Month: May 2017

Israel’s dangerous drift to chauvinism may make a solution ever harder to find.

Special Report: Six Days of War, 50 Years of Occupation / The Economist
May 20, 2017

Israel cannot at the same time have all of the “Land of Israel,” a predominantly Jewish state and full democracy. Most Israelis (and many Palestinians) cannot conceive of a one-state model with equal rights for all Arabs and Jews. In reality, a one-state model means that some or all of the Palestinians would be disenfranchised. So, in the end, two states still looks like the least bad option to most Israelis and Palestinians.

IN A COUNTRY of larger-than-life leaders—founding fathers, warriors and peacemakers  — it is easy to forget how long Binyamin Netanyahu has been around for. Having served as prime minister for 11 years—three years in the 1990s and eight years in his current stint — he is Israel’s second-longest holder of that office after David Ben-Gurion. He is on first-name terms with the world’s leaders. But what has he achieved?

On the big questions of war and peace, not much. He has won no big battles and secured no big peace agreements. Instead he has managed the conflict and avoided big disasters, which is no small feat. He has waged two wars against Hamas in Gaza, fending off calls for a full reinvasion. In the West Bank, the Palestinian Authority co-operates on security. Hizbullah, the Lebanese Shia militia, is too busy in Syria to risk a second front with Israel, and its paymaster, Iran, is some years away from being able to make a nuclear bomb.

Continue reading “The Ultimate Deal: One State or Two?”

There is no end in sight to the occupation.

Special Report: Six Days of War, 50 Years of Occupation / The Economist
May 20, 2017

Arij, a student, picks her way past the fetid rubbish by the wall as she returns to East Jerusalem from Birzeit University, a commute of two-and-a-half hours each way. She does not speak Hebrew, so could not go to an Israeli university. “I don’t know any Jews. I am not ready to make friends with them,” she says. Most Israelis are not interested either. The Arabic that they are usually taught is a pidgin designed for places like Kalandia, with phrases in the imperative: “Jib al-hawiya” (give me your ID).

ISRAEL, THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY and Hamas may be bitter rivals, but they all agree on one thing: the Erez border crossing between Gaza and Israel, for the lucky few allowed to use it, is a prime opportunity to recruit spies. At the Israeli terminal a poster showing a handshake offers the “Chance of Your Lifetime” to Palestinians willing to provide information on militants. Beyond a buffer zone, at the PA and Hamas posts, murals warn Palestinians against betraying the homeland.

Erez marks one of the world’s strangest frontiers, separating the lush fields of Israeli kibbutzim from the free-fire zones, rubble and chaos of Gaza — a territory that is neither a state, nor an autonomous domain of the PA, nor even a fully occupied territory after Israel pulled out in 2005. Instead it is a large detention camp, guarded from without by Israeli forces (and by Egyptian troops), and from within by Hamas, the strongest of the armed gangs, which pushed out the PA in 2007. The PA’s border post provides a convenient buffer between Israel and Hamas.

The façade of the Israeli terminal masks a surreal automated facility. No Israeli is in sight as Palestinians emerging from Gaza make their way through remote-controlled gates and scanners. Commands are barked through distorted tannoys, or made with obscure hand signals from behind the blast-proof window of a control room high above.

Continue reading “A Sorry State: The Half-Life on an Occupied Palestine”

Dazzling high-tech firms divert attention from a serious productivity problem.

Special Report: Six Days of War, 50 Years of Occupation / The Economist
May 20, 2017

The economic disparities are striking. With GDP per person at $35,700 a year in 2015, Israel’s standard of living is much the same as France’s. For the West Bank the figure stands at $3,700, akin to Egypt’s; for Gaza it is about $1,700, similar to Congo-Brazzaville’s. In real terms, Gazans are about 25% poorer today than they were at the time of the Oslo accords.

Israel’s security barrier is, to a large extent, also a one-way protectionist barrier. The Palestinian market is fully exposed to Israeli goods, but Palestinian products struggle to get out. Strawberry farmers in Gaza, working less than a kilometer from the border fence, say they cannot export to Israel and only rarely to the West Bank. In the main, Palestinians are treated as a source of cheap, and disposable, labor.

