WHAT'S NEW IN IPCRI
By GERSHON BASKIN
21/02/2011
While riding in a Jerusalem taxi recently I noticed that the name of the company was decorated with stars of David. I asked the driver about it. He replied: “Yes, our company only hires Jewish drivers, so our passengers can feel safe.”
I remember moving trucks in Jerusalem with large signs reading “Jewish workers only.”
There were ads in the Yellow Pages for companies that only employed Jewish workers. I guess it’s become politically incorrect to be so blunt. I saw a pizza place in Baka that was searching for delivery boys “after army service,” which definitely made me think – do delivery boys in southwest Jerusalem need combat training? It must be a tough job.
By GERSHON BASKIN
14/02/2011
Congratulations to the people of Egypt! They have shown the real power of the people. Their success was, of course, linked to the fact that their feeling of being disenfranchised and without the ability to improve their lives was shared by the army. Tahrir Square was filled with young people who had no job, so their energies and frustrations were poured into the struggle for freedom, human rights, economic justice and democracy. They won also because their cause was just and they clearly held the higher moral ground.
Everyone is now asking: Where next? We see the beginnings of uprisings in Algeria, Jordan, Bahrain and Yemen. Our analysts are busy examining the social, political and military elites of all the Arab countries to determine whether there is the social energy to overthrow those dictatorial regimes as well.
READ MORE...>>>
By GERSHON BASKIN
07/02/2011
It is quite amazing how little we really know about Egypt. Thirty-two years of peace have not had a deep impact on our awareness, knowledge or even curiosity about the largest of our Arab neighbors. Of course every Israeli knows the names Hosni Mubarak and his son Gamal. Many even knew the name Omar Suleiman before he was recently appointed vice president, because of his significance in the security world that so dominates our comprehension of the world.
There is no doubt that Egypt’s policies of keeping the peace cold and the cultural boycott have not encouraged Israelis to seek greater knowledge and intimacy with Egyptian society and culture. It is really a great pity, because had we made the effort to reach out, we would have a much richer understanding of the televised revolution of Tahrir Square.
By GERSHON BASKIN
01/02/2011
Friday morning, in an east Jerusalem hotel, at a strategic thinking session of Israelis and Palestinians, my attention is divided between a fascinating discussion of local developments and the 20+ “tweets” I am receiving every minute from Egyptians and Egyptian news services about the emerging reality of a new Middle East. I am captured by a strong sense that history is being made as the Egyptian masses leave the mosques after noontime prayers to overturn the regime of Hosni Mubarak and change the face of Egypt and the region.
My heart is with the Egyptian people facing an autocratic regime, whose leaders have denied them basic freedoms and pillaged the wealth of Egypt, transferring much of it to bank accounts abroad and living in palaces overlooking the Nile while millions of citizens live on less than $2 a day.
By GERSHON BASKIN
24/01/2011
The Al-Jazeera leaks on the extent of Palestinian concessions in previous negotiations with Israel are being presented as earth-shattering throughout the Arab world. The Palestinian Negotiations Affairs department’s own internal documents demonstrate that the Palestinians have been willing to grant Israel sovereignty over almost all of the neighborhoods in east Jerusalem. The Palestinian leadership headed by President Mahmoud Abbas agreed to the model proposed by former prime minister Ehud Olmert which would grant Israel a role in the Old City of Jerusalem under a special system and even an international body that would have guardianship or control over the Temple Mount/Haram al Sharif.
For anyone who has been intimately involved in the negotiations process over the past two decades, this is nothing new. In fact, most of the concessions “leaked” were actually already made by Yasser Arafat when he accepted the Clinton Parameters (albeit a year and a half too late).
By GERSHON BASKIN
17/01/2011
From the age of 14 until making aliya at 22 I was an activist and leader in the Zionist youth movement Young Judaea. Aliya, as we were taught and as we imparted to many others who we inspired to follow in our footsteps, was not simply a change of address. “Moving up” to Israel had to involve a qualitative change of life based on the most important of values – tikkun olam, repairing the world, or more specifically, making our world a better place. These are the most fundamental principles on which I have become the person that I am today.
