Professor Paul Eidelberg
Negotiation between Israel and her Arab neighbors exemplifies different types of diplomacy. Unless these types of diplomacy are understood on theoretical as well as practical grounds, Israeli negotiators may commit—indeed, they have already committed—tragic errors.
Theoretical Analysis
Negotiation between democracies and dictatorships is bound to be rendered difficult by the basic differences in the political character of the two regimes. Diplomacy is not an ideologically neutral affair. How and why states negotiate—their methods and objectives—depend mainly on their principles of government. The diplomacy of a government based on consent—on freedom of discussion, pluralism and compromise—will differ profoundly from the diplomacy of a government based on coercion, propaganda and conformity.
Sir Harold Nicholson, a theoretician and practitioner of diplomacy, makes a fundamental distinction between martial and democratic diplomacy.[1] Whereas martial diplomacy regards negotiation between adversary states as a form of warfare pursued by other means, democratic diplomacy—largely the product of commercial societies—regards negotiation between adversaries as a means of conciliation requiring mutual concessions leading to lasting agreement and peace.
The methods of martial diplomacy resemble a military campaign or a series of maneuvers the ultimate goal of which is victory over the enemy if not his complete destruction. The purpose of negotiation is to outflank your enemy, to weaken him by all manner of attacks. If the opponent is a democracy, attempts will be made to manipulate public opinion through the media, the object being to undermine popular support for the government’s negotiating position.
Efforts will also be made to divide the government itself by subtle appeals to political factions and opposition leaders. And of course there will be attempts to drive a wedge between the government and its allies. The principle is divide and conquer.
The tactics of martial diplomacy against democracies are also military in character. First of all there is the use of surprise—what Nicholson calls “sudden” or shock diplomacy. Its purpose is to demonstrate strength, to cause concern and confusion and thereby increase the opportunity for direct and indirect pressure. A recent example took place in Cairo before the entire world, when Yasir Arafat, with Israeli, American, and Egyptian leaders and diplomats suddenly refused, on stage, to sign the previously agreed upon Oslo II Accords. This incredibly bold maneuver left Israel’s Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin with the choice of calling the televised event off or making additional territorial concessions to the cunning terrorist. Rabin, not known for steel nerves, yielded.
Another tactic of martial diplomacy is the use of indirect force to compel concessions. Syrian President Hafez al-Assad employs various terrorist organizations to attack Israel as a “bargaining chip” on the negotiating table. (This also applies to the PLO and its collusion with Hamas to squeeze concessions from pliant Israeli governments.)
Then there is the extensive use of deception. Negotiating demands are couched in moralistic and democratic language such as “peace” and “self-determination.” To spread the glad tidings of peace to the unwary, or to promote divisions in the ranks of the enemy, flattering interviews are granted to susceptible journalists and other opinion-makers. Statements are issued to promote goodwill and a sense of security before turning to more aggressive offensives, such as propaganda campaigns designed to alienate the enemy’s allies. Some of these statements are so palpably mendacious as to create doubt as to their very mendacity or at least their malevolence.
While martial diplomacy attempts to disarm the adversary through guile and professions of peace, these attempts are punctuated by veiled or less-than-veiled threats of war. This use of cunning and intimidation by the martial school of diplomacy reflects the basic character of dictatorial regimes. Obviously, under such a system of negotiation, trust, fair-dealing and conciliation are not easy. A concession made, a treaty concluded, is apt to be regarded not as a final settlement of a conflict, but evidence of weakness and retreat, an advantage which must soon be exploited in preparation of further advances and triumphs. Here martial diplomacy is aided by the fact that democracies, more than other kinds of regimes, ardently desire peace and, even in the absence of pressure, will make gratuitous concessions even to the extent of taking “risks for peace.” Indeed, the very principle of compromise intrinsic to democracies renders them more yielding than dictatorships. Knowing this, the leader of a military regime—and many civilian dictatorships are actually animated by military principles—will launch his diplomatic campaign from a negotiating position involving impossible demands from which he will hardly deviate. For example, Assad insisted that Israel withdraw entirely from the Golan Heights before he would even consider signing a peace treaty!
What makes this demand even more outrageous is that not only did Israel capture the Golan Heights in a war of self-defense, but this once barren land was purchased in 1892 by Edmonde de Rochschild from nomadic Arabs for the purpose of settling the area with Jews. (The purchase has been confirmed by Turkish and French authorities and, in 1957, the deeds of purchase were deposited in the Land Office of the Government of Israel.) But if Assad’s demand was outrageous, the willingness of Labor Party leaders Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres to withdraw from the Golan Heights, and without even pressing Israel’s purely legal claim to this vital strategic territory, appears incomprehensible. An explanation of this extraordinary state of affairs will deepen our understanding of democratic and martial diplomacy.
