the leonard davis institute for international...

ן ליחסים בינלאומיים ע נרד דיוויס"המכו ש לאו The Leonard Davis Institute for International Relations

"Israel in Domestic & International Perspectives" An International Conference Celebrating The 40th

Anniversary of the Leonard Davis Institute, June 4-6, 2012, Jerusalem

1

ABSTRACTS

DAY I ____________________________________________________________________________ 4

MONDAY, JUNE 4TH: OPENING SESSION ________________________________________________ 4

17:00-19:00 _____________________________________________________________________ 4 OPENING PANEL: ISRAEL AT ITS 60S: BETWEEN PAST AND PRESENT _________________________________ 4 CHAIR/DISCUSSANT – ITZHAK GALNOOR, HEBREW UNIVERSITY AND VAN LEER INSTITUTE ___________________ 4

Alan Dowty, University of Notre Dame _____________________________________________ 4 International Perspectives of the First Zionist Settler __________________________________ 4 Naomi Chazan, Truman Institute __________________________________________________ 4 Political Realignment in Israel? Neo-Nationalists vs. Democrats __________________________ 4 Benny Miller, University of Haifa __________________________________________________ 5 Israel’s Territorial Orientation: Is Israel a Revisionist, Status-quo or Failed State?____________ 5

DAY II ____________________________________________________________________________ 6

TUESDAY, JUNE 5TH: "STATE, SOCIETY AND FOREIGN POLICY MAKING" _______________________ 6

09:00 – 10:45 ___________________________________________________________________ 6 PANEL 1: THE POLITICS OF IDENTITY AND SECURITY ____________________________________________ 6 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT - ARIE KACOWICZ, HEBREW UNIVERSITY ___________________________________ 6

Oren Barak , Hebrew University ___________________________________________________ 7 Security Relations in Israel - Looking Through the Mirror _______________________________ 7 Ron Krebs, University of Minnesota ________________________________________________ 7 Insecurity, War, and Israel’s Democracy ____________________________________________ 7 Amir Lupovici, Tel Aviv University _________________________________________________ 8 Reading Copenhagen School in Israel ______________________________________________ 8

11:00 – 12:45 ___________________________________________________________________ 9 PANEL 2: DIASPORA POLITICS AND FOREIGN POLICY: THE CASE OF ISRAEL _____________________________ 9 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT - UZI REBHUN, HEBREW UNIVERSITY _____________________________________ 9

Gabriel Sheffer, Hebrew University ________________________________________________ 9 Israel, the Jewish Diaspora and Foreign Policy in a Comparative Perspective ________________ 9 Natan Aridan Ben-Gurion University of the Negev ___________________________________ 10 Working out the Relationship: Israel and its Advocates: Converging and Diverging Paths from AZPAC to J-Street _____________________________________________________________ 10 Yossi Shain, Tel Aviv University __________________________________________________ 10 Jewish Politics in Transition-The Shifting Character of the Division of Labor between Israel and the Diaspora _________________________________________________________________ 10 Both countries guard the security interests of Jews in other states. The implicit division of labor between the two countries is a function of a ________________________________________ 11 number of variables, including relations between each of them and other countries where Jews live; the ideological disposition of the Israeli ________________________________________ 11 government of the day (including the importance it gives to Diaspora matters); the agendas of American Jewish organizations; objective threats to Jewish physical security in Israel and other countries, and the resources Israelis and Diaspora Jews command to meet them; the strength and organizational quality of local Jewish communities, and their ties to specific Jewish organizations abroad and to government officials in Israel and other countries primarily the United States. ________________________________________________________________ 11

14:00 – 16:00 __________________________________________________________________ 11 PANEL 3: DEMOCRACY, CIVIL & COLLECTIVE RIGHTS – THE CASE OF THE ARAB MINORITY __________________ 11 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT: URIEL ABULOF, TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY ___________________________________ 11

Yifat Maoz, Hebrew University ___________________________________________________ 11 Planned Encounters between Israeli Jews and Arabs: An Overview ______________________ 11 Oded Haklai, Queen's University _________________________________________________ 12




2

State-Minority Relations in Israel: The Challenge of Internal Palestinian Nationalism ________ 12 Hillel Frisch, Bar-Ilan University __________________________________________________ 13 Israel's Geo-Strategic Setting: Israel, and its Arab _________________________ Citizens 13 Amal Jamal, Tel Aviv University __________________________________________________ 14 Redefining the Jewish State and the Hollowing out _____________ of Palestinian Citizenship 14

16:15-18:15 ____________________________________________________________________ 15 PANEL 4: ISRAEL AND THE WORLD POWERS ________________________________________________ 15 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT – URI BIALER, HEBREW UNIVERSITY _____________________________________ 15

Kenneth Stein, Emory University _________________________________________________ 15 US-Israeli Relations 1947-2010: The View from Washington ___________________________ 15 Guy Laron, Hebrew University ___________________________________________________ 16 The Politics of Reconciliation & Intimidation: Israeli-Soviet Relations 1963-1977 ____________ 16 Ziv Rubinovitz, Hebrew University, ________________________________________________ 16 The Past is Present: The Carter-Begin Friction over the Autonomy Plan and Settlements______ 16 Stephan Stetter, University of Munich, ____________________________________________ 17 EU–Israel Relations ___________________________________________________________ 17 EU-Israeli Relations in a Changing Global Political Order: ______________________________ 17 How does the Gradual Change towards a Post-Westphalian System Shape This Relationship? _ 17

DAY III __________________________________________________________________________ 18

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6TH: "ISRAEL IN INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE" ________________________ 18

08:45-10:30 ____________________________________________________________________ 18 PANEL 1: THE STATE OF CONFLICT, INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS AND NORMS – ISRAEL BETWEEN COMPLIANCE &

DEFIANCE _______________________________________________________________________ 18 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT - GAD BARZILAI, UNIVERSITY OF HAIFA AND UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON ___________ 18

Amichai Magen, IDC, Herzliya; Hoover Institution, Stanford University on Legal and Institutional Development in Israel _________________________________________________________ 18 Janice Stein, University of Toronto ________________________________________________ 18 Inside Out: Israel as the Exposed Nerve of the International Legal Order __________________ 18 Robbie Sable, Hebrew University _________________________________________________ 19 Israel and UN Resolutions ______________________________________________________ 19

