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Friday October 11, 1996

Palestinians must police themselves to gain true peace

Jodi J. Schwartz

Which Israeli leader signed a document promising the Palestinians autonomy with "a strong local police force"? Which Israeli prime minister understood that to maintain order and contend with Arab political extremists and petty criminals, Palestinian authorities needed armed security officials?

It was Menachem Begin. An armed Palestinian police force was an integral part of the Camp David agreements. Those Israeli and American Jews who now vilify the Oslo peace accords for giving Palestinians weapons are ignoring what their hero Begin understood: Ending this hundred-year blood feud will be a profoundly complex business. In saying, "We told you so" and capitalizing on the deplorable incidents of Palestinian police firing at the Israel Defense Force, the real agenda of too many people is scuttling the entire peace process, rather than helping to salvage it .

Anyone who loves Israel was traumatized by those incidents. No one should excuse those policemen or explain away their disgraceful behavior. But for Israel, the most important task is to study what happened and try to ensure that it isn't repeated, not to use the incidents as a pretext for shattering the promise of Oslo and provoking even worse violence.

So what happened? Veteran West Bank reporter Danny Rubenstein gave this account in the Israeli daily Ha'aretz: "Palestinian security personnel in Ramallah and Bethlehem most certainly did not receive an order from on high to open fire on IDF soldiers. The directives they were given were to let masses of young Arab demonstrators storm the Israeli soldiers...But when the Israelis responded with fire at the youths, neither the police nor their `soldiers' could hold back...They also opened fire."

It was inexcusable for Arafat to encourage anti-Israel demonstrations. But there is clearly more than enough blame to go around for the recent confrontations, which almost certainly would have occurred even without an Old City tunnel controversy.

Rubenstein continued: "More than the [Palestinian Authority] inciting the civilians to demonstrate, it was the population at large in the West Bank and Gaza that pushed its leaders to finally take action against Netanyahu's government...which is avoiding implementing the agreements and insulting the Palestinian leadership.

"The peak was when Arafat answered the Israeli demand to remove a number of unimportant offices in Jerusalem and expected something from the Israelis in exchange -- for example, withdrawal from Hebron. Instead, they ordered the Ministry of the Interior and the Jerusalem Municipality to demolish the Arab houses built in the city without permits."

So both sides have had problems living up to the Oslo Accords. But those problems should prompt both to take the accords more seriously, not to discard them.

What alternative is offered by those making a hue and cry about uniformed Palestinians with guns? Return to the "good old days" of the occupation? Enforce a police state in the territories where Palestinians will have token powers but where Israelis with rifles will be on every corner, arresting burglars and prostitutes as well as terrorists?

The only credible way to ensure Israel's security is to build on what has been learned but continue to address the root cause of this conflict, which is that two peoples are laying claim to the same small piece of land and need to live side by side, in peace.

That is how most Israelis feel. A poll by the Israeli firm Shvakim Panorama conducted at the height of the Palestinian riots showed that 79.5 percent of Israelis favor "continued implementation of the Oslo peace process." There is no way to do this without Palestinian police who can squelch violence within their camp.

It's important to remember that the Palestinian Authority passed a crucial test just one day after some of its policemen fired at the Israelis. Other Palestinian policemen then risked their lives to serve as a buffer between angry Arab kids and the IDF. This would have been inconceivable had the police not been armed.

What has also been overlooked in this crisis is that the Palestinian police have already protected and saved many Israeli lives. They have certainly earned the respect of the IDF and Israel's domestic intelligence agency, the Shin Bet, in the last year because they have shared data and closely collaborated with the Israelis to stop terrorist attacks.

Indeed, just after Netanyahu took office, leading figures in the Shin Bet told him that Israel's ability to thwart terror would be seriously compromised without the help of Palestinian security forces.

Needless to say, the Israeli government should not ignore what has happened or allow Palestinian policemen as much leeway as before. The working relationship between the IDF and those policemen needs to be re-examined and readjusted, perhaps significantly. But that need not mean backing out of Israel's commitment to redeploy in Hebron and jumping off the peace track.

The Palestinians have rifles but they have no tanks, no missiles, no air force and no ability to organize in sufficient numbers to threaten Israel militarily. The only army in the territories has been and will be Israel's.

Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai has made it clear that the IDF will hit the Palestinians with full force the next time violence erupts. If that unspeakable tragedy occurs, Arab policemen may make the IDF's task more difficult in sporadic confrontations, but they will not stand a chance against waves of Israeli troops and tanks.

The challenge now is to prevent such a nightmare. That means getting the peace process that began at Camp David back on track, and insisting, like Menachem Begin, that Palestinians police themselves.

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