Israel under a socialist government represents the epitome or extremity of democratic diplomacy. The principal reason is this. Israel’s socialist elites have substituted democracy for Zionism and Judaism as the only legitimate and respectable basis for Israel’s existence. They regard Israel not as the state of the Jews but as the state of its citizens, almost 20 percent of whom are Arabs (on whose votes the Labor Party is utterly dependent). This attitude is very much rooted in the anti-religious or materialistic cosmopolitanism of Karl Marx. As a consequence, Israel’s socialist elites are devoid of any profound sense of Jewish national consciousness. This is not all. Having never received even close to a majority of the Jewish vote, Israel’s socialist elites parade under the banner of a pluralistic, democratic society. All this makes them and Israel the easiest victims of martial diplomacy.
Calculating upon the divisions inherent in pluralistic societies, those guided by the martial school of diplomacy will seek to maneuver their opponent into negotiating with himself, a task rendered easier when the opponent lacks a strong sense of national pride and solidarity. Two statements of Shimon Peres, Israel’s most prominent internationalist—he applied for Israel’s membership in the Arab League—illustrate the point. As evidence of his materialistic cosmopolitanism, let this Marxist-cum-bourgeois remark of Mr. Peres in 1994 suffice: “We live in a world where markets are more important than countries.” Hence, in negotiating with Yasir Arafat over Israel’s heartland, Judea and Samaria, Mr. Peres ignored Arafat’s brazen violations of the Israel-PLO peace agreement, saying: “I don’t believe we should judge the [peace] process by the performance of Yasir Arafat. We’re not negotiating with Arafat. We’re negotiating with ourselves…”(!!).[2]
Returning to our theoretical level of analysis, when negotiating with a democracy, the ruler of a dictatorship will try to force his opponent into piecemeal surrender or into a militarily indefensible position. The morality of martial diplomacy is quite simple: “What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine—or at least negotiable.” In contrast, democratic diplomacy is based on the assumption that compromise with one’s rival is generally more profitable than his total destruction. Negotiation is not merely a phase in a death-struggle, but an attempt to reach some durable and mutually satisfying agreement. The means used are not military tactics but the give and take of civilian or commercial intercourse. The problem is to find some middle point between two negotiating positions which, when discovered, will reconcile their conflicting interests. And to find that middle point, all that is required is goodwill, frank discussion, and compromise.
Not only naïve journalists but even sophisticated politicians and political scientists often think that merely for adversaries to meet and talk to each other is a positive step toward peace, when, as history has shown, and as martial diplomacy intends, it may only be a lull before the storm.
Because democracies are based on discussion, the general tendency of democratic diplomacy is to overestimate the ability of reason to produce confidence and lasting agreement. This tendency of democratic diplomacy results in a number of errors when confronted by martial diplomacy.
First, there is the error of making gratuitous concessions, sometimes as gestures of goodwill. The hope is for reciprocity, hardly to be expected, however, from dictatorial regimes. As Henry Kissinger has written, anyone succeeding in the leadership struggles of such regimes “must be single minded, unemotional, dedicated, and, above all, motivated by enormous desire for power. [Nothing in the personal experience of dictators would lead them to accept gestures of goodwill at face value.] Suspiciousness is inherent in their domestic position. It is unlikely that their attitude toward the outside world is more benign than toward their own colleagues.[3] Simple reciprocity is hardly to be expected from such men. (The theme of “reciprocity” was emphasized in Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress in July 1996. Mr. Netanyahu seems to realize that the asymmetry between democratic and dictatorial regimes renders reciprocity problematic, something he refrained from making explicit before his American audience.)
Second, there is the democratic prejudice that international conflict is caused primarily by lack of mutual understanding—the supposed root of mutual fear and suspicion. The assumption here, so typical of liberal or pluralistic societies, is that men are by nature benevolent, and that through discussion they will discover that what they have in common is more important than their differences.
Third, guided by that liberal prejudice, the democratic school of diplomacy tends to minimize conflicting ideologies or thinks they can be overcome by “confidence building” measures, such as cultural exchange and economic relations. Given only mutual tolerance and material prosperity, war can be made a thing of the past. Such sentimental materialism is characteristic of bourgeois as well as of socialist democracies preoccupied as they are with enjoyment of the present. Thus, when Shimon Peres said “We live in a world where markets are more important than countries,” he was suggesting that national borders or wars fought over territory are things of the past. Forgotten is the high degree of commercial (and cultural) intercourse between France and Germany before the Franco-Prussian War.[4] Also forgotten is that Russia and Germany were the greatest trading partners before of the First and Second World Wars.
