Yair Hirschfeld was one of two Israeli academics (alongside the late Ron Pundak) who began unofficial and secret discussions with Palestinian officials in Oslo that led to the Declaration of Principles between Israel and the PLO. He tracks the global and regional changes that have made peace harder to achieve, and argues that we cannot return to the Pre-7 October Peace Process. Instead, he suggests the international community – led by the Gulf states – should plan for a comprehensive Middle Eastern security process, as well as the reconstruction of Israel’s southern and northern border area and Gaza.
Part 1: The History of the Peace Process
1979-2008: From the Beilin-Abu Mazen Understanding to the rejection of the Olmert parameters
I first became involved in what became known as ‘the peace process’ when Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran, and the Islamic Revolution replaced the Shah’s regime in February 1979. Previously, with the help of the Shah, President Sadat of Egypt had neutralised Saudi and other Arab opposition against his peace initiative with Israel. Yet after the revolution, this was no longer possible. I explained to the Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky that negotiations for a Palestinian self-government agreement were doomed to failure, and suggested seeking a bottom-up strategy by offering to economically empower the Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza. This suggested concept received support from King Hussein of Jordan, and the leader of Israel’s opposition, Shimon Peres. Peres subsequently asked me to arrange confidential meetings with Palestinians for him, his deputy Yossi Beilin, and other activists from the Israeli Labour Party.
I arranged meetings for Peres with the pro-Jordanian Palestinian leadership; together with Yossi Beilin I met supporters of various PLO factions; with others I met the Palestinian business leadership and journalists. The first question we asked was whether Israel should unilaterally withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza. The answer we repeatedly received was that in such a scenario ‘at first we Palestinians will kill each other, and then we will kill you.’ The second question we asked, then, was what we should do. They invariably answered: ‘Attempt to seek an agreement with Jordan and/or the PLO’. This we did. To cut a well-known story short, in September 1993, the Oslo Accords were signed.
My colleague Ron Pundak and I then asked Chairman Arafat to nominate two non-official negotiators to work with us on preparing an initial model for a Permanent Status Agreement (PSA). Hussein Agha and Ahmad Samih Khalidi were to become close friends. On the evening of 31 October 1995, the four of us presented our work to Abu Mazen and Yossi Beilin. It became known as the Beilin-Abu Mazen Understanding.
Abu Mazen then asked me to drive him from Tel Aviv to Herzliya to see the Egyptian Ambassador to Israel, Muhammad Bassiouni. On the way Abu Mazen was full of praise for our work, telling me that with some ups and downs along the way, we would be able to conclude the proposed agreement.
Thirteen years later, in the autumn of 2008, Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, offered (now) President Abu Mazen an improved Beilin-Abu Mazen Understanding. On the issue of territory, Olmert’s proposal was identical to what we proposed – a 6.3 per cent swap, meaning that additional settlements built since 1995 had no negative effect. On Jerusalem and refugees, his proposal was even more accommodating to the Palestinians. Yet this time Abu Mazen refused. Olmert sent Pundak to suggest Abu Mazen propose any possible change he wanted. He again refused. Abu Mazen also rejected a request from Condoleezza Rice to at least acknowledge the achievements.
One major change between 1995-2008 was within the global-regional power equation. During the 1990s the United States was all powerful. Russia and most Arab states accepted Washington’s leadership. Potential spoilers in the form of Iran and its proxies were relatively weak. Then 9/11 happened, followed by the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2008, when President G.W. Bush committed to withdraw from Iraq, Iran and its proxies were no longer marginalised. Israel’s peace offers were rejected in 2008 and again in 2014.[1] And Israeli unilateral withdrawals from Lebanon in June 2000, and from Gaza in September 2005, caused exactly what had been predicted by our Palestinian counterparts two decades earlier: first the Lebanese and Gazans killed each other, and then they came to kill us Israelis.
Four Safety Nets to Block the Return from Negotiations to Violence
In May 1996 Netanyahu was elected Prime Minister. Arafat agreed that Agha should regularly meet Netanyahu and Ambassador Dore Gold to discuss a peace-building strategy. The concept that ultimately evolved suggested Netanyahu could say he opposed the creation of a Palestinian state, while naming issues to negotiate that would allow him and the Israeli government to pave the way to a two-state agreement.