10:45-12:30 ____________________________________________________________________ 19 PANEL 2: ISRAEL IN A GLOBALIZING ECONOMY – OPPORTUNITIES AND CONSTRAINTS _____________________ 19 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT: GALIA PRESS-BARNATHAN, HEBREW UNIVERSITY ____________________________ 19

Lior Herman, Hebrew University, _________________________________________________ 19 Pecunia non olet: Israel and the Global Anti- ________________ Money Laundering Regime 19 Alfred Tovias, Hebrew University _________________________________________________ 19 Which Economic Anchor Works Best: The EU or the OECD? _________________________ 19 Uri Bialer, Hebrew University ____________________________________________________ 20 The Power of the Weak: Israel’s Secret Oil Diplomacy 1948-1957 _______________________ 20

13:45-15:30 ____________________________________________________________________ 21 PANEL 3: ISRAEL AND ITS NONSTATE NEIGHBORS - DIMENSIONS OF CONFLICT AND PEACE _________________ 21 CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT: SHLOMO HASSON, HEBREW UNIVERSITY _________________________________ 21

Yael Ahronoff, Michigan State University __________________________________________ 21 The Challenges of Asymmetric Conflict: Continuing Questions from the Israeli Experience ____ 21 Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, Hebrew University _________________________________________ 22 Justice and Morality in Peace-Making _____________________________________________ 22 Alex Mintz, Shaul Mishal & Nadav Morag, IDC Herzliya _______________________________ 22 Polythink: Israeli Decision Making at Camp David 2000 and Beyond _____________________ 22

15:45-18:00 ____________________________________________________________________ 23 PANEL 4: "HOW SHOULD WE STUDY ISRAEL?" ______________________________________________ 23




3

CHAIR AND DISCUSSANT - GALIA GOLAN, IDC HERZLIYA ________________________________________ 23 Transformation of an Intractable Conflict: Breakthroughs and Failures for Israel in the Arab-Israeli Conflict ________________________________________________________________ 23 P.R. Kumaraswamy, Nehru University, New Delhi ____________________________________ 24 Teaching Israel to the Other_____________________________________________________ 24 Kenneth Stein, Emory University _________________________________________________ 25 How we study Israel? __________________________________________________________ 25 Avraham Sela, Hebrew University ________________________________________________ 25 Studying Israel Inside-Out & Outside-In ____________________________________________ 25




4

Day I

Monday, June 4th: Opening Session

17:00-19:00 Opening Panel: Israel at its 60s: Between Past and Present Chair/Discussant – Itzhak Galnoor, Hebrew University and Van Leer Institute

Alan Dowty, University of Notre Dame

International Perspectives of the First Zionist Settler

The early Zionist settlers in Ottoman Palestine – the first aliya, roughly 1882-1905 – had at least three choices in their orientation toward regional and international forces. They could see themselves as part of a European civilizing mission that was bringing modernization to less developed areas of the world. They could see themselves as an indigenous people seeking to reclaim its Middle Eastern roots, either in cooperation or conflict with existing populations. They could, at least theoretically, also see Jewish settlement in Palestine as a continuation of traditional Jewish pattern of minority communities existing within host populations. The dominant perspective was largely shaped by the background of many first aliya settlers as refugees embittered by what they saw as the failure of assimilation in Tsarist Russia, and this perspective was in turn a critical factor in shaping the political culture of the Jewish yishuv in Palestine and the state of Israel.

Naomi Chazan, Truman Institute

Political Realignment in Israel? Neo-Nationalists vs. Democrats

Israel has experienced a process of democratic recession in recent years, punctuated by public campaigns against minorities, civil society organizations, pluralist religious groups, academic institutions and the media. During the past year, these campaigns have taken on legislative form aimed at institutionalizing a new nationalist worldview in the formal political arena.




5

At the same time, the threat to substantive democracy has fuelled a reconsolidation of democratic forces at the level of civil, highlighted by the mobilization of hundreds of thousands of citizens in the social justice protests of last summer. This paper will trace these developments, explore their roots and discuss their implications for the country both domestically and internationally.

Benny Miller, University of Haifa

Israel’s Territorial Orientation: Is Israel a Revisionist, Status-quo or Failed State?

This article investigates variations in the territorial orientation of Israel. I introduce a typology of states’ territorial orientations based on four major types of states: revisionist (or expansionist), failed, frontier, and status quo. The essay then introduces the argument that the s/n balance is a key factor affecting the state’s territorial orientation. More specifically, the combined effect of variations in the extent of success in state-building (strong or weak states) and nation- building (nationally congruent or incongruent) shapes the level and the type of the state orientation by producing different categories of states with regard to their territorial ambitions and control. Strong states but nationally incongruent generate revisionist or the “Greater” states, which seek to expand their territorial control. The combination of state strength and national congruence leads to a status quo state. Weakness and incongruence bring about civil conflicts and loss of control by the state in at least parts of its territory in “failed” states. Weakness but congruence produce the “frontier state” with boundary and territorial conflicts, but also with a reasonable likelihood of evolution of status quo orientation over time. From the end of the War of Independence to the Six-Day-War Israel was a status-quo power committed to defend the outcome of the 1949 armistices even though one opposition party—the Herut party-- entertained explicitly revisionist ambitions. Irrespective of the pre-war goals, the 1956 War—rather than revising these boundaries—helped to consolidate them. However, following the 1967 War a stronger Israel adopted some revisionist polices even if it didn’t endorse the ultimate objectives of the nationalist “Greater Israel” movement. These revisionist policies are based at least in part on the national incongruence of pre-1967 Israel due to the supposed Jewish “national historic rights” in Judea and Samaria. The most important revisionist policies are the annexation of E. Jerusalem and the policy of settling the occupied




6

territories. Settlers beyond the original boundaries of the state tend to create or reinforce revisionist inclinations of the state. Still, the revisionist inclinations had some limits due to the tension inherent in Jewish nationalism between on the one hand reducing national (historical) incongruence by controlling territories with nationalist importance and, on the other hand, enhancing national (demographic) congruence by not adding more non-Jews to the state. Thus, although the unification of Jerusalem was almost a consensual policy (but not since the 2000 Camp David summit), the settlements, esp. at the heart of the West Bank and in Gaza triggered major domestic controversies. Moreover, the peace treaty with Egypt led to the dismantling of the settlements in the Sinai and in 2005 the settlements in Gaza were also evacuated with the Israeli disengagement from there. While the disengagement from Gaza showed the strength of the Israeli state to impose its will on hard-liner ideologues, recent incidents in the West Bank raise some questions about the capacity of the Israeli state to impose law and order in relation to the much more numerous and extremist settlers there, thus raising the specter of Israel as a “failed state” at least in this crucial domain. However, support of most of the public and the political system, at least formally, in the two-state solution based on the 1967 lines (with mutually agreed territorial swaps)—in order to reduce the national demographic incongruence-- show the potential for Israel to return to be a status-quo state.

