The Political Interest

By Michael Kramer

"Israel has no foreign policy, only a defense policy."

-- Moshe Dayan

"Israel has no foreign policy, only a domestic political system."

-- Henry Kissinger

The historian Isaiah Berlin is reported to have said that Yitzhak Shamir is like a wall and that while walls have uses, being talked to is not one of them. Listening to Shamir, however, is revelatory. For in common with several other world leaders (Saddam Hussein comes quickly to mind), the Israeli Prime Minister has always said exactly what he thinks and more often than not has done exactly what he has said he was going to do.

Several years ago, I asked Shamir about the Dayan and Kissinger observations. Both were correct, he said, admitting that his nation's obvious security needs and geography combined with an increasingly conservative politics to support his own heartfelt suspicion of the Arabs in Israel's midst. "But there is more," he added calmly. "You see, I just don't believe in trading land for peace. I mean I don't believe in it."

Since then, and despite his willingness to attend the peace conference that James Baker has been trying to arrange, Shamir has not changed his mind. "It is not a religious notion for him," explains the Israeli philosopher David Hartman, "but rather a deeper commitment to a historical consciousness that says a vital people has been too long denied its rightful place on all of the land of Israel." What is politically significant, says Hartman, is that "the people trust Shamir to stick to his guns. They know he is not out to win a Man of the Year award, that he's not interested in having cocktails with the goyim. The polls say a majority would favor trading land for peace, but they know that if it is Shamir who cuts a deal, it will be because it is smart to do so, not simply expedient."

A deal? Only dreamers still hope that the Prime Minister's hard line is a negotiating gambit. Realists know better. Most skulk away depressed. Some summon the courage to strike back, as George Bush is doing.

For Shamir, a territorial compromise that could realize the hope of most Israelis to live in peace is not a dream at all, but a nightmare. "Peace for peace" is what Shamir wants, a pledge of Israeli cooperation with her poorer Arab neighbors in exchange for an end to the Arab boycott of corporations that do business with Israel. Beyond that, Shamir is perfectly satisfied with the status quo. To him, Israel appears blessed: Saddam is defanged, Syria has been humbled because its longtime patron, the Soviet Union, is consumed with its own problems, and the Palestinian intifadeh, while a nuisance, rarely intrudes on the daily lives of most Israelis.

Understand Shamir's basic intransigence on the central question and you can appreciate why Israel precipitated the latest settlement dust-up. And make no mistake about it: it was Shamir, not Bush, who started it all -- intentionally. "At some point, the Issue -- we capitalize it -- will really be joined," says a Shamir adviser. "Whenever that time comes, the Prime Minister's 'no' could kill the chance of U.S. aid in the settling of Soviet Jews. So we decided to try and get the money first. Given our underlying position, we reasoned it would be harder later, not easier."

Buttressed by an assumption articulated long ago by Defense Minister Moshe Arens -- "It doesn't matter who the President is as long as we have the Senate" -- Shamir's American allies began their campaign. The conventional wisdom held that no American President would risk precious political capital by vetoing legislation supporting Israel. When Bush threatened just that, the Israelis were stuck. But even those who call Bush an anti-Semite must know that the President is merely anti-Shamir, or more properly that Bush is simply exercising an American prerogative to quarrel with another government's policies.

Is there any way out? Creative diplomacy may resolve the instant crisis. Israel may get the absorption assistance it seeks in some form, at some time. But the Issue will linger, and if the logjam is to be broken, the burden of change should be borne equally by the other side. Too many wars have confirmed that the Arabs' hard line should be taken as seriously as Shamir's.

Many Israelis buoyed by Yasser Arafat's seeming acceptance of their right to exist in December 1988 have had second thoughts. "Beyond everything," says the Israeli author Ze'ev Chafets, "beyond the continuation of terrorist actions, the Palestine Liberation Organization's refusal to amend its covenant ((which calls for the destruction of Israel)), the P.L.O.'s support for Iraq during the gulf war, and the insistence of West Bank Palestinians that their statements and actions be cleared by Arafat, there is a single image that will probably not recede for all of our lives. It was when we were all huddling with our gas masks hoping the Scuds wouldn't hit and the Palestinians were on their rooftops cheering. It will be a long time before anything the Arabs say is trusted."

David Hartman, who has long favored a two-state solution, agrees. "Baker needs to spend less time trying to stop the settlements, which won't happen, and more time convincing the Palestinians that they must prove to us that they understand that we are home, that we are equally entitled to live here. If that ever happens, the hard-line ideologies will fade as controlling political forces, the settlements question will be resolved, and we will be as welcoming of the West Bank Arabs, and perhaps even of the P.L.O., as we were of Anwar Sadat."

If and when Hartman's dream is realized, the Shamirs will be thanked for having helped to keep Israel together for almost a half-century of unending hostility, and then they will be retired. Until then, the rejectionists will rule -- and half in frustration, half in admiration, Israelis will continue to say what they have said for years: Nobody does nothing better than Yitzhak Shamir.