History, however, has little significance for democratic societies, whose political leaders and diplomats are given to election-oriented or short-term pragmatism. Hence Hasannin Heykal, former editor of Egypt’s leading daily Al-Ahram, could say: “Israelis and Americans have always been at fault in approaching situations in what they believe to be a strictly pragmatic way. They have dealt only with what they could see, concentrating on the present to the almost total exclusion of the past. How often in talks with Rogers, Kissinger, and Sisco and others has Egypt heard Americans say, in effect, ‘We’re not interested in raking over the past: Let’s look at the situation as it is today.’ But today’s situation,” Heykal teaches us, “is the creation of yesterday.[5] Arabs have long memories, and patience.
Last, but perhaps the most serious error and weakness of democratic diplomacy, is that it makes too sharp a distinction between peace and war; that is, it fails to take seriously the already noted fact that for martial diplomacy peace is war pursued by other means. Stated another way, to men of goodwill, unrelenting malevolence is incomprehensible.
And yet, along with this dangerous prejudice, democratic diplomacy harbors the contrary prejudice that autocrats are temperamental types that must be handled with kid gloves. Dictators often foster this prejudice in order to discourage democratic statesmen and other opinion-makers from enlightening public opinion about the vicious nature, methods and objectives of dictatorial regimes. (Notice the silence of American and Israeli politicians regarding the atrocities committed by the Assad regime in Hama and in Lebanon.) There is nothing dictators fear more than truth, which is why their media are government-controlled.
The very character of dictatorships—centralized decision-making, control of public opinion, ruthlessness—give them certain negotiating advantages which cannot be overcome unless democracies negotiate from a position of dauntless power; in which case these advantages, paradoxically, can be made to work for us rather than against us. Take the Machiavellian flexibility of totalitarian states. The most notorious example is the Hitler-Stalin Pact: one day mortal enemies, the next day brothers in blood. A more recent example was Anwar Sadat’s shift from a pro-Soviet to a pro-American foreign policy, designed to force Israel back to its pre-1967 borders.
This extreme flexibility should teach us that dictators are not moral purists or doctrinaires. Whatever their ideological principles or long-range objectives—and these should not be obscured or minimized—they are quite capable of postponing them when unfavorable circumstances require. And precisely because they are dictators, they can do so with remarkable rapidity, depending on the force brought to bear upon them. Dictators respect force; it is the cornerstone of their regimes. But knowing how to negotiate with these professional students of power can shorten conflicts and sometimes even prevent them.
The Unspoken Price of Negotiating with Dictatorships
Political scientists fail to emphasize, however, that whenever a democracy and a dictatorship negotiate publicly as equals, the dictatorship gains enormously. Such negotiation places these two types of regimes on the same moral level. This moral equivalence corrupts public opinion in the democratic world, a world already mired in the university-bred doctrine of moral relativism. Consider the case of Israel.
It may sound quixotic, but Israeli politicians—Left and Right, secular and religious—degrade Israel by seeking the recognition of Arab regimes whose media (especially Egypt’s) vilify Jews and the Jewish State. To demand the cessation of this anti-Semitism as a precondition of negotiation would enhance Israel’s honor, a crucial element given the overweening pride of Arab-Islamic culture..
Instead, Israeli spokesmen at the October 1991 Madrid Conference said it was great progress to meet and shake hands with Arab negotiators, even though some were leaders and supporters of the on-going intifada. Moreover, for Israelis to negotiate with their Arab adversaries is to convey the impression that Arab regimes are no less disposed to candor and peace than Israel, and that agreements reached with Arab autocrats will bind their successors despite the fact that the latter represent no one but their own cliques and have no scruples whatever about adhering to the agreements of their predecessors. On the other hand, for Israeli politicians to be candid about the bellicose and devious character of Arab regimes is to preclude negotiation. Arab rulers need not worry: It is against the law in Israel to tell the truth about Israel’s Islamic enemies. To do so is to impugn Israel’s own Muslim citizens and to expose oneself to the charge of racism—in Israel a felony. It matters not that these citizens are have ever been exempt from military service for security reasons, indeed, that most openly supported Saddam Hussein in the Persian Gulf War despite his threat to incinerate Israel including themselves.