Day II

Tuesday, June 5th: "State, Society and Foreign Policy Making"

09:00 – 10:45 Panel 1: The Politics of Identity and Security Chair and Discussant - Arie Kacowicz, Hebrew University




7

Oren Barak , Hebrew University

Security Relations in Israel - Looking Through the Mirror

Among the many works dealing with Israel's pattern of civil-security relations there are only a limited number of studies that compare Israel to other, relevant cases. Still, these comparisons are interesting because they help us better characterize the Israeli case. In this paper, I draw on these comparative works in order to elucidate the Israeli case. I also suggest what kind of additional comparisons might be useful to better comprehend it. My main emphasis is on three major questions that are related to Israel's pattern of civil-security relations, and which, moreover, have political significance. These questions are: (a) Is there a differentiation between Israel's civilian and security spheres? (b) Is there effective (and not merely formal) civilian control over the military and the other security agencies in Israel? (c) What is the relationship between the various sectors of Israeli society, and particularly its Jewish and Arab Palestinian communities, and how is this relationship reflected in the security sector?

Ron Krebs, University of Minnesota

Insecurity, War, and Israel’s Democracy

The question is whether what I would want to write would fit well with the conference themes. The conference rationale talks about second-image reversed effects, but it seems, based on the panels and much of the rationale, that the real focus is on foreign policy as the explanandum. As you know, my own research on Israel has been of late firmly second-image-reversed, and while the natural extension is to think about further feedback effects -- that is, how these second-image-reversed dynamics shape foreign policy -- it's a bit premature for me to do so. What I would like to write, and what would fit very well for the kind of "big statement" edited volume you seem to have in mind, is a broad piece on how Israel's security situation has shaped its democratic development. I think the story is far more complicated than our usual, rather simple accounts that either valorize Israel (look how democratic we are when any other nation would have become a classic garrison state!) or condemn Israel (lsrael is an ethnodemocracy--and the security situation has nothing to do with it!). One theme of the article, consistent with the conference themes, is thinking about the Israeli experience in comparative perspective -- what we learn about Israel from other nation's experiences with conflict, and what the Israeli case suggests about dynamics that might take




8

place elsewhere that scholars have ignored. Finally, I think I'd close the piece with some speculation about what Israel might look like in the _absence_ of intense security threats.

Amir Lupovici, Tel Aviv University

Reading Copenhagen School in Israel

Since the 1990s a growing number of scholars use the concept securitization developed by Buzan et al. (1998) to denote the process through which different issues are constructed as existential threats and thus require taking ‘extraordinary measures’ in order to address them. While the concept is very fertile and has been implemented to explore different kinds of threats in a number of countries and regions, the concept has been used in the study of security issues in Israel to a very limited extent. In this respect, although scholars have pointed to the need to implement the concept of securitization to explore Israel (Barak and Sheffer, 2007: 19-20), or exemplified the utility of this concept by considering examples from Israel (Buzan and Waever, 2009: 263), with only few exceptions of studies that comprehensively explore securitization processes in Israel (e.g., Coskun, 2011; Abulof, 2012) the research remains marginal and anecdotal. This is somewhat puzzling given the fact that Israel is considered to be a country with a prevalent security discourse, and in which existential threats are often highlighted (e.g., in Barak and Sheffer, 2009). Furthermore, scholars do address similar and overlapping assertions concerning, for example, politics of fear (Rosler, 2011), and analyze public opinion surveys regarding existential threats Israel is facing (e.g., Arian, 1999; Ben Meir and Bagno-Moldavsky, 2010). Nonetheless, these important studies are not combined with the rich literature of securitization.

I argue that the integration of the concept of securitization with current scholarship concerning Israel's security issues is promising as it allows conducting a more rigorous comparative study of these matters. As such, it helps to improve our understanding of Israel security practices by providing useful tools to look into the politics and discourse that create framings of (in)security as evident in other states. In addition, studying securitization processes in Israel has useful implications to theories of securitization exactly because Israel is characterized by noticeable security discourse, and because there is rich evidence regarding them from different and complementary scholarly perspectives. In addition, studying securitization in Israel may contribute to the emerging debate on the relevancy of the concept of securitization outside Western Europe (e.g., Bilgin, 2011; Wilkinson, 2011).




9

The paper is built of three main parts. First, I demonstrate how despite the great impact of this concept in IR the study of securitization of Israel is rather limited. Second, I briefly discuss a number of alterative explanations to this scarcity and use this discussion to show the importance of incorporating this concept to the study of Israel and to show how it can be done. Lastly, I discuss the implications and advantages of implementing the concept of securitization to study Israel, both regarding understanding Israel security and regarding securitization theories.

11:00 – 12:45 Panel 2: Diaspora Politics and Foreign Policy: The Case of Israel Chair and discussant - Uzi Rebhun, Hebrew University

Gabriel Sheffer, Hebrew University

Israel, the Jewish Diaspora and Foreign Policy in a Comparative Perspective

I'll discuss the following issues: a. the growing numbers of ethno-national diasporas who are actively involved in various significant matters concerning their homelands; b. The growing involvements of homelands in the development and activities of their ethno-national diasporas; c. The various actual impacts of these mutual involvements and relationships, on their homelands', host-lands', as well as on the diasporas' foreign policies: d. the main changes in the relevant cultural, social and political situations in Israel and in the Jewish Diaspora; e. the consequent main changes in the relationship between Israel and the Jewish Diaspora that have, or have not, recently been reflected in Israeli foreign policies in general, and especially in regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (among other things I'll mention the Jerusalem issue about which I am publishing now a book); f. the impacts of Israeli politics and policies on the Jewish Diaspora and its relationship with its host-states; g. some general methodological, analytical and theoretical observations about homelands-diasporas relations in the sphere of politics and especially foreign politics and policies.




