2005-07-16-calculus_of

By Ira Sharkansky

The events of the past few days help to clarify the ABC's of Israeli security policy.

The basic element is to hope for the establishment of a responsible Palestinian state, and not to do anything that is likely to make that impossible. By "responsible" we mean something that will live alongside Israel in peace, and control those within its population that want to destroy Israel and Israelis.

This hope produces a continuing calculation of benefits and costs. As long as there remains a chance of a responsible state being developed, the Israeli government is willing to take some risks and absorb some costs. And it is willing to make some concessions to Palestinian authorities who may be on the road to developing a responsible state.

We are not idiots. We invest a great deal in defending ourselves, including some actions that anger the Palestinians and those who support them. Like the barrier, which is ugly and offensive, but seems capable of limiting the violence against us.

What to do when the violence heats up to intolerable levels? That can mean when efforts to kill Israelis succeed. In other words, a hundred or so homemake rockets with limited destructive power can land in Israeli settlements without bringing a response, until one lands too close to an Israeli. Or a number of suicide bombers can be apprehended on their way to mayhem, until one succeeds.

What to do when the losses mount to unacceptable levels? First, a limited response, like some targeted killings and rocket strikes against the workshops where the rockets are made. Or as in the response to the Natania suicide bombing, sending the troops back into a West Bank town that Israel had earlier turned back to Palestinian control. There the IDF arrested a few activists and killed some not willing to be arrested. It also humiliated the Palestinian Authority by indicating that what could be given could also be taken away.

All this is a very limited set of responses, designed to punish violence, but to keep alive the prospect of developing a responsible Palestinian state.

The threat of something greater is also one of the tools employed. Currently there are lots of tanks, troops, and other equipment being assembled on the borders of Gaza, and explicit comments indicating that they will be used if the Palestinians do not control their own violent gangs.

The temptation is to unleash the airforce and artillery units in order to show Palestinians that we can kill civilians with greater efficiency and effectiveness than they. But that is not likely to happen. It would stretch international and Israeli tolerance for carnage beyond what is acceptable. Even if given the orders to do things like that, it is likely that officers and soldiers trained to avoid civilian casualties would not respond.

It is within the range of tolerable responses to send the tanks and the troops into Gaza in order to occupy substantial areas in order to punish violence and humiliate the Authority that does not control the violence. The orders will not be given lightly, both to avoid the Israeli casualties that would occur and to give the Palestinians yet another chance to keep alive the prospect of creating a responsible state.

This is the basic calculation: what is likely to be achieved in the short and long run? and what is likely to be lost in the short and long run?

No doubt about it. The IDF can destroy Palestinians and the hope of a Palestinian state. But those actions will postpone, perhaps for ever, the prospect of living in a condition of tolerable disputes with a minimum of violence. The calculations are not easy, and the results never free of second thoughts and a great deal of criticism from inside and outside the country.

Sharkansky is a member of the political science department at Hebrew University in Jerusalem