Ha'aretz, 28th August
Who's in charge in the West Bank?
By Yehuda Bauer
It is impossible for a modern state to exist without a monopoly over military, police or other power, and over its use in accordance with the law. When an alternative center of power is established, causing a significant number of citizens to stop recognizing the government's authority, the government is undermined.
The democratic government has monopoly power in Israel, within the Green Line border. Within the West Bank, Israeli security forces have control in the sense that, with marked success, they protect Israel's interests in the face of the armed resistance of Palestinian terrorist groups. The price of success is a severely oppressive regime to which Arab residents of the West Bank are subject.
But Israel does not control the several hundred thousand Jewish settlers in the West Bank. They accept Israeli rule only to the extent that it works in their favor. When they think it does not, then in the best-case scenario they ignore it; otherwise, they succeed in resisting it.
The police, security services and army are under the constant threat of active resistance on the settlers' part, and they submit to that threat. The necessary monopoly over this power no longer exists. There are two states; one committed to a Western democratic government, and the other committed to extremist, messianic religious rule.
Here is a completely imaginary scenario:
Under the pressure of the Quartet and others, the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority reach an agreement. Israel is to withdraw to the 1967 borders. A Palestinian state will be established involving an exchange of territory that will leave most West Bank settlements in Israeli hands. Israel agrees, after Knesset approval and a national referendum, to evacuate within 10 to 15 years tens of thousands of settlers from communities that are not included in these land swaps. Jerusalem is to be divided, with free trade between both sections. The Temple Mount will be transferred to Waqf control, and everyone will be assured access to it, under efficient international supervision. Palestinian refugees will be absorbed by the Palestinian state, and only a very small number will be able to enter Israeli territory in the framework of family unification. A third party will ensure adherence to the financial side of the deal. Arab states, aside from Syria and Lebanon, will recognize Israel and commit to normal financial ties with it.
Under this imaginary scenario, does anyone think that the tens of thousands of settlers slated for evacuation will leave their homes while singing 'Hatikva' and dancing? It's clear that the resistance will be violent, and the hilltop youth are liable to become armed militias. The Israel Defense Forces, if no changes take place, will be sensitive in its dealings with the settlers rather than resolute, because the government has lost its monopoly over the use of power in accordance with the law.
There is no truth to the well-known tradition that the Second Temple was destroyed due to baseless hatred or internecine rivalry. The Temple was destroyed because religious, messianic extremists forced the nation to rebel against a global empire that it had no chance of defeating. This time there may be a scenario (an imaginary one) in which a radical religious minority thwarts peace because the fanatic political assassins of the Second Temple period have found worthy successors.
