The Middle East: A Turning Point?: An Israeli-Palestinian Peace

Harold H. Saunders

From Foreign Affairs, Fall 1982

Article preview: first 500 of 9,125 words total.

Summary:  Given the summer?s immersion in day-to-day death and destruction in Lebanon, we need to begin putting the Israeli-Palestinian War of 1982 in larger perspective. For better or worse, it will mark a turning point in the history of Israel, in the course of Arab-Israeli relations, in U.S.-Israeli relations, in the political character and orientation of important Middle Eastern states, and in the U.S. position in that critical area.

Harold H. Saunders is Resident Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington, D.C. He was Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs from 1978 to 1981, Deputy Assistant Secretary in the same office in 1974-75, and a member of the National Security Council staff, with responsibility for Middle East matters, from 1967 to 1974. He participated in the negotiations at Camp David and previously in the Kissinger shuttles. He is coauthor of The Path to Peace: Arab-Israeli Peace and the United States, and author of The Middle East Problem in the 1980s. Many of the insights in this article were acquired during visits to Egypt, Israel and Jordan in July 1982.

Given the summer's immersion in day-to-day death and destruction in Lebanon, we need to begin putting the Israeli-Palestinian War of 1982 in larger perspective. For better or worse, it will mark a turning point in the history of Israel, in the course of Arab-Israeli relations, in U.S.-Israeli relations, in the political character and orientation of important Middle Eastern states, and in the U.S. position in that critical area.

To understand the significance of the war, it is necessary first to assess what Israel set out to accomplish by sending its forces into Lebanon. As is usual in almost any war, it had both immediate war aims and ultimate political objectives; although the two usually overlap, and did in this case, it is useful to distinguish between them.

The initially stated Israeli war aim was to clear a zone in southern Lebanon of weapons and fighters within reach of northern Israel. This war aim-"Peace for Galilee"-was understandable in view of past attacks on Israel's northern communities and the growing stockpile of Palestinian equipment in the region.

Within a few days, as Israeli forces moved rapidly north to lay siege to Beirut, Israel's stated war aims were expanded to include the eviction from Lebanon of the military presence and political headquarters of the Palestine Liberation Organization. This aim had a plausible basis as part of protecting Israel's physical security; it also conformed to the widespread desire of most Lebanese to be rid of the disruptive PLO apparatus there.

Even before the move north, the Israeli air force carried out sharp and effective attacks on Syrian antiaircraft batteries, engaging and destroying Syrian aircraft as well. These operations plainly reflected an objective of neutralizing Syrian forces and in the process discrediting Soviet assistance and equipment.

It also became evident that Israel had objectives in terms of the political structure of Lebanon itself. At a minimum, it sought to preserve and enlarge an Israeli-dominated buffer zone in southern Lebanon. Moreover, Israeli authorities sought to have their Maronite Christian allies emerge in control of Lebanon, or to lay the foundation for a lasting Israeli-Syrian condominium there.

But the ultimate political objectives of Israel's leaders did not stop there. The physical removal of the PLO apparatus from Lebanon was seen as a means to a larger end-one frankly avowed in the statements of these leaders for several months. That end was the destruction of the organized Palestinian movement. With a fragmented and dispersed PLO, Israeli leaders foresaw the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza-deprived of outside moral support-coming to accept permanent Israeli control there, in a situation in which much of that Palestinian population could be induced (or gradually coerced) to migrate across the Jordan River into Jordan.

In short, the most important Israeli objective was to resolve the Palestinian problem once and for all, by making the remaining Palestinians merely an ethnic minority within an enlarged Israel, and ultimately by transforming Jordan into a Republic of Palestine, with an accepted Palestinian diaspora elsewhere. ...

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