Nonviolent Change Journal

Ephraim Sneh, is chairman of the Knesset subcommittee
on defense planning and policy and a former member of the Israeli cabinet.
Reprinted from The New York Times, May 2, 2003, http://www.nytimes.com.
Distributed by the Common Ground News Service with permission to republish.

The plan for Israeli-Palestinian peace, known as the road map, cannot be allowed to fail. The alternatives are too frightening. Failure would most likely lead to the collapse of the cabinet of Mahmoud Abbas, the new Palestinian prime minister, giving Hamas the upper hand on the Palestinian street. As a result, those in Israel who have claimed that there are no moderate Palestinians with whom to negotiate will be vindicated.

We can guess what might happen next: another round of terrorism and violence that will make it even more difficult to have meaningful Israeli-Palestinian dialogue.

The road map's success is crucial. But putting it in place will not be easy. Those who would like to sabotage it are determined and ruthless. For this reason, it's vital that we find a way to make concrete progress immediately. And the best way to do that is through a quick interim accord - a pilot project for the peace process.

The Gaza Strip is the most appropriate place for such an experiment. This mini-road map - "Pilot Gaza" - would have three consecutive stages.

First, the Palestinian government would be given full access and power to act in the Gaza Strip. Second, to improve living standards, all economic and infrastructure projects there - including the United States-financed desalination project and the Karni industrial complex - would be resumed and steps would be taken to allow more workers to enter Israel and to facilitate the export of goods from Gaza. Third, if the Palestinian government could show, within one year, that it had dismantled terrorist organizations in Gaza, stopped incitement and imposed law and order there, then Israel would evacuate its settlements and withdraw its troops.

The assessment that terrorism was effectively suppressed and that conditions for Israel's withdrawal were met would have to be unanimously validated by representatives from the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations.

While the aim of the road map is the creation of a viable, independent Palestinian state by 2005, the scope of this state's sovereignty and its geographic boundaries are, as yet, not specific enough. But unless Abu Mazen, as Mr. Abbas is commonly known, is able to present to the Palestinians a satisfactory and attainable destination for the road map, he will find it difficult to gain the popular support he needs to curb terrorism effectively.

The new Palestinian government may be tempted to stop terrorism through a tacit agreement with Hamas and Islamic Jihad instead of dismantling them. Such an approach would merely postpone the inevitable showdown over who will emerge as the dominant force in Palestinian society - Fatah or Hamas. So long as the question of Palestinian leadership hangs in the air, violence will continue. Israelis will feel threatened, and thus the Israeli government will not be able to make the hard concessions required for peace.

The success of Pilot Gaza would accelerate efforts to put in place the road map. It would also reduce violence in other parts of the Palestinian territories, help the residents of Gaza return to normal life and allow the Palestinian Authority to show the world it can govern effectively. Such success would demonstrate that an agreement based on joint antiterrorism measures, economic cooperation and the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, can be achieved - not just on a map, but in reality.

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©2002.2003. All rights reserve. The Nonviolent Change Journal is published by the Research/Action Team on Nonviolent Large Systems Change - an interorganizational and international project of The Organization Development Institute.

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