Facts such as these demonstrate that the contradictions between democracy and Arab-Islamic culture are so many and so profound that negotiations between Israel and any Arab state will not enhance Israel’s security, to say nothing of her dignity, so long as such states remain dictatorships. Israel’s peace treaty with Jordan is no exception. The left-wing government of Yitzhak Rabin yielded, for that piece of paper, 330 sq. km. of what can be shown, in terms of international law alone, to be Jewish land. Be this as it may, the Israel-Jordan treaty merely formalized the de facto political cooperation which has long been the policy of their respective governments vis-à-vis any threat from Syria and Iraq. Besides, not only does the treaty take no precedence over Jordan’s commitment to the Arab League, but Hamas and Islamic Jihad have retained their headquarters in Amman, and it remains a capital offense in Jordan to sell property to Jews.
Contradictions between Israel and its Neighbors
The contradictions between Israel and its Arab-Islamic neighbors need to be examined from the perspectives of political philosophy and culture. What follows is a summary of those contradictions.
First of all, democracy, as we saw, is based on consent, pluralism and persuasion. This adorns democracy with a certain easy-goingness. Past grievances are readily swept aside and political opponents can be friends despite their differences. Differences are resolved by discussion and mutual concessions, and agreements are usually abiding. In contrast, Arab culture is based on the primacy of intimidation and even violence. Agreements between rival factions do not really terminate animosities, which is why such agreements are so short-lived. (Think only of Lebanon.)
Second, thanks to the biblical influence on the West, democracy is based on the primacy of the individual. This influence did not penetrate Arab-Islamic culture which is based on the primacy of the group—be it the village or the extended family. The individual Arab or Muslim has no identity outside the group; it is to the group that he owes his loyalty. This is one reason why internecine conflict has been endemic among Arabs throughout their history.
Third, freedom, including freedom of speech, is one of the two cardinal principles of democracy. This is not the case of Arab-Islamic culture, which is strictly authoritarian and whose media are government-controlled.
Fourth, unlike democracy, whose other cardinal principle is equality, Arab-Islamic culture is strictly hierarchical. Top-down leadership is a fundamental principle of Islamic theology.
Fifth, democracy is generally regarded as a process—the “rules of the game”—by which various individuals pursue their private interests and have diverse “lifestyles.” In contrast, Arab-Islamic culture binds everyone to the substantive values prescribed in the Koran.
Sixth, whereas democratic societies are preoccupied with the present (PEACE NOW), Arab-Islamic culture exists under the aspect of eternity colored by events of the past and dreams of the future. This is one reason why the concept of revenge for past injuries is a dominant motif of the Arab mind. (A local proverb tells about a Bedouin who took revenge after 40 years and said: “I was hasty.”) Given their loyalty to the group, they are religiously bound to wreak vengeance on those who have slighted the honor of any Muslim. (Israel’s very existence—its ruling over Muslims—is deemed an insult to Islam, for Jews are supposed to be dhimmies.)
Seventh, whereas democracy is steeped in secularism, Arab-Islamic culture is rooted in religion. Even Arab leaders who are not devout Muslims identify with the basic goals of Islam. The radical separation of religion and politics found in democracy is foreign to Islamic regimes.
Eighth, it bears repeating that the peaceful tendencies and publicity found in democracy stand in striking contrast to the militancy and dissimulation characteristic of Islam. Here let me quote the late Professor Yehoshafat Harkabi, a former head of Israeli Military Intelligence, a confident of Shimon Peres and an advocate of a Palestinian state.
Writing when one did not have to fear the charge of racism, Harkabi refers to Islam as a “combatant,” “expansionist” and “authoritarian” creed. He admits that “the idea of jihad is fundamental in Islam,” in consequence of which “hatred,” “hostility” and “conflict” are endemic to Arab culture.[6] Moreover, he quotes Arab sociologist Dr. Sonia Hamady, who writes: “The Arabs usually look for external causes of their frustrations; they prefer to put the blame on some scapegoats [like Israel or America, the ‘Great Satan’]. Similarly, as a rule, their aggressive feelings are not turned inward but directed towards others."[7]
Furthermore, and of crucial significance, Harkabi acknowledges that “the use of falsehood,” “distortions of the truth” and “misleading slogans” are typical of Arab political life. Harkabi goes so far as to suggest that mendacity is “second nature” to Arabs, and that one may rightly regard “falsehood as the expression of [Arab] national character.” Again he quotes Hamady: “Lying,” she writes, “is a widespread habit among Arabs, and they have a low idea of truth.” [8]
The only rational conclusion one can draw from Harkabi’s own analysis of Arab-Islamic culture is that to expect genuine and abiding peace between Israel and her autocratic neighbors is not only a piece of folly but an insult to Islam.
