Israel's new realism

Kadima's victory in Israel's elections is the country's most important political turning point in 30 years, if not longer. The new party - barely six months old - has realigned Israeli politics by transforming the entire framework of ideological...

Everyone knew that Kadima would win and form a coalition with the moderate left Labour party, which managed a respectable second-place finish. As a result, some Kadima voters stayed home, while other potential supporters voted for Labour to strengthen its hand in pushing social and economic issues in Kadima-led coalition.

On the right, the Likud party, which Ariel Sharon abandoned to establish Kadima, did very poorly, partly because many conservative voters also deserted it for religious, immigrant and other parties. In fact, a wide variety of small political groups, including three Jewish religious parties, Arab parties and a pensioners' party, won seats. Since Kadima and Labour will not have a majority even as coalition partners, they will have to bring in some of these groups.

But the importance of the distribution of seats pales in comparison to that of the longer-term changes in Israeli politics implied by Kadima's victory. Indeed, having attracted leading figures from both Labour and Likud, Kadima is now established as the most successful centrist party in Israel's history. With few political stars left in either Labour or Likud, Kadima may become the country's dominant party for many years to come.

Ehud Olmert, the party's leader and now elected Prime Minister, has been a maverick of the centre since his student days - a fitting symbol for the rapprochement of left and right. But the rapprochement itself is, of course, mainly the work of Mr Sharon, whose influence is by no means diminished because he is in a coma. Kadima is built on Mr Sharon's charisma and programme, which reversed the most basic Israeli strategic thinking of the last half-century.

For 30 years after the 1967 war, Israelis agreed on the need to keep control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip unless or until there was a comprehensive peace agreement with the Palestinians and the Arab states. From a security standpoint, the occupied territories constituted critical terrain for defending Israel against an attack on its borders by Arab states' armies.

Moreover, from a diplomatic standpoint, the territories were regarded as bargaining chips ("land for peace") to be used in achieving a negotiated solution. The Oslo agreement in 1993 and the ensuing peace process embodied that expectation.

The strategy ran aground in 2000, when Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered to give up almost all the occupied territories and accept a Palestinian state in exchange for real peace. The Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat turned him down flat and instead returned to a massive campaign of terrorism against Israel.

The entire Israeli political spectrum was thrown into confusion. The left had maintained that Mr Arafat would make a deal and honour it; the right claimed that Mr Arafat would make a deal and violate it. Everyone was wrong: there would be no deal to honour or violate. With the collapse of the strategy's most basic premises, what should Israel do?

Mr Sharon formulated the answer in 2004, concluding that Israel did not need the territories. They were no good as bargaining chips, because there was no one with whom to bargain. Nor could they be annexed to Israel, owing to the demographic problem implied by continued control over so many Palestinians. Finally, with the USSR gone and the United States the world's sole superpower, the geostrategic situation had changed entirely. Arab states, preoccupied with other issues in the post-Cold War era, were less interested in the conflict, while the security situation in the territories themselves had become a problem.

Mr Sharon's solution was unilateral withdrawal and the idea that Israel would decide on its own interim boundaries with a view to what it would claim if there was ever a negotiated agreement. Moreover, Mr Sharon now agreed that a security fence, which historically was favoured by the Israeli left, would enhance Israel's defences. The country would then focus on domestic issues such as economic development, improving its public institutions, and raising living standards.

This approach appealed to the vast majority of Israelis, regardless of their political loyalties and the victory in January's Palestinian election by Hamas, which extols terrorism and demands Israel's extinction, only reinforced the new strategic consensus. In fact, the new consensus is shared by most of Labour and the main opposition within Likud. The dream of peace, the nationalist fervour, and the purported religious redemption that animated Israel's political combatants for a half-century are gone, replaced by a resigned pragmatism.

That may inspire little enthusiasm but the Israel that Mr Olmert has now won a firm mandate to lead is by no means demoralised. On the contrary, public opinion polls show that citizens remain highly patriotic and optimistic about their personal lives. They have merely concluded that politics will not bring miracles, and that the most they can expect is to keep external threats to a minimum. That is Mr Sharon's legacy. And, in Israel, fulfilling it will be no small achievement.

Prof. Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Centre of Israel's Interdisciplinary University and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA). His latest book is The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East.

Israel's new realism

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