Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations Research Articles

The Media Framing of Blame Agency in Asymmetric Conflict: Who is Blaming Whom for the 2014 Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations Failure?

ABSTRACT Utilizing the 2014 Israeli-Palestinian failed peace negotiations, this study examines the relationship between blame agency, the national identity of a newspaper, and the type of newspaper. To do so, we collected all news and opinion pieces from six newspapers representing broadsheet and tabloid newspapers from Israel, Palestine, and the United States one week before the official failure of the negotiations and three weeks following this date (N = 281). The results illustrated that the stronger party’s media (Israel) tend to portray Israeli actors casting blame on Palestinians, with some capacity for self-criticism, while the weaker party’ media (Palestine) report on both Palestinian actors and Israeli actors blaming Israel, revealing a unique pattern of the weaker actor in asymmetric conflict portraying the stronger party as engaging in self-blame. In addition, the study found that tabloids extensively blame the adversary while broadsheets spread blame more evenly. The mediator’s media was found to adopt blame frames from the side with which it shares cultural proximity. We conclude by discussing the implications of such findings on journalism studies in asymmetric conflict situations.

Israel's Peacemaking under Security Challenges: Implications of a Retrospective Outlook

41 Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Vol. 43, No.3, Spring 2020 Israel’s Peacemaking under Security Challenges: Implications of a Retrospective Outlook Gilead Sher* Adelaide Duckett** Israeli Involvement in Peace Processes Israel’s first conflict began as a state-in-the-making in 1947 and intensified with its establishment as a state in the War of Independence in 1948, involving all of its neighboring states of Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon, which were supported by Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and others. The war came to an end with the 1949 armistice agreements. These established the armistice lines including the Green Line, and an end to the war, but not a formal peace as no state yet recognized the State of Israel. Conflict continued throughout the 1950s between Arab troops and Fidayeens and Israeli forces but did not escalate into full-scale war. In 1956, the Suez crisis resulted in an Israeli invasion of the Sinai Peninsula, allowing Israel to reopen the Straits of Tiran. Israel subsequently retreated from the Sinai Peninsula, only to recapture it a decade later in the Six-Day War of June 1967. *Gilead Sher is currently the Isaac and Mildred Brochstein fellow in Middle East Peace and Security at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. He was chief of staff and policy coordinator to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, a senior negotiator at the Camp David summit and Taba talks, and a delegate to the 1994–95 Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement negotiations under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. He is an IDF Colonel who served in reserve service as a brigade commander and a deputy division commander. Sher heads the Center for Applied Negotiations and is a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). He is the author of The Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations, 1999–2001 and coeditor of Negotiating in Times of Conflict and Spoiling and Coping with Spoilers. **Adelaide Duckett is a student at the University of Chicago working under Gilead Sher and the Center for Applied Negotiations. Attacked by five Arab states, which were supported by eight additional ones, Israel swiftly conquered the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, and the Golan Heights from Syria. As a result of the war, Israel expanded its territory significantly, but the admirable victory of the 19-year-old country fighting for its life has not been translated, as of yet, into serving the core values of a Jewishdemocratic state. In an attempt to regain their lost territories, Egypt and Syria in October 1973 launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the most sacred holiday in Judaism. The fighting lasted less than three weeks and ended with an Israeli victory and no major territorial changes. The end of the Yom Kippur War marked the start of the first major peace process in Israel’s history. After a summit conference in Geneva aimed at resolving the conflict collapsed with Syria’s refusal of attendance, the U.S. began acting as mediator, concluding an Israeli-Syrian Agreement on Disengagement in May 1974 and establishing a channel of communication between Israel and Egypt. Two years of indirect negotiations, punctuated by a change in Israeli leadership in the election of Yitzhak Rabin as Prime Minister, resulted in an interim agreement reached in September 1975. The agreement secured Israeli use of the Suez Canal, an Israeli withdrawal in the Sinai Peninsula, and the establishment of a demilitarized buffer zone between the new borders. This agreement laid the foundation for a full framework for peace reached in 1978. Following the unprecedented November 1977 visit to Israel by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, U.S. President Jimmy Carter offered to facilitate negotiations between the two nations at Camp David. Intense negotiations resulted in two documents: the Framework for Peace in the Middle East1 and the Framework for the Conclusion of a Peace Treaty2 between Egypt and Israel. The Framework for Peace in the Middle East set forth a plan for reaching a final status settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, which led the foundations 42 1 “Camp David Accords: The Framework for Peace in the Middle...