During my first 10 years here I devoted myself to trying to improve relations between Jewish and Arab citizens. I volunteered for two years and lived in Kafr Kara in the framework of Interns for Peace. I then convinced the government under Menachem Begin to hire me to become the first civil servant responsible for advancing Jewish-Arab relations.
By GERSHON BASKIN
10/01/2011
Iam writing from Vancouver, the first leg of my North American speaking tour. My first stop is the University of British Columbia. Its student body, like much of Canada, is a rainbow of striking diversity. The cultural environment on campus is a proud blend of pluralism and politeness, acceptance and curiosity, a thirst for knowledge and academic achievement.
Along with Dr. Sami Adwan, a colleague from Bethlehem University, I addressed an audience of more than 700 – members of the academic community and local Jews and Arabs. Our subject: building peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
By GERSHON BASKIN
03/01/2011
Who really wants Gilad Schalit released, except his family? Apparently no one. “The State of Israel is doing everything possible to bring Gilad home.”
Come on, who are they kidding? After four and half years, a few kilometers from the border in an area which is under our complete external control, sits an IDF soldier, one of us, one of our children, sent to defend us, in captivity by our enemy with no real sign that he will be coming home in the near future.
Before I start on the Prime Minister’s Office, let me assign blame where it really belongs – on Hamas. But criticism of Hamas is not going to pressure it to change its demands for Schalit’s release.
By Gershon Baskin
28/12/2010
What would be so terrible if the state of Palestine continues to gain more and more recognition, even from Israel’s friends and allies? That is the game in play today. Almost all of the world’s leaders have come to the conclusion that the Netanyahu government has nothing to offer the Palestinians and that another round of negotiations at this time will be fruitless.
The Americans are also coming to the same conclusion, but it is more difficult for the self-appointed mediator and policeman of the world to accept the failure of its intervention and the limits of its power.
For information on Gershon Baskin's – Canada – US Trip (January 7-22) - click here
By Gershon Baskin
28/12/2010
What would be so terrible if the state of Palestine continues to gain more and more recognition, even from Israel’s friends and allies? That is the game in play today. Almost all of the world’s leaders have come to the conclusion that the Netanyahu government has nothing to offer the Palestinians and that another round of negotiations at this time will be fruitless.
The Americans are also coming to the same conclusion, but it is more difficult for the self-appointed mediator and policeman of the world to accept the failure of its intervention and the limits of its power.
Read More...>>>
By GERSHON BASKIN
14/12/2010
Has the US actually plotted a new course for the peace process, or was Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s Saban Forum speech simply rehashed merchandise, as some Palestinian Authority officials have stated? Is a return to proximity talks a retreat in the peace process? Is Israel’s refusal to again freeze all settlement building recognition that the two-state solution is no longer viable? Can a peace process get anywhere if the conflicting parties are not speaking to each other directly? These and many other questions will be answered in this brief Q&A on the peace process.
Question: Is the US marketing old goods by going back to proximity talks? Answer: No. When it first proposed proximity talks, through the shuttle diplomacy of George Mitchell, the goal was to reach direct negotiations. This was a mistake, and precious time was lost on process issues rather than on issues of substance.
By GERSHON BASKIN
07/12/2010
A week ago I wrote in this column that “the house is on fire and it’s time to wake up before everything we have built is destroyed by our own doing.”
I was, of course, not referring to the tragic fire in the Carmel Forest. The fire is now out and Nature will have to work its wonders to bring life back where cinders now took over, but Nature knows how to recover.
The fire I wrote about is the proverbial fire under the house of the Zionist enterprise, and I wonder how it will be defeated. The country is facing the most crucial period in its history, with a need to make unprecedented decisions, and it seems that the decision makers are not even aware.
