November 2016
People often confuse hope with optimism. Hope is a spiritual quality that recognizes that God is ultimately sovereign, and that the arch of history, however long, bends towards justice. Optimists expect change for the better in the near future. Those filled with, and driven by hope operate in difficult circumstances with the faith and certainty that evil and oppression and injustice cannot prevail ultimately, and that oppressive structures carry within them the seeds of their own destruction.
They are encouraged by numerous examples in history where apparently all-powerful totalitarian regimes or dictators collapsed almost overnight; where apparently hopeless causes ultimately prevailed, where ingrained hatreds were overcome, and impeccable enemies were reconciled; where, against all odds, unjust regimes were defeated, and the weak triumphed. Examples range from the fall of slavery, apartheid, and colonialism, to the collapse of totalitarian regimes and despots, from Rumania’s Nicolai Ceausescu, to Uganda’s Idi Amin, and Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak.
The victories in each of these cases appeared totally improbable at the time, yet in hindsight, the signs were all there, and the results were not only predictable, but almost inevitable. To detect them, one had to look deeper and take the longer view than the one normally taken by the pundits, the “experts” and those who realistically assess the “situation on the ground.”This is also true of the situation of the Palestinians in their struggle with Israel and the Zionist movement. Their existing situation gives no grounds for any optimism whatsoever: They are physically fragmented, occupied, exiled, and powerless. In fact the balance of power at every level—military, economic, scientific, and technological—is totally lopsided against them. Their “friends” in the arab world are worse than their enemies; their leadership is pathetic, if not outright collaborationist; Israel effectively carries out its oppressive policies with full impunity and with the support of the world’s only superpower which promises to punish those who attempt to support them in any meaningful way.Are there any signs of hope for Palestinians? I believe there are such signs, and many of them are paradoxical.
Here they are:
1. Ethnic Cleansing is no longer a possible outcome:
For a number of reasons, it is no longer possible for Israel to expel additional large quantities of Palestinian Arabs from Palestine, as it did in 1948, and 1967. A few hundreds or thousands may still be expelled, and hundreds of thousands may be disenfranchised, but it is no longer possible to create a mass exodus across the borders and therefore physically ethnically cleanse significant numbers of Palestinians under any conceivable scenario. While there are many in Israel who would love to see such an exodus, and who are alarmed at the “demographic threat,” such an exodus cannot be engineered any more.
2. The reality and acknowledgement that no Palestinian or Arab military option exists.
While it is doubtful that any combination of Arab forces could have defeated the state of Israel in the past, now that fact is not only confirmed but is acknowledged by one and by all. While Israel continues to repeat its mantra about its security and the existential threats it faces, no one, including its own military leaders actually considers that military attacks are a serious threat to its existence and power.
3. The slow realization that Israel also has no possibility of resolving the dispute by military power alone.
While Israel continues to prefer military strikes as its first option, and has a tremendous arsenal of nuclear, WMD, and conventional military forces, with a huge armaments industry and awesome destructive power, its military might has long surpassed its limitations. It still has tremendous firepower, and can rain destruction on its enemies, near and far, at will, but its ability to achieve political objectives by military power alone is severely limited.
4. Increased international awareness and involvement. While the Palestinian cause has always enjoyed international support, that support and involvement is now increasing in communities that have actual power and influence over Israel, such as Europe and the United States.
The increased role of non-state actors, and the effectiveness of such tactics as BDS, as well as social media, provide a basis for Hope, even though we cannot predict how and when these actors will have a decisive impact on the ground.
5. The escalating shift to the Right in Israel, and the weakening of democratic institutions there. Paradoxically, while this shift increases brutality toward Palestinians and adds to their suffering, this element both weakens Israeli overall power, and reduces its ability to garner external support.
As those trends continue, the elements of Israel’s “soft power” diminish, and all that is left is brute military force, which historically presaged the fall of many empires in the past.
6. The collapse of the “peace process” and the two-state solution. Another paradox. The peace process provided Israel with protection from forces challenging its occupation for many years, and the two-state solution provided an alibi to avoid dealing with the serious moral and ethical issues involved in the creation of a “Jewish state” and the racist and discriminatory elements involved in it, as well as a delay in dealing with the issues of the right of return and of equality for non-Jewish citizens of Israel.
