Perhaps the most significant aspect of the unofficial peace agreement drawn up by Israelis and Palestinians in Geneva has been the reaction to it.

Some Israeli government officials have denounced it with the not so subtle suggestion that the Israelis who participated were traitors. The Bush administration gratuitously dismissed the exercise as irrelevant.

Both governments stated that the only game in town is the “road map,” which both privately concede is, at best, on life support, and which neither government shows any enthusiasm about reviving.

The Palestinian Authority ignored the Geneva draft until, according to journalist Ze’ev Schiff, Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat decided that if it drives Sharon crazy, it must be good.

The strangest criticism of the agreement is the charge that it is “virtual.” But the criticism is off point. Of course both the Israeli and Palestinian delegates understand that they are not engaged in official negotiations.

The point of Geneva, and other similar exercises, is to produce a draft document that, under appropriate conditions, could be the basis for an official agreement. It also serves to debunk the argument that “there is no one to talk to” on the Palestinian side. What’s wrong with any of this?

Some, especially in Israel, say negotiating unofficially with the other side is treasonous. But Israelis on the right and left have been doing it for years.

There were unofficial negotiations with Jordanians, Egyptians, Palestinians and Syrians long before such negotiations became official. That is how peace gets made, and not only in the Middle East.

As for the Israeli opposition going outside of the country to oppose government policy, that’s not new either. During the Labor governments of Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Ehud Barak, high-level Likud figures practically moved to Washington to urge Israel’s friends to oppose Israeli government policies.

Short-term fixes

For three years since the Camp David collapse, Israelis and Palestinians have, by necessity, focused on short-term fixes while avoiding discussion of what a final agreement would look like. That is understandable. It is hard to contemplate final status agreements with bombs and bullets flying.

Yet the focus on the short term has permitted both sides to forget what peace might actually look like. Sharon says he is willing to make “painful concessions” without spelling out what they might be. Palestinians say they are ready for peace with Israel but avoid saying if they are willing to accept Israel as a Jewish state.

This document helps fill in the blanks. And, according to a Yediot Achronot poll, some 39 percent of Israelis support these provisions even though no formal document has been presented.

The terms of the agreement track earlier attempts at a negotiated end to the conflict, most significantly those made at Camp David and Taba. According to media accounts, the terms include:

• Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, with borders close to the pre-1967 lines.

• Establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.

• Some 80 percent of settlers would be included within areas allotted to Israel with land transfers from Israel itself to make up for these West Bank lands remaining under Israeli control. The large settlements of Ariel and Efrat in the center of the West Bank would be in the Palestinian area.

• Palestinians would give up the right of return for all but a nominal number of refugees. Several thousand might go back, but only with Israeli agreement. Others would get compensation.

• Jerusalem would be divided administratively though not physically. The Temple Mount would be under Palestinian sovereignty. An international force would guarantee access for all visitors. Israelis would retain the Western Wall.

• Security arrangements would ensure that the Palestinian state would not be a military threat to Israel nor could any third state use the Palestinian state as a staging ground for attacks on Israel.

• Israel would retain control over Palestinian air space as well as over the borders with Egypt and Jordan.

It is unlikely that many Israelis or Palestinians will be happy with all of these terms. Other issues, including final borders, are also problematic. But this does not detract from the Geneva document’s significance.

The question then is where do Israelis and Palestinians go from here. That is hard to say. Previous experience provides little reason for optimism.

The 2002 Saudi initiative, which offered Israel full peace and normalization in exchange for the West Bank and Gaza, was ignored by both Israel and the United States and disappeared without a trace. Other initiatives, like the ones offered by George Mitchell and George Tenet, also vanished into the ether.

The same could happen to this one. History provides a warning.

In February 1971, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt sent word to Prime Minister Golda Meir that if Israeli forces withdrew from the banks of the Suez Canal, he would “restore diplomatic relations with the United States” and move swiftly “to sign a peace treaty with Israel.”

The Nixon administration encouraged Israel to test Sadat’s intentions by responding positively. But Meir rejected Sadat’s offer.

Two years later (30 years ago this month), Sadat initiated the Yom Kippur War to reopen the Suez Canal and to regain the Sinai. Repelling the Egyptian (and Syrian) assault cost the lives of 2,500 Israeli soldiers.

Could those lives have been saved if the Israeli government had pursued Sadat’s offer? No one knows. We only know what happened after it rejected the offer. In the end, Israel lost those lives and, after Sadat’s post-war peace initiative, every inch of the Sinai as well.

The 1971 experience demonstrates that often the most dangerous course of action is inaction. Ignoring the Geneva agreement, and similar initiatives, is far more risky than considering it.

No one can force Israel or the Palestinians to sign any agreement not in their perceived interests. But that does not mean that serious efforts to substitute negotiating for killing should not be welcomed.

At the very least, the Geneva document is something to talk about. It may be much more than that.

M. J. Rosenberg is director of policy analysis for the Israel Policy Forum in Washington, D.C. The views expressed here are not necessarily those of the Israel Policy Forum.