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What Is Needed Is a Peace Road
An exclusive interview with Ami Ayalon, former head of the Israeli security service, who–together with Sari Nusseibeh, a Palestinian–promoted a peace petition to end the terror by focusing on four concrete issues: the status of Jerusalem, security, borders, and refugees

Interview by Mauro Bottarelli

Is expelling or killing Yasser Arafat the only hope for reaching an end to the hostility in the Middle East? That is the question posed by the controversial hypothesis advanced by the Israeli government after the fall of Abu Mazen and the formal breaking of the treaty by Hamas and the Islamic jihad. The whole world, from the United States to the European Union to the Vatican, criticized this decision. But not only they; inside Israel, too, the dissenting voices come through loud and clear. An example is Ami Ayalon, former head of the Israeli Internal Security Service (Shin Bet) and the promoter today, together with the Palestinian Sari Nusseibeh (President of Al Quds University in Jerusalem and senior Palestinian Liberation Organization representative), of a petition for peace in the streets of Israel and Palestine. He is a man who, as the head of the most powerful security force in the world, had the courage to tell the press, “Let it be clear that when our soldiers kill unarmed Palestinian children, they have received orders that are patently illegal.” He is a man who has always faced the same problem–yesterday with arms and intelligence work, today with the pragmatism of the will and hope for dialogue.

Mr Ayalon, what is your opinion of the government’s decision to expel Yasser Arafat?
I think the most important thing to reflect upon is not the reactions to this hypothesis but Israel’s interest, which is first and foremost security. We must decide what we really need to reach a lasting agreement with the Palestinians and what means are the most useful and intelligent to use in order to reach that end. To my mind, the most important thing is to create the conditions for having as our counterpart a Palestinian leadership capable of negotiating a peace agreement. So Arafat has not done what he should have? Fine, but the problem is that the only ones to gain from his disappearance from the scene would be Hamas and the fundamentalists of the Islamic jihad. Right now, his elimination would unleash very violent reactions that would become a harbinger of all the Palestinian claims for the Hamas leaders. Our problems, Israel’s problems, are much more deeply rooted than the person of Arafat. Thus, thinking that the open questions will be resolved by exiling or killing someone seems to me an enormous and dangerous simplification.

Do you think that Arafat’s leadership can still guarantee hope for the road map?
The question is that the road map, per se, is only a word, a formula, and as such I do not think it can stop the attacks or the selective killing; up to now, at least, it has not done this. I think the road map can be useful only if understood as a document of principle, whose aim is to give official form to the fixed points of what our final agreement with the Palestinians will be. The problem, in my view, is above all this: the lack of definitive prospects. Do you know when the attacks and selective killing will stop? When both we and they have clearly before us what the future awaiting us after the agreement will be, what we shall gain and what we shall lose in exchange for peace. I see no other way out of the terror. The road map, unfortunately, does not define this precisely, and this is why I consider it to be useless in the actuality of facts. In the end, the four fundamental prerogatives fit on one page: why complicate our life?

And what are those prerogatives, Mr Ayalon?
A solution for the status of Jerusalem, security, borders, and the question of the refuges and their right of re-entry. That’s it–four concrete points on which we can confront each other, debate, and argue, but at least with a concrete prospect before our eyes. Let us limit the field of action, let us focus seriously on the concrete things, the priorities. This also applies to the question of the famous wall. We have the right and the duty to defend ourselves, but we cannot separate ourselves with a wall, as though we did not want to see what is happening on the other side–a sort of visual exorcism of reality. Let’s give a prospect to the process of dialogue, let’s talk clearly about borders, on the level of geography and place names. At that point, we won’t need walls.

As an ex-soldier, how do you estimate the prospects of a deployment of UN peace-keeping forces to act as a buffer between the Israelis and Palestinians in order to facilitate pacification of the area?
I do not at all think that UN intervention can be helpful; there are already too many soldiers around, and it does not seem to me that they serve much purpose. Even more so as the UN troops would be viewed as enemies by both sides and, paradoxically, they would risk setting off new spirals of violence. Here it is not a question of being more or less optimistic. In all honesty, I can only say that if we do not find some added value, a change of direction from a political action of mere fighting against terrorism, we won’t get anywhere. Or rather, we will come closer to the precipice. We need determination and courage. Is there enough of these around to hope we can make it? This is the real question we must ask.