At the time we all knew that Arafat controlled and dominated Palestinian decision-making. Accordingly, I asked my friend Zuheir el-Menasreh – then governor of the Jenin district – to explain Arafat’s strategic thinking to me. He believed Arafat would always pursue two strategies, seeking a way forward on the path to peace, while also – in case it did not work – allowing him to return to violence. The conclusion we drew in the late 1990s was simple: we had to find a way to block the return to violence.
We did this in four ways.
First, following Agha and Khalidi’s suggestion, we prepared a speech for Arafat called ‘Moving from the Logic of War to the Logic of Peace’. He delivered this speech – word for word – in Stockholm in December 1998.[2] It opened the way to negotiate a code of conduct, defining conditions necessary to prevent the use of violence, in case negotiations reached an impasse.
Second, with the support of the Norwegian government, two teams of experts negotiated what we called an Economic Permanent Status Agreement. This proposed creating the necessary political, administrative and physical infrastructure to build a successful and prosperous Palestinian state – while defining Israeli-Palestinian economic relations before concluding any final agreement on all outstanding core issues of conflict.[3]
Third, we sought to reach what we called ‘Integrated Security Arrangements between Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian State – The Need, Main Characteristics and the Possible Participation of Third Party Forces’.[4]
A fourth effort was the creation of a good neighbourly relations model between the Governorate of Jenin and the Israeli municipalities of Haifa, Gilboa and Emek HaMaayanot. It coordinated the planning of physical infrastructure of water, sewage, energy, roads and more; upgraded economic cooperation; sought civilian security; and coordinated human resources development and education.[5]
The lesson learned then remains relevant today: before committing to the endgame, it is essential to build safety networks, supporting the interests of all sides, while preventing crisis situations in negotiations to pave the way back to violence, further tragedies and despair.
The Danger of Appeasing Militant Islam and Hamas
During the 1980s the United States armed what became Al Qaida in order to fight the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and later paid the price on 9/11. During the first decade of the 21st century, Iran and its proxies became powerful and dangerous. During the next decade the United States and most of the liberal-democratic world appeased what became the axis of evil: Iran and its proxies all over the Middle East, supported in many different ways by Russia and China. When the Muslim Brotherhood – with American support – took power in Egypt, Hamas believed they could rely on Egyptian support and initiated a military confrontation in November 2012. The US sought a ceasefire with Turkey and Qatar’s assistance, but even Egyptian President Morsi resisted this.
During the war, the network of the Economic Cooperation Foundation (ECF), the non-governmental organisation I founded together with Yossi Beilin and Boaz Karni, played a crucial role, with Nimrod Novik liaising with Egyptian security, General Baruch Spiegel coordinating with the Israeli government and army, and me maintaining contact with Robert Serry, UN Peace Envoy to the Middle East, and Jeff Feltman who had become a UN official and advised Secretary of State Clinton.[6] Qatar opposed the ceasefire that had been concluded with Egyptian help, and ordered Hamas to renew violence, causing further death and destruction (eventually, Feltman helped broker a fragile ceasefire). From that moment, I tried to campaign against Qatar. The Qataris financed jihadi teachings and incitement as well as providing military support and arms to most jihadist groups. I made an effort to document these activities in my annual report to the James Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University in Houston, Texas (the institute where Qatar was paying for stem-cell research). My report was rejected, and my fellowship was not renewed.[7]
We failed twice in fighting Hamas and Qatar on our home turf in Israel. When in 2006 Gilad Shalit was taken hostage by Hamas, the ECF established a joint Israeli-Palestinian team to prepare a comprehensive Prisoners Release Concept.[8] We investigated the number of prisoners, the time and nature of their sentences, their organisational affiliation, and the prisoners’ area of residence. The basic concept was to provide for a comprehensive prisoner release to be carried out over a prolonged period of time, conditional on the maintenance of a complete ceasefire. Acts of terrorism would stop the prisoner release, and only after strong security action on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) against the perpetrators would the prisoner release be renewed.[9] At the end of 2007, fearing public opposition led by the families of terror victims, the Olmert Government rejected the proposed concept. In 2011, Prime Minister Netanyahu agreed a prisoner exchange to free Gilad Shalit, and released 1027 prisoners, among them Yahya Sinwar.
