Prof. Asher Susser comments in the latest issue of "Bitter Lemons International" on the collective Arab predicament, in light of the latest findings of the Arab Human Development Report.  He recommends that Israel not let Arab weakness blind it to the severe long-term challenges to its own existence posed by the lack of a political settlement with the Palestinians and continuing occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. 

www.bitterlemons-international.org
Middle East Roundtable
Edition 2 Volume 2 - January 8, 2004
Development and the Arab-Israel conflict

Arab disarray and Israel's impasse
by Asher Susser

Israel would be making a grave mistake if it chooses
to observe the Arab predicament while ignoring its own.

As Iraq was overrun by the United States, the Arabs did nothing to prevent the outcome. Some Arab states actually assisted the US; others did nothing at all. Even the much-vaunted "Arab street" remained silent. Referring to the "Arab world" these days seems anachronistic. If the term is intended to suggest that the Arab states are a functioning political collective, it is clearly a misnomer. The Arab collective has become nothing but a motley assortment of states, each fending for itself.

The state of the Arab collective is not a consequence of the defeat of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Rather it was Saddam's ignominious defeat that was symptomatic of the Arab condition. The Arabs, for the most part, have no illusions. Arab intellectuals and commentators are the first to recognize the Arab predicament, and it is they who project a mood of profound collective despair. The rapid disintegration of the Iraqi regime revealed the enormous discrepancy between the power of the modern Arab authoritarian state to pulverize its own civil society and its concurrent incapacity to defend itself against severe external pressure. There are many immensely powerful Arab regimes, but they rule with an iron fist over weak states. Indeed, it is their oppressive rule that is one of the main reasons for the weakness of these countries.

The latest Arab Human Development Report for 2003, as its 2002 predecessor, offers a most critical overview of Arab achievement. The most recent report examines the "growing knowledge gap" between the Arabs and the developed countries. Oppressive regimes, according to the report, have shackled active minds and impeded the growth of knowledge in Arab societies where "creativity, innovation and knowledge are the first victims of the suppression or the denial of freedoms." Arab education is declining in quality, and in terms of infrastructure for the dissemination of information (telephone lines or access to digital media) the general trend in the Arab countries "gravitates towards the lowest indicators in world standards." The translation movement in the Arab states "remains static and chaotic." lagging extremely far behind the standards of such countries as Hungary and Spain. All of the above contribute to the poor state of production in science and technology in the Arab countries.

The Arabs are in deep crisis, politically, socially and economically. Most have missed the boat of globalization; are suffering from a leadership vacuum; and are in no position to determine the Middle Eastern regional agenda, which is set, in the main, by outsiders and by the area's non-Arab powers--Israel, Turkey and Iran--more than it is by the Arabs.

Israel, by contrast, is the only Middle Eastern state that has a place in the globalizing first world. But Israel would be making a grave mistake if it chooses just to observe the Arab predicament while ignoring its own. The protracted war with the Palestinians is having a debilitating effect on the Israeli economy, preventing sufficient investment in those fields critical to Israel's long term economic and technological advancement, without which Israel cannot maintain its place in the globalizing first world. Israeli education standards are declining and a dangerous knowledge gap is developing between different segments of Israeli society. This decline is not related to the war with the Palestinians, but the drain of the war on Israel's economy will hamper the efforts to correct the educational downturn.

The war and the occupation are eroding Israel's international legitimacy precisely in that same liberal democratic first world which has been the backbone of Israel's international stature since its foundation. The lack of political settlement with the Palestinians, the occupation and continued Israeli promotion of the settler movement are exposing Israel to a demographic threat to its character as the state of the Jewish people, thus undermining its raison d'etre. The combination of all of the above; the erosion of Israel's socioeconomic and technological power-base, its declining international legitimacy, and the impact of demographic trends, pose an extremely severe challenge to Israel's long term survivability.

Occupying territory is becoming an insufferable political and strategic liability. The value of territory is no longer an asset for Israel's security against the threats of the conventional power of the Arab states that no longer exist anywhere near to the degree they did in the past. Considering, on the one hand, the dangers to Israel that are inherent in the status quo, and the Arab predicament, on the other, Israel would do well to withdraw from the occupied territories. It needs to do so for its own sake and it can afford to do so, because of the receding threat posed by the Arab environment. As for the threats that do prevail, such as Iran's nuclear potential, terrorism, or demography, hanging on to territory will do nothing to alleviate them.

Considering the Arab predicament, the time has come for Israel to seriously rethink the relationship between territory and security.

-Published 8/1/2004 in  http://www.bitterlemons-international.org

susser@post.tau.ac.il