What to Do About Israel

By Strobe Talbott

When Menachem Begin came to the White House to introduce himself to Jimmy Carter back in 1977, he brought with him a detailed, top-secret inventory of favors that the Israeli intelligence services had rendered the U.S., such as sharing captured Soviet-made weapons and intelligence reports from agents who had penetrated terrorist organizations. The just-elected Prime Minister intended the catalogue to be Exhibit A in his first call on the U.S. President--documentary proof of Israel's contribution to the political and military interests of the West. Begin believed that Israel could count on the U.S. only as long as the U.S. counts on Israel as a partner in the common cause of resisting Soviet expansionism and Arab radicalism.

Four years and another election victory later, Begin still feels that way, and he will probably make much the same pitch to Ronald Reagan when the two meet for the first time in Washington next week. Reagan is likely to listen sympathetically. He and his top aides have repeatedly hailed Israel as the cornerstone of the "strategic consensus" that the Administration hopes to build in the Middle East. Much more than any previous match-up of Israeli and American leaders, Begin and Reagan are inclined to stress Israel's value as a "security asset" to the U.S.

Unfortunately, though, the more the two men agree on that notion, the more they will be deluding themselves and each other. The more they will also be cheapening the U.S.-Israeli relationship and misrepresenting its very basis. In 1948 the U.S., led by Harry Truman, decided to midwife the birth of Israel out of the conviction that the Jewish people deserved a state of their own, especially after the horrors they suffered at the hands of the Nazis. The wisdom of the U.S.'s original sponsorship of Israel has been vindicated many times in many ways, by the sturdiness and vitality of Israeli democracy as well as by the richness of Israeli artistic and intellectual life. As a culture, a society and a polity--as a hospitable if sometimes overheated environment for the thriving of Western values--Israel has been a credit to itself and to its American benefactors.

But it is worth recalling that Truman's Secretary of Defense James Forrestal opposed the creation of a Jewish state in the coldest days of the cold war, partly because he feared that Israel and America's commitment to it would hamper the twin strategic tasks of keeping Joseph Stalin at bay and keeping the peace in the oilfields and tanker lanes. Truman overruled Forrestal--but for reasons of right, not might. He was under no illusion that Israel was, or ought to be, a military ally or that the U.S. was fostering an anti-Soviet "consensus" in the area. Arab hostility toward Israel, combined with Arab resentment of the U.S. as Israel's chief backer, has represented a major target of opportunity for the Soviets in the area ever since.

Truman's successors up through Jimmy Carter felt that American guardianship of Israel was more than worth the trouble--but that it meant trouble nonetheless, especially as one war after another broke out, with the Soviet Union championing the Arabs. Soviet military support never translated into an Arab victory, but by the same token American diplomacy never translated into a permanent, comprehensive peace. The U.S.'s lonely, patient mediation between the Arabs and Israelis paid off in some important stopgap agreements along the way, but to many Americans it seemed a thankless, if not hopeless, job. Successive Israeli leaders recognized that even though they possessed the most formidable military machine in the region, their chronic conflict with their neighbors made Israel appear at best a mixed blessing to the U.S. in its own competition with the Soviet Union. Therefore they tended to soft-pedal the strategic dimension of U.S.-Israeli relations and to stress instead the ties of history, humanitarianism and ethnic politics.

But Menachem Begin trusted none of those. "Sentimentality," he called them. After all, the much vaunted Judeo-Christian experience, which links Israel to the West, includes the Holocaust, which Begin experienced personally and with which he is obsessed. His fellow Jews in America make up only 2.7% of the population. Begin recognized that American Jews wield influence far beyond their numbers, but he also knew that there is considerable pent-up irritation in the U.S. with the power of the pro-Israel lobby (which includes, of course, many non-Jews) and that a significant body of American Jewish opinion opposes him. Besides, even before the Arab embargo of 1973, Begin had suspected that oil is thicker than either blood or water.

Hence the list he handed to Carter and the pitch he will make to Reagan. His message: let's be hardheaded; we need you for our survival, and you need us as an outpost in defense of your security.

