2006-02-04-two_one_no

By Ira Sharkansky

It had to happen sooner or later. Some 80 percent of the homemade rockets shot from Gaza do not make it out of the area. Most of the rest land in empty fields. Overall, more Palestinians than Israelis suffer.

Yesterday a rocket landed on one of the temporary houses set up for the people moved out of Gaza in the disengagement. It injured four people, among them a baby who was initially described in critical condition. Now he has improved to moderate, and family members have been injured even more lightly.

Since the Palestinian election, Israel had resisted responding to the occasional rain of missiles. Last night and this morning, the IDF has been shelling the area from which they fired for the past 18 hours or so. The area is empty, and so far no Palestinian casualties have been reported. Currently fields are being turned into a moonscape, roads and bridges damaged. Next time the damage to Gaza and its people can be more serious.

Meanwhile, Hamas is still saying it will never recognize Israel. Insofar as it won he most parliamentary seats in the recent election, that pretty much takes the issue of a Palestinian state off the table. In a light year or so it may become a reasonable option, but I would not bet on it.

If a "two-state solution" is one platitude that is not likely to move policymakers, so are a couple of others that the politically correct express several times each day.

One mantra is the "demographic threat." This is supposed to mean that a much greater increase in Palestinian than Israeli births will doom Israel. The fact of the matter is that birth rates of Israeli Arabs have declined. As in the case of other groups, it has come with the increasing education of women. An exception is ultra-Orthodox Jews. If there is a demographic threat here, it is likely to come from them. But it will take a while. They are starting from only 10 percent of the Jewish population.

Palestinians in Gaza and even more in the West Bank (more advanced economically than Gaza) have high birth rates. But the principal benefit of the Oslo accords, reinforced by the recent disengagement from Gaza, is that Israel is not responsible for those people. If they want more kids, they have to feed them, find education and work for them, urge them to migrate, and/or suffer the consequences. Sure, they try to migrate to Israel. Most come illegally, and some by marrying Israeli Arabs. But Israel does a better job in dealing with the illegals than the United States does with its hungry neighbors. And Israel is tightening the procedures to grant residence to foreign Arabs who marry Israelis. Human rights groups grumble and submit their petitions to court, but government efforts continue.

Yet another mantra is the "one-state solution." According to this, if Israel does not make peace with a Palestinian state, it will have to absorb all the Palestinians in Israel, and they will outvote the Jews.

This is a darling that has been used as a threat by Arab activists and their supporters, some of them Israeli Jews. The fault is that no ranking Jewish politician takes it seriously.

If none of these mantras are realistic, what is the solution to the Palestinian-Israeli problem?

There is none. Israel will continue to build its barriers and hunker down. The IDF will continue to go into the West Bank as directed in order to deal with problems that affect Israel. These intrusions are much easier when there is no formal Palestinian state, and the need for the intrusions is a major reason why there no Palestinian state.

Israelis will suffer, with increases and decline in the incidence of casualties. Palestinians will suffer more, mostly economically and socially, but they may feel good for electing Hamas, stroking their nationalism, and calling for aid from Arab and other governments.

Sharkansky is an emeritus member of the political science department at Hebrew University in Jerusalem