11

Natan Aridan Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

Working out the Relationship: Israel and its Advocates: Converging and Diverging Paths from AZPAC to J-Street

The paper aims to fill the void in historical research on the subject of pro-Israel advocacy which hitherto has been terra incognita. Introducing unpublished primary sources and oral testimonies from Israeli, U.S. and British archives, it accounts for and examines the attitudes, policies, perceived roles, and dilemmas faced by Israeli diplomats and Diaspora Jewry which served as 'transnational actors' in furthering Israel's cause in helping to establish both an official and unofficial Israeli lobby during Israel's formative years. The paper elucidates upon the unique symbiosis, converging and diverging paths of the fascinating and multifarious relationship between Israel's diplomatic missions and the pro-Israel advocates in the Diaspora till the present. In reveals that although Israel initiated and aimed to direct lobbying, the power and success of the Israel lobby derived from loyal citizens in the Diaspora who often in their zeal, lobbied their governments to pursue policies which Israel had neither initiated nor sanctioned.

Yossi Shain, Tel Aviv University

Jewish Politics in Transition-The Shifting Character of the Division of Labor between Israel and the Diaspora

Israel is today the focal point of Jewish identity and unity world wide, but this unique status is often noted than analyzed. Moreover, it is unclear how exactly Jewish Kinship functions--particularly for those Jews who are secular or even atheist and who have no intention of even visiting Israel let alone settling there. One of the questions I will ask is therefore, how kinship ties are manifested in the behavior of "stronger" Jewish communities towards Israel as well as their weaker or less advantageously positioned counterparts? From a security FP and perspective, every Jew in the world today has two countries; Israel and the United States (meaning both the government and the Jewish community).




11

Both countries guard the security interests of Jews in other states. The implicit division of labor between the two countries is a function of a

number of variables, including relations between each of them and other countries where Jews live; the ideological disposition of the Israeli

government of the day (including the importance it gives to Diaspora matters); the agendas of American Jewish organizations; objective threats to Jewish physical security in Israel and other countries, and the resources Israelis and Diaspora Jews command to meet them; the strength and organizational quality of local Jewish communities, and their ties to specific Jewish organizations abroad and to government officials in Israel and other countries primarily the United States.

14:00 – 16:00 Panel 3: Democracy, Civil & Collective Rights – The Case of the Arab Minority Chair and discussant: Uriel Abulof, Tel Aviv University

Yifat Maoz, Hebrew University

Planned Encounters between Israeli Jews and Arabs: An Overview

Attempts at improving intergroup relations through organized

encounters between Jewish and Arab citizens of Israel began sporadically already in the 1950s, when the Arab population in Israel was still under military rule. They continued through the 1960s and the 1970s, at which time several large-scale programs of planned encounters between Israeli Jews and Arabs were established (Maoz, 2006). In the 1980s planned encounters between Jewish and Arab citizens of Israel grew rapidly in number and altered their form and objectives. A series of public opinion surveys indicated growing right-wing extremism and increased anti-democratic and anti-Arab tendencies among Israeli Jews (Zemach, 1986; Maoz, 2000). These trends evoked concern among Jewish educators and served as a strong trigger for the initiation, expansion and institutalization of contact interventions between Israeli Jews and Arabs. Thus, planned encounters between Israeli Jews and Arabs became part of a quickly expanding category of intergroup contact interventions used to address different conflicts and intergroup tensions




12

around the world as well as to address and improve intra-state minority-majority relations.

Oded Haklai, Queen's University

State-Minority Relations in Israel: The Challenge of Internal Palestinian Nationalism

Up until recently, relations between Israel and its Arab minority received little attention in analyses of the broader context of the Palestinian-Israel conflict. The domestic ethnonational divide has typically been treated as unrelated to the regional conflict. However, over the last two decades, the patterns of Arab political mobilization in Israel have undergone considerable transition. Multiple political organizations - parliamentary and nonparliamentary - have emerged, making demands on the Israeli state in the name of Palestinian minority nationalism in Israel. Among other things, many of these organizations claim that they are an integral component of the Palestinian nation, and that without addressing majority-minority relations in Israel, the conflict cannot be fully resolved. These patterns mark a significant shift from the quiescence of the 1950-1960s (Lustick 1980) or the Communist mobilization of the 1970s and 1980s (Kaufman 1997). What accounts for the Palestinian ethnonational turn in Arab politics in Israel? What are its implications, if any, for Israel and for the regional conflict?

This paper argues that the changes in the patterns of Arab political mobilization in Israel should not be viewed through the conventional narrow lens of state-minority, or majority-minority, relations alone, but in the general context of Israeli politics as a whole. In contrast to conventional wisdom, I claim that the transition in Arab politics cannot be attributed just to the

minority’s grievances or its Palestinian identity. Rather it is a result of broader changes in Israeli state-society relations, including the decentralization of power and authority, intra-Jewish social and political fragmentation and parochialism, and an increase in political competition. With the centrifugal transition of authority away from the central government to other institutions, such as the judiciary, civil society organization, and private actors in the economy, multiple political parties and civil society organizations representing a wide spectrum of particularistic interests emerged in Israel over recent decades (including religious groups of various stripes, settlers, secularist-liberals, immigrants from Russia, and so on and so forth).




13

With their proliferation, Israeli politics and society at large have become more divided and parochial. The transition of Arab politics in Israel both mirrors overall changes in the patterns of Israeli politics and is a result of changes in intra-majority politics that, on the surface, seem unrelated to it.

As long as these state-society conditions prevail, mutual parochialism – including Palestinian ethnonational mobilization – are likely to persist if not intensify. At the same time, the patterns of mobilization remain typically contained within the institutionalized channels of Israeli politics: political parties, litigation-centered activism, and civil society mobilization. Mobilization rarely digresses to violence and illegal politics.

