It’s Time to Reconsider a Federal Arrangement
By Israel Zwick, CN Publications,
It isn’t necessary to be an expert in governmental relations to realize that an Arab state in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza would be an administrative and economic disaster. Any observant tourist who spends two weeks traveling around Israel and the Arab areas can easily determine that independently.
On page 68, of The Israel-Arab Reader, Seventh Edition, edited by Walter Laquer and Barry Rubin, I discovered a little snippet of Israeli history that is little known and seemingly insignificant. It is widely known that in 1947, the UN Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) recommended that that the British Palestine Mandate “be constituted into an Arab State, a Jewish State, and the City of Jerusalem.” This was the opinion of the seven majority members of the Committee. What is little known is that three members of the Committee released a minority proposal:
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Three U.N.S.C.O.P. members (the representatives of India, Iran and Yugoslavia) proposed an independent federal state. This plan provided, inter alia, that an independent federal state of Palestine would be created following a transitional period not exceeding three years, during which responsibility for administering Palestine and preparing it for independence would be entrusted to an authority to be decided by the General Assembly.
The independent federal state would comprise an Arab State and a Jewish State. Jerusalem would be its capital.
During the transitional period a Constituent Assembly would be elected by popular vote and convened by the administering authority on the basis of electoral provisions which would ensure the fullest representation of the population.
The Constituent Assembly would draw up the constitution of the federal state, which was to contain, inter alia, the following provisions:
The federal state would comprise a federal government and governments of the Arab and Jewish States, respectively.
Full authority would be vested in the federal government with regard to national defence, foreign relations, immigration, currency, taxation for federal purposes, foreign and inter-state waterways, transport and communications, copyrights and patents.
The Arab and Jewish States would enjoy full powers of local self-government and would have authority over education, taxation for local purposes, the right of residence, commercial licenses, land permits, grazing rights, inter-state migration, settlement, police, punishment of crime, social institutions and services, public housing, public health, local roads, agriculture and local industries.
Apparently, these three members did not believe that carving up the tiny Palestine Mandate into disjointed strips of land was a viable option. This was not the first time that the practicality of separate Jewish and Arab states was questioned. On page 43 of the book, there is a British Government Policy Statement Against Partition issued in November 1938, almost a year before the German invasion of Poland.
4. His Majesty’s Government, after careful study of the Partition Commission’s report, have reached the conclusion that this further examination has shown that the political, administrative and financial difficulties involved in the proposal to create independent Arab and Jewish States inside Palestine are so great that this solution of the problem is impracticable.
5. His Majesty’s Government will therefore continue their responsibility for the government of the whole of Palestine. They are now faced with the problem of finding alternative means of meeting the needs of the difficult situation described by the Royal Commission [Peel Commission, 1937], which will be consistent with their obligations to the Arabs and the Jews. His Majesty’s Government believes that it is possible to find these alternative means. They have already given much thought to the problem in the light of the reports of the Royal Commission and of the Partition Commission. It is clear that the surest foundation for peace and progress in Palestine would be an understanding between the Arabs and the Jews, and His Majesty’s Government are prepared in the first instance to make a determined effort to promote such an understanding.
Apparently, there was recognition that the partition plan as proposed by the Peel Commission would not be administratively and financially practical. Note that in both of these documents, the Arabs living in Palestine are not referred to as “Palestinians” but merely as “Arabs” presumably in recognition that they do not constitute a distinct ethnic group. Actually, at that time, the Jews living in Palestine were known to European Jews as “Palastinishers.”
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India, Iran and Yugoslavia.
So how have these countries done with federalism?
1. India — the world’s largest multiparty democracy (which is quite a distinction!), which has survived through several governments of opposing parties for some 60 years (like Israel). They are “federal”, in the sense that India is composed of states speaking different languages (from mutually unintelligible language families), using different alphabets, and having a different history from one another. Compared with European countries, this is remarkable — even Switzerland is homogenous by comparision.
But in one way, India has failed to accomplish federalism: The Moslems insisted on, and got, a state of their own (now two states — Pakistan and Bangladesh).
2. Iran — the land of many minorities: Persians, Baluchis, Lurs, Kurds, Azeris. They’ve never had a federal state.
3. Yugoslavia — They had a federal state from 1919-1941 and from 1945-the 1990s. They tried; it didn’t work; and the divisions there were mostly of a language and sectarian nature — sort of like we have in Iraq today (and Iraq has never had a federal state).
I don’t know who the other commission members were, but I dare say, they haven’t had any more success at federalism than the three countries above. Even the United States of America, which is actually a pretty homogenious place, doesn’t have much in the way of “states rights” anymore (As a matter of fact, neither did Yugoslavia). And if even India could’t interest the Moslems in federalism (The war has never ended about Kashmir, which had to be partitioned between two countries), I dare say Israel will not be able to either. I know many Jews would love the idea, but Moslems are — think about it — INCAPABLE of federalism! No Moslem state has ever been federal in the least! Look at Cyprus, at Kossovo, at Chechnya, Pakistan, you name it. Throughout history, Moslem rulers have been able to deal with other peoples in only one way: forcing them to live in humiliation under an iron-fisted ruler.
Democracy is really a Christian form of government. It started in New England, when the congregational form of church government became a “congregational” form of town government. It didn’t come from the Greeks who, through the large part of their history, have been ruled by tyrants. The French tried democracy without its religious basis, and they’ve had a roller-coaster ride trying to get used to it. Other countries followed suit, usually with poor results. It took in places like India and Japan — which, you will note, are RELIGIOUSLY unique places. Israel has an “arguocrasy”, in keeping with its religious background; but democracy has never worked in a Moslem country for very long. Indonesia has perhaps the best record: They’ve been independent for nearly as long as India; but their national hero (Sukarno, Indonesia’s “Nehru”) left office only after a violent civil war, only to be succeeded by a strongman who ruled for over 30 years.
Look at the history of the land of Israel: It was ruled by the Egyptians, then the Jews (who split into two competing kingdoms), then the Assyrians, then the Babylonians, then the Persians, then the Greeks, who split between Ptolemaids and Seleucids, then the Jews again (who fought, brother against brother), then the Romans, then the Byzantines, then the Persians, then the Arabs — who continually fought among themselves: Umayyads, then Abbasids, then Tulunids, then Abbasids again — then the Berber Fatimids, then the Seljuk Turks, then the Frankish Crusaders, then the Kurdish Ayyubids, then the Circasian Mamlukes, then the Ottoman Turks, then the British, and then, after a 19-year war of independence and unification, the Jews.
Not one of those governments was a federal system; not since the days of the Judges, and even then every “state” was an Israelite tribe. What’s more, the land of Israel is by no means unique in the area: Every one of those powers who ruled Israel also ruled over much of the Middle East, and sometimes beyond that — to Spain, to India, to Sudan and Uzbekistan. In fact, the Jews are one of the few peoples in the area with clearly-defined “national” ambitions: Everyone else in the area — Arabs, Turks, Persians, Kurds — has an open-ended imperial outlook.
The federal idea is worth a thought, but I think we need to think again, and again.
Shalom shalom
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