Israel's Ability Research Articles

Reparations and Oil in the Cold War: British Perspectives on the Luxembourg Agreement of 1952

This article analyses the British perspectives on the Luxembourg Reparations Agreement between Israel and the Federal Republic of Germany from 1952. Short-term economic interests were of central importance when it came to assessing the consequences of this deal for the United Kingdom. Her Majesty's Government welcomed West German reparations as a means of securing Israel's ability to pay for oil supplied by British companies, but at the same time saw them as a threat to its economic and political interests in the Middle East. British diplomats underestimated the long-term political value of the Luxembourg Agreement precisely because they read it verbatim. They recognized the reservations on both sides but did not expect that working relations between Israel and the Federal Republic would improve rapidly after the Agreement was ratified, limiting in turn the UK's political and economic room for manoeuvre in the region. By examining a hitherto little-noticed chapter of British foreign policy in the postwar years, the article foregrounds the commercial aspects of diplomacy in the early 1950s and contributes to a better understanding of international relations in the Cold War.

National Security Decision-Making in Israel: Improving the Process

National security decision-making has been at the forefront of Israeli life for over six decades. Repeated wars, ongoing hostilities at lower levels, the need to confront dire and even existential threats, and various peace initiatives have all imbued Israel's national security decisions with unusual importance. Traditionally held to be primarily reactive in character, Israeli decision-making has become increasingly proactive in recent decades. At the same time, many of the diplomatic and military initiatives Israel has undertaken have gone awry, and the number of policy failures has become untenable. Indeed, Israel has suffered from a decades-long domestic political stalemate - arguably a crisis - on matters of its fundamental existence, including the Palestinian issue, with the political system unable to resolve the contending currents of opinion.Although a very small nation, Israel has a clearly disproportionate impact on world affairs, and its decision-making processes are thus of considerable concern to the United States and the international community as a whole. Despite a uniquely close relationship with the US based on common democratic systems, cultural traditions, and a resulting bilateral presumption of mutual understanding, the reality is that relations between the US and Israel are rife with misunderstandings.Understanding Israel's decision-making process (DMP) is thus essential. This article briefly presents the driving forces behind the Israeli DMP and argues that Israel can no longer afford the failings of its own decision-making processes. It concludes with recommendations for reforms needed primarily on the institutional level, but the electoral as well.Earlier research1 has established that Israel's national security decision-making processes are shaped largely by three causal factors: first, a uniquely harsh and dangerous external environment, characterized by rapid and sweeping change and only limited malleability, which greatly shapes and circumscribes Israel's national security choices; second, Israel's proportional representation (PR) system, which causes deep political fragmentation and a resulting need to govern through coalition governments, with clear consequences for the roles of the premier and cabinet; and finally, the relative weakness of the primary civilian national security organs (the foreign and defense ministries and the National Security Staff2) in the national DMP, compared to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and intelligence services.These causal factors were found to result in ten primary characteristics and pathologies:(1) The Israeli DMP is focused overwhelmingly on the short term and is often improvisational and sequential. Long-term policy formulation is consequently minimal.(2) Crucially, premiers manifest a clear tendency to avoid systematic policy planning, especially in the cabinet, but even more so in the Ministerial Committee on Defense (MCoD) and informal decision-making forums. Consequently, policy objectives, priorities, and options are typically not well elucidated, which greatly hinders Israel's ability to achieve its goals.(3) The cabinet and MCoD are typically dysfunctional, and most real decision-making is thus conducted by the premier in informal forums with the defense minister, chief of staff(CoS), other senior defense officials, and, at times, the foreign and other ministers. Israel thus does not have an effective statutory forum for national security decision-making.(4) By the time an issue reaches the cabinet, the premier and relevant minister(s) have typically settled on a preferred course of action and present just one option that can be approved or rejected. The creation of the Israeli National Security Council (INSC) in 1999 has partially alleviated this, but an insufficient consideration of options remains a basic problem.(5) The DMP is intensely politicized, albeit less so regarding decisions to use military force. …

De-Radicalization in Israel's Prison System

An effective de-radicalization process in prisons is intended to facilitate the renouncement of violence and terrorism by those that have carried out such offenses. A key lesson that can be drawn from Israel's de-radicalization efforts is that it is possible, indeed recommended, to treat inmates—regardless of their level of radicalization—in a dignified and humane manner. However, Israel's ability to significantly de-radicalize security prisoners is limited if it is at all existent in its current form. Security prisoners with the potential for positive change should be placed in a different, perhaps foreign setting. This article provides an overview of Israel's prison system, the challenges it faces, its efforts to de-radicalize security inmates and suggests additional courses of action.