In relation to potential impact on the regional conflict, the particularistic claims made by Palestinian ethnonational forces in Israel - including demands for consociationalism, increased autonomy for the minority, and proportional representation, -have thus far not featured in discussions between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators. At the same time, it has been suggested that the growing vociferousness of the minority on the domestic front has made it more difficult for the Palestinian negotiators to recognize Israel as a Jewish state lest they be accused of selling out their co-nationals in Israel.

Hillel Frisch, Bar-Ilan University

Israel's Geo-Strategic Setting: Israel, and its Arab Citizens

Even though Israel's external security profile is continually in the news, the subject of numerous studies in international relations, most scholars who have written on Israel's Arab minority have analyzed its political experience almost exclusively within the framework of state-minority or majority-minority ethnic relations.

These oversights are all the more surprising since the external security dimension has become increasingly central to the study of ethnicity and nationalism as concepts such as ethnic security dilemmas became central in the literature. The following paper builds on the seminal works of Otto Hintze, Peter Gourevitch’s "Second Image Reversed", Putnam's two-level games, Barnett, Solingen and Shafir in demonstrating that the quality of the relationship between the Israeli state and the predominant community and Israel's Arab citizens has been to a great extent a function of Israel's broader regional geo-strategic security situation. Generally, policies towards Israel's




14

Arab citizens moderated in (the rare) times of relative geo-strategic security and hardened when Israel's regional position became more precarious.

Economic liberalization was a key intervening variable, which as Barnett and Soligen have shown, was both initiated by the Israeli elite, amongst other reasons, to maintain Israel's long-tern strategic edge, and mandated by structural forces related to globalization. Israel’s Arab citizens were the unintended beneficiaries of such policies.

The relationship also explains Israeli Arab mobilization patterns. Arab citizens protested most when the Israeli Jewish public was most divided as the inter-state conflict declined and the Palestinian issue rose as the political opportunities model in the field of contentious politics would have us expect. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the containment of Iraq and the formation of the Rabin government and the Oslo peace process in the early 1990s, Israeli Arabs strategically mobilized to advance their collective goals in the face of a divided Jewish public.

But in the recent decade, Israel’s geo-strategic situation has once again deteriorated in the face of a growing Iranian threat. The Israeli public has serried ranks and reducing the effectiveness of Arab protest, which is why, contrary to the expectations of many, Israeli Arab mobilization after the al-Aqsa intifada actually declined.

Amal Jamal, Tel Aviv University

Redefining the Jewish State and the Hollowing out of Palestinian Citizenship

This paper claims that recent legislative and judicial policies in Israel mirror efforts made to redefine the meaning of the Jewish state. The prospect boarders, the demographic composition, the political culture and the material resources are being remolded in order to meet a close nationalist and chauvinist meaning of the "Jewishness" of the Israeli state. The paper demonstrates how this hegemonic project submits contenders to new forms of governmentality, based on rigid lines of loyalty. It claims that leaders of the project utilize majoritarian despotism in order to redefine the meaning of citizenship, which is reflected in many new legislations that stand in clear contradiction with the identity and political rights of the Palestinian minority in Israel. The Nakba Law, the Citizenship Law, the Boycott Law and the




15

Admission Committees Law are partial examples of the anti-democratic laws that aim to hollow out Arab citizenship from any substantial meaning. The paper also demonstrates how discriminatory demographic planning, housing and geographic zoning policies aim to normalize the hegemonic interpretation of the Jewish identity of the state, as the national home of the entire Jewish people, emptying the principle of civic sovereignty from any democratic meaning. The paper reflects on the legislative activism of the last decade, claiming that it renders Palestinians fragmented and uprooted- floating subgroups in segregated zones, living in continuous and consolidated Jewish space. The contentious strategy of the Palestinian community to counter Israeli policies has been the priming of its indigenous identity and its demand for full equal civic rights. The paper ends up with demonstrating how the unwillingness of the Jewish majority to accept such demands have made the surveillance and control policies of the state more vicious.

16:15-18:15 Panel 4: Israel and the World Powers Chair and discussant – Uri Bialer, Hebrew University

Kenneth Stein, Emory University

US-Israeli Relations 1947-2010: The View from Washington

From the American vantage point, at least three components tightly tie the US-Israeli

relationship: mutual strategic interests, shared values, and American public opinion. A

fourth and often understated core bond is the attitude of American officials,

Republican or Democrat, who have positive feelings toward Jews, Judaism or Israel.

A repetitive countervailing force against a positive US-Israeli relationship has been

negative feeling emanating from American policy-makers and bureaucrats. Frequently

neutralizing this predisposition to tilt against Israel has been Arab and Moslem state

action that either habitually rebuked or angered official American overtures. The

unintended result was to leave Israel sometimes as a sole reliable friend in an

uncertain neighborhood. Using oral interviews, presidential archives, and secondary

sources, this paper will chart the ups and downs of the bilateral relationship, one often

strewn with caustic disagreements, but in the end of crucial value to respective

national interests.




16

Guy Laron, Hebrew University

The Politics of Reconciliation & Intimidation: Israeli-Soviet Relations 1963-1977

This paper cites Levi’s Eshkol decision, upon his entry to the prime minister's

office, to change Israel's policy toward the Soviet Union in the hope that better

relations would contribute to a relaxation of regional tensions. Eshkol made several

gestures toward Moscow to convey his goodwill, but the Soviet Union never came up

with a meaningful response. Golda Meir took a more combative approach and

endorsed the “Let My People Go” campaign, which embarrassed the Soviet Union

greatly. But rather than reacting with anger, by the 1970s it was Moscow that was

courting Israel. Internal conflicts in the Kremlin, deteriorating relations with the Arab

world and Brezhnev's embrace of détente go a long way toward explaining Moscow's

shifting moods.

