a gloomy analysis of the middle east coflict

This was published today in The Australian .
Dunno Mike sexton but he has very simply explained why peace is not feasible there , as long as , factions in the Palestian side would not abandon their wishful thinking of eliminating Israel .duff

Michael Sexton: Violent role models make peace unlikely

January 20, 2004
THE statement in the past few days by the Palestinian group Hamas that Israel will "drown in a sea of blood" if it tries to kill the group's spiritual leader in retaliation for recent suicide bombings is a reminder of the bleak reality that lies behind the rhetoric of road maps for peace. The emptiness of much of this rhetoric is underlined by a consideration of two campaigns in recent modern history that provided the models for Hamas and other Palestinian militants.

The conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians is often described as the problem of the Middle East. In fact, although the Palestinians are supported – with varying degrees of enthusiasm – by the Arab countries of that region, the clash of arms is confined to the relatively small area occupied by the state of Israel.

One of the chief reasons for pessimism about the future of this conflict is that the Palestinian militants have largely taken as their models the two classic urban terror campaigns of the post-war years – Algeria and Northern Ireland.

During the 1950s and the early '60s those groups in Algeria that wanted complete independence from France – usually referred to collectively as the FLN – declared as open targets not only French soldiers but also any European inhabitants or Algerians who had co-operated with the administration. The French responded with a brutal campaign of their own. One technique of the FLN that was particularly effective in destabilising civilian morale was the planting of bombs in cafes and hotels frequented by Europeans. These were not suicide missions because the bombers usually slipped away before the explosion.

When Charles de Gaulle returned to power in 1958, he realised that negotiations with the FLN were pointless and resolved privately to declare victory in the war and withdraw – a procedure that he later recommended to the Americans and one that would have saved them many lives in Vietnam. When sections of the army grasped what de Gaulle intended, they launched a regime of counter-terror under the name of the OAS.

But within a few years France was gone. So too were many Frenchmen whose families had been in Algeria for more than a century. Those Algerians who had worked with the French were mostly killed.

The tactics of the FLN were picked up and expanded by the IRA in the '70s and the '80s. Their real target was always the British government. The bombs left in pubs, clubs and shopping centres in Northern Ireland and England killed ordinary members of the community. But they were designed to convince the administration at Westminster that the price of keeping Northern Ireland as part of the UK was too high to pay. The IRA had picked its mark well.

Even Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair – usually tough-minded realists in the area of foreign policy – lacked the stomach for the measures necessary to take on domestic terrorism. In an extraordinary performance for any government, they capitulated to a group that had killed one cabinet minister – Airey Neave – at Westminster, fired rockets into Downing Street and narrowly missed killing Thatcher with a bomb that seriously injured several of her colleagues.

The result is that Northern Ireland is now governed by a body that includes a number of mass murderers. It also means that the majority of the population in Northern Ireland, who wanted to remain part of Britain, will ultimately be forced by the British government to become part of the Irish Republic.

The important parallel with the Middle East is that over many years the IRA has never deviated from this objective. On occasions its alter ego – Sinn Fein – has pretended to negotiate with the British but always as a holding operation while the longer-term campaign continued. The many concessions made by the British were accepted but nothing was conceded in return – the decommissioning of weapons, for example, has never taken place.

The problem for Israel is that Hamas and a range of other Palestinian groups have only one solution to the conflict. It is not partition or the redrawing of boundaries but the removal of Israel and its population from the landscape of the Middle East. They make no bones about this and it is somewhat puzzling that many Western commentators seem reluctant to take them at their word. They have no interest in negotiations because – from their point of view – there is nothing to negotiate about. There is no evidence that the Palestinian administration is capable of restraining these groups.

In any event, it is not clear that the administration has a real negotiating position. In 2000, remember, Yasser Arafat rejected an offer – extracted from the Israelis by Bill Clinton – that met most of the Palestinians' key demands.

Israel, however, unlike France in the case of Algeria or Britain in the case of Northern Ireland, does not have the option of withdrawal. There is nowhere else to go. In these circumstances, it is difficult to see any solution in the immediate future or even in the longer term.

Of course, this is an extremely pessimistic view of the conflict and the prospects for its resolution. It is, however, difficult to find anything in the present position or in the history of the past 50 years that would provide any cause for optimism. It may be that an acceptance of these harsh realities in Washington and elsewhere in the West would at least bring a greater awareness of the magnitude of the problem.

Michael Sexton is NSW Solicitor-General and the author of several books on history and foreign affairs.