Begin is only half right. His country does need the U.S. for its survival, but the sad fact is that Israel is well on its way to becoming not just a dubious asset but an outright liability to American security interests, both in the Middle East and worldwide. The fault is largely Begin's, although the U.S.--and particularly the Reagan Administration--has contributed to the problem by failing to define American interests more clearly and to stand up for them more forcefully.

The underlying, and potentially undermining, irritant in U.S.-Israeli relations is Begin's refusal to relinquish the West Bank of the Jordan River, which Israel seized during the Six-Day War in 1967. He and his political allies in Israel's ruling coalition regard the West Bank as an integral part of the Jewish homeland, deeded to modern Israel in the Old Testament. Begin once said privately that one of his greatest heroes, after the Zionists Theodor Herzl and Vladimir Jabotinsky, is Giuseppe Garibaldi, the soldier-statesman who united Italy a century ago and helped introduce into the vocabulary of contemporary politics the word irredentism, which means a policy of expanding the boundaries of a state to incorporate territory claimed on the basis of historical or ethnic ties.

Begin's policies on the West Bank are unabashedly irredentist. While pretending to leave open the de jure status of the territory, he is vigorously and transparently seeking its de facto annexation. By pushing ahead with the establishment of Jewish settlements on the West Bank, Begin hopes to make that annexation irreversible.

He may succeed. Even though the leaders of the opposition Labor Party are willing to negotiate with Jordan about territorial concessions on the West Bank, they may inherit a fait accompli if they return to power. They might find the thousands of Jewish settlers, many of whom fanatically share Begin's biblical dream of a greater Israel, even more difficult to dislodge than the nearly 1 million indigenous Arabs are to absorb into Israel.

That prospect is contrary to America's interests--and, indeed, to Israel's own--in numerous ways. Israel argues that it is strong, stable and pro-Western, while most of the Arab states are weak, fractious and radical. But one reason the Arabs are that way, and becoming more so, is precisely because of their impasse with Israel. The tragedy and chaos that have engulfed the once peaceful, prosperous nation of Lebanon are a direct spillover of the Palestinian problem. Anwar Sadat's position both within Egypt and among his Arab brethren elsewhere will remain precarious unless he can point to some success in the Palestinian autonomy talks initiated by the Camp David agreements and due to resume in three weeks. By and large Sadat has shown forbearance over Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem and flexibility over the delicate issue of West Bank water rights. Israel, for its part, has done everything it could to prevent the West Bank Arabs from genuinely governing themselves--a goal set by the Camp David accords.

Granted, if Israel were to budge and permit the establishment of real Arab self-rule on most of the West Bank, that in itself would bring into sharp focus tricky, long-deferred questions about whether and how to demilitarize the area and who should ultimately have sovereignty there, Jordan or the Palestinians. Nonetheless, even though it is sure to raise some new problems, progress toward self-rule would be an improvement on the current festering of old ones. Even a lasting resolution of the Palestinian dilemma would not automatically bring stability to the Middle East or shore up all American interests there, but it would certainly help. Similarly, Israeli stubbornness is not the only obstacle to the pursuit of peace, but it is certainly a major one.

The continuing Israeli occupation of land Jordan administered from 1948 until 1967 galls, humiliates and weakens King Hussein, who has proved himself many times a staunch friend of the West. For all their own foot-dragging in the past, the Saudis have demonstrated true statesmanship--and implicitly recognized Israel's right to exist--in the way they helped mediate the current cease-fire in Lebanon. They are desperate for a U.S.-sponsored breakthrough in the Arab-Israeli conflict, largely to help them justify their own close ties with the U.S. Yet those ties are being strained anew by the determination of Israel and its lobby in Washington to block the sale to Saudi Arabia of airborne warning planes (AWACS) and other hardware that the Reagan Administration announced last week. Reagan, and Carter before him, chose to make this deal a symbol of the U.S.'s commitment to the security of Saudi Arabia. Whatever the wisdom of that original American decision, a reversal now would be damaging to U.S. interests. Therefore Congress should approve the sale.