My 2007 report to the Baker Institute predicted the rise of spoiler activities (p. 48) and recommended strengthening the PA by creating regional support for it from Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, in order to deter and contain Hezbollah and Hamas.[10] Instead, Netanyahu chose to appease Hamas, with the aim to weaken the PA, and permitted the transfer of over $2 billion per year to the organisation.[11]
Part 2: The Future of the Peace Process
The Future we Narrowly Missed: The Biden-MBS-Netanyahu-Initiative before 7 October
During the two and a half years before 7 October 2023, three complementary efforts were underway: President Biden worked with the Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman (MBS) and with Netanyahu on a US-Saudi-Israeli peace plan. In parallel, the Europeans developed the ‘the Peace Day Effort for Middle East Peace’, a dialogue with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Arab League Secretariat, Egypt and Jordan on expanding the peace effort to the entire Middle East, enabling these powers to cooperate separately and together with Israel and Palestine. Launched at the UN on 18 September 2023, three weeks before the war, it established working groups with Israeli and Palestinian participation.[12]
Complementary but separate to this effort, an Israeli team I coordinated together with the Middle East Nonviolence and Democracy team on the Palestinian side, worked on the details of Palestinian State-building, addressing the territorial dimension, as an opening to renewed trust and a renewed Israeli-Palestinian negotiating process within a wider regional framework. What we ultimately hoped to achieve was peace and stability in the entire region. The emerging Peace Plan hoped to create a Global-Regional Block reaching from the United States to Europe-the Middle East-India-Malaysia-Indonesia-Japan-Australia and New Zealand, with the aim to isolate Iran, reinforce Western cooperation against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and Chinese aggressive aspirations directed against Taiwan. With its attack on 7 October, Hamas, with the support of Iran, Russia and the supply of military equipment from China, turned the dream of peace and stability into a nightmare. This time, it is not only a nightmare for Israel, but also for all liberal-democratic nations of this world.
Israeli Strategy after 7 October
For many years, Iranian long-range missiles have been paraded through Tehran’s boulevards with the words ‘Death to Israel’ written on them. Hamas’ military arsenal has been filled by Iran, Qatar, China and possibly also Russia. Hezbollah has an arsenal of over 150,000 missiles and rockets supplied by Iran which can reach every square inch of Israeli territory. The genocidal strategy is long-term. The aim now is to bring about the collapse of the pro-Western regimes of Jordan and Egypt, and encircle Israel, while mobilising militant Islamists in Europe and the United States. The threat is global and the West under President Biden’s leadership is engaged in fighting and deterring the global onslaught in Ukraine, Taiwan, the Middle East and Africa.
For Israel this new conjuncture is both a threat and an opportunity.
The opportunity is to plan now for the Day After, in line with the five conditions the United States has laid out namely: No Displacement (of Palestinians from Gaza); No (Israeli) reoccupation of Gaza; No return of Hamas to Gaza; The need for humanitarian assistance; the PA/PLO will be the responsible partner for Gaza and the West Bank.[13]
In order to achieve this, the Israeli team I coordinated in late October suggested a four-pronged approach to defeat Hamas:
Delegitimise Hamas by allowing the US led coalition of the willing to adapt the language and action of UN Security Council Resolution 1368 of 12 September 2001[xiv] to apply to 7 October 2023. It might now read:
Unequivocally condemns in the strongest terms the horrifying terrorist attacks which took place on 7 October 2023, in Southern Israel, and condemns Hamas’ action of hiding behind the Palestinian civilian population to protect their military action and equipment; regards such acts, like any act of international terrorism, as a threat to international peace and security; expresses its deepest sympathy and condolences to all victims and their families, Israelis and Palestinians; calls on all States to work together urgently to bring to justice the perpetrators, organisers and sponsors of these terrorist attacks and stresses that those responsible for aiding, supporting or harboring the perpetrators, organisers and sponsors of these acts will be held accountable.