The deliberate sabotaging of that process and of the two-state solution, particularly by settlement building and expansion, paradoxically highlights these issues, and calls into question the entire Zionist project. As long as the two-state paradigm prevailed, Israel was able to continue its policies undeterred.
7. The breaches in the wall of Israeli stranglehold over US foreign policy. During recent years, there has been a deterioration of support for Israeli policies as an unshakable bipartisan issue.
AIPAC was exposed as a paper tiger, and it was shown that US politicians can in fact defy the Israeli lobby and succeed. Constituencies that had been viewed in the past as unshakable unquestioning supporters of the most right wing Israeli positions (such as the American Jewish community, and Evangelical Christians) are showing more nuanced positions and openness to issues of Justice for Palestinians than ever before.
8. The revival of Palestinian identity for “Israeli Arabs.”
For many years, the non-Jewish Arab citizens of Israel were largely absent from the discussion of Israel/Palestine peace efforts, and Israel seemed to have “domesticated” them with a combination of economic progress and the appearance of political rights. As Israel is becoming more racist and blatantly fascist, this façade has collapsed, and that population is becoming fully engaged in the struggle for equality and for Palestinian rights.
9. The Persistence of Palestinian nationalism against all odds.
Ben Gurion once stated that the older generation will die off, and the new generation will not know or remember Palestine. Nothing is further from the truth. Today in Israel, the Occupied Territories, and the Diaspora, and against unbelievable odds, Palestinian nationalism is alive, well, and vibrant, especially among the young. And this is not the result of “incitement” or directives by any leadership.
Each of these trends and elements seem to be firm, clear, irrevocable, and growing stronger. Together, they provide a great Hope for the future. A just resolution of the Palestinian question will have a tremendous positive effect not only for Jewish Israelis and Palestinians, but it will have a great effect throughout the region and will remove a major deep source of antagonism between the West and Moslem and Arab countries. It will also have a great effect on international law and institutions, who have suffered from the weakening of their power and influence because they have not been properly applied to this question.
A tipping point has not yet been reached, and it is unclear what will happen when it is reached. It may well be that Israeli society can find a way to live with Palestinians peacefully, without dominating them, as happened in South Africa when Apartheid collapsed. On the other hand, it is possible that the loss of domination will only occur in the context of bloody destruction. One thing is sure: the arch of history, however long, bends towards justice, and we must continue to work for justice, with Hope and faith, and concern for both Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs
This is the first of my nine Signs of Hope. You can read an introduction to this series here.
Since the beginning of the Zionist project, the idea of ethnically cleansing Palestine of its non-Jewish inhabitants was a desired outcome for enabling the Jewish state to exist and thrive. Desiring to make a democratic state conflicted with giving equal rights to the indigenous people who were, and possibly could become again, a numerical majority. Wishful slogans like “a land without a people for a people without a land” mixed with fanciful plans to “spirit away” the local population and find them a home elsewhere. Consistent with this mindset was an insistence on denying that Palestinians constituted a distinct entity (as opposed to “Arabs”) and the continued reluctance to countenance a Palestinian state anywhere in Eretz Yisrael.
In 1948, ethnic cleansing was indeed practiced on a major scale as the majority of Arabs in Palestine (around 750,000) were expelled to the surrounding areas[1]. Revisionist Israeli historians, including Benny Morris and Illan Pape, have brought to light many archived documents that show this displacement was a deliberate strategy of the early Zionists.[2] They prove that a group of their leaders, including Ben-Gurion, created Plan Dalet to militarily achieve that objective and “sweep away” as many of the Arabs as they could during the fighting.[3] Once their eviction was accomplished, the borders were sealed and the refugee population was prevented from returning. Repeated United Nations calls for the return of the refugees to their homes (starting with Resolution 194) were routinely ignored. Arab villages were then destroyed to prevent any hope of return for these Palestinians. To this day, calling for a Palestinian right of return is viewed as a call for the destruction of the state of Israel, as the demographic balance would tilt against a Jewish majority.
