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Hawks of Different Feathers

(Jerusalem Post) Shlomo Avineri - There are two kinds of hawks in Israel: ideological and strategic. The ideological hawks view the territories as an integral part of the historical Land of Israel, the homeland of the Jewish people. For them these are part of the Jewish patrimony, referring to the West Bank by its Hebrew historical appellation - Judea and Samaria. For the strategic hawks, given Israel's narrow and vulnerable shape and continuing Arab enmity, controlling the West Bank and Gaza is not an ideological imperative, but one driven by security considerations. For them, Jewish settlements in the territories are security outposts, aimed at preventing or repelling an attack on the Israeli heartland. Ariel Sharon, coming from a military background - and growing up in a social milieu much nearer to Labor than to Jabotinsky's ideas - is a strategic hawk. Absent a Palestinian partner, and amid continuing Palestinian terrorism, Sharon appears to be following his strategic-oriented thinking: Set up an effective barrier, move some isolated and strategically untenable settlements - and wait for another day. The writer, a professor of political science at Hebrew University, was director-general of Israel's Foreign Ministry.
2004-02-16 00:00:00
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