The Arab world has come to terms with the fact of Israel’s existence, that violence doesn’t help their cause, and that time is not on their side. The “dream of a Greater Palestine” is no longer part of their ethos.
So contended Colette Avital, Israeli diplomat, former deputy speaker of the Knesset (Labor Party) and former consul general to New York, in remarks at Congregation Sinai on Oct. 18.
Speaking to an audience of about 80, she said that violence in the Israel-administered territories is down, economic growth is up under the administration of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, and the Palestinians accept that they won’t get more than 22 percent of the territory they want.
Similarly, 75 percent of Israelis today accept a two-state solution as the only one possible, she said. Avital does not want Israel to make the same mistake she made with Gaza, refusing to negotiate with the PLO and thus handing the territory to Hamas.
Avital acknowledged that some people in Israel still believe in one state, but she says that would mean the end of Zionism.
“[When we count all the Arabs in the territories] we are already a minority,” she said. “The purpose of the Zionist movement was not just to have our own land, but also to normalize our lives… We want to remain democratic, not a minority that rules a majority.”
If Israel is to remain a Jewish country and a democracy, Avital argued, she must pursue negotiations at this optimal juncture for a two state solution with clear and mutually accepted borders with her neighbors on all sides.
While acknowledging the impediments to peace, Avital explained that failure to resolve the Arab/Israeli conflict as soon as possible could only lead to much more serious problems in the greater region.
Iran poses a more serious danger than the Palestinians, but failure to resolve the smaller issue will only give Israel’s enemies a greater pretext against her.
Avital contended that the settlements in the contested territories are secondary to the primary issue of borders. When asked where those borders should be, she said Israel cannot dictate them, but has to resolve the issue with the surrounding countries.
When asked what Israel should do about the possibility of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons, she said the weapons themselves would not be the problem but the regime.
Avital began her remarks, as do many Israelis who visit Milwaukee, with a humorous anecdote about former Milwaukeean Prime Minister Golda Meir.
When one man after another failed to stop a noisy air conditioner from drowning out a meeting, Meir pulled the machine’s plug on the machine. From this incident, Avital said, she learned always to seek the most pragmatic solution to a problem.
Avital was born in Rumania, and made aliyah at the age of ten with her parents. As a political science student at Hebrew University, she worked as a secretary for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and rose through the ranks to earn Israel’s ambassadorship to Portugal and ultimately the Western Europe portfolio.
She served as Israel’s Consul General in New York City from 1992 to 1997 and as a Knesset member from 1999 to 2009. In addition to English and Hebrew, she speaks French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Rumanian, and her website has pages in Arabic and Russian.
Her appearance was sponsored by the Milwaukee area’s new chapter of J Street, the self-described “political home of the pro-Israel, pro-peace movement,” with national headquarters in Washington, D.C.
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