Stop all income from getting to Hamas and take effective action against Iran, Qatar, and Turkey, in a situation in which they continue financing Hamas.
Put an end to Hamas’ military capacities by destroying their entire military buildup.
Provide massive humanitarian relief to the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza, by creating a functioning system of governance and security. In terms of governance, the ‘coalition of the willing’ (the United States, the United Kingdom the UN Envoy for Humanitarian Relief and Reconstruction, Sigrid Kaag, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Jordan, Egypt) should assist the PA in establishing a Gazan National Emergency Committee, which shall be enabled to take over governmental duties. On security, the office of the United States Security Coordinator should cooperate with Arab police contingencies, possibly from Egypt, Morocco and other Arab states.
Obtaining a commitment from the United States to build a wide international coalition in support of these four measures aimed at defeating Hamas allows Israel to agree to a long-term cease-fire in exchange for the immediate release of all Israeli hostages.
These are demands that are all achievable in one form or another.
We Israelis have to understand that the US-Israel Relationship remains fundamental and that if we do not ‘go with the tide’, the tide will go against us. Our situation is similar to that of Ukraine. Ukraine is at the geopolitical forefront in the global struggle against Russia’s expansionist aspirations, while Israel is at the geopolitical forefront in the wider global struggle against the expansionist aspirations of militant Islam. Both Ukraine and Israel are dependent on the political, military and financial support of the United States and its allies, as well as on the wider support of what may be called ‘world opinion’. We may find the genocidal accusation against Israel outrageous and revolting, although the present suffering of the Palestinian civilian population is heart-breaking. It is for us to show and document that, while pursuing our vital strategic interests, we do care and take action in support of their well-being. We also have to document to the world Hamas’ cynical strategy to commit crimes against both Israelis and their own civilians.
This does not mean that Ukraine or Israel have to blindly accept a US diktat. But it does require that our strategic dialogue should be pursued within the well-defined strategic framework, laid out and defined by President Biden and his administration.
We Cannot Return to the Pre-7 October Peace Process
The personal and collective fears of Israelis and Palestinians have become dominant. What is now needed is a comprehensive Middle Eastern security process: planning for the reconstruction of Gaza as well as the reconstruction of Israel’s southern and northern border areas in tandem. The United States and Israel will have to negotiate a security and political Memorandum of Understanding, defining milestones on the way to a secure, stable and prosperous Middle East, with parallel US understandings with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Jordan, Egypt and the PA.
Given effective security provisions, we have to seek the zone of achievable common ground, in a shared effort to rebuild the economy of Palestine, set within a wider regional political, security and economic structure. A preliminary guestimate in USD – based on the experience gained after Operation Protective Edge in the Gaza in 2014 – of the requirements of the 2024 immediate crisis-support and reconstruction plan amounts to:
– Food support and other social requirements, education, health, etc.: $1.5-2 billion;
– Housing and shelter: $3-4 billion;
– Infrastructure and non-residential buildings: $1.5 billion;
– Rehabilitation of industrial, agricultural, trade and other business-sector facilities, as well as immediate support for the revitalization of economic activity: $2-3 billion;
– Reconstruction and reactivation of government services, other governance-related support: $0.5-1 billion.
However, to achieve the necessary economic ‘Leap Forward’, investment of over $50 billion and more will be needed.
These sums cannot be raised by US or European donations. In light of this, the only way to finance this ‘leap forward’ is to follow the political, security, economic and business interests of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, other Gulf states and India. This has to be done along an intra-regional East-West and a parallel South-North Corridor, connecting the Indian Ocean, the Arab Gulf, and the Red Sea via land and sea routes to the Eastern Mediterranean and onwards to Europe. Such a plan requires connecting the railway structure of the East, via a 400 kilometre railway connection in Jordan to the existing Israeli and a planned Palestinian railway networks, creating many hundreds of thousands of employment opportunities along the way. [15] A crisis-support and reconstruction plan should be designed and executed with an eye on the wider, longer-term ‘Economic Leap Plan’, which will be based on integrating Gaza with key regional projects and regional economic cooperation at large.