November 22, 2010
Letter to the Palestinian leadership:
Dear President Abbas, Prime Minister Fayyad, Minister of Foreign Affairs Malki, PLO Commissioner for Foreign Affairs Nabeel Shaath, PLO Head of Negotiations Saeb Arikat
I write to you with great concern regarding the article (below) that appears in today’s Jerusalem Post. If the content of the article is correct, you should take immediate action against the author of the report in question (if he is in fact employed by the PA or by the PLO) because his baseless claims are a serious blow to the legitimacy of Palestinian claims and make a mockery of the idea of peace between the Palestinians and the Jews.
This is a most serious mistake, similar to the one of the late President Arafat when he denied any Jewish connection to the Holy Temple Mount (Haram al Sharif) in Jerusalem. Your own Holy Quran documents without a doubt the Jewish connection to the Temple Mount. Denying this fact is a denial of Islam’s Holy book. Supporting reports such as the one mentioned in the Jerusalem Post article does great damage to the Palestinian people and to the cause of peace. There are enough real and factual issues to report on. The job of the PA Ministry of Information is not to invent information and to falsefy accepted history.
Any observer, even a non-professional arceaologist can discern that the stones used to construct the Western Wall (the Kotel) are from the era of Solomon’s Temple and the Temple rebuilt by King Herod which was hundreds of years before Islam appeared on the world stage. The falsification of history, as done in the report by the Palestinian poet Al-Mutawakel Taha, a senior official with the Ministry of Information, is a serious stain on the Palestinian Authority.
I hope that you will act swiftly to correct this terrible mistake.
Respectfully yours,
Gershon Baskin, Ph.D.
Link to Jerusalem Post article: http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=196329
By GERSHON BASKIN
22/11/2010
It is time to put the ‘real’ peace offer on the table.
Israel is facing the most severe crisis in its history. Surprisingly, most of its citizens choose to ignore this reality. The growing movement to delegitimize our right to exist cannot simply be dismissed by calling it anti- Semitism. The reasons are more complex than that.
The country is also losing its best friends, and even Jews inside and outside of it are beginning to dissociate themselves from it because of the ongoing occupation. Many Jewish students on campuses across the US have told me that Israel’s behavior embarrasses them. The house is on fire and it’s time to wake up before everything we have built is destroyed by our own doing.
Most objective observers, even supporters of Israel, believe that the two-state solution is no longer viable. They say: How can a Palestinian state be created where there are so many settlements and bypass roads exactly in the place it is supposed to exist? They add that the situation is getting worse – the refusal to freeze all settlement building, especially in Jerusalem, means no Palestinian state will be possible.
IPCRI Founder and Co-CEO Dr. Gershon Baskin is coming to the US and Canada on
a cross-country speaking and fundraising tour
January 6 - 22, 2011
Call to help set up speaking engagements and meetings
On January 6, Gershon Baskin will begin his US-Canada speaking tour with a conference at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver Canada. Gershon will be speaking at several events being organized by J-Street. Much of the program has not yet been set and this is a call to friends of IPCRI all over to assist in setting up a program. Gershon is prepared to travel anywhere in the States and Canada that will be worthwhile financially. This is a tour to raise money for supporting the work of IPCRI in advancing the “two-states for two peoples” solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Speaking engagements will be accepted that include a speaker’s fee and travel expenses plus the ability to do a fundraising pitch to the audience. Preferences will be given to large audiences.
By GERSHON BASKIN
08/11/2010
Ban Ki-moon
Secretary-general, United Nations
Your Excellency,
On behalf of the State of Israel and the Jewish people, and as an expression of our sincere intentions to achieve comprehensive and lasting peace with the Palestinian people, we submit for the consideration of the Security Council the following commitments, and have no objection to these commitments being expressed in a resolution.
The people of Israel and the entire world seek a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, which should include the application of both the following principles:
The resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is predicated on the mutual recognition of the rights of the Jewish people and the Palestinian people to self-determination as expressed in UN Resolution 181 from November 29, 1947 leading to the establishment of two nation-states for two peoples on the territory that was the British Mandate until May 14, 1948.
