- "This has been and still is one of the great
mysteries: How is it that there is no political expression of the fact
that most of the Israeli public is in favor of evacuating the settlements?"
-
- Spreading The Secret
-
- One of the best-kept secrets in Israel is that most Israelis
are fed up with the occupation, and just want to get out.
-
- According to June's findings by Mina Zemach, Israel's
foremost pollster, 63% of Israelis are in favor of "unilateral withdrawal."
In fact, 69% call for the evacuation of "all" or "most of"
the settlements.
-
- Mina's numbers are corroborated by everybody else: The
Peace Index of Tel-Aviv University's Tami Steinmetz Center found that 65%
of Israelis "are prepared to evacuate the settlements under a unilateral
separation program".
-
- A poll commissioned by Peace Now a month earlier revealed
that 59% of Israelis support immediate evacuation of most settlements,
followed by a unilateral withdrawal of the army from the occupied territories.
-
- Here's another "secret" revealed by Mina Zemach:
60% of Israelis believe that Israel should agree to the establishment of
a Palestinian state as part of a peace agreement.
-
- Is this too much good news all at once? To temper it,
here are a few more findings by Mina Zemach: 74% of Israelis say that Sharon
is doing a good job and 60% believe that the Israeli army should be allowed
to attack the refugee camps in Gaza.
-
- To quote Mina Zemach's closing remarks (at a lecture
I heard her give in Tel Aviv yesterday, sponsored by the New Israel Fund),
"Similar trends appear on the Palestinian side in surveys conducted
by my Palestinian colleagues. Both sides want their leaders to be very
aggressive, but most are willing to have a peaceful, two-state solution."
-
- Mis-perceptions and manipulations The findings alone
are impressively pro-peace, but there are two more amazing aspects, in
my opinion. The first is that most Israelis are not aware that the majority
wants the occupation to go away. To illustrate, I report an informal experiment
conducted by peace activist Ron HaCohen in his Tel-Aviv University class.
When asked what opinion the students believed was most common among Israelis,
they guessed "dismantle most" or "dismantle only a few"
of the settlements. Little did they suspect that the category "dismantle
ALL the settlements" was the one most commonly chosen. Ron's students
guessed that the Israeli public was much more pro-settlement than it actually
is. Most people, I believe, feel this way.
-
- The second amazing aspect relates to the fact that the
government can get away with ignoring this information. To quote columnist
Hannah Kim in yesterday's Ha'aretz, "This has been and still is one
of the great mysteries: How is it that there is no political expression
of the fact that most of the Israeli public is in favor of evacuating the
settlements?" For months, I have been asking people their thoughts
about this. The following answers seem to sum up the views I heard:
-
- First, Mark Mellman, one of the top political consultants
in Washington, was not surprised. He said that it's not unusual for policymakers
to ignore majority views, and that it's our job to get them to sit up and
notice.
-
- Ron HaCohen said, "Our main source of information
about what people think, feel or believe is the mass media. The media portray
the Israeli people as much more pro-settlements than they really are."
-
- Hanna Kim suggests that the power of the settlements
is a combination of their integration into the Israeli economy and the
effectiveness of their Knesset lobby. This fits into what is generally
known about the power of small, but determined lobbies? on many issues
and in many countries.
-
- To all the above, I would add the determination of the
Sharon government to play deaf to this view. When asked about abandoning
even remote, isolated settlements, Sharon sidesteps the question. When
pressed, he recently responded that Netzarim - the Gaza settlement that
everyone loves to hate - is as dear to his heart as Tel Aviv. In other
words, not a single settlement is negotiable.
-
- I was privileged to hear a great panel discussion this
evening, sponsored by Bat Shalom, on the subject of the "fence"
that Israel has begun to erect between Israel and Palestine. All the panelists
(five Israeli and Palestinian women professors who are also peace activists)
felt that the fence would conceal the real issue - the Palestinian suffering
on the other side as a result of the occupation - and would replace a negotiated
peace agreement. Galia Golan also pointed out that the fence was being
used to grab more land, as it was not being built on the Green Line, and
that it ultimately would provide little protection, as mortars and rockets
could go right over it. Other speakers were Rima Hamami, Inas Haj, Naomi
Chazan, and Tanya Reinhart.
-
- The most impassioned plea of the evening came from Tanya,
who begged the audience to listen to the polls and trust that people mean
what they are saying. "Now is the time to call for leaving the territories
immediately, unilaterally," said Tanya, "just as we did in Lebanon."
-
- I think she's right.
-
-
- Views expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect
those of israelinsider.
-
- © 2001-2002 Koret Communications Ltd. All rights
reserved. http://web.israelinsider.com/bin/en.jsp?enPage=ViewsPage&enDisplay=
|
