The return of George Mitchell
Martin Kramer, Sandbox blog, Jan. 21, 2009
As early as today, according to reliable reports, President Obama will appoint former Senator George Mitchell as his special Middle East envoy. Mitchell, it will be recalled, led a commission to investigate the causes of Israeli-Palestinian violence back in 2001. (Details and some takes here.)
I had the chance to spend some time with Mitchell last month, when he and I attended a conference at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv. I don’t think he’d spent much time in the region since his earlier mission, and he was clearly collecting information on all that had happened in the interim. During a twenty-minute taxi ride, he peppered me with questions about Hamas and Gaza—the new twist that will make his mission that much more difficult. I hope I set him straight.
Click here to read a transcript of his remarks at the conference (mine are there too). It’s what Mitchell didn’t say that left the greatest impression on me. Mitchell had been U.S. special envoy to Northern Ireland, a task he later passed on to Richard Haass, who now heads the Council on Foreign Relations. That effort was crowned with success, and both Mitchell and Haass have had frequent recourse to the Northern Ireland analogy in relation to Israel and the Palestinians. It’s a problematic one, but at least Mitchell uses it in a restrained way. When he makes it, he simply means to say that even difficult conflicts can be resolved. In contrast, Haass stretches it way too far, and once argued that “U.S. officials ought to sit down with Hamas officials, much as they have with the leaders of Sinn Féin, some of whom also led the Irish Republican Army.” Some press reports had named Haass as a candidate for the envoy slot, and I wrote against the idea because it would have been read as a nod to Hamas. (Continue Reading this Article)
Hamas has asked the West to lift the ban on talking to it but unless its prepared to renounce jihad and its central plank to destroy Israel, that won’t happen. Neither will a Palestinian state and the truth is some conflicts are by definition, unsolvable.
Comment by NormanF — January 21, 2009 @ 10:07 pm
If Mr. Mitchell thinks the situation in Israel parallels that in Ireland, it might be useful to construct a timeline.
I. Independence from Great Britain.
IRELAND: became independent around 1921 (I can’t do lookups while posting, because this seems to activate Ted’s SP-=M f*ltr [it also seems to act up whenever I refer to it]).
ISRAEL: became independent in 1948. I honestly don’t recall when Jordan became independent. In 1948, they seemed to be semi-independent: They conducted their own foreign policy, but had British officers over their armed forces.
II. Division of the country.
IRELAND: accepted division of the country, as the price of independence — in 1921.
ISRAEL: accepted two divisions: Transjordan was partitioned off in the 1920s; and in 1948 they accepted a second division — as the price of independence, like in Ireland.
III. Continuing unrest.
IRELAND: The pro-Ireland faction in Northern Ireland (which continues to this day to be ruled by Great Britain) continued resistance, including a terrorist guerilla war from around 1970 to around 2000.
ISRAEL: differs from Ireland: Foreign powers, including Britain’s proxy state of Transjordan, declared open war on Israel, and lost.
By the time the Irish intifada got underway, Israel had already conquered the second-partition area of “Palestine” — tantamount to the Irish Republic having conquered the northern Six Counties known as Northern Ireland by force, after a pro-British invasion of its homeland. If the parallel with Israel were to carried further, the invaders would have been Anglophile countries such as the US, Canada and Australia.
If the Israeli situation had been transferred to Ireland, It would have been the PROTESTANTS waging a guerilla war against the Republic. On the other hand, if the Irish situation had been transferred to Israel, it’s the ISRAELIS who would have had British officers in their army, not the Arabs; and today they would be waging a guerilla war against a prospering Palestinian state. Neighbors such as Egypt and Jordan would never have gone to war against it.
Timewise, there’s also a mis-match. Since Ireland became independent in 1921 and Israel in 1948, we ought to allow a 27-year developmental lag: Israel today should be considered to be like Ireland in 1982. Remember that in 1982, it was the IRISH REPUBLICANS doing the terrorist bombing. The whole analogy needs to be flip-flopped, therefore, comparing Israel today to the NORTHERN Irish of 1982, people who were complete pawns of the British. The Irish Republic would be analogous to interfering foreign powers such as Iran and Egypt, and the “territories” in Ireland analogous to YeSh and Hamasstan would be places in Northern Ireland such as Derry. Belfast would, of course, be analogous to Jerusalem.
I’ll just comment on two things: First of all, the analogy points to peace not being attained for another 20 years, despite the most well-intentioned efforts on all sides. Second, the final outcome would have to be a ONE STATE solution, with an Arab minority peacefully living under a Jewish majority in a parliamentary democracy.
If Mr. Mitchell does think the Israeli situation parallels that of Ireland, I hope he realizes what this implies, and moves in a direction that will bear fruit.
As a post-script in that direction, let’s consider what the “glue” is that allows The Irish Republic, Great Britain and Northern Ireland to live in relative calm today: It is the European Union, a union made up mostly of outsiders to the conflict, which has brought prosperity to all concerned. The analogy in Israel, would be a union that include outsiders such as the Europeans, along with their Arab neighbors. There are many in Israel who would welcome Israeli entry into the E.U.; but imagining Arab participation in such a union is about as close as our joining the Federation with the Vulcans Klingons. At the very least, THIS will take some 20 years more to happen.
Comment by BlandOatmeal — January 22, 2009 @ 12:58 am
The IRA never sought the destruction of Great Britain. They simply wanted the British out of Ireland. Fatah and Hamas seek the destruction of Israel and they want all the Jews gone when that happens. So the analogy between Northern Ireland and Israel/The Territories is an invalid one. The British and the Irish who share a Christian religion and the same language get along uneasily; it is not surprising that the Arabs and the Jews who have different religions and languages don’t get along at all.
Comment by NormanF — January 22, 2009 @ 2:33 am
Once again: So long as Muslims believe in Islam and the Koran, which says to kill Jews, there will be no peace until either Islam or Judaism is destroyed.
Comment by Ed D — January 22, 2009 @ 12:15 pm
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