Israel Looks Inward. By Einat Wilf. Al-Monitor, February 27, 2013.
Wilf:
The
Israeli elections were not about peace, and had very little to say on the
matter. When the world was asking whether Israelis have swung to the right or
the left or even the center, Israelis were thinking in very different terms. No
longer right or left, but rather inward or outward — and their response was a
resounding “inward.” To borrow the American term, Israelis have chosen to focus
on “nation building at home.”
Many
Israel-watchers were appalled by such a choice. How could Israelis choose to
focus inward when the Arab world around them is going up in flames, when they
continue to control the increasingly restless West Bank and when Iran shows no
signs of giving up its quest for nuclear weapons capability? Some exasperated
commentators have interpreted this inward focus as escapism or even
callousness.
But
Israelis made a rational choice. They were neither escaping reality nor being
indifferent to it. Israelis took a look around them — at the Arab world, at the
West Bank, at Iran — and realized that they are not likely to face any major
policy choices on these fronts anytime soon. Whether analytically or
instinctively, they understood that the Arab world will be overwhelmed by its
own problems for years to come. The Arabs in the West Bank, while continuing to
detest Israel’s control over them and oppose it, are still unable to make the
difficult choices that would yield an agreement that would end this control,
and the Iranian issue, while critical, depends on a wide range of factors and cannot
be decided by a national vote.
The
inward-looking Israeli choice explains Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s
unprecedented and unparalleled status as the only person that Israel is willing
to accept as prime minister at this time. Having delivered four years of rare
calm and stability, as revolutions were sweeping the Arab world, Israelis have
chosen to “subcontract” all foreign and defense policy to Netanyahu, so as to
focus on domestic issues. They realized that while Netanyahu might not deliver
peace, he is also unlikely to entangle them in war. At a time of deep
uncertainty, they found this prospect comforting.
Israelis
were also taking a page from their own history. They reminded themselves that
while the conflict with the Arab world has been raging for more than a century,
it has never stopped them in the past from building their society, culture and
economy. They realized that the fact that there might be no immediate solution
to the conflict with the Arab world does not mean that they have to put their
lives as a people and a country on hold. This is not to say that achieving
peace is no longer the highest priority for Israelis, but in the absence of a
realistic chance of achieving it, the rational course for a productive and
dynamic people is to turn their energies elsewhere.
