By Efraim Halevy
April 7, 2008
Yedioth Ahronoth
Only a weak echo was heard in the Israeli and international media after the interview given by Khaled Mashal to the Palestinian newspaper Al-Ayyam last week. Mashal said publicly for the first time that his movement would recognize the 1967 borders for a Palestinian state and that the arrangement would have to include the issues of Jerusalem and the refugees.
When asked whether this was a tactical or strategic position, he replied that this was a strategic position. He associated his position with the position drawn up by the prisoners of the Palestinian movements in Israeli prisons, which was expressed in the prisoners’ document from 2006. Mashal said that all the Palestinian movements were partners to this document, including Abu Mazen’s Fatah.
For over a year, Mashal has been voicing his position to foreigners who visit his office in Damascus. When speaking to them, he does not detail his positions on the issues of Jerusalem and the refugees, just as he did not do so in the interview. In private conversations he says that Hamas will not make advance concessions in its fundamental positions on the core issues, and clarifies that at the end of the day, at the conclusion of any negotiation, the entire Palestinian nation will becalled upon to decide and approve any arrangement.
The Mashal declaration constitutes acquiescence to the repeated demand, which his interlocutors from the past year have put to him, to say publicly what he has spoken to them in private. A lack of response to his statements does not conform to Israel’s real interests at this time.
Hamas, and Mashal as one of its spokesmen, does not want to participate directly in peace talks with Israel. If it receives legitimacy as a recognized partner in the overall Palestinian equation, it will leave it to Abu Mazen to conduct the talks. Israel is not being required, then, to sit down face to face with Hamas representatives. This being the case, why are Israel and the international community refusing to permit Hamas’s inclusion in the equation?
Whoever examines the publicly-stated positions of Fatah and Hamas must admit that there is no difference between them. Both adhere to the 1967 borders. Both include the issues of Jerusalem and the refugees in the negotiations. Neither have backed down in any way, outwardly, from extreme positions on these two core issues. Whoever reads Abu Mazen’s speech at the Damascus summit will find sharp and harsh criticism of Israel and will not find even the slightest public hint of a change in thePalestinians’ basic positions.
Indeed, Mashal is unwilling to declare in advance that he recognizes Israel’s right to exist, as required by the international community. At the same time, Abu Mazen insists on not declaring in advance his recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. Is there a real difference between these two unacceptable positions?
Hamas has taken very severe blows from Israel in the past months, and it yearns for a cease-fire. A party that wishes to cease the fire, attests to the fact that it is at a disadvantage. This is the right moment to try to achieve a reliable temporary arrangement.
Hamas has proven that it still holds substantial destructive power, to the point of posing a real danger to the peace talks being conducted between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said in a public interview to the Israeli media that he is in favor of including Hamas in the diplomatic process, otherwise it is doubtful whether the negotiations will be able to reach a successful conclusion.
If Israel does not seriously consider a change of policy in light of the voices coming from the leaders of Hamas in the Gaza Strip and in Damascus, under conditions that are optimal for Israel at the present time, we may find ourselves quickly falling down a slippery slope.
Anyone who needed proof of the fragile state of the Israel-Hamas balance received it last week, in an incident where there was a hair’s breadth between injury to the former GSS director, Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter, to the actual outcome. The fate of this balance is a matter of chance, more now than ever.
In the past two weeks, Ayman al-Zawahiri has called twice to attack Jews and Israel, “in Israel and everywhere else.” In the eyes of al-Qaeda, the members of Hamas are perceived as heretics due to their stated desire to participate, even indirectly, in processes of any understandings or agreements with Israel. Mashal’s declaration diametrically contradicts al-Qaeda’s approach, and provides Israel with an opportunity, perhaps an historic one, to leverage it for the better.
Are our eyes too blind to see? Are our ears too deaf to hear?
Efraim Halevy is head of the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies in