In 1985 I was the first USAID officer to be assigned responsibility for managing and monitoring foreign assistance NGO programs in the West Bank and Gaza. In that capacity, I was the author and negotiator of the first U.S.-funded Palestinian-Israeli Cooperation Program. The process involved a large number of people and organizations: the Israeli government, the State Department, the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv; the U.S. consulate in East Jerusalem, USAID, the Palestinian leadership, various nongovernmental organizations in the West Bank, Gaza and Israel, and Jewish and Arab American NGOs in the United States. After two years of difficult negotiations, work finally began on the first activity, revising history textbooks for kindergarten through grade 12. Teams of Israeli and Palestinian academics, teachers and parents began development of mutually acceptable content for history textbooks.
Sticks and Stones...
About the same time, in 1987, the first intifada (Arabic for shaking off) commenced. Best known for boys throwing stones, the campaign also involved general strikes, boycotts, tax strikes, Molotov cocktails and, eventually, armed attacks against the harsh and inhumane conditions of the Israeli occupation and the campaign by the Israelis to make life intolerable in the West Bank and Gaza so as to drive out the Palestinian population. In August 1988, the level of violence within Israel escalated with the first suicide bomb attack on a crowded bus in West Jerusalem. Twenty-three Israelis were killed and more than 130 were wounded, many of them children. The Israeli forces responded with beatings (often breaking bones), home demolitions, extrajudicial killings, and mass detentions (sometimes of thousands of Palestinians at a time), deportations, curfews and torture. Whatever the tactic, the Israeli strategy was always to hit back harder than they had been hit. During my visits throughout Gaza and the West Bank to monitor USAID programs during tills difficult period, I witnessed many encounters between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians. I once came upon a group of young boys (maybe 7 or 8 years old) throwing stones at Israel Defense Force members. The soldiers started to chase them and all got away except one boy, who was taken to a group of soldiers.
One of the soldiers seemed to be in charge and gave an order. The soldier holding the boy straightened out his arm; then another soldier raised his leg and brought his boot down against the back of the elbow of the boy's arm with a force strong enough to break the bone. The boy screamed, broke free and ran. The soldier who performed this act was young; I guessed maybe 17 or 18, with bright red hair. All these years later I still recall thinking about what trauma that boy would suffer-and the young soldier would suffer, too. For in tills conflict, there were no winners: everyone lost, and all, including witnesses like me, were traumatized. It was years before I stopped seeing scenes like this in my dreams. Though I kept trying to get our cooperation program going, I eventually came to question the value of our efforts in the Israeli- Palestinian context. Perhaps the power differential between the two sides was too great to expect that dialogue and cooperative efforts would have beneficial effects.
There were some committed individuals on both sides who worked very hard on cooperative efforts. But they seemed to burn out because over the years, on any level of analysis, they were seeing such meager positive results. And all the while the conflict became more intractable, violence on both sides increased, and living conditions for the Palestinians deteriorated. Eventually, the violence became so horrible and pervasive that I saw little or no possibility for positive impact. I moved on to Foreign Service assignments in other parts of the world. When I did return to the region two decades later as a private citizen on a peace delegation organized by the Interfaith Peace-Builders, I found the situation for all parties unimaginably worse.
Continuous Traumatic Stress Disorder
With determination, hard work and U.S. assistance, today Israelis enjoy a prosperous economy, high standard of living and a strong military. By contrast, Palestinians have one of the lowest per capita incomes in the world and a small police force, lack an effective government and have no military. In terms of conflict resolution, neither the Israeli nor the Palestinian strategy is succeeding. Both sides live their lives in a continuous state of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder-except there is no "post" in this conflict. It is continuous traumatic stress disorder: CTSD. Israel appears to be stuck in victimhood, a perpetually defensive posture even though the country has the 22ndhighest gross domestic product per capita in the world (ahead of New Zealand, Finland, Denmark and Ireland) and is thought to have the 11th-strongest military in the world. For its part, the Palestinian "government" can hardly be said to govern, but the people work equally hard to remain "steadfast" to preserve what little remains for them in inhumane, intolerable conditions.
As an American citizen, I have come to see efforts to resolve the Palestinian Israeli conflict as my obligation, since my tax dollars and my government are helping to support it. From what I have seen over the years, I am convinced that the conflict could have been resolved years ago were it not for U.S. intervention. Our role has escalated and prolonged the agony of both peoples by providing Israel with funds and milita1y equipment that not only free up resources to build settlements and walls but deploy military equipment against civilian populations in Lebanon and Gaza, violating both U.S. and international law.
Causes for Hope
So why, after 20 years of feeling despondent and demoralized by this situation, do I now suddenly have hope for the future? First, from what I've seen over the past decade, the Palestinian people have developed some nonviolent strategies that are beginning to have positive impact. An excellent example is the West Bank village of Bil'in, where the 'Israeli-built wall took away 50 percent of the town's farmland. When the people of Bil'in took their case to the Israeli.