Finally, it must be reiterated that in dealing with Arab-Islamic regimes, Israel confronts not merely personal and transient dictatorships, but autocracies which, despite their differences, are part of a world civilization. Islamic civilization is animated by memories of former greatness and aspirations of future glory. This makes Muslims exceedingly proud, so much so that even an illiterate Arab, living in squalor and filth, feels naturally superior to the Jews as English aristocrats would in olden days feel toward Cockneys.
This analysis leads to a rather grim conclusion: All other things being equal, democratic diplomacy cannot compete well with martial and Islamic diplomacy. Of course, not all other things are equal, especially in the case of Israel. For Israel’s Arab adversaries have the strategically and economically motivated support of the world’s only superpower, the United States, a democracy committed to Israel’s withdrawal to her pre-1967 “Auschwitz” lines. This suggests that democratic diplomacy in the Middle East is a destructive and, for Israel, a self-destructive, fraud. It also suggests that Israel’s government had better learn a very different kind of diplomacy. But first, other aspects of Israeli diplomacy must be clarified.
The Irrational Dimensions of Israeli Diplomacy
Israeli diplomacy is fraught not only with many of the misconceptions of democratic diplomacy, but with fear of anti-Semitism and a compulsive adulation of democracy. This makes Israeli politicians across the political spectrum all the more obsequious when negotiating with other nations, especially democracies, a fortiori the United States. Many Jews, even among the religious, harbor the fear that if Israel’s government were to act distinctively Jewish, it would irritate the nations and arouse their hostility. This is the real reason why they identify Judaism as democratic (so contrary to Spinoza, the father of liberal democracy, who rejected Judaism). Yet such antipathy toward Israel already exists despite the diluted Jewish character of various Israeli governments.
Recall the refusal of democratic Europe to allow the United States to use NATO landing fields to re-supply Israel during the Yom Kippur War. Recall, too, the Washington’s recognition of the PLO in 1974, even though its Covenant calls for Israel’s destruction. To this add the UN General Assembly’s 1975 resolution (only recently rescinded) equating Zionism with racism, and the Security Council’s frequent condemnations of Israel with or without the compliance of the United States.
Evident here is old hydra of anti-Semitism, which secular Zionists thought they could escape by establishing a secular democratic state in the Land of Israel. True, the Nazi Holocaust discredited overt anti-Semitism, but as one writer has pointed out: “The Palestinian grievance has enabled latent anti-Semitism to be channeled discreetly into ‘respectable’ criticism of Israel—which was shrewdly distinguished from world Jewry.” [9]
Contrary to prevailing notions, it is by no means obvious that Israel’s situation would be worse under a government headed by “stiff-necked” Jews, to recall their biblical appellation. Oddly enough, modern Israel is also called stiff-necked—“intransigent” is the current label—even though her government has been pathetically yielding. Whatever one may think of its treaty with Egypt, for a Likud government to have surrendered the Sinai with its Israel-developed oil fields, strategic air bases and $15 billion infrastructure without being able to retain the small Jewish settlement of Yamit—to have sacrificed all this for what Anwar Sadat scornfully called a “piece of paper,” is hardly a mark of intransigence. [10] What shall we then say of a Labor government that was anxious to surrender Judea and Samaria to the head of a mere terrorist organization? [11]
What incites the nations—unknown to themselves—is not Jewish intransigence so much as Jewish infirmity. To tell the nations, as did Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir—reputed hawks—that “everything is negotiable,” is to confess that nothing is sacred, indeed, that Israel can be bought. But then to enter the diplomatic arena and drag out negotiations when you have compromised your nation’s honor must surely arouse not only contempt but irritation and hostility. Such self-abasement alienates friends, who admire strength, and incites enemies, who exploit weakness.
For Israel’s government to cultivate a reputation for intransigence concerning its people’s heritage and patrimony, and to be worthy of that reputation, need not arouse the enmity of democratic nations (certainly not if such intransigence is modulated with a measure of biblical wisdom). Consider: when the government of France behaves distinctively French—cynical and condescending, some would say—no other nation is agitated by the fact. Nor is any foreign office disturbed by that which has long distinguished England’s foreign policy: righteous hypocrisy. Again, in Saudi Arabia, when a Muslim’s hands are cut off for theft, not a word of opprobrium will be heard from the American State Department. Cutting off the hands of thieves is recognized and accepted as the Saudi way.
