Suchergebnisse

An analysis of the principal stages and issues of the Arab-Israeli Conflict since 1945. The Introduction sets out the origins of Arab Nationalism and Zionism, and traces their varying fortunes through the agreements of the First World War, the British Mandate and the Holocaust. The book goes on to examine the creation of Israel and the collapse of Arab Palestine. It explains the consolidation of the conflict through the events of 1956 and analyses the crisis period of the 1967 and 1973 war. The final chapter traces the various attempts to reach a settlement, with particular emphasis on recent events

The Arab—Israeli conflict, which at first had a zero-sum, protracted nature, has changed over time because of effective conflict management that has made conflict reduction and even resolution possible. Following an adaptation process in response to the outcomes of the Six Day War, and the shifts from suppression to regulation, and vice versa, both sides experienced after the Yom Kippur War some learning process by which they became ready to transform their mode of thinking in the conflict. However, without the active encouragement of the USA, the learning process could not be developed. However, the Arab—Israeli conflict is not a single conflict, especially when analyzing and evaluating movements toward new forms of behavior in a given conflict system. The differences in the rate and scope of learning in each conflict influenced differently the shifts in conflict management, and from conflict management to conflict resolution. An initial learning process proved to be necessary for shifting from regulation to institutionalization, but this was not sufficient to move from institutionalization to resolution. There was a need for a further and deeper learning process to enable conflict resolution.

Partial solutions can present way stations en route to complete resolution of regional conflicts, or they can actually hinder those resolutions by providing comfortable resting places with no incentives to move on. The step-by-step peace process in the Middle East took account of local and global realities, but it left the conflict stuck in its progress after the Camp David Accords and the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty. Saddam Hussein erred in seeing in the end of the Cold War an opportunity to carry out aggression with impunity, but there will be other Saddam Husseins as long as a general settlement is not produced in the region. What is needed is joint U.S.-Soviet action and a balanced formula that provides for the return of a few Palestinians to Israel in exchange for the maintenance of some Israeli settlements on the West Bank, sealed by an international conference.