Making Place: The Shifting Green Line and the Development of “Greater” Metropolitan Jerusalem

This paper is about place making in Jerusalem, an important city at the heart of the Palestinian–Israeli conflict. It examines how place making in Jerusalem has had the consequence of shifting what is known as the Green Line. the Green Line represents the armistice or ceasefire boundaries following the end of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Development of different parts of captured territories after the 1967 War has shifted and rendered unstable perceptions of the Green Line and has wreaked havoc with prevailing conceptions over what constitutes Jerusalem. Symbolic and social boundary reconstruction is at the heart of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, a powerfully organized mechanism that tilts power to Israel with the use of bulldozers, bricks, and cranes as well as tanks and weapons. the shifting Green Line represents a battle line of an idea war over Israel's ability to claim legitimacy over a new Jerusalem. This paper examines the dynamic processes of how boundaries are being shifted through narratives of various actors involved in these processes.

How to Coerce a Multi-Dimensional System into a Undimensional Frame: Israel's 1996 Electoral Change

Political instability affects Israel's ability to govern itself. Many equate this instability with the problematic nature of its electoral institutions. This study examines the effects of the 1992 electoral institutions change by analyzing 1996 pre-election data and the actual 1999 electoral results. It argues that while policy-balancing theory and a decrease in the number of parties might have been a valid solution in a different context, in the Israeli case, due to its multi-dimensional political system, such an institutional change could not yield this outcome. Some concrete recommendations as to future changes are made.

Israel's violated republican equation

Historically, Israel's ability to sustain a situation of armed conflict for a long time was predicated on the republican equation in which the dominant group – the secular Ashkenazim – exchanged military sacrifice for social dominance. Nonetheless, an imbalance between military burden and social rewards, which emerged during the 1970s and1980s, led the middle-class Ashkenazim to undertake collective action aimed at reducing the burden of military service through protest and peace movements, along with more individual tactics. These modes of action, together with the attenuated status of the military, spurred on national-religious and Mizrachi groups to integrate themselves into the traditional equation, or to formulate an alternative one (the Gush Emunim and the Orthodox route). Arguably, the status of each group in the military, which itself saw an erosion in its social status, played a major part in shaping the nature, scope and strategy of each group's collective actions. The groups capitalized on the opportunities that the military offered them in accordance with their capacity to utilize the resources they had at their disposal.

Israeli Policy towards the Occupied Palestinian Territories: The Economic Dimension, 1967-2007

This article focuses on economic dimension of Israeli policy towards Palestinian territories occupied in 1967. The article argues that since 1967, both before and after Oslo process, Israeli policy was directed at preventing Two, i.e. division of land into two states and two economic (and political) sovereign entities, while also negating One, i.e. establishment of a single political and economic entity. Although Israeli policy repudiated both Two and One, it changed character and formulations from time to time. Thus, Israeli policies will be examined with all their twists, turns, and reversals, discussing their repercussions on Israel and especially on Palestinian economy. INTRODUCTION: THE DILEMMA OF THE OCCUPATION to me if I do, and woe to me if I don't. - Former Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, quoting Talmud to Israeli Defense Force generals in 1967 Many Israelis, including those who shaped country's policies after June 1967 War, did not realize that Israel would continue to rule West Bank of Jordan River for so many years. At first, declarations and private meetings indicated that it was probably temporary, partly since there were serious doubts about Israel's ability to hold and continue to rule newly occupied Territories.1 A clear message came from leading global powers against future annexation of Territories and there was also a major discrepancy between Israel's desire to expand its sovereign territory and international law. However, Israeli policy-makers, among them Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, had other doubts arising not from country's political ability to expand geographically, but from implications of such a decision. In a recent account of 1967, Tom Segev wrote: Once Eshkol shared his thoughts with IDF generals, there was no doubt as to what he wanted: A large country empty of Arabs. But not for first time he relayed feeling that Israel was a victim of various forces and historic processes beyond its control. Thus he used Talmudic expression: Woe to me if I do, woe to me if I don't ... The effect of continuing conquest on Israel as a democratic, Jewish state disturbed Eshkol more than it did Moshe Dayan; this was only real difference between them. All rest were ego and politics.2 The far-reaching consequences of integrating Territories into Israel were well-understood by some leaders. Annexing Territories and erasing pre-war economic and political borders - the Green - meant forming one geo-political unit. Forming one unit could bring about integration of Palestinians into Israeli polity and generate a new political reality. Conversely, preserving border and not annexing Territories could lead to establishment of two political and economic units between Mediterranean Sea and Jordan River. The controversy between integration and separation, between erasing Green Line and preserving it, between One and Two, has haunted discussions from very beginning.3 Understanding continued tension between integration and separation is an integral part of any analysis of years since 1967. In this article I will focus on economic dimensions of Israeli policy which refrained from deciding one way or other, avoiding a decision on Two entities or One. I will argue that since 1967 Israeli policy has been directed at preventing Two, i.e. division of land into two states and two economic (and political) sovereign entities while also negating One, i.e. establishment of a single political and economic entity. Although since 1967 Israeli policy has repudiated both Two and One, it changed character and formulations from time to time. Thus, I will examine Israeli policies in depth, with all their twists, turns, and reversals, discussing their repercussions on Israel and especially on Palestinian economy. …

Measuring Success in Coping with Terrorism: The Israeli Case

This article examines the degree of efficacy of Israel's antiterror policies and ability to cope with terrorism using seven parameters that fall into seven parameters: reduction in civilian casualties among Israelis and Palestinians, Israel's ability to cope economically, Israeli social cohesion, the status of international and domestic support for the Israeli government and the extent of weakening of international and domestic support for the Palestinian leadership. The article concludes that based on most of these parameters, Israel has been successful in coping with terrorism, although greater security must be attained through a change in Palestinian policies.