Ziv Rubinovitz, Hebrew University,

The Past is Present: The Carter-Begin Friction over the Autonomy Plan and Settlements

This paper will present the friction between the U.S. and Israel over the autonomy plan and the issue of moratorium on settlements. Tension was present from the moment Menachem Begin became prime minister, and its climax was at the last night meeting of the Camp David summit on September 16, 1978, followed by a period of diplomatic friction that was never resolved. During the post-Camp David friction (and ever since), President Carter had implied that Begin deceived him on the question of moratorium on West Bank settlements. The paper is based on recently declassified documents in Israel and the U.S. that allow assessing the conflicting positions. It will focus on the ideological bases of Begin’s autonomy plan, which was designed to balance between his Zionist-Revisionist ideology and regional and international political reality that unfolded at the time. The plan represented pragmatism and realism which incorporated compromises between Begin’s ideological beliefs that the occupied territories belong to Israel as of historical right (he constantly argued that they were the patrimony), and the political necessity to settle the Palestinian issue without accepting that they have a right for self determination. Hence the plan was to control the territory but not the inhabitants. Declassified documents shed new light on the autonomy plan as well as on the related issue of the duration of the moratorium on settlement activity. Although the paper will focus on the 1977-1979 era, its content remains relevant to current discussions on the Middle East conflict. The concept of




17

autonomy evolved over the years in various directions, and the issue of moratorium on settlements returned in 2009 when President Obama demanded it from Prime Minister Netanyahu. Therefore, Begin's autonomy plan and the moratorium are relevant today was they were during Begin's premiership. Revisiting them seems consequently valuable.

Stephan Stetter, University of Munich,

EU–Israel Relations

EU-Israeli Relations in a Changing Global Political Order:

How does the Gradual Change towards a Post-Westphalian System Shape This Relationship?

The paper situates EU-Israeli relations within theories of global political order in International Relations (IR). It starts from the observation that the literature on EU-Israeli relations often makes implicit assumptions about how this relationship relates to structures, institutions and processes of the world political system. The aim of the paper is to give these assumptions a more explicit outlook. It argues that the ups and downs of EU-Israeli relations can be understood in a more coherent manner if studied against the backdrop of a conceptual matrix guided by theories on changing dynamics of global political order in International Relations (IR). More specifically, it suggest that understanding this relationship as being deeply affected by a gradual change from a Westphalian to a post-Westphalian global political order has much to offer to the debate. The paper is divided into three sections. Section one looks at the two predominant approaches to the study of EU-Israeli relations, namely policy-oriented analysis and analyses drawing from Foreign Policy Analysis. I show that these theories have implicit assumptions about global political order which can be made visible when relating them to theories of change in global political order. In the second part, the paper elaborates on that basis on the distinction between a Westphalian and a post-Westphalian order as a way of capturing the broader global structures and norms to which EU-Israeli relations relate. In the third part the paper then applies these conceptual insights to a discussion of EU-Israeli relations over the last 30 years.




18

Day III

Wednesday, June 6th: "Israel in International Perspective"

08:45-10:30 Panel 1: The State of Conflict, International Organizations and Norms – Israel between Compliance & Defiance Chair and discussant - Gad Barzilai, University of Haifa and University of Washington

Amichai Magen, IDC, Herzliya; Hoover Institution, Stanford University on Legal and Institutional Development in Israel

This presentation helps theorize external influence on domestic legal and institutional

change by summarizing findings from a recently published article exploring the

degree, conditions, and pathways by which instances of institutional and legal change

in Israel can be traced back to the EU. The presentation theorizes the processes and

mechanisms by which EU diffusion into the Israeli domestic system might occur, and

identifies the main factors that facilitate and hamper receptivity to EU influence.

While there is little evidence that deliberate EU influence mechanisms – manipulation

of utility calculations, socialization, or persuasion – have produced substantial impact,

Israelis emerge as highly selective, sophisticated emulators of EU institutions –

adapting and implementing EU standards in specific policy-realms, typically as the

result of two distinct mechanisms of emulation: competition and lesson-drawing. The

article demonstrates the possibility of variable pathways of diffusion of EU rules,

standards, and norms beyond Europe, and advances existing knowledge of the

conditions and pathways of emulation – the least understood mechanism of diffusion.

Janice Stein, University of Toronto

Inside Out: Israel as the Exposed Nerve of the International Legal Order




19

Robbie Sable, Hebrew University

Israel and UN Resolutions

10:45-12:30 Panel 2: Israel in a Globalizing Economy – Opportunities and Constraints Chair and discussant: Galia Press-Barnathan, Hebrew University

Lior Herman, Hebrew University,

Pecunia non olet: Israel and the Global Anti- Money Laundering Regime

Money laundering became an increasing challenge for the international community in recent decades. In a globalised world, the significance of fighting money laundering lays in the negative financial and societal consequences that money laundry and related criminal activity has on states and societies. Taking Israel as a case study, this paper argues that that an anti-money laundering regime has developed and institutionalised over the past decade. While several incentivising factors for international cooperation were at play (e.g. the globalisation of financial markets), it was only after an external shock took place that a formal regime developed. Thus, the 9/11 attack and subsequently the global war on terror served as catalysts for the creation of international institutions, norms, procedures and rules for decision-making and enforcement against money laundering. The creation and institutionalisation of the global regime had decisive effects on transforming Israel’s policy, which was based on passive encouragement of money laundering coming from abroad and avoidance of anti-money laundering legislation despite international pressure to enact such legislation.

Alfred Tovias, Hebrew University

Which Economic Anchor Works Best: The EU or the OECD?

The paper focuses on the double process of Israel's progressive adjustment to and homologation of foreign norms and standards by negotiating an Action Plan with the European Union which should lead to the conclusion later on of a new Neighbourhood Agreement with the latter; and second, by opting for OECD membership. The paper shows that economic reforms are facilitated




21

by the paradoxical fact that Europe itself shares with Israel an increasing number of demographic and socio-economic features. But the policitization of the ENP has had backfiring effects, whereas the soft conditionality applied constantly on Israeli policy-makers by OECD membership seems to work pretty smoothly and with surprising effects. Not surprisingly, the popularity of the OECD among Israeli policy-makers and media is on the rise, while the one of the EU is stagnant or declining, partly as a function of its recent domestic difficulties and partly as a result of the increasing gap between capabilities and expectations regarding the EU's external action.