In 1967, at the age of 15 I personally witnessed this cruel outcome of the Zionist agenda. During the first days of the Six Day War, as the victorious Israeli army rolled into the West Bank I witnessed a long stream of Palestinians making their way on foot out of Bethlehem, through the Judean desert, towards Jericho and the Jordan River. They hoped to cross over before the Israeli forces captured the town. I also saw them thankfully make their way back to their homes in Bethlehem as Jericho fell to Israeli forces, thus blocking their “escape route.” Others were not so fortunate, and two to three hundred thousand Palestinians, some of them refugees for the second time, made it across the river. [4] They became Naziheen (displaced), as Israel promptly sealed the border at the Jordan River and prevented their return to the West Bank.
Soon after the war ended, some, including my own mother, were lured into making a trip to visit their relatives in Jordan with a promise they could return in ten days. They were not allowed back and were shot at or turned away when they tried to cross into the West Bank at shallow crossing points near Jenin. My mother miraculously managed to cross back since she and a friend, burdened with my infant sister, had been separated from a larger group who were caught and denied entry. Palestinians in Gaza, then as now, had nowhere to run to other than the forbidding Sinai desert, and no significant exodus occurred there.
Those who managed to stay once the confusion had settled were issued residency cards by the Israeli military authorities after a census was taken and became acknowledged as “legal” residents of the occupied West bank and Gaza. Their residency cards (Hawiyyeh) became their most valuable possession, and attempts to maintain that residency status or acquire it for family members became a constant struggle for each of them. Such struggles were a daily reminder of the demographic imperative of the Zionist project that wanted the land but not the people of Palestine. Those who left for lengthy periods of time or married non-residents were in danger of losing their status. Others were threatened from time to time with revocation of their status and deportation. This also held true for East Jerusalem residents, though not for Israeli citizens.
As the struggle between Palestinian nationalism and Zionist ambitions continues to fester, and the prospect of a peaceful resolution along the lines of a two-state solution continues to disappear, voices for mass expulsion of Arabs continue to be heard, especially in right wing circles. When Israelis talk of Jordan as being the real “state of Palestine,” Palestinians—reminiscent of a not-too-distant past—are terrified by the possibility of another mass expulsion. The fear is that in the heat of a major military conflagration, whether real or deliberately manufactured, atrocities would be committed and Israel would create a panic. In so doing, they would seize the opportunity to rid themselves of large numbers of Palestinian Arabs, particularly from the West Bank, thereby improving their demographic position.
Such fears arose during the Second Intifada. At one point, Palestinians felt there was a danger of massacres by settlers or the army, and many of them wanted to flee. However, when they did flee from the Jenin refugee camp and surrounding villages, they went towards Nablus and the city centers rather than towards the Jordan Valley and the borders with Jordan; therefore, no mass exodus resulted.
As Israel becomes more and more right wing, and as those publicly advocating expulsion of Palestinians have ceased to be a fringe ideological minority and instead are taking important positions in the government, it is perhaps legitimate to revisit this question: Could the fear of another ethnic cleansing in fact be realized?
While there is no doubt in my mind that there are those in Israel—including in positions of power and authority—who would love to be rid of substantial numbers of non-Jews from the occupied territories, I do not believe such a resolution is possible any more. The reasons are as follows:
1. Mass expulsion—occurring during periods of military strife, confusion, and panic—drives civilians away from the impacted areas; civilians, however, always run away from an advancing military threat but never towards well-fortified, mined, and guarded borders. The Jordan Valley has been for years a well-guarded boundary between Jordan and Israel and is bounded by electric fences, minefields, and vigilant forces on both sides of the border. It has also been largely restricted and inaccessible to the majority of West Bank Palestinians. No panicked, or “voluntary,” mass exodus across the Jordan River—or any Israeli border for that matter—can be manufactured under these circumstances, no matter what the provocation.
2. Even if we supposed a deliberate mass expulsion at gunpoint were to happen, the logistical requirements would be too great. If the Israeli army provided trucks and buses, rounded up civilians, and sent them forcefully to border points, such an operation would take weeks and months to implement for any substantial number of expellees. Expelling a mere fifty or one hundred thousand civilians in this fashion would require massive logistical effort. It could not be easily conducted in the face of the expected international outcry, and even if it were a success, it would not significantly alter the demographic picture in any strategic way. Numbers beyond those figures are unimaginable.