One reason underlying such sublime indifference is this: Governments are expected to conform, more or less, to the tradition of their people. This is an obvious precondition of international understanding, of stable relations among independent and sovereign states. When any government fails to act authentically, that is, in accordance with its nation’s basic beliefs and values—which the diplomatic corps of other nations study assiduously—this causes confusion and sometimes hostility in foreign capitals.
Contrast the government of Israel (leaving aside, for the moment, the recently elected government of Binyamin Netanyahu). Far from acting distinctively Jewish, it emulates democratic America. Only let it deviate one iota from the indiscriminate egalitarianism and unrestrained libertarianism of contemporary America than the wrath of Washington and of the news media is heaped upon the supposed-to-be Jewish State.
In Israel, the dogmas of contemporary democracy—more immune to questioning than any religion—has produced the most ludicrous anomalies. Indiscriminate egalitarianism compels the supposed-to-be Jewish State of Israel’s to allow its Jew-hating Arab citizens to vote, such that now there are nine Arabs in the Knesset—really PLO surrogates—who refuse to speak anything but Arabic in this supposed-to-be Jewish legislature. As for Israel’s unrestrained libertarianism, the only place in the Middle East where the PLO has its own press is in Jerusalem. In fact, during the Persian Gulf War, a Likud government allowed Israel’s Arab press to publish pro-Iraqi and anti-American propaganda while Israel was being bombed by Scud missiles!
By exalting contemporary democracy, Israeli politicians and intellectuals have established, in the minds of American policy-makers and opinion-makers, a set of behavioral expectations which no democratic people would tolerate of their own government. Conversely, having from the outset failed to act authentically as a government whose policies and pronouncements are preeminently Jewish, Israel’s leaders have laid the foundation for their country’s humiliation and for much of the world’s antagonism toward the supposed-to-be Jewish State.
To compound its folly, by emulating a democracy that pays lip-service to Christianity, Israel’s government has unwittingly conditioned gentiles to expect the Jews to abide by the most unassertive or self-effacing Christian precepts: turn the other cheek, love your enemies, resist not evil. And to the extent that this government has adhered to these benign and apolitical precepts—unpracticed by any gentile nation—it has not only forsaken Judaism, it has also repressed the sense of outrage among Jews whose loved ones have been victims of Arab terrorists. Animated by an anemic humanism, the government of Israel has been dehumanizing its own people. Even their instinct of self-preservation has been sacrificed on the altar of the secular democratic state.
Contrary to the expectations of Jewish politicians and intellectuals who, out of fear of anti-Semitism, mindlessly portray Israel as a democracy so as it endow it (and themselves) with legitimacy and respectability, it is precisely this lack of Jewish national authenticity—this adulation of what now passes as democratic values—that underlies international contempt for Israel.
Contrast Prime Minister Netanyahu’s abovementioned address to a joint session of Congress. When he spoke as a proud Jew he was applauded; when he declared that Jerusalem would ever remain Israel’s undivided capital, he received a standing ovation.
On the other hand, Mr. Netanyahu punctuated his address with the trite incantation of “democracy”—obviously to arouse sympathetic support from his audience vis-à-vis nasty Arab autocracies. This obsequiousness, so typical of Israeli politicians, is a strategic error. For the more Israel is perceived as a democracy, the more it is expected to make concessions to Arab autocracies.
A Jewish Alternative
To avoid the perils of democratic diplomacy, Israel’s Prime Minister will have to emphasize Israel’s raison d’être as a Jewish State. Moreover, he will have to show that in Israel, the basic principles of democracy, freedom and equality, must be derived from the Torah’s conception of man’s creation in the image of God. From that source alone can the unfettered freedom and indiscriminate equality of contemporary democracy derive ethical and rational constraints. Here I am alluding to classical democracy, which acknowledges a Higher Law, the only sound and rational basis for limited government on the one hand, and the inalienable rights of the individual on the other. But this means that democracy must be assimilated to Judaism, not Judaism to democracy. It mans that democracy, however important, cannot be deemed the paramount principle of an authentic Jewish State.
Strange as it may seem, Mr. Netanyahu unwittingly approached this position when he proudly declared: “I am a Jew first and an Israeli second.” And further: “Israel is the state of the Jews, and not of its citizens.”
If Israel were simply a state of its citizens it would be a conventional, pluralistic democracy. Any Israeli citizen, regardless of his religion or ethnicity, could then become—and by law he can become—Israel’s President or Prime Minister. But how can this be if Israel is supposed to be a Jewish State? Obviously there is a basic tension between a Jewish State and a democratic one.
