To be or not to be?
By Yuval Steinitz

(July 20) - Israel's concept of defense before 1967 proposed 
that any significant deployment of Arab forces in the Sinai 
Peninsula or the West Bank would necessitate a preemptive strike. 
This concept was based on David Ben-Gurion's and Yigal Allon's 
analysis that Israel's impossible borders, combined with the 
lack of any strategic depth, made its defeat inconceivable. 
Indeed, the Six Day War erupted when the Egyptians suddenly 
created a casus belli, by mobilizing massive ground forces into 
the Sinai. 

Israel's concept of peace following 1967 proposed that the 
famous land-for-peace formula would be achieved if, and only if, 
Israel's Arab adversaries came to terms with two basic conditions: 
First, an end to the conflict, including a total ban on any 
further territorial or other fundamental demands; second, full 
demilitarization of the territories that are given back. 

The problem is that while Egypt fulfills most demilitarization 
and arms control commitments included in the Israeli-Egyptian 
agreement signed 25 years ago (not withstanding other bold 
violations carried out by Egypt), the Palestinians behave as if 
their goal is to establish a world record for violation of 
agreements. For example, the Oslo Accords, signed on the White 
House lawn by then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian 
Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat in 1993, included a Palestinian 
commitment to limit their force in the territories to 9,000 
armed policemen. It took less than a year until 24,000 such 
policemen took their positions. Today, only eight years after 
the signing ceremony, there are approximately 70,000 fighters 
in the territories. The last four months added a new phenomenon: 
a decisive Palestinian effort to enter the field of light 
artillery, that is, to deploy light mortars, Katyusha rockets, 
and anti-aircraft missiles, within walking distance from major 
Israeli cities and from most IDF air bases. 

It is therefore high time to pull our heads from the sand and 
look at the overall picture. The Palestinian Authority is 
preparing to play a key role in any future Arab assault on the 
Jewish state. It is for this aim that it deploys significant 
forces, which are equivalent to three or four infantry divisions, 
just a few kilometers from Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the coastal 
plain. This move exacerbated Israel's major Achilles heel: 
its tiny geographical dimensions. 

If this is the diagnosis, what is the prognosis? 

Some Israelis suggest that the most urgent need at this point is 
to put an end to the violence. This means to try achieving a 
cease-fire and to prevent shelling, shooting, and other threats 
to the people of Israel. This approach, however, ignores the 
fact that from a broader, national security perspective, the most 
serious threat is not the current war of attrition against 
Israeli civilians, as painful as it is, but the evanescence of 
arms-control limitations and demilitarized zones. 

Let us assume, for the sake of argument, that there had been 
no Palestinian violence during the last 10 months. It seems 
that in such a case, the bold violation of the demilitarization 
and arms-control commitments of Oslo would suffice to make an 
Israeli preemptive strike inevitable. A strike which would aim 
to eliminate illegal weapons and reduce fighting capabilities 
of the Palestinian forces, and, finally, to enforce them to 
honor their commitments. 

In other words, if a real cease-fire is a preliminary condition 
for resuming negotiations, then a preliminary condition for 
resuming the cease-fire must be a complete elimination of all 
illegal weapons, combined with a renewed Palestinian commitment 
to endorse their most basic commitments. 

Is the very insistence on preserving demilitarized zones in 
such immediate proximity to the heart of the country beyond 
Israel's power? 

Unfortunately, the answer might be yes. For the only possible 
interpretation of the acceptance of the American Mitchell and 
Tenet plans - which emphasize the cessation of violence, but 
pay lip service to the demilitarization and arms-control 
issues - is this: the Americans and the Israelis are willing 
to comply with the process of establishing a real army in the 
territories. 

If even the appearance of mortars in the territories and in 
the outskirts of Jerusalem is not a clear casus belli, then 
Arafat's road to an army is wide open. Such compliance might 
also have negative implications for the fate of other 
demilitarization agreements between Israel and its Arab 
adversaries, such as the demilitarization of the Sinai desert 
in the south, or of the eastern side of the Golan Heights in 
the north. 

In sum, the only certain judgment concerning our "peace 
process" with our Palestinians counterparts is this: 
To be or not to be? That is our question. 

(The writer is a Likud MK and chairman of the Knesset 
Subcommittee for Defense Planning and Policy.)