New Israeli blitzkrieg
Socialist Outlook newspaper1990sPaul ClarkeTranscribed or corrected by hand from the printed page.
THE LATEST Israeli incursion into Lebanon, attacking the villages of Kafra and Yater, was patently aimed at damaging the 'peace process' opened up at the insistence of the United States.
Israel's actions over the past two weeks have utilised all the casual ruthlessness and brutality with which the Zionist state typically operates against Arabs – the bombing of refugee camps, the assassination of Hezbollah leader Abbas Masawi and his family, the destruction of hundreds of Arab homes, the wrecking of villages.
But beyond the headlines Israeli leaders are infuriated by the peace negotiations and want them to fail. The reasons for this are primarily connected with internal Israeli politics.
In the aftermath of the Gulf war, the US seized the initiative to force the hands of both Israel and its Gulf coalition Arab allies to conduct the peace talks. The US aims had nothing to do with giving justice to the Palestinians; rather they aim to impose 'Pax Americana' on the region, tying the Syrians especially to US policy aims.
The US expects the peace negotiations to be long and drawn-out. For the US that is not necessarily a disadvantage, so long as the US dominates the political agenda in the region. But for that to happen the talks have to at least appear to have the possibility of a realistic outcome.
What does that mean in practice? It can only mean demobilising the PLO and Arab resistance to Israel in return for some kind of political autonomy (not necessarily independence) for the West Bank and Gaza strip. It is here that US political objectives clash with domestic Israeli politics.
Far from preparing to cede any kind of autonomy, Israel is settling tens of thousands of new immigrants, mainly from the Soviet Union, in new settlements on the West Bank. Arab homes are being bulldozed to make way for new Israeli villages. The aim is to permanently change the population structure of the area.
Housing construction is in the hands of extreme right-winger Ariel Sharon, who as defence minister personally organised the massacres in the Lebanese Palestinian refugee camps in 1982.
Israeli politics has been inexorably shifting to the right for more than a decade. The election of Yitzak Rabin as Labour Party leader is one more sign of this shift.
The lessons are clear. Peace talks are going nowhere, because the US lacks the clout to impose on Israel even limited autonomy for the Palestinians. Neither side will want to be seen to pull out of the talks. But on the ground nothing will change. The broad consensus in official Israeli politics is for maintaining the iron hand against the Arabs. And that means more air raids, the continuing detention of hundreds of Arab prisoners, and brutal repression in the occupied territories.
There is no road to freedom for the Palestinians in the current talks. Neither is there any road forward in isolated military attacks. Only by linking the Palestinian struggle to a regional strategy to defeat both reactionary Arab regimes and Israel's Zionist leaders can a new phase of the Palestinian liberation struggle be begun.