By Ira Sharkansky
JERUSALEM— One should never say never. However, Probably not is a fair guess.
Closest to me is one more round in the endless conversations among officials about peace between Israel and Palestine.
The latest we hear is that Israel is willing to stop building settlements, stop taking Palestinian land, and will remove “illegal” settlements once negotiations begin.
Does that mean stop creating new settlements, stop adding on the fringes of existing settlements, or stop building within existing settlements?
Can we assume that it does not include a promise not to build within Jerusalem, given the loud assertions of the prime minister, supported by large majorities in Israeli polls?
So far the Palestinian leadership has not moved down from the lofty position it reached as a result of earlier rhetoric by the American President and Secretary of State. They are still insisting on a complete freeze, including Jerusalem, as a condition for starting negotiations.
And that nasty problem of Gaza is still hanging.
If we look at facts on the ground, the picture becomes even more complicated, in ways that challenge simple portrayals.
Reliable sources indicate that Israel has slowed or stopped construction in sensitive neighborhoods of Jerusalem. The most recent flap about Gilo involves planning approvals by one level in a complex bureaucracy. In the best of circumstances, the people involved may be at least a year away from actual construction.
Are the realities–whatever they are–enough to satisfy the White House or the folks claiming to run things from Ramallah?
That is not apparent. Residents, architects, and contractors can complain about delays or rejections in their applications for construction, but the Israeli politicians who are claiming to represent their people assert that there is no freeze, and American and Palestinian politicians claiming to control their realms are drawing lines that may or may not represent reality.
So who’s to judge?
And so far we’ve been dealing with the smallest of details, unimportant to anyone other than a few thousand residents and business people concerned about homes and profits.
Think of this as a lesson in government, taught by a retired professor of public administration. In short, obfuscation or disinformation is the language of politicians, and the bureaucracy is the government. The politicians blather on at the top, and often do not know, and do not control what happens among those formally responsible to them. John Kennedy once said, “There is always a schmuck who doesn’t get the word.”
The professor says that there is more than one schmuck, they are not likely to think of themselves as schmucks, and they have their own readings of the laws, rules, and their responsibilities. And, to be sure, some of them are schmucks, i.e., either lazy, ill informed, or intent on using their bit of power to do what they want, no matter what others may say.
The lesson is relevant for officials,clerks, and advisers in units dealing with local planning in Israel, policy formulations and implementation in the White House and State Department, and whoever is currently doing anything or speaking to the media in Ramallah and Gaza.
Somewhat more important issues like the Iranian nuclear program, and the future of those millions in Iraq and Afghanistan are also dependent on the claims and assertions of those who must demonstrate their knowledge and control, when actually they are far from well informed and control only a bit of what happens.
It should be no surprise that there are also schmucks, and individuals convinced that they know best at all levels of everybody’s military.
Are we on the road to peace here? Stability in Iraq? Something or other in the place called Afghanistan? A solution for Iran’s messianic aspirations?
Never say never, but probably not is a decent answer.
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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.