the situation was clear to us even then,\u201d he says of Madrid, \u201cand is still clear to us, unfortunately, because Israel wants to achieve some sort of accommodation. Right now, it seems to be stuck.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I ask the ambassador to look back on the past again, particularly to Israel\u2019s two most controversial policy moves of the last few decades: The Oslo peace process and the disengagement from Gaza.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think Oslo was a mistake, by and large,\u201d he says, \u201cbecause of one principal issue. Not necessarily the issue that people on the extreme right raise, that it could or would actually lead to Palestinian statehood. This would have depended also on developments. But I think the major sin of Oslo was legitimizing the PLO.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe PLO was out of the country,\u201d he continued. \u201cThey were in Tunis, after the first Lebanese war. They had no standing, no official standing, and Oslo gave them not only official standing, but exclusive official standing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNow, it should have been clear to the authors or negotiators of Oslo that Arafat and his group represented principally the Palestinian diaspora,\u201d he asserts.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo it was short-sighted to bring them back,\u201d he says of the PLO. \u201cAnd I think [Yitzhak] Rabin in his own heart and mind understood this quite early on. Perhaps not at the beginning but I think he understood it and he even expressed himself that Arafat was really cheating Israel.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

On the Gaza disengagement, Shoval sees less a miscalculation than a missed opportunity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the criticisms of Gaza at the time was we shouldn\u2019t do anything unilaterally; we should have gotten something in return,\u201d he says. \u201cIn principle, I\u2019m not against unilateral actions. I mean most of what Israel or the Zionist movement has done over the years was unilateral, including establishing the State of Israel and many other things. But here there was an opportunity to get not only some sort of not only vocal but practical concessions from the Palestinians\u2019 senior leadership, but perhaps also from the United States.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Referring to President George W. Bush\u2019s 2004 letter to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon accepting that Israel would not be expected to withdraw completely to the pre-1967 borders, Shoval notes, \u201cThings which later under Sharon and Bush did actually take place, like the letter of Bush, new realities and so on.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

However, he insists, \u201cmore could have been done. The way the disengagement was done was actually just leaving, closing the door, goodbye. So that I think was really basically mishandled.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

During Shoval\u2019s tenure as ambassador, a mini-crisis erupted between President George H.W. Bush and Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir over negotiations with the Arab states, in which Bush sought to use loan guarantees for the absorption of Russian Jewish immigrants to force Israel\u2019s hand. I ask him to compare this to the intense rivalry between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama, culminating in Netanyahu\u2019s March 2015 speech before Congress opposing the nuclear deal with Iran.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFor Bush, this matter of the settlements and the Palestinian issue was something he very much wanted to accomplish,\u201d he says. \u201cI think because he saw himself very much as a foreign policy president, he wanted this achievement. And he was annoyed by Israel\u2019s positions, which he thought was something that a country like Israel should not take upon itself.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWith Obama it was different,\u201d he goes on to say. \u201cObama, I think a priori, before he even entered the White House, had a certain, you could call it ideological or pragmatic attitude toward the Middle East: That America must create a new relationship with the Muslim world, the Arab world, and his attempts to create a relationship with Iran at the very beginning.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe thought that Netanyahu, who led almost the international campaign against the nuclear rising Iran, on which he was right of course, as we now know, was a fly in the ointment,\u201d Shoval states. \u201cWho is he or who are they to fight me, Obama, on the American political scene?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNetanyahu\u2019s speech in the US Congress is, of course, part of that,\u201d he says. \u201cWas it a mistake or not? On the one hand it was not a mistake, because it really increased the recognition of the threat of Iran in the Congress, in the world. On the other hand, although one can never know exactly how things develop, I think it had a negative impact on Israel\u2019s relationship right now with the Democratic Party.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The topic of the Democrats\u2019 seeming disconnection from Israel has been the object of much discussion of late, but Shoval does not see it as solely the result of Netanyahu\u2019s actions.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNot only because of that,\u201d he says. \u201cI think the main fault lies with the new elements in the Democratic Party. I don\u2019t even call it \u2018left.\u2019 I call it anti-establishment in every sense of the word.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