Uri Bialer, Hebrew University

The Power of the Weak: Israel’s Secret Oil Diplomacy 1948-1957

Petroleum was during the first twenty years of the Israel’s existence the only practical source of energy for its rapidly growing population and its expanding and modernizing economy. As such, it was no less a basic existential problem than the supply of armaments. However, despite almost crippling financial limitations, the chief constraints in obtaining crude oil and its refined products were political. Governments and the major oil companies, primarily British and American (and later the Soviets and the Iranians, too) viewed the issue predominantly from the perspective of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Nevertheless, Israel pursued an ambitious oil policy, whose aims extended well beyond the supply of minimal civilian and military requirements. It sought to reestablish the Haifa oil refinery (a British enterprise, in operation since 1939) as a supplier of domestic demand (to include a newly-established petrochemical industry) and of export-earned foreign exchange. For these purposes the pipeline from Iraq to Haifa was expected to be reactivated and/or the Suez Canal opened for tankers serving Haifa. Moreover, the Israeli government repeatedly tried to break the monopolistic price structure imposed on the domestic oil market during the British Mandate regime, and to abolish the tax-exempt status of the foreign oil companies. Although not all these goals were achieved Israel’s diplomacy during the

1948-68 period had been definitely successful. It managed to diversify Israel’s oil supplies by closing independent deals with Russia and Iran, and to somewhat improve its relations with the foreign companies operating domestically. Above all it secured supply agreements with Iran which not only became the main source of oil but helped developing the Red Sea port of Eilat into an oil depot, and constructing pipelines from there northward, eventually to Haifa, thus opening a new oil supply route (of Iranian crude and of Haifa-refined




21

products) to Europe. The paper aims at providing explanations for these successes of Israel’s diplomacy which can justifiably be defined as “Statescraft in the Dark”. The analysis of these endeavors necessitates at least a book length monograph. I shall therefore confine the paper to three major achievements of Israel’s secret oil diplomacy which has in fact remained in the dark well into the late 1990’s, these were keeping the British in (1949-50) , the secret diplomatic entry into Iran (1950) and the opening of the Iranian oil gates (1955-7) .

13:45-15:30 Panel 3: Israel and its Nonstate Neighbors - Dimensions of Conflict and Peace Chair and discussant: Shlomo Hasson, Hebrew University

Yael Ahronoff, Michigan State University

The Challenges of Asymmetric Conflict: Continuing Questions from the Israeli Experience

In the aftermath of Israel's Operation Cast Lead against Hamas in Gaza and the subsequent Goldstone Report alleging that Israel committed war crimes during that operation, there has been much debate as to whether low intensity conflict against a group operating from the midst of civilians in civilian clothing poses new dilemmas for militaries and whether new, amended, or specified rules of warfare for this particular kind of conflict need to be established. Soldiers on the ground have greater freedom to make operational tactical decisions that can have grave consequences. How does a military pursue militants in the midst of civilian areas, putting at risk some of these civilians, while simultaneously trying to make the populace oppose these militants? To what extent will Israel’s initiation of training for a “population coordination officer” successfully assist battalion and brigade commanders in taking into account the effects of planned operations on the civilian population? How does this impact the assessment of success? Does measuring success include an assessment of the ethics of the means used, the impact on diminishing the capacity of the enemy on the ground, or through the competing narratives constructed by media representations of the conflict? This paper will investigate the extent to which new rules of warfare




22

are needed for asymmetric conflict and how militaries can minimize the cost to civilians though analyzing Israel’s wars with Hamas and with Hezbollah. It will also examine the limits of these measures, and whether therefore the main way to weaken these groups is through peace agreements with alternative actors.

Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, Hebrew University

Justice and Morality in Peace-Making

The Israeli concept of peace in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process is mainly realistic and rational and not necessarily a normative one. Israel has an interest to make peace in order to end the conflict. Concluding the conflict has the potential to improve Israel's security and political stand. The issue of moral and justice plays some role in the negotiators' discourse but it is part of realistic and rational calculations rather than responsibility for the Palestinian suffering or because of a bad conscious. Nevertheless, in the Israeli concept of peace there two considerations of moral and justice. The first refers to the Palestinians demands from Israel to recognize the injustice it caused to the Palestinians and to accept the right of return. The second consideration refers to the occupation of the Palestinians and to the need to preserve Israel as a Jewish and a democratic state. While the first reconsideration relates to the outcomes of the 1947/9 war, the second consideration refers to the 1967 war outcomes. This paper will examines the dialectics of the two consideration throughout the peace process and the unilateral disengagement.

Alex Mintz, Shaul Mishal & Nadav Morag, IDC Herzliya

Polythink: Israeli Decision Making at Camp David 2000 and Beyond

This paper builds on the Polythink concept introduced by Mintz et al (2005) as an anti-thesis to the Groupthink concept. We discuss the polythink syndrome, the polythink symptoms and their implications for governmental decision making using a case study of members of the Israeli delegation at Camp David 2000. Based on in-depth interviews with the actual members of the delegation, we show that some decisions at Camp David were a by product of the Polythink syndrome. Implications for decisions taken by the current Israeli government in the areas of national security and foreign policy are then discussed.




23

15:45-18:00 Panel 4: "How Should we Study Israel?" Chair and discussant - Galia Golan, IDC Herzliya

Transformation of an Intractable Conflict: Breakthroughs and Failures for Israel in the Arab-Israeli Conflict

There have been many attempts at resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict altogether or in its parts (bi-lateral peace) since 1948. Most of them, obviously, failed though there have been notable breakthroughs even in some of the cases that ultimately failed, in addition to the two successful achievements of peace agreements (Israel-Egypt; Israel-Jordan). Rather than trace the history of peace attempts since 1967. I shall examine a number of breakthroughs and failures since 1967 in an effort to identify those factors which may have determined success or failure of conflict transformation and resolution. In his definition of intractable conflict, Louis Kriesberg (1998) suggests the following factors for transformation: leadership change, war weariness, high cost of continuing, loss of popular support, changes in the external environment, while William Zartman speaks of “ripeness” that occurs when there is a perception of a mutually hurting stalemate and perception of an opportunity in a push/pull type of interaction. Failure can be attributed to the absence or weakness of these factors in the battle against those elements that have made the conflict intractable, such as long standing grievances, deeply rooted identity issues, internalization of the conflict, failed efforts at resolution, repeated cycles of violence – to which a myriad of psychological (Bar tal; Halperin; Canetti), historical and religious (Ellman, Reiter, Hassner) factors may have contributed or may be added, along with the spoiler factor discussed by Stedman and others. I am not convinced that we can ever know with certainty just what caused success or failure; nor do I believe that we can confidently quantify the role of or relative value of each factor, particularly since there is often an interplay of factors, some more dominant some less salient (even unconscious), perhaps testable at a given time. Archival material, memoires, interviews all help our understanding, of course, but much is still highly subjective (and partial) as well as open to interpretation. (Viz. the numerous accounts of the Camp David talks, even by participants, or the absence of clear evidence that Rabin indeed intended to agree to the creation of an independent state). This said, I shall try to analyze the factors involved, for Israel, that determined the following breakthroughs or failures (partial list most likely): Breakthroughs: Failures: Jordan 1967




