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Demilitarization - Preventing Military and Terrorist Threats from Within and By Way of the Palestinian Territories

(Institute for Contemporary Affairs-Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs) Brig.-Gen. (res.) Udi Dekel - The Israeli demand for demilitarization of the Palestinian entity has been in effect since the 1993 Declaration of Principles, which served as the basis for the Oslo process and the establishment of the Palestinian Authority. Israel cannot tolerate living alongside an entity honing a terrorist infrastructure and hosting hostile military forces. Israel's definition of demilitarization is that no security threat develop either within or by way of Palestinian territory. Israel's current military freedom of operation in the West Bank, which enables the IDF to reach every place where prohibited arms are manufactured or hidden, has thus far prevented terrorists there from being able to manufacture rockets and launch them at Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. It has also enabled the IDF to intercept suicide bombers. Two main potential scenarios are liable to unfold in the wake of the establishment of a Palestinian state. The first involves threats to Israel from within a failed Palestinian state that serves as a base for terrorist infrastructures, as happened in Gaza. The second involves threats to Israel from the east, via Palestinian territory. In Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to date, the heads of the PLO and the PA have refused to agree to a definition of a Palestinian state that would be demilitarized. Brig.-Gen. Udi Dekel was appointed in 2008 by then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to head the Negotiations Unit with the Palestinians. Previously he served as head of the Israel Defense Forces Strategic Planning Division.
2010-05-26 08:40:50
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