Considering a non-document: concepts, components, and contexts

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to begin a conversation about the term “nondocument.” It analyzes this term’s possible concepts, components and contexts. Design/methodology/approach This conceptual paper draws upon the work of documentation studies scholars, including Michael Buckland, Bernd Frohmann and Niels Windfeld Lund, to begin an exploration of the term “nondocument,” framed within the context of the 2013–2014 Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations brokered by the USA. It is comprised of seven sections revolving around different questions regarding non-document. Findings The document at the center of the 2013–2014 Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations aimed to establish a framework for an eventual final-status peace agreement. There was skepticism, however, about the document’s proposed reservations inscription permitting either party to express reservations with any part of the framework. It was claimed that this reservation inscription made the document self-negating and therefore a non-document. This document was arguably a hybrid entity: a document-non-document. It was a document in the context of the negotiations. It became a non-document in the context of the collapse of the negotiations. Research limitations/implications The 2013–2014 peace negotiations between Israel and Palestine, brokered by the USA, revolved around a diplomatic document outlining provisions for a final peace settlement. The two parties were skeptical of a proposed provision permitting reservations to be expressed over other provisions within the document. An official involved in the negotiations stated that this provision made the document a non-document. But what exactly is meant by this term? This paper takes the opportunity to begin exploring such a notion. The aim, however, is not to definitively define non-document but instead to raise questions and provoke further discussions of this term. Originality/value The concept of non-document is underdeveloped. This paper presents questions and conceptual tools to help develop this term whilst providing possible points of departure for further examinations of how documents are or might be non-documents. These questions and tools also point in directions for various other approaches to phenomena that could be regarded as documents in some respects but not in others, or the ways in which something could is “almost” but “not quite” a document, or even help determine what is “not document.” Ultimately, this term could help expand other “conventional” approaches to documentation.

The Conundrum of the Palestinian Two-State, One-State Solution

This study seeks to explain the implications of the US's withdrawal from the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, resulting in the weakening of the Palestinian Authority, and calls for abrogating the Oslo Accords. Causes of the failure of the Accords, such as the Palestinians' inability to act on Oslo's projected date of 1990 for statehood, or to stand up to the Clinton Parameters for peace, or to stem the tide of the Jewish settlement movement, or to capitalize on pronouncements of the International Criminal Court on the Wall and the settlements, are examined. International stalemate resulting from Israel's freezing of the Quartet's Roadmap leading to Israel's rebranding itself as a Jewish state hammered the last nail in the coffin of the two-state solution. The article concludes with an assessment of Israeli reaction to the one-state solution.

Book Review: Chie Ezaki, Political Process of the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations (in Japanese)

Book Review: Chie Ezaki, <i>Political Process of the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations</i> (in Japanese)

The gender–culture double bind in Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations: A narrative approach

This article investigates structural conditions for women’s inclusion/exclusion in peace negotiations by focusing on the linkage between acts of gender stereotyping and cultural framing. Through a narrative analysis of semi-structured interviews with Israeli negotiators and administrators who participated in official negotiations during the Oslo peace process, I link two recent claims about how gender may affect negotiators’ understandings of strategic exchange: the gendered devaluation effect and the gender–culture double bind hypothesis. Building upon postcolonial feminist critique, I argue that narratives about women and cultural difference (a) demonstrate and engage with Israeli essentialist and Orientalist discourses about Arab culture and masculinity; (b) manifest how ideas about strategic dialogue and negotiations are gendered; and (c) convey how policymakers and negotiators may use cultural claims to rationalize women’s exclusion from diplomatic and strategic dialogue. Furthermore, the study implies that dominant framings of Israeli–Palestinian negotiations as a binary East–West encounter need to be replaced by a more nuanced conceptualization of cultural identity that captures contextual aspects of difference, including the existence of military power and masculine dominance.