Yet Mr. Netanyahu (like apologetic rabbis) has repeatedly said there is no conflict between Judaism and democracy. Leaving aside the morally decayed freedom of contemporary democracy, surely he is aware of the fact that another democratic principle, the egalitarian principle of one adult/one vote, may in time enable Israel’s prolific Arab citizens to transform the supposed-to-be Jewish State into an Arab-Islamic autocracy. This is not the place to enlarge on this subject. [12] But so long as Mr. Netanyahu genuflects to democracy, he will the more readily succumb to the pitfalls of democratic diplomacy. Let me suggest how Israel’s Prime Minister can avoid such pitfalls and serve the cause of his country as well as of democracy, indeed, of mankind.
A Primer on Diplomacy
The question before us is this: How can democracies in general, and Israel in particular, negotiate effectively with dictatorships?
A study of autocratic regimes reveals that their methods of negotiating with democracies differ significantly with those they employ with other autocracies. Contrary to appearances, authoritarian politicians are not necessarily less politicians. They are, however, less amenable to compromise with democratic politicians, and precisely because they usually don’t have to! Their “stall-and-rage” technique of dealing with democracies works well for them; it does not work well when dealing with fellow dictators, and is seldom used for that reason. Hence it is not only the character of dictatorships, but the cunning of dictators that produces the kind of negotiating tactics we always seem to experience; his tactics depend not only on his system of government, but on the tendencies of our own.
Bearing this in mind, suppose we were to write a handbook for democratic negotiators based on the current and simplistic assumption that dictators have an intrinsic antipathy to compromise. The manual might say something like this:
“The nature of dictatorships makes it inherently difficult for rulers of such regimes to compromise. The autocrat himself is little used to political compromise and tends to view it, as he does all domestic opposition, as a challenge to his authority, perhaps to his very life. This personal hostility to compromise or meaningful give-and-take is reinforced by the inherent instability and vulnerability of all regimes resting on coercion rather than consent. The democratic statesman must take this into account, tempering his expectations and standing ready to take the first step, going the extra mile, and perhaps giving more than he gets.”
Suppose, however, our manual for democratic negotiators were based on very different but generally more realistic assumptions about dictators. It might read like this:
“The nature of autocratic political systems makes it inherently easy for rulers of such regimes to compromise. Successful autocrats are above all things calculating, possessed of a shrewd grasp of facts operative in the negotiating arena. They have no difficulty envisioning the kind of settlement that would be equitable or that would at least temporarily terminate disputes with other powers; and ruling over a society resting on coercion rather than consent, they have no difficulty in imposing such a settlement should they deem it necessary.
“Negotiating problems arise exactly because the autocrat understands the propensities of democratic statesmen and the political system they represent. He knows that to the democratic mind compromise is often seen as a good in itself; that completed negotiations are frequently taken as successful negotiations serving to secure domestic political advantage. He also knows that democratic politicians are impatient for results, especially during election years, in consequence of which he need only bide his time, remain obdurate, or threaten to break off negotiations in order to elicit gratuitous concessions intended to hasten and conclude the negotiating process.
“He is particularly well attuned to the fact that democratic governments are greatly influenced by public opinion, that opinion is usually divided on all issues, and that opinions in democracies can be manipulated to his own advantage. He is also aware of the democratic antipathy to violence and therefore sees the threat of conflict working in his favor. If his democratic counterparts regard him as irrational or ideologically disinclined to compromise, or if they view his system of government as one that by its nature is unable to make significant concessions, he will know this too and take manifest advantage of it.
“The democratic statesman must in no way encourage the dictator on any of these points or negotiations will degenerate into a tedious, counterproductive exercise in making unilateral concessions. He must know from the very outset what he wants out of the negotiations. He must let the dictator take the first step toward compromise and under no circumstances be willing to give more than he gets or give the slightest indication that this might be the case. It must never be forgotten that the autocrat will view all efforts to be ‘reasonable’—as this term is understood by democrats—as confirmation of his own understanding of democratic negotiating weakness, and he will press his claims unremittingly thereafter.”
Would Israel’s use of this type of diplomacy be effective with Arab-Islamic dictatorships? Perhaps, if fortified not only with military strength, but also with a due measure of Jewish wisdom and Jewish national pride—qualities respected by Muslims. Muslims are contemptuous of the democratic West, its materialism and nihilism. This materialism and nihilism have invaded Israel. To this extent Israel poses a threat to Islamic civilization. In other words, Israel, perceived as a secular democratic state, threatens the political-religious power structure of the Arab-Islamic world.