Demography and transfer: Israel's road to nowhere

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, which dates back to the latter part of the nineteenth century, has always been a conflict over land and population balance. At the start of the twenty-first century, with no end in sight to the conflict, the issue of demography stares both sides in the face. Israel's ability to maintain military and economic superiority over neighbouring Arab countries in general and the Palestinians in particular is matched by its inability to maintain long-term numerical superiority in the areas it holds west of the Jordan River. It is expected that within 10 to 15 years there will be parity between the Arabs and the 5.5 million Jews who currently live in historical Palestine. While discussion of Arab population transfer has been relegated to internal debates among Zionist leaders, the idea itself has always remained a key element in Zionist thinking of ways to solve the demography problem and ensure Jewish population dominance. A recent decline in Jewish immigration to Israel, the rise of the religious-political right, continuing Jewish settlement in the West Bank and Gaza and the recent Palestinian uprising have moved this debate to the public arena. Fractions among Israel's intellectuals, political figures and Sharon government ministers have raised the demography issue publicly, calling openly for the transfer of the Palestinian population to Jordan.

Israel and the refugee problem: from exodus to resettlement, 1948–52

For almost two generations historians and Middle East scholars alike, have endeavoured to address and clarify much of the confusion surrounding the events and circumstances of Israel's 1948 War of Independence. Indeed, many of the uncertainties and dilemmas regarding the military operations, diplomatic efforts and strategic planning of the war have been thoroughly investigated and documented. However, other relevant issues pertaining to the 1948 armed conflict, such as the Arab refugees remain complex and largely misunderstood to the present day. In retrospect, there appears to be no clear-cut answer to how Israel succeeded in finding a solution to the problem of the Arab refugees within her borders? In other words, what were the factors, players, policies and interests contributing to the full assimilation of the Arab refugee population into Israeli society? Fortunately, the passing of time has allowed for the processing of old and new information, and the movement towards discussing the question of the Arab refugees of Israel's 1948 War of Independence may begin anew. For the purpose of clarity, this article has been broken down into three sections that cover the main processes and events between 1948 and 1952. The first part deals with the number of Arab refugees involved, which provides the necessary framework by which to gain a full understanding of the seriousness of the problem facing Israel and her neighbours at the end of 1948. The second section provides an analysis of the Israeli Government's official policy regarding the Arab refugee problem. The final section assesses Israel's ability to implement a policy and eventually reach a viable solution to the Arab refugee problem within her borders.

Cartographic Characteristics of Current Christian Pilgrimage Maps of The Holy Land

This article investigates some aspects of the cartography of current Christian pilgrimage maps of the Holy Land, using the research method of cartographic content analysis. It was found that uniform characteristics occur in the cartographic representations of Christian pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The maps are designed to convey a Christian-religious message, are politically and religiously biased, and lead to misinformation and misinterpretation. Another conclusion is that a complex continuum can be derived in which the features that characterize the maps — secularism and tourism as opposed to devoutness, holiness and pilgrimage — can be rated. This is important because it allows us to classify and to analyze the maps for practical purposes on the basis of their position on the continuum. Pilgrimage maps were found to have a special cartographic status because of their subjective nature and their attempt to combine a contemporary reality with a tradition of maps of the ancient Holy Land. After the recognition of the biases in the maps, they should be examined for their practical implications: the influence of the different messages on Israel's ability to attract various groups of pilgrims.

Ethnic Democracy and the Legal Construction of Citizenship: Arab Citizens of the Jewish State

The citizenship status of its Arab citizens is the key to Israel's ability to function as anethnic democracy, that is, a political system combining democratic institutions with the dominance of one ethnic group. The confluence of republicanism and ethnonationalism with liberalism, as principles of legitimation, has resulted in two types of citizenship: republican for Jews and liberal for Arabs. Thus, Arab citizens enjoy civil and political rights but are barred from attending to the common good.The Arab citizenship status, while much more restricted than the Jewish, has both induced and enabled Arabs to conduct their political struggles within the framework of the law, in sharp contrast to the noncitizen Arabs of the occupied territories. It may thus serve as a model for other dominant ethnic groups seeking to maintain both their dominance and a democratic system of government.