Resettling the West Bank Settlers

In countering view that Israeli- Palestinian conflict is intractable, Israeli writer Amos Oz has famously described it as one over estate.1 Surely he was applying a clever riff on basic concept of territory - on which so much of geopolitics rests. And in part there is simple question of urban sprawl, where homes in settlements cost one third or even one quarter of what an equivalent- sized house or apartment would run in Israel's urban centres.2 But it is also broader and deeper. In invoking importance ofhow public space is conceived, real estate metaphor fills in an important part of story between reaching an agreement at bargaining table and eventually having to ratify it at home. This becomes clear as we consider long history of breakdowns in Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. Part of explanation is failure of each side to let go of maximalist positions out of fear of alienating segments of their domestic support base. In case of Israel, government's inability to deal effectively with Jewish settlements in West Bank is among thorniest problems.3The Israeli government has no choice but to account for demands of settler population. They number in hundreds of thousands; have sympathizers among broader population, including state leaders; and themselves occupy decision-making positions in civil service and Israeli armed forces.4 Without understanding dynamics of settler identity, observers cannot provide workable ideas for inching Israelis and Palestinians toward a final agreement.Thinking about how collective identity influences view of public space, this article starts from assumption that, while it is certainly not inevitable, a two-state solution is most likely arrangement on which both sides will reach agreement.5 It follows that to make way for a likely Palestinian state in West Bank, Israeli government will have to move tens of thousands of settlers across green line into Israel.6 Though there are 500,000 settlers in West Bank (including 200,000 who reside in and around east Jerusalem), conventional wisdom - based on past negotiations and on Israeli red lines regarding largest settlements - suggests that only about 70,000 settlers will be made to move in event of a final agreement,7 though some recommendations argue for a range of 100,000 to 120, ooo.8 The remaining settlement blocs will likely be annexed to Israel in return for negotiated land swaps.9But Israel's last foray into relocating a settler population still haunts country. Prior to 2005 Gaza withdrawal, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told an Israeli parliamentary committee that the fate of Netzarim [a small settlement in Gaza Strip] is fate of Tel Aviv.10 In event, 8000 Gaza settlers felt abandoned to subpar housing options and lacklustre employment opportunities inside Israel.With lingering ill-will from Gaza evacuation, it can be assumed that in event of a large-scale disengagement, Israeli government will present West Bank settlers with strong economic incentive packages. But in context of a peace agreement, and to allow for Israel's successful implementation of it, government will have to get maximum buy-in from settlers in what wul no doubt be a politically, socially, and emotionally painful process of relocation. After cheque is cashed, settlers will have to feel that they can live meaningful lives on other side of green line, lives that connect with their well-entrenched identities as frontier Zionists. Without such guarantees, government will simply be unable to generate enough legitimacy from this crucial sector of population.Focusing on identity as a key factor in dealing with settlers suggests recasting of territorial attachment. If stuff of identity is as symbolic and imaginary as it is physical and concrete, there is room for Israeli government to highlight new symbols and images with which settlers can connect. …

Gender and “Peace Work”: An Unofficial History of Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations

Unlike earlier attempts to theorize Israeli women's peace activism in civil society, this article examines the involvement of women in backstage roles of formal negotiations during the Oslo Process. On the basis of a qualitative analysis of the organizational structure and gender division of labor in Israeli negotiating bodies, I find that women were placed as midlevel negotiators and professional and legal advisors, and also served as spokeswomen and secretaries. This pattern of participation reveals 1) that the “security logic,” developed by Israeli negotiators led to, and reinforced, a structured gendered division of labor, providing a rational justification for gender inequality; 2) that the ability to control administrative capacities and women workers generated symbolic masculine power and assisted in maintaining asymmetries between Israeli and Palestinian delegations; 3) and that midlevel Israeli negotiators' narratives reveal the extent to which conceptual confusion and self-contradictory approaches toward the Oslo Accords reinforced women's overall invisibility. I conclude that patterns of rigid gender roles in official negotiating structures not only minimize women's meaningful inclusion in peace negotiations but also affect the production of public historical narratives about gender, peace, and war.