3. The presence of the internet, satellite television, and mass communications would make this sort of forced exodus immediately known throughout the world and would lead to such an outcry that it could not be sustained for very long. No matter what unrest or military event is taking place, the exodus itself would become the major story and would be impossible to sustain. No matter what the provocation, Israel would have no more than 24-48 hours to complete any such operation, and as stated in point 2, it is impossible for significant numbers of people to be deported in this manner.
4. Jordan, the potential recipient country, would be vehemently opposed to such an operation, and would both place physical obstacles to its implementation and lead international efforts to block it.
5. The current residents of the West Bank all hold Israeli-issued identity cards which distinguish them from “Palestinians refugees” and give them legal and political status in demanding immediate repatriation, both under Israeli and international law.
6. Israel can do much to surround, corral, and restrict Palestinians within the occupied territories, but to force them across international borders out of its area of control is an entirely different proposition. No country, including the United States, would tolerate it. If such an event were to occur, the US would be hard pressed to veto a unanimous binding resolution at the Security Council under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter. The last time Israel attempted a deportation (of about 450 Hamas operatives who were airlifted by army helicopters to Marj El Zuhour in Lebanon), the international outcry forced Israel to permit them to return.
7. Such a mass exodus, were it to occur, would only reignite the issue of the right of return for all Palestinians, including those expelled or who fled in 1948 or 1967. It would also throw into question the Israeli Hasbara line about Palestinians being responsible for their own exile in 1948.
In summary, it appears that despite the tremendous power imbalance between Israelis and Palestinians and the apparent impunity with which Israel is seen to act, at least that one option (mass expulsion), however desirable it may be from an ideological point of view, is off the table and could never be implemented. As a result, other solutions must be sought. Or to put it another way: Israelis and Palestinians, whether they like it or not, must find a way to live together in this land. Glum as the prospects for peaceful coexistence in Israel/Palestine may seem at this time, this at least is a certainty and a sign for Hope.
[1] This figure is consistent with the writings of historians, and with primary sources such as the Final Report of the United Nations Economic Survey Mission for the Middle East published by the United Nations Conciliation Commission, December 28, 1949.
[2] See Ilan Pappé’s 2006 book, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, by Oneworld Oxford; or 1948: A History of the First Arab–Israeli War, by Benny Morris, published by Yale University Press in 2008.
[3] According to Illan Pappe, Plan Dalet was a “blueprint for ethnic cleansing” (Pappé, 2006, pp. 86–126, xii).
[4] P.81 – Bowker, Robert P. G. (2003). Palestinian Refugees: Mythology, Identity, and the Search for Peace. Lynne Rienner Publishers.
Month: April 2017
This is the second of my nine Signs of Hope for Israel and Palestine. You can read Sign #1 here and an introduction to the series here.
The US and Israel recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), a long-term commitment to an already long-term military relationship. The price tag of 38 billion dollars over 10 years was only one feature of this agreement. Far more important was the establishment and confirmation of a network of relations for technological transfer, joint development of weapons, and sharing of information, all of which was intended to insure the continuation of Israeli military dominance and prominence in the Middle East.
Already, Israel has an impressive military manufacturing and arms sales industry. It is the 8thlargest in weapons sales in the world.[1] It is a major exporter of smart munitions and is reputed to be the top seller of drones worldwide.[2] It has developed its own nuclear weapons program and is reputed to have 200 nuclear weapons, which can be mounted on planes, rockets, or submarines.[3] During its incursions in Gaza and Lebanon, Israel used the latest weapons and boosted their sales by labeling them “battle tested.”[4]
While the Israeli narrative is that it is surrounded by threatening countries, the reality is that none of the nearby Arab countries, even combined, presents a serious military threat. The Sinai Peninsula is demilitarized, under the terms of the Egypt-Israel peace agreement, and forms a formidable barrier in the South. Jordan, apart from being a friendly country with a peace agreement with Israel, is effectively considered a buffer zone against any Arab army from the East. No such army is likely to come, though, especially after Iraq has been effectively destroyed as a military power. Syria has also been devastated, and it is struggling to maintain its own territorial integrity, much less threaten to invade Israel from the North.
On water, the Israeli navy and its submarines roam the seas and the Arab shores, and there is no hint of any naval military threat. To the contrary, Israeli forces have the ability to project their power far and wide. Netanyahu reportedly seriously considered bombing the nuclear reactors of Iran, before the Iran deal was concluded with the US, effectively ending its military nuclear program.[5] Israel’s army faces no real threats, but it operates as though an invasion were just around the corner.