Encountering Peace: Declare victory and stop building
By GERSHON BASKIN
28/09/2010
Let’s face it, the leaders of the settlement movement did not oppose the building moratorium because some young couples couldn’t afford their mortgage. They did not oppose it because a new classroom or nursery school could not be added even if needed as a result of natural growth. They did not oppose it because of the compassion they felt for real-estate developers whose profits were falling.
They opposed the building moratorium for one reason only: because building more settlements, more roads for settlers, more houses for more people means preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank.
The winter session of the Israeli Knesset will debate the possible use of referenda to ratify future peace agreements. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has repeatedly stated that should the PLO conclude a full peace agreement with Israel he will bring it to the people in a referendum for ratification. IPCRI has prepared a case study survey of the use of referenda in peace treaties around the world. In the future, we hope to present our own specific recommendations for Israel and Palestine based on learning the lessons on the use of referenda in peace agreements.
Click here to download the document in pdf
Click here to open up the document in html
By GERSHON BASKIN
14/09/2010
Yes, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is right – why should Israel continue the settlement freeze; after all, everyone knows Gilo will never be Palestinian. Ramot Eshkol will not be part of the Palestinian capital of al-Kuds, nor will Pisgat Ze’ev? Palestinians should understand that there are certain facts that will not be undone. The Jewish Quarter of the Old City and the Western Wall will remain under Israeli sovereignty in any peace agreement; without this, there can be no peace and certainly the Palestinians should realize this by now.
Yes, but Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is also right – why should the Palestinians enter new negotiations while Israel continues to build settlements on land which will become part of the Palestinian state? Haven’t too many Israeli facts already been created on the ground? The last time Netanyahu was prime minister, Har Homa didn’t exist, but now look at it – another Israeli city built on Palestinian land. The whole need to find land to swap comes from the facts that Israel has created, illegally by international law.
READ MORE...>>>
August 31, 110 Tuesday 29 Elul 3870 12:56 IST
By GERSHON BASKIN
31/08/2010
There won’t be many more opportunities to make it work. That is the growing consensus. Even if the public does not sense it, there is a real urgency; we must move toward reaching an agreement. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is resolvable. There are solutions to all problems. In addition to the multiple rounds of Track I negotiations that have taken place since Madrid in 1991, there have also been thousands of hours of informal Track II negotiations in which a couple of hundred Israeli and Palestinian experts have participated and have reached understandings and “shelf agreements.”
Photo by: Associated Press
By GERSHON BASKIN
17/08/2010
Direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations are likely to begin in the near future. The international community under the conductor’s wand of the Obama Administration has applied considerable pressure to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to withdraw from all of his demands for setting the conditions for his participation in the negotiations.
Photo by: Associated Press
By GERSHON BASKIN
02/08/2010
Direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations are likely to resume in the near future. Both sides will reluctantly pay a price to enter the room even though neither side is too anxious to actually be there.
Common Ground News Service - Middle East22 July 2010
JERUSALEM - Jerusalem is revered worldwide as the cradle of the three monotheistic religions. Moslems, Jews and Christians – all view it as a holy ground. Thus, full respect for the rights of all three – one that is based on mutual understanding and recognition – is an inevitable requirement on the road to peace.
Until each of the parties arrives at the realisation that the city cannot be solely “his” the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will remain irresolvable. The past has proven that no one nation or one religion can claim sole ownership over Jerusalem and receive international recognition for it. Jordan failed to get such recognition when it ruled over East Jerusalem and the Old City between 1948 and 1967. Now Israel faces a similar response. In other words, international recognition will not be granted to one side at the expense of the other and will be given only to an arrangement whereby the local parties mutually agree to share this sacred city.
Read More...>>>
By GERSHON BASKIN
19/07/2010
November 6, 2012 – that’s the date when Barack Obama will stand for election for a second term. By November 2011 he will already be deeply involved in campaigning and most of his attention will be focused on Middle America and not the Middle East. On November 2, midterm elections will be held in the US in which members of Congress (including all 435 in the House of Representatives and 34 of the 100 in the Senate) stand before the electorate. The US political calendar is a map of the window of opportunity which might exist for advancing Israeli-Palestinian peace.