We Israelis and Palestinians will need to develop a code of conduct, how to move from the logic of war to the logic of peace, even if many of us will continue to hate each other. We have to find a way to assure public-private investment in reconstruction and the ‘leap forward’, from the region and the world at large that their investment will not be destroyed once more.
There is still a long way to go.
[1] See: Yair Hirschfeld The Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process – An Insider’s Personal Account Springer International Publishing House’ forthcoming.
[2] Yasir Arafat ‘Address to the Swedish Parliament, Stockholm 5 December 1998’ in: Journal of Palestine Studies; 28, No.3, April 1999.
[3] ECF ‘The EPS Model – A Possible Set of Israeli-Palestinian Economic Understandings’;
[4] The Israeli team was headed by Gilead Sher, the Jordanian team by Major General Mansur Abu Rashed, and the Palestinian team of Agha and Khalidi was supported by General Nasr Yussuf.
[5] Yair Hirschfeld and Sharon Roling “The Oslo Process and the People-to-People Strategy” in: Development, Community and Conflict”. 2000, 43/3 pp.23-28. The Society of International Development, London.
[6] Yair Hirschfeld, ‘Correspondence with Jeff Feltman,’ Hirschfeld Khoury-DeConcini Papers, Substack, forthcoming (originally written November 20-21, 2012), https://hkdpapers.substack.com/p/correspondence-with-jeff-feltman (specifically my message at 10:55 AM on November 19, 2012, his message at 11:04 AM on November 20, 2012, my message a 11:30 AM on November 20, 2012, and my message on November 21, 2012) (hereafter cited as Hirschfeld, ‘Correspondence with Jeff Feltman,’ Hirschfeld Khoury-DeConcini Papers).
[7] Hirschfeld, ‘Correspondence with Jeff Feltman,’ Hirschfeld Khoury-DeConcini Papers (specifically the two attachments I sent at 3:22 PM on November 28, 2012).
[8] The Israeli team was led by Brig. General Ilan Paz, the Palestinian team by Hisham abd-el Razzeq, a former Minister for Prisoner Affairs of the Palestinian Authority (PA).
[9] See Yair Hirschfeld, Second Year Report – Submitted to the Baker Institute for Public Policy; October 12, 2007; pp. 59-60
[10] Ibid. p. 49 and p. 59. At the time we arranged for two workshops which included Saudi, Egyptian, Jordanian and Palestinian participants as well as the head of UNRWA John Ging, (for whom I arranged a donation from the Saudis.) However Hamas threatened to kill Ging and the UN took him out of Gaza, turning UNRWA into a willing instrument of any and every Hamas dictate.
[11] See Thinking of the Endgame – Annex A, ‘Hamas Government Financing’, October 22, 2023. Qatar payments to Gaza via Israel amount to about $ 400 million annually; income from customs and fees from Israel, from Egypt, and taxing smugglers, amounts annually to about $ 500 million; PA tax transfers for (non-working) civil servants amounts to about $ 1 billion annually. All these income sources can be controlled by Israel. The fifth source of income is derived from payments for military equipment from Iran, the sums of it cannot be estimated or verified.
[12] See: MEPP: The European Union, Saudi Arabia, the Arab League, in cooperation with Egypt and Jordan, launch the Peace Day Effort for Middle East Peace, September 18, 2023. https://www.eeas.europa.eu/eeas/mepp-european-union-saudi-arabia-arab-league-cooperation-egypt-and-jordan-launch-peace-day-effort_en
[13] See statement of Secretary of State Blinken in Tokyo, Japan; November 8, 2023; state.gov/secretary-antony-j-linken-at-a-press-availability-Y1.
[14] UN SCR 1368, September 12, 2001.
[15] The UAE Foreign Trade volume reached in 2022 the respectable sum of $ 599 billion. Saudi investments in the Red Sea area are estimated to reach many hundreds of billion dollars. These investments make it essential to secure trade routes to the West and help stabilise the Jordanian, Egyptian and Palestinian economies.