Kuwait, whose population is nearly a quarter Palestinian refugees, has drifted alarmingly toward the pro-Moscow pole of the nonaligned movement. Other small gulf states may follow. The nonaligned have recovered from their initial collective outrage over the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and resumed their earlier harping on Israeli occupation of the West Bank. The close identification of the U.S. with Israel has impeded American attempts to coordinate diplomacy with the European Community, and it has complicated U.S. relations with most Third World countries and virtually all Islamic ones. It has also complicated American efforts to preposition military supplies and guarantee access to bases around the gulf.

A network of such arrangements is strategically critical if the U.S. is to deter, and, if necessary, resist, a Soviet thrust toward the warm waters and the oil. To be sure, Israel's own military power might be a genuine asset to the U.S. in such a contingency. Israel could provide the American units with tactical air support--as long as its hostile Arab neighbors did not take advantage of the broader conflict and attack Israel and thus tie down its air force. Moreover, while the possibility of a Soviet blitzkrieg into Iran or Pakistan cannot be discounted, a new war in the region is far more likely to cast Israel once again in its all too familiar role as a combatant taking on the Arabs or as a muscle-bound but paralyzed pariah on the sidelines of another inter-Arab conflict.

Beyond the realm of scenarios and strategies, there is a more amorphous but still important respect in which Israel is doing a disservice both to itself and to its American defenders. Israel sometimes seems to have taken on the visage and tone of a rather nasty and bitter nation, even a violent one. There was something strutting and heartless about the way the Begin government celebrated its gratuitously vengeful bombing attack on Beirut, in which about 300 were killed. It would be unreasonable to expect official contrition. But Israel in the past has managed to convey more sorrow than anger when it wielded its terrible swift sword. Now there seems to be only anger, and it is too often shrill, self-righteous and even a bit frightening--more so to those who love Israel than to those who hate her.

This growing catalogue of detriments to U.S.-Israeli relations ought to be Exhibit A when Reagan deals next week with Begin's claim that Israel is part of the solution to the U.S.'s strategic problems. Reagan should explain that Israel itself is a problem, and a growing one.

So far, however, the Reagan Administration has shown a distressing reluctance to stand up to Begin, especially on the central issue of the West Bank. Reversing the position of the Carter Administration, Reagan has contended that the settlements are "not illegal," thus inviting Begin's smug observation that a double negative equals a positive. The Administration has pledged to continue the Camp David process, although it has done so rather half-heartedly and without much idea about how to proceed. It has only tacitly and in passing endorsed United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, which essentially calls for Israeli withdrawal in exchange for Arab recognition. Hardline Israelis have pointed to what they see as the absence of an explicit, ringing endorsement as a sign that the Reagan Administration may be down-playing 242, which was the basis of Middle East policy for the previous four U.S. Administrations.

Reagan has indicated to his aides that he tends to accept Begin's often repeated and patently self-serving argument that the Palestinian issue is parochial and containable; that it is one of history's running sores, like the chronic but localized troubles over Cyprus or Kurdistan; and that it should not loom large in the dealings of a superpower with its strategic partner. Sadat rebutted that point of view passionately in his own meeting with Reagan three weeks ago, arguing, correctly, that the Palestinian issue is the biggest barrier to his own and the U.S.'s efforts to stabilize the area on behalf of the West. Israeli intransigence and Arab propaganda have combined to make the Palestinian cause a major international issue. But now Begin has a chance to rebut Sadat.

Even though Reagan and his top aides were mightily annoyed over the Israeli bombing attacks against Beirut and the Iraqi nuclear reactor this summer, they muted their annoyance in public, expressing instead their "understanding" of Israeli insecurity and militancy. To the rest of the world, it appeared either that the U.S. had known in advance about the bombing missions and condoned them or, more accurately, that the U.S. had not known what a client state was going to do with American-supplied aircraft and munitions. Neither interpretation did American prestige any good.

Nor did the Administration's temporary and symbolic delay in the delivery of jet fighters to Israel repair the damage, especially since Secretary of State Alexander Haig announced the lifting of the suspension less than 24 hours after Begin complained that the U.S. was "absolutely unjustified" in holding up "Israeli planes. . . bought by Israel." Begin--or, more to the point, Haig--might have added that the planes were bought largely with U.S. military aid funds.