Arab despots have learned, however, they can accomplish their objectives vis-à-vis Israel without war, that is, by means of diplomacy, and precisely because Israel’s political and intellectual elites are secular democrats more or less devoid of Jewish wisdom and Jewish national pride. Only effete and bourgeois democrats would barter away their people’s 3,800 year patrimony for “peace” (and a sham peace at that). Only by virtue of his calculated understanding of such men would Anwar Sadat find the boldness to come to Jerusalem and demand Israel’s complete withdrawal to its pre-1967 borders. Only to such men would he have the temerity to declare: “To speak frankly, our land does not yield to bargaining… We cannot accept any attempt to take away … one inch of it nor can we accept the principle of debating or bargaining over it." [13]
This remains the position of Egypt’s government. Indeed, the Director General of Israel’s Defense Ministry, Maj. General (res.) David Ivri, admitted at a symposium in Tel Aviv on April 13, 1992: “The peace with Egypt is not peace. It is actually a cease-fire that has continued for 15 years …” Ivri went so far as to admit that “[President Hosni] Mubarak has not created any Egyptian interest in Israel’s continued existence.” [14]
It will be objected that if Israel does not compromise with its Arab-Islamic neighbors—and this means the open-ended policy of “land for peace”—war is inevitable. There are basic flaws in this objection, and quite apart from the fact that “the history of man is,” as Churchill said, “the history of war.” First, Israel’s elimination from the Middle East is a demonstrable goal of various Arab-Islamic regimes. [15] Second, trading Jewish land for peace can only facilitate that goal. Third, and most important, why the ruler of any state ventures on the path of war depends on his perception of the enemy, and not only of the enemy’s military power. If Israel were perceived as a truly Jewish as opposed to a secular democratic state—and as I have elsewhere shown, a Jewish state would not be a theocracy [16]—this would certainly affect the attitudes and calculations of Arab regimes. Nothing that has been done or tried by any Israeli government has altered the authoritarian and militant character of these regimes. Another approach is needed.
Israel’s problem is not to change any Arab-Islamic state. Israel’s problem is to change itself.
Only if Israel undergoes a renaissance in Jewish civilization will its government be able to negotiate wisely and effectively with Arab-Islamic regimes. Such a renaissance might even hasten their transformation into peace-loving states.
This is an updated version of my article “Two-and-a-Half Types of Diplomacy,” Crossroads, No. 34, 1991.
[1]Harold Nicholson. Diplomacy (Oxford University Press, 1970), pp. 25-26.
[2]Pennsylvania Gazette, November 1994, p. 17; The Jewish Week, June 2, 1994.
[3]Henry Kissinger, American Foreign Policy (W.W. Norton, 1974), p. 37.
[4]See the following note.
[5]Hasannin Heykal, The Road to Ramadan (Quadrangle Press, 1975), pp. 260-261. Contrast Shimon Peres: “I have become totally tired of history because I feel history is a long misunderstanding.” Which recalls bon mot: “Whoever forgets the past is condemned to repeat it.”
[6]Y.. Harkabi, Arab Attitudes to Israel (Jerusalem: Keter, 1972), p. 133.
[7]Ibid., p. 126.
[8]Ibid., p. 348.
[9[See Gabriel Ben-Dor (ed.), The Palestinians and the Middle East Conflict (Ramat-Gan, Israel: Turtledove Publishing, 1978), p. 304.
[10]In an interview with The New York Times on October 19, 1980, Sadat baldly declared: “Poor Menachem [Begin], he has his problems. After all, I got back 90 percent of the Sinai and the Alma oil fields, and what has Menachem got? A piece of paper.”
[11]To gain a new and deeper understanding of the mentality of Israel’s political leaders, see Paul Eidelberg, Demophrenia: Israel and the Malaise of Democracy (Prescott Press, 1994), ch. 5.
[12] See Paul Eidelberg, “Toward a Jewish Constitutional Democracy,” International Journal of Statesmanship (Beverly Hills, CA: Foundation for Constitutional Democracy in the Middle East), Vol. 1, No. 1, April 1996.
[13] Cited more fully and discussed in my book Sadat’s Strategy (Montreal: Dawn Books, 1979), p. 34.
[14]Jerusalem Post, April 14, 1992.
[15]As Sadat has written: “The effort of our generation is to return to the 1967 borders. Afterward the next generation will carry the responsibility.” Cited in Y. Harkabi, Arab Strategies and Israel’s Response (Free Press, 1977), p. 55.
[16]See Paul Eidelberg, Judaic Man: Toward a Reconstruction of Western Civilization (Caslon Co., 1996), pp. 141-143.