حزب مفدال الصهيوني الدينى وموقفه من عملية السلام الإسرائيلى الفلسطيني 1990-2000

This article looks at the potentialities of a Jewish religious group called Mifdel as an obstacle to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process in the period 1990-2000. Generally, the international and regional context in the first decade of the peace process indicated a situation conducive to an interim and final settlement of the conflict. However, the two sides merely reached a partial settlement and failed in the more essential final settlement. The focus on Mifdel does not mean ignoring the role of other groups such as the hawkish wing of the Likud party and Moledet, the Islamic movement Hamas, and Jihad Islamic movements that still have an unrealistic outlook. This paper shows that Mifdel’s ideology, as it is implanted, radicalized and propa­gated, was an important source of resistance against the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. For Indon­e­sian Muslims, the Middle Eastern conflicts, especially the Palesti­nian-Israeli conflict, have caused very complicated problems. Regarded by some as religious conflicts these Middle Eastern tensions have influenced very much the dynamics of Muslim communities in Indonesia.

The Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, 1999-2001: within reach

1. A Sense of Hope 2. Direct and Blunt Dialogue 3. The Friends of Peace Must be Strong 4. Politically, I'm Strangled 5. The Swedish Government at Your Service 6. First Movements 7. Do You Want An Agreement? 8. Trapped In a National Myth 9. An Historic Opportunity 10. God Bless You 11. Albright Tries to Prevent Collapse 12. Eight Hundred Times Jerusalem 13. There is Going to be a Catastrophe 14. Two States for Two People 15. Walls of Misunderstanding 16. Head of a Gang Leader 17. A Single Bullet in the Barrel 18. It's the Only Way 19. Do You Want to Continue Crying? 20. The Future of The Region Is In Your Hands 21. We'll be Counting the Corpses on Both Sides 22. And Thou Shall Make Peace in the Land

Water Rights in the West Bank and in Gaza

With the launch of the UN International Decade for Water on 22 March 2005, awareness is raised in the international community of the growing demand and scarcity of water for people throughout the world. Water is a particularly scarce resource in both Israel and the Palestinian Territories. The use of the water resources of the West Bank and Gaza has been part and parcel of the Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations. With the beginning of new peace negotiations under Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, the topic of water and its allocation to Palestinians and Israelis is back on the negotiation table. The present article will point to the water crisis in Israel and the Palestinian Territories and analyse core provisions of international law which govern the use of water resources. Finally, it will outline how an allocation of water rights according to principles of international law could take place.

The PLO factor in Euro-Israeli relations, 1964–1992

The breakdown of Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations following the Camp David meeting in the summer of 2000 highlighted the fundamental divisions that exist between Israel and the European Union on matters relating to Palestinian rights and Israeli responsibility for the ongoing conflict. This article argues that Europe's staunch defence of the Palestinian side at this time has its roots in more than two decades of Euro-PLO relations. As such it examines the nature of European support for the PLO prior to the signing of the Oslo accords in the early 1990s and, in particular, it evaluates the impact that Europe's consistent policy of supporting a political role for the PLO in negotiations has had on its political and economic relationship with the Jewish state.

U.S. Fails in Effort to Break Deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations

For the past 48 hours, I have been involved in an intensive effort to reach an agreement that would put Israeli-Palestinian negotiations back on track. We have made some progress which we hope will facilitate agreement in the coming days. If the issues are resolved, President Clinton is prepared to invite the parties to Washington on May 11, 1998 to launch accelerated permanent status negotiations.