By GERSHON BASKIN
05/07/2010
The entire world knows what an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement looks like. Our leaders know, most of the Israeli and Palestinian people know, US President Barack Obama, special envoy George Mitchell, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Quartet envoy Tony Blair, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon – they all know it. There are no secrets. This is the most researched conflict in the history of conflicts and there are more detailed plans on how to resolve even the minutest of details in this conflict than any other.
Collectively, those of us working for peace over the past 20 years have conducted thousands of hours of meetings between Israeli and Palestinian experts on every aspect of the conflict. The best universities in the world have convened Israeli-Palestinian peace projects and presented their findings to the international community and to the local leaders.
By GERSHON BASKIN
21/06/2010
Under the public radar and due to extreme amounts of skepticism, George Mitchell’s mediation efforts continue without public debate or concern. The silence is because almost no one believes they will be constructive, and the media blackout imposed by Mitchell.
Four rounds of talks have taken place. The parameters have been set, the process has begun, and now it is time to get serious.The proximity talks can produce agreements; this is how I think they should proceed:
• Intensive negotiations: Talks conducted twice a month are not going to produce an agreement. The best model for proximity talks is Camp David I between Egypt and Israel. Convening intensive talks, even if not face-to-face, in an isolated location for at least five days at a time is the way to move. The initial talks will not involve the principals – Binyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas – but the lead negotiators and technical assistants. The process must now move into an intensive phase.
By GERSHON BASKIN
11/06/2010
ALMOST NO ONE IN THE MIDDLE EAST HAS ANY confidence that proximity talks will lead to an Israeli-Palestinian agreement. In my view, however, if conducted with the full weight of the office of the president of the United States behind them, including a readiness to make full use of the diplomatic tool box, these talks do have some chance of success.
Actually, there are advantages to proximity talks. Let’s face it, so far direct talks have failed and there is no reason to believe that a new round would end any differently. For very good reasons, Israelis and Palestinians deeply distrust each other. Direct negotiations at this time would not be constructive and could quickly break down. On the other hand, the big plus of proximity talks is that the mediator “owns the message.” He can frame and interpret it in a way that moves the process forward.
What next – from crisis to progress?
Gershon Baskin
March 19, 2010
The crisis in relations between Washington and Jerusalem is not necessarily a bad thing in terms of being able to move a peace process forward. There is no doubt that the crisis poses one of the most serious challenges to the Obama administration in its foreign policy agenda in general and potentially could shape and influence the policy of the US in the region for years to come.
It is quite important to map out all of the policy options within the US diplomatic tool box now in order to be able to develop a positive outcome. The facts of what really transpired are not completely known to the public. There are rumors and only limited clear facts really known. The following is what I have been able to piece together – with a clear reservation that if this scenario is incorrect then the projections may also be incorrect; however, if it is correct the situation is in fact the most serious crisis in Israel-US relations, perhaps, ever.
Prior to the decision of the Arab League to support the launching of the proximity talks, the PLO presented Mitchell with a three page document with questions and firms positions regarding the beginning of the negotiations. The Palestinian paper included: negotiations will be based on the green line, the negotiations should begin where the Olmert proposal to Abbas ended, the negotiations must include all of the permanent status issues and there must be a total settlement freeze, including Jerusalem, throughout the course of the negotiations. I was told by someone who is usually a reliable Palestinian source that Senator Mitchell gave Abbas a paper with the US responses include US assurances that the Israeli building in East Jerusalem would be frozen during the period of the negotiations. If this is true, I can only assume that Netanyahu agreed to it, although he probably also agreed that there would be no Israeli announcement of this policy. Again, if this is true, then advancing the planning process of the 1600 units in Ramat Shlomo and other plans that were advanced in the District and Local planning committees at the same time is a direct breach of trust with the US and is therefore, much more serious than a bureaucratic mishap or a simple decrease in trust between the parties prior to negotiations. The depth of the breach also determines to a certain extent the depth of the policy options. More...>>>
March 19, 110 Friday 12 Nisan 3870 13:00 IST 
It was never really about the timing. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s apology to US Vice President Joseph Biden enabled the Tel Aviv University speech to conclude the visit on an up note. The ice-cold water from Washington came only after the prime minister thought that he had successfully passed through the storm.