Supreme Court, it ruled that the wall needed to be moved to give the farmers access to their land. 1bat was five years ago and the ruling still has not been implemented. So every Friday, the people of Bil'in have organized nonviolent protests. These demonstrations include Palestinians, Israelis and people from around the world and use art, song, dance, theater and poetry. But they usually end the same way, with the Israelis using tear gas and rubber bullets against the protesters. As a consequence of the townspeople's activism, almost nightly Bil'in suffers raids, arrests and beatings by the IDE But today most of my hope emanates from outside Israel and Palestine. In mid-August 2009, for example, Bil'in was visited by the Elders. Organized by former South African President Nelson Mandela, this distinguished group of former world leaders have pledged their collective influence and experience to build peace and to address the major causes of suffering in the world. These human rights champions-Mandela, Desmond Tutu, Gro Brundtland, Jimmy and Rosalind Carter, Mary Robinson, Martti Ahtisaari and Eta Bhatt-came to recognize the nonviolent efforts of the people ofBil'in and to bring international attention to the conflict. I am also encouraged that international civil society has taken a strong role in working to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Organized in response to a call made by the Palestinian National Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Committee, BDS programs and networks of resistance against the occupation are multiplying around the world Several European Union countries are boycotting Israeli products, and there have been reports of produce rotting on shelves. In 2010 the Israeli Manufacturers Association reported a 21-percent drop in demand due to boycotts. Some European and international unions have become involved in BDS, as well. Several large investors, including the Norwegian government, have divested from the Africa-Israel fim1 owned by Lev Leviev that constructs settlements in the West Bank in violation of international law. But the organization with possibly the greatest potential impact on Israel (given the cultural valuation of education by Israelis and Palestinians) is the Palestinian
Campaign for Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel and its American sister organization (the U.S. Campaign for Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel). The interest here is in discouraging academic and cultural cooperation and performances with Israel until the occupation ends. In addition, many of the churches and civic organizations in the U.S. and Europe that reaffirm Israel's right to exist also boycott and divest from companies providing products or services (including financial) that support Israelis or Palestinians who attack civilians. 'These nonviolent strategies are paying off. Many new solidarity groups have emerged during the last 10 years, such as the International Solidarity Movement and Women in Black. Professional organizations and human rights groups like Amnesty International and Oxfam, Code Pink, the ~U.S. Veterans for Peace and other peace groups, are also involved.
One State, Not Two
Lastly and most importantly, I am greatly encouraged by the increasing discussion of a one-state solution to theIsraeli-Palestinian conflict. A Jewish taxi driver first introduced me to this idea in 1988, when I traveled with him fromHebron to Ga:z:a City. When I told him what I was doing there, he told me, "lhere is only one solution to our problem here, and we all know it. The Palestinians know it, we Israelis know it. That solution is one state with Jerusalem as the capital. You could call it the United States of Palestine with perhaps three states: Israel, Gaza and the West Bank. "Our problem is that the Palestinian leadership does not want this solution and the Israeli government would never allow it. And even if we could overcome these too, your American government would never support it. So we are caught in a situation without resolution because our leaders cannot agree on the only solution that will ever work:' At the time, I thought to myself, "What does a taxi driver know?" Still, it was an interesting idea that I stored in the back ofmymind. I believe that idea's time has come. We now have 20 years of experience demonstrating the impossibility of a two-state solution or even of creating an effective government for the Palestinians. Many voices are calling for a one-state solution: a country in which Palestinians and Jews live togeth en~ith equal rights and responsibilities. This would not necessarily be the end of Israel, but it would require a secular state, the end of the Jewish state. This is a real stumbling block for Israelis and the Jewish diaspora, who have all seen a Jewish state as a fundamental sanctuary. It seems to me, however, that religious states, no matter how benevolent, are simply not viable-not Islamic states, not a Jewish state, not even a peaceful Quaker state (think colonial Pennsylvania). Religious states by definition discriminate against the minority (or minorities) and are therefore unstable and unsustainable. To date, Israel proves my point. So, for all the reasons I've already noted, a one-state ·solution is the only viable one. Under it, neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis get everything they want, but both sides get what they need. (For an excellent discussion of the onestate solution, read AJi Abunimah's 2007 book, One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.)
Seeking a Win-Win Solution
For all these reasons, I have hope today. There are courageous Israelis and Palestinians who are getting beyond "us versus them" thinking and are moving into real, nonviolent conflict resolution. The Jewish, Christian and Muslim peoples of Palestine are learning that we are all imperfect human beings, and only through nonviolent means can they bring about a lasting resolution satisfactory to all parties. As Moshe Dayan said, the only way to achieve peace "is not to talk with my friends but to talk with my enemies:' We have learned not to rely on the paralyzed, self-interested and often co-opted U.S. and Israeli governments for answers or even to ask the important questions. As powerful as these governments are, people power, witl1 international support, can still prevail, as it did in South Africa eventually even with support from the U.S. Government. Today I see growing Israeli, Palestinian and international support for finding solutions that are winners for all the parties to the conflict. Only such an approach can finally end the intolerable suffering of both the Israeli and Palestinian peoples. •