There are those who claim, perhaps in hindsight, that Israel was never really threatened militarily. The Arab armies have never been a match to Israel in weapons, technology, or preparedness. Even in numbers, while the combined Arab armies sometimes appeared on paper to be larger than the Israeli army, the Egyptian commander Saad Mohamed el-Husseiny el-Shazly, once said in a lecture on the October War that in every military confrontation with the Arab armies, Israel has managed to field more men, tanks, fighter planes, and guns than the Arab armies. Today, no Arab army exists that threatens to confront, much less defeat, the Israeli army.
It is true that Israel continues to claim that it is in fear for its very existence,[6] but hardly anyone actually believes that. Even its own army professionals and intelligence officers have uniformly, and sometimes publicly, declared that no such existential threat exists and that whatever challenges Israel may face, they are NOT military in nature.[7] More often, references to security are used to justify political decisions regarding the Palestinians[8] or to plead for special treatment and trade advantages.[9]
More significant than the reality and numbers and military analysis of actual power is the common recognition of Israel’s military predominance. This is not only done by the Arab countries and governments, but also by the Palestinian people themselves, who now commonly recognize this and acknowledge that their chances of “liberating Palestine” militarily, or ending the occupation through “armed struggle,” are nonexistent.
Even those who continue to believe in armed struggle do so not out of any confidence in ultimate military victory, but out of a conviction that they need to continue to resist militarily, however helpless their prospect. They believe that surrender is not an option, and they hope that continued military operations can give them some advantage in their dealings with Israelis. The feeling in the Arab world that Israel can be defeated militarily no longer holds sway.
Yet this reality and this realization have not sunk into the Israeli collective conscience. Politicians still gain popularity by stoking deep-seated fears for security. The desperate actions of Palestinians, whether through “lone wolf” knifings or the ineffective Qassam missiles, which often do not even carry explosive warheads, only keep this fear alive and allow “security” language to dominate Israeli politics.
My point is that this military domination, which shows no signs of being overturned, can be itself a sign of hope for peace. Not because I accept the logic of “peace through power,” which only invites protagonists to an arms race, but because I trust that at some future point, we will be able to address the issues of peace and conflict without being totally stymied and trumped by Israeli “security” concerns. Not only is there no military threat from Palestine or the surrounding countries, but this is recognized both by these parties and the Israeli military. Security concerns should therefore be off the table, and not the determining dominant factor in seeking to move forward towards a peaceful solution.
[1] “Top List TIV Tables,” Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, http://armstrade.sipri.org/armstrade/page/toplist.php
[2] George Arnett, “The Numbers Behind the Worldwide Trade in Drones,” The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/mar/16/numbers-behind-worldwide-trade-in-drones-uk-israel
[3] Rachael Revesz, “Colin Powell Leaked Emails,” The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/colin-powell-leaked-emails-nuclear-weapons-israel-iran-obama-deal-a7311626.html
[4] Shuki Sadeh, “For Israeli Armies, Gaza War Is a Cash Cow,” Haaretz, http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.609919
[5] Geoffrey Aronson, “Israel Won’t Bomb Iran But US Has Nothing To Do With It,” Al-Jazeera, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2015/08/israel-won-bomb-iran-150828055312791.html
[6] David Rosenberg, “Netanyahu: Radical Islam is Existential Threat, Just Like Nazism,” Israel National News, http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/215980
[7] “Ex-Israeli Spy Chief: Iran Isn’t an Existential Threat,” Al-Jazeera, http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/upfront/2016/06/israeli-spy-chief-iran-isn-existential-threat-160601114106330.html
[8] Ben White, “Israel Uses Its Security Needs to Justify Discrimination,” The National, http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/how-israel-uses-its-security-needs-to-justify-discrimination
[9] Ryan McNamara, “Why the US Backs Israel,” Jacobin, “https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/09/israel-weapons-deal-obama-netanyahu/
Month: April 2017
This is the third of my nine Signs of Hope for Israel and Palestine. You can read Sign #2 here, Sign #1 here, and an introduction to the series here.
In my last post, I listed the details of the awesome power of Israel’s military, and stated that the recognition of its military superiority can be a Sign of Hope for peace.