Photo by: AP
A free people in our land
By GERSHON BASKIN
16/03/2010
The current government has excelled at putting the country on a collision course with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, the government and the media are focusing attention on the relationship with the US and completely missing the real point of our predicament. It is not about our relationship with Washington, it is about our existence in the region and our relationship with our direct neighbors. It is time for the Israeli public to wake up from the hibernation of a long spring of calm and comfort. The hot summer is approaching and with it disaster. More...>>>
Arabic text follows the English
Gershon Baskin
Al Quds Newspaper (Jerusalem) March 3, 2010 (page 18 – oped page)
With the Netanyahu right-wing religious government in power in Jerusalem it is clearer than ever that there is no partner for peace in Israel. The amazing thing about this statement is that the world believes that there is no partner in Ramallah. The international community through the mainstream media is confronted with an Israeli peace offensive which presents Netanyahu as the partner pleading with the Palestinians to come to the table while Palestinian President Abbas is portrayed as the refusnik. Isn’t it time to set the record straight?
It is time for the Palestinians to go on the offensive. It is time for the international community and more importantly for the Israeli public to know that the Palestinian people and their leaders are interested in peace with Israel now. It is time for the Israeli public and the international community to understand that the Palestinians have reasonable demands that could be acceptable to most Israelis.
What does the Israeli public know and believe? They know that Netanyahu has spoken peace in every speech he makes. They know that he accepted the two-state solution and recognized Palestinian national rights for a state. They know that Netanyahu continuously speaks about his desire to return to negotiations. They know that Netanyahu says that all issues can be put on the table. They know that the Palestinians demanded a settlement freeze and that Netanyahu agreed and has frozen settlement building for ten months as a good will gesture to the Palestinians. They know that Israel has removed check points and that the Palestinian economy is booming (as a result of that – this is how it is presented in the media).
By GERSHON BASKIN
01/03/2010
In 1996 in his first term in office, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu opened the Hasmonean Tunnels, declaring that this place was the “rock of our existence.” Following the opening, riots broke out in Jerusalem and throughout the West Bank and Gaza. Fifty-eight Palestinians and 15 IDF soldiers were killed.
Now the prime minister has fanned the flames once again, announcing that the Cave of the Patriarchs (and Matriarchs) in Hebron and Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem are national heritage sites.
If the consequences of such political babbling were not so deadly, one could simply say populism is a necessary evil of democracy. But we have a prime minister who speaks before he thinks and, more importantly, speaks about peace with our neighbors without any serious thinking about what peace means.
This is, of course, not the first time that riots in Hebron have spread throughout the Holy Land. There was the massacre of 1929 in which 67 Jews were killed by their Arab neighbors after rumors spread that Jews were killing Arabs near the Western Wall. In 1996, with the opening of the tunnels, rumors spread that Israel was digging under the Aksa Mosque so that it would collapse.
Can Israel survive this coalition?
BY GERSHON BASKIN
16/02/2010Netanyahu as a statesman needs to reshuffle his cabinet. He needs to approach Livni and
propose to her that Kadima replace Israel Beiteinu.
I have little faith in the ability of the current government to make peace with the Palestinians or with Syria. It seems that the international community largely shares this assessment and as a result Israel is on a collision course diplomatically with much of the world.
Israel’s good diplomatic relations are predicated on the assumption that Israel is truly interested in peace with its neighbors and at least is trying to advance a process in that direction. The aggressive style and attitude of Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman have placed Israel in direct confrontation with neighboring states and others in a way that create a real strategic danger for us.