That fact lies at the heart of both the reason and the means for a tougher U.S. policy toward Israel. The U.S. has an immense investment in Israel: billions in public and private funds since 1948. It also has an incalculable political, human and idealistic, or what Begin would call "sentimental," investment in the survival of the Jewish state. But not in its irredentist conquests. Quite the contrary, the U.S. is obligated by morality and Realpolitik alike to do everything in its power to thwart Begin's annexation of the West Bank. American ambiguity on that point serves only to encourage Begin, confuse other Israelis and anger almost everyone else.

Reagan should use the occasion of Begin's visit to clear up any doubts about his personal commitment to Resolution 242 and particularly to its implication of a West Bank withdrawal as part of a peace. He should also assert his unequivocal opposition to the West Bank settlements. Declared public policy must be brought more into line with concerns--and warnings--that U.S. officials express privately. On that score, Reagan might consider putting Begin on notice that since the West Bank settlements are in effect financed by American dollars, the U.S. will hold in escrow against genuine progress in the autonomy talks a certain proportion of the $800 million now budgeted in economic aid to Israel. Furthermore, if Israel sanctions any new settlements, or expands existing ones, it will be penalized by corresponding additions to that escrow account. Thus a future, more moderate Israeli government could recoup what Begin's policies had cost his nation not just in cash but in American good will.

The U.S. obligation to work harder in prying Israel off the West Bank does not, however, entail recognizing the Palestine Liberation Organization or pressuring Israel to do so. The fashionability of the P.L.O. option in the West these days is directly proportional to frustration with current Israeli policy: any idea that makes Menachem Begin apoplectic cannot be all bad, or so it might seem. Trouble is, moderate Israelis are almost as adamant in refusing to deal with the P.L.O. as Begin is, at least as long as the P.L.O. refuses to accept the existence of Israel. Also, once the U.S. recognizes Yasser Arafat & Co., the P.L.O. will be under less pressure to recognize Israel. Sadat urges the simultaneous mutual recognition of Israel and the P.L.O. Right now there is no sign of receptivity to that idea on the part of either the P.L.O. or Israel, and the U.S. has no way of bringing them together without compromising its necessary boycott of the P.L.O. The best course for American diplomacy is to keep the West Bank autonomy talks alive so that there is still something for King Hussein or the Palestinians to negotiate about if and when there is an Israeli government they can deal with.

If Israel continues to take international law into its own hands as violently--and as embarrassingly to the U.S.--as it did in Baghdad and Beirut, then the next display of U.S. displeasure ought to be more sustained and less symbolic. It might include selective cutbacks in American military aid, which is $1.2 billion for fiscal '81 alone. Some of that aid is not critical to Israel's defense. In fact, it amounts to a subsidy to the Israeli defense industry, which in turn sometimes competes with the U.S. on world markets.

There is little doubt about how Begin would respond to warnings of these or similar sanctions. He would remind Reagan that every time a U.S. Administration has tried to pressure him in the past, it has strengthened his political position at home and brought down on the White House the wrath of Israel's many friends in Congress. That is true, but there is no reason why it must always be true, and plenty of reasons why it should not.

It is high time for the U.S. to engage Israel in a debate over the fundamental nature of their relationship. If that means interfering in Israeli internal politics, then so be it. Israel has been interfering skillfully and successfully in U.S. politics for decades, and will be doing so again with a vengeance in the weeks to come over the Saudi AWACS sale. About half the Israeli electorate questioned the wisdom of Begin's policies in the last election. Perhaps a majority will do so in the next. The U.S. might help bring that about if its Government were less timid in asserting publicly that Begin's aims and means are potentially disastrous for both Israel and the U.S.

A policy aimed at inducing Israel to behave more compatibly with American global interests does not mean abandoning or even diminishing the special U.S. relationship with Israel. Just the opposite, in fact: it might help rescue that relationship from the mistrust, misunderstandings and misconceptions that have begun to eat at its foundations--starting with the delusion that Israel is, or ever has been, primarily a strategic ally. Whether they think of themselves as hardheaded or sentimental, both Israelis and friends of Israel in the U.S. must realize that for all the very real external threats faced by the Jewish state, none is more difficult to deal with than the danger that under Begin, Israel may become not only a net liability to the U.S. but its own worst enemy as well.

--By Strobe Talbott

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