I now must state what the limits of that military power are, and why those limitations constitute another Sign of Hope.
While Israel does have awesome firepower and the ability to rain fire and destruction on its enemies near and far, and while Arabs (and certainly Palestinians) have no credible military power to threaten, much less defeat Israel, nonetheless this military machine has long reached its outer limits and no longer can achieve any additional strategic goals on behalf of the State of Israel and its policies.
Geographically, Israel’s army can no longer capture or hold additional territories: to the North, it advanced as far as Beirut but had to withdraw and was not even able to hold a “sanitary corridor” in South Lebanon, in the face of Lebanese resistance by Hezbollah created largely in response to Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. Any further incursion into Syria, beyond the Golan Heights, would necessitate occupying the Syrian capital of Damascus, with its 4 million inhabitants, which is only 20 miles from the current borders. No Israeli general or politician would seriously contemplate such a step after the Lebanon debacle.
To the South, Israel’s army reached the Suez Canal but had to withdraw from Sinai, after the October War, as part of the Camp David Peace Accords. The Sinai Peninsula stretched the Israeli army to its limits, and Israel was pleased to withdraw from that area. It has even withdrawn from the densely-populated Gaza Strip, and while it still controls the borders of the Strip, the air above it, and the sea coast, it is unlikely to achieve much more militarily by reoccupying it.
To the East, despite the fact that some extremists would claim historical and religious rights to some of the territory east of the Jordan River (two and a half tribes of ancient Israel were “promised” territory there), the political and demographic headaches involved, not to mention the international outcry, would make any territorial expansion to the East wholly unthinkable.
In addition, some military analysts point to the fact that the Israeli Army made a poor showing both in its war on Hezbollah[1] and its war in Gaza[2], [3]. Other than remote bombardment and destruction, its army failed to effectively engage adversaries on the field of battle, despite their numerical and equipment advantages. In all cases, Israel has captured all the territory its army can possibly capture and hold, and can at best hope to achieve effectively demilitarized zones to prevent Arab armies from approaching it.
It is true that the Israeli army continues to believe in the power of deterrence, yet that power does not seem to have the desired effect on non-state actors, who continue to form a security threat to Israel and its citizens.
The reality is that Israel’s “security” challenges are no longer military in nature, but have to do with the very essence of the political struggle it has with Palestinians and the Arab world in general. In that struggle, military domination and power seem to have little effect. Israel is facing a determined population that, despite the huge imbalance of power, has not been cowered and refuses to acquiesce to continued Israeli domination.
Even though Israeli intelligence has made impressive successes in infiltrating hostile organizations, it has not been able to neutralize the feelings of the people, or their willingness to carry out often hopeless attacks. The latest manifestations of this resistance has been “lone wolf” attacks by individuals not affiliated with any of the armed or political groups, and even individuals who have no access to weapons or training have been using household instruments (knives and scissors) or vehicles to ram into soldiers, settlers, or civilians. The army leaders have made it clear that politicians cannot look to them for answers when the civilian population under their control erupt from time to time into mini “intifadas”[4].
Imposing excessive punishment on the population, as well as collective retribution against the families and communities of the perpetrators have also failed to do anything other than increase the level of hatred and bitterness and determination to resist.
Israelis often complain that the Palestinian Authority (their greatest ally in controlling the population) is “not doing enough.” And they also hypothesize that certain elements, as opposed to the occupation, “incite” the population, and that the school curriculum (which is approved by Israel) somehow further incites Palestinian children to resist. The reality is that their insistence on military responses as their preferred solution has failed.
While the Israeli population at large continues to emphasize the military as a necessary tool for achieving its goals, objective observers, including many in Israel’s own military leadership, recognize that force alone and military power alone cannot achieve these goals, and that some form of cooperation by Palestinians is required to get them the security they need. And this growing realization is itself another Sign of Hope.
[1] http://www.counterpunch.org/2006/10/13/how-hezbollah-defeated-israel-2/
[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/22/opinion/sunday/israels-army-goes-to-war-with-its-politicians.html?_r=0
[3] https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/israel-approaches-to-peace-process-by-daniel-kurtzer-2016-08?barrier=accessreg
[4] http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/02/individual-intifada-mahmoud-abbas-terror-attacks-idf.html