These anti-establishment Democrats, he points out, \u201cput all sorts of issues into the same pot, whether it\u2019s Me Too or whether it\u2019s gay rights \u2014 all important issues \u2014 whether it\u2019s the dire story of Afro-Americans in America \u2014 and the Palestinians, as if this were part of the same thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd this is a trend today which is worrying to Israel, because the Democratic Party has traditionally, historically been a mainstay of support for Israel,\u201d he notes. \u201cAnd right now it\u2019s lopsided. Main support comes from the Republicans, whereas support among Democrats has lessened. I\u2019m not saying it\u2019s disappeared, but it\u2019s lessened.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere are today members of Congress from the Democratic left who are actually legitimizing even the activities of BDS, which is an all-out antisemitic and anti-Israel organization whose aim is the destruction of the State of Israel,\u201d he observes. \u201cAnd that is a reality which not only Israel, but American Jews must be very, very concerned with.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

On the topic of American Jews, Shoval thinks that the idea of a growing rift between them and Israel is \u201ca bit overblown,\u201d but there is an issue with \u201cthe attitude of official Israel towards non-Orthodox American Jews.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is a major problem; not only for Israel, I think it\u2019s a major problem for the Jewish people, the Jewish community in America in particular,\u201d he says. \u201cAlthough Netanyahu himself and most Israelis support the position of American non-Orthodox Jews to have full rights as Jews in holy places and religious practice, because of certain political realities in Israel, and in spite of very serious attempts by Netanyahu in his different governments to change the situation, he has not succeeded.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBut I can only hope that in spite of that, and in spite of the visceral opposition of most American Jews to the Trump regime, Jews will understand, especially non-Orthodox Jews \u2014 Orthodox Jews will remain Jews whatever happens \u2014 but liberal, progressive, Reform, Conservative Jews, what will keep them basically Jewish is the close relationship with the State of Israel,\u201d he states.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI said at an AIPAC conference years ago, 20 years ago, those Jews who are not interested in Israel are not interested in remaining Jews,\u201d he says. \u201cIsrael will have to do a lot about that, but the American Jewish leadership will have to do a lot about that. Otherwise, part of American Jewry will disappear, which I think is a tragedy, and I\u2019m saying this not as an Israeli but as a Jew. Jewish people have so much to be proud about, in their history and their legacy and their contribution to the world at large.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This sentiment extends to Shoval\u2019s view of the country whose history he has lived.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWithout trying to sound like a Pollyanna, we as young people, we were sure there would be a Jewish state,\u201d he says. \u201cWe were sure that this was going to happen. But realistically, objectively, this wasn\u2019t sure at all. The odds were against us. Here we were, 500,000 Jews. Most of the Jews in Europe had been murdered during the Holocaust, which would have been our main human reserve for the State of Israel. Arab states around us were getting independence, were building up armies. So with the attitude of the British, the unclear attitude of the Americans and the Russians, if it hadn\u2019t been for a person like Ben-Gurion, who knows?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cObjectively, Israel \u2014 if you take just one fact: 500,000 Jews with very mediocre economy in the country, successfully absorbing within a very short time a million immigrants, sharing what we didn\u2019t have with them,\u201d he states. \u201cThis was an unprecedented achievement. And fighting a war and winning it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBut Israel was so poor at the beginning,\u201d he notes. \u201cAnd if I look at that situation and I look at Israel today, I think this is the biggest historical success in world history or modern world history. Compared to any of the other countries which achieved independence at the same time. And the odds against us were much more severe than most of the other countries.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSo I\u2019m happy about what Israel has achieved,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd Israel is today one of the most successful high-tech countries in the world. When Israel is an important center of cultural activity. When Israel has in the meantime integrated another million immigrants from Russia. Israel being military strong. I think we shouldn\u2019t be satisfied, but we should be happy with what we\u2019ve accomplished.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSatisfied we should never be,\u201d he adds. \u201cJewish people should always strive for more. Obviously, I would like to see a different relationship between us and our neighbors. But if that is not possible, perhaps the best we can achieve is some sort of de facto relationship, not necessarily to love each other but at least to avoid fighting each other. And I think a strong Israel as it is today can accomplish that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I ask him if he is an optimist, as he certainly sounds like one, and Shoval simply smiles and says, \u201cI think Jews have to be optimists.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Israel\u2019s Ex-US Envoy Says Jewish State at \u2018Special Time in History\u2019 Due to \u2018Very Good Relationship\u2019 With Trump Administration BENJAMIN KERSTEIN Ex-Israeli Ambassador to US Zalman Shoval answers a question at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, Feb. 1, 2001. Photo: Jessica Persson \/ Reuters. Former Israeli Ambassador to the United States Zalman Shoval […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71380"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=71380"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71398,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71380\/revisions\/71398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=71380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=71380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=71380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}