The "land swap" rubric of Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations conceals Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and is one step away from legitimising its illegal settlements, writes Hassan Nafaa* A new recipe is being put together for peace in the Middle East. After 25 years of trying, the old-style peace process died at the hands of the Bush administration. Then the Obama administration came along and things started to move again. George Mitchell came to the region and Barack Obama began calling on Israel to stop building settlements in Arab territories. The US president also urged Palestinians and Israelis to resume talks in the hope of reaching an acceptable solution within a reasonable timeframe. This was a far cry from the attitude of previous administrations. Obama formulated a new vision for US foreign policy, reviving hopes of a better rapport with countries across the globe, Arab and Muslim ones included. Obama's new approach to the Middle East was greeted with satisfaction, especially on the part of the Palestinians and Arab moderates. Israel, however, saw the shift in US policy as unnecessary and harmful to its regional schemes. Although the Israelis were determined to resist any substantial change in US policy, they were careful to placate the new US administration. Consequently, Netanyahu made a few insignificant concessions while keeping the right to approve the final "recipe" of any settlement plan. When the Americans asked for a freeze on settlement activities, the Israeli government granted building licences for more than 3,000 residential units before promising to freeze settlement activities in the West Bank. Netanyahu excluded Jerusalem from the freeze and said that the freeze would last for 10 months only. He promised to begin negotiations immediately on the two-state solution, but only if the Palestinians recognised Israel as a Jewish state. Netanyahu wasn't making concessions. In fact, he was adding unprecedented conditions on the Palestinians. The volume of new housing he authorised exceeded any expected growth in the settlements within the 10-month period. In other words, the building of settlements was being boosted, not halted. Netanyahu's request for Jerusalem to be excluded from the freeze, if granted by the Palestinians, would pave the way to the exclusion of Jerusalem from the negotiations. And his demand that the Palestinians recognise Israel as a Jewish state would undermine rights of the Israeli-Arabs. This is odd indeed, but also the kind of thing one expects the likes of Netanyahu to do. What was truly bizarre, however, was that Obama accepted Netanyahu's offer and called it an adequate basis for resuming negotiations. One can only conclude that Obama changed his mind and reversed his earlier position. Not only did the US president welcome the Israeli offer, but Obama also started putting direct and indirect pressure on the Palestinians to change their position and negotiate while Israel is building settlements. The US administration has been telling Arab countries that a just solution can still be found and that they should seize the opportunity to pursue such a solution. The Americans argue that: - Netanyahu's position has changed and he no longer opposes the creation of a Palestinian state. - The Israeli rightwing is more capable of reaching a peace agreement, simply because the Israeli leftwing is now too weak. - It is possible to overcome the thorny issue of settlements and focus instead on drawing borders. It is also possible to overcome the thorny issue of the 1967 borders through land exchange. And it is possible to overcome the political and psychological obstacles related to the unconditional resumption of talks by relying on US guarantees to both sides. The fate of the current peace recipe, it seems, hinges on two issues that are central to the current negotiations: the nature of the guarantees and assurances the US administration is willing to give to the Palestinians and the Israelis; and the way in which the concept "land exchange" would be translated into actual maps. In other words, the "recipe" depends on US letters of guarantee and a map defining the land swap. One cannot expect current peace efforts to lead to any tangible results. The Palestinian issue doesn't lend itself to such blatant self-deception. We cannot all of a sudden pretend that the inalienable rights of nations mean nothing. Before long, the Palestinian people, landless and homeless, would understand that no clever wording of guarantees and no kinked lines of a land swap map can conceal the fact that they are being sold down the river. A careful examination of potential US guarantees reveals two types of problem. On the one hand, the guarantees are nothing but an artificial attempt to mend a crisis of confidence that should have been addressed through confidence-building measures involving the two parties involved. Also, similar attempts have failed repeatedly in the past, simply because guarantees from a third party cannot bridge the mistrust between the Palestinians and the Israelis. On the other hand, for a third party to give credible guarantees, that party must be unbiased, which the Americans are not. The party giving guarantees should keep both sides at an equal distance, which Washington cannot afford to do. The Arabs are no strangers to US guarantees. The Americans gave us guarantees prior to the Madrid Conference of 1991 and again prior to the Annapolis Conference of 2007. In both cases, these guarantees turned out to be useless. Therefore, one can only draw the conclusion that US guarantees alone cannot overcome the Arab-Israeli crisis of confidence. As for the "land swap", it is nothing but a lame attempt to confuse the fact that Israel has occupied Arab land. The land swap is designed to treat the occupied territories as "disputed" and not occupied, which is one step away from giving legitimacy to Israeli settlements. Should the Palestinians agree to a land swap they would be undermining not only their rights but also any chance for peace. This is because Israel is likely to use the land swap to: - Deny that the 4 June 1967 lines are the basis for drawing the borders of a future Palestinian state. Israel will use these lines only as a basis for determining the "size" of the land that the Palestinians should receive in compensation. - Annex areas in the West Bank for any number of flimsy reasons and carve off lands within or close to Jerusalem, along with land rich in ground water. - Annex the so-called "large settlement areas", which were created originally as a means of dissecting the West Bank and deterring the creation of a viable Palestinian state. - Delude world public opinion into thinking that Israel was making a sacrifice in order to reach a settlement with the Palestinians. Israel would claim that it gave up Biblical land in order to help resolve a "humanitarian" problem that was upsetting international peace and security. The only thing US guarantees can do is to push the Palestinians into a torturous negotiating process. The Palestinians will be negotiating without a political framework, without legal backing, and without even a timetable. If they agree to land exchange prior to the talks, the Palestinians would be giving Israel the right not only to annex major settlements but also to grab more land and liquidate the Palestinian issue. If the Palestinian Authority is still committed to the Arab peace initiative, it shouldn't go back to the negotiating table before Israel declares that the land it invaded by force in 1967 is occupied land. The Palestinians should negotiate with Israel only on the basis of the Arab initiative. Israel is unlikely to agree to any of the abovementioned two conditions in the near future. Therefore, it is unlikely that the "recipe" the US is working on would help either the Palestinians or the Arabs. * The writer is professor of political science at Cairo University.