IN A PATCH of desert until recently frequented only by passing camels, workers in a computer lab examine new “smart” appliances: a slow cooker on one bench, a security camera on another, a smoke detector on a third. Millions of devices that incorporate mini-computers are being connected to the internet. But as well as convenience, the “internet of things” offers cyber-criminals many new vulnerabilities to exploit. “If I were an attacker, I would never hide in your PC,” says Oleg Brodt, director of research and development at Cyber@BGU, the cyber-security research centre run by Ben Gurion University in Beersheva. “I would try to hide in your smoke detector or door alarm, because nobody bothers to protect them.”

The centre has shown how wearable devices can be used to eavesdrop on corporate networks. It has also demonstrated the multitude of ways in which even supposedly ultra-secure computer systems not connected to the internet can be hacked. These include exploiting FM radio waves emitted by video cards, the blinking of LED lights or even the pattern of heat signatures.

Continue reading “Startup Nation or Left-Behind Nation? Israel’s Economy is a Study in Contrasts”

Religious soldiers are replacing kibbutzniks. Does it matter?

Special Report: Six Days of War, 50 Years of Occupation / The Economist
May 20, 2017

Is the IDF the most moral army in the world, as many claim? There must be doubts. Breaking the Silence, a group of reservists who bear witness to what they have seen and had to do while in uniform, tell many disturbing stories, from the petty humiliation of Palestinians to actions that might count as war crimes.

ARMY INDUCTION DAY feels like a graduation party. Family and friends gather. The kids leave home to become the defenders of the Jewish state. The gun is passed from father to son. On the day the paratroopers are being signed up at Bakum, the main recruitment centre of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), young men dance in a circle to the beat of a drum, singing “Don’t be afraid, Israel.” All in the cheerful band wear the knitted skullcaps of the national-religious movement, having studied at a religious military academy in the settlement of Eli.

Religious Zionists have largely taken over the ideological fire of the secular kibbutz movement, which built socialist collective farms in the early years of the state. Now it is the boys from the yeshivas (Jewish seminaries) who seek to settle the land and become army officers. If the army is a microcosm of Israeli society, then its top units may be the harbingers of Israel’s future elite. The paratroopers form a sort of military aristocracy. Eight of the 15 IDF chiefs of staff since 1967 have worn the red beret and boots, and several became prominent politicians.

Continue reading “The Army’s New Elite: Israel’s Army is Recruiting Ever More Ultra-Orthodox Officers”

Israel’s politicians promote religion and intolerance.

Special Report: Six Days of War, 50 Years of Occupation / The Economist
May 20, 2017

“I am not so concerned about security and more concerned about what happens in Israel. This issue divides us. It creates hate and chauvinism. I don’t want Israel to become hell.”
— Israel Harel, a veteran of the Israeli settler movement

THE SIGN AT the entrance is clear: “According to Torah Law entering the Temple Mount area is strictly forbidden due to the holiness of the site.” Rabbinical tradition holds that Jews may not set foot on any part of the esplanade atop Jerusalem’s holiest site. Once the location of the Jewish temple, which was destroyed by the Romans in 70AD, the area has for centuries been a Muslim compound comprising the al-Aqsa Mosque and the golden Dome of the Rock. Because the location of the Holy of Holies (the inner sanctum of the former temple) is unknown, say the rabbis, ritually impure Jews might accidentally enter and defile it. These days Jews mostly pray outside, at the base of the retaining wall, known as the Western Wall, or Kotel.

Nonetheless, Jewish zealots venture into the al-Aqsa compound almost every day, ostensibly as tourists. The police let them jump the queue of foreigners and form a protective cordon as they perambulate the Dome of the Rock, amid curses from Muslim worshippers. Sometimes they stand silently, gazing at it longingly. They are filmed by the police, who are supposed to ensure that they do not attempt to pray. One trick is to address God while pretending to speak on a mobile phone.

Continue reading “Right v. Far Right: Politics in Israel No Longer Offers Much of a Choice”