24

Egypt 1975, 1977-79 Jordan 1987? Oslo 1993 Oslo 1996 Syria (Rabin?) Camp David Jordan 1994 API maybe Olmert (Syria) Syria (Rabin,Barak) Olmert, Netanyahu

P.R. Kumaraswamy, Nehru University, New Delhi

Teaching Israel to the Other

While the Jewish people are the predominant consumers and distributors of academic discussions on Israel, Israel evokes considerable interest among people who are gentile, kafir, infidel and pagan. A vast majority of this ‘Other’ is unfamiliar, even alien, to the Judeo-Christian heritage, with which Israel is rather familiar when dealing with the West. They have little understanding or empathy for historical rights of the Jewish people to the land of their ancestors or the Promised Land. Indeed, the non-western world, especially the Asian part, is not only non-Christian but also predominately Islamic. In this part of the non-West, unfamiliarity with the Judeo-Christian heritage is often complemented by the new Judeo-Islamic conflict. How does one teach Israel to this ‘Other’? A central role of the United States in Israeli politics, foreign policy and worldview is natural and inevitable. But even from a purely political point of view, there has been a noticeable change in global power equation because of the decline of the western economy and the rise of the East. While the pre-eminence of the US is not in question, its longevity definitely is. The predominantly Christian Europe is no longer friendly towards Israel and its domestic politics is gravitating more towards the Arabs and the Palestinians than ever before. Is it possible to discuss Israel as a flourishing democracy without noticing and discussing its internal tensions, cleavages and fault-lines? How do we square the historic Jewish longing for statehood with the current Palestinian longing for similar rights? Can the excessive focus on the latter reach a point where one would tend to ignore and negate the former? It is not possible to ignore the accomplishments of Zionism in articulating the longing of a people scattered all over the world. Nor can this achievement be made subservient to




25

contemporary situations and political correctness? Against the daily news of Palestinian sufferings and subjugations, how does one communicate the millennium-old Jewish longing for freedom, epitomized by Moses himself? Israeli academics can afford to take their ideologies into their classrooms because there are alternate viewpoints available. The country’s vibrant political culture provides counterviews to every argument, interpretations and logic. Such conditions are a luxury in a gentile classroom. One cannot gloss over uncomfortable issues or wish away harsh realities: more people were killed after the Oslo agreement than before; Israeli Arabs are citizens without equal status. Questions abound. Can one be objective and honest without being judgmental or be less critical than of Israel than its leaders or harsher than Hamas? Can one indeed criticize Israel without being called an anti-Semite? A narrow anti-Muslim agenda might get quick friends but will not endure. Teaching Israel is even more a challenge when the students you engage have strong caste, color, gender, racial, linguistic and ideological contexts. . In the end what is the purpose of teaching Israel: to paint a rosy picture, to indoctrinate or to justify? Or to just generate considerable interest that Israel becomes a life-time passion for the young scholar? That choice will determine the answer to the original question: how to teach Israel to the Other?

Kenneth Stein, Emory University

How we study Israel?

There is more to Israel’s story than the recent “matzav,” or to the myth that Israel exists only as a response to the holocaust, or that it is only about the Arab-Israeli conflict. However, why has the history of a people so shaped by yesterday become so generally limited in knowing and telling their own story? Is it self-imposed apathy, weariness, or ignorance that has left its majority telling to the bias of charlatans and polemicists? Thirty-five years of teaching undergraduates and a dozen years of learning with 1800 pre-collegiate Jewish teachers loudly evokes a common finding: one cannot own Zionist and Israeli history unless one knows it. If it is worth knowing, where to begin? If not, what are the consequences?

Avraham Sela, Hebrew University

Studying Israel Inside-Out & Outside-In




26

In recent years numerous chairs of Israel Studies have been established in leading

universities in the United States and the United Kingdom. Whether representing a

growing demand for knowledge about the Jewish people and the State of Israel or a

response to Israel's growing erosion of international legitimacy, the growing interest

in the field and scope of academic courses, especially in the United States, requires a

thorough reflection on question represented by the title of this panel.

The study of Israel in Israeli academic institutions is typically marked by the

disciplines in which they are being taught and between historical and social approach.

While the former approach focuses on the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict the latter

takes interest in Israeli society and politics with little or no interest in its role at the

international level and in contemporary issues in our age.

With hindsight of nine years of experience in teaching an undergraduate course in the

Department of International Relations at the Hebrew University, the paper suggests

that the study of Israel should adopt an interactive approach comprised of domestic,

regional, and international perspectives, including those of state-society relations,

diplomacy security, and economics, as well as those of international law, Jewish

Diaspora and transnational identities. Additionally, though the Israeli state

undoubtedly carries some unique character traits, its study should adopt a comparative

and theoretical approach.

The study of Israel should thus adopt an historical-thematic approach for examining

factors that shape Israel’s foreign relations in the Middle East and the international

arena. Looking at critical factors shaping Israel’s national security policy, this

approach should enable us to distinguish elements which have been constant and

relatively unchanging from those that are more variable and subject to change. Special

attention should be paid to the effects of domestic politics, ideological conflicts and

decision-making processes on variations in Israel's national security and interactions

with the world, especially regional Arab players, including the development of armed

conflicts and the role of diplomacy and peacemaking efforts.

In view of Israel's geopolitical situation employing two complementary outlooks—

outside-in, and inside-out, in this order—offers a better understanding of Israel's

security and foreign policies in response to both regional and international constraints

and opportunities. At the same time, analyzing the Israeli perspectives and responses




27

towards regional and international players and processes sheds light on the domestic

politics and their impact on continuity and change in its foreign and security policies.

the leonard davis institute for international...

Documents