Mr Begin's grand design
Christopher Hitchens
Clever scientists have been able to recon- struct the whole frame and fabric of a dinosaur from the study of one surviving bone or mandible. There is usually one detail in every convoluted story that gives the clue to the wider context. In the case of the Lebanese war, where too many eyes have been fixed on the secondary question of where the Palestinians take up their next period of exile, the critical detail passed by a few weeks ago. On 25 July Mr Menachem Begin brought the Tehiya Party into his coalition.
This action did more than raise his Knesset majority to eight. The Tehiya Par- ty, whose name in Hebrew translates roughly as 'Renaissance', is the most ex- treme and devout wing of the Israeli rejec- tion front. By signalling his partnership with it at such a time, Mr Begin answers a lot of questions about his real objectives in Lebanon and elsewhere.
Take, for instance, Professor Yuval Ne'eman. He is one of Tehiya's three MPs, and is now Israeli Minister of Science and Technology. Reassuringly, he used to be a key adviser in the development of Israel's nuclear programme. On 1 August he said: `This war is in two parts. One is what is happening up there in Lebanon, and the other is to create a situation in which there will be practically nowhere, no place left, to create a Palestinian state other than in Jordan — where there is one already. It is now a matter of work- ing every day and every month to ac- celerate the Jewish colonisation of Judaea and Samaria and Gaza.'
Nor is this mere bluster. As the price of admitting Tehiya to his cabinet, Mr Begin promised to increase the budget for set- tlements on the West Bank (or Judaea and Samaria if you must). Indeed, the whole policy of his government has been to use the Lebanese invasion as a means of securing permanent control over the occupied ter- ritories.
Mr Michael Oren, the spokesman for the `Civil Administration of Judaea and Samaria', put it quite succinctly: 'We're conducting a political war against the PLO. The army is conducting a military war, and we're conducting a political war.' As if in confirmation of his words, the Israeli authorities dismissed the last senior Palesti- nian mayor (and the leading 'moderate') to hold office. On 11 July Rashad Shawa, Mayor of Gaza, was summarily sacked. This was two days after a decree which imposed a sentence of five years' im- prisonment on anybody who imported development funds without the written permission of the Israeli occupying adminis- tration.
Thus, the crucial link with Jordan is gradually being broken as a step towards final annexation. It is hoped by the Israelis (and was claimed by Sharon at a recent press conference) that the military defeat of the PLO in Lebanon will encourage civilian compliance with this plan. In case it does not, other measures are in hand. Bir Zeit University, long the centre of Palestinian higher education and nationalist feeling on the West Bank, was closed a few days after the invasion of Lebanon. The Arab press was subjected to even more extensive cen- sorship and restriction.
Elias Freij, the Mayor of Bethlehem and the only surviving elected representative of any importance, says now that 'under the smoke of war in Lebanon, the Israelis are making war on the West Bank'. Taken together with the latest plans to reserve almost one third of the occupied territories for new settlements and road-building, these events argue that Israel's strategy is something more than defensive.
Back, then, to the Tehiya Party. It claims that all of `Eretz Israel', which is to say both sides of the Jordan river, was given to the Jews by God. Its leader, a striking woman by the name of Geula Cohen, was the sponsor of the Bill which annexed all of Jerusalem as Israel's 'eternal and indivisi- ble' capital. The party opposed the Camp David accords as being too soft on the Palestinians (whom they call 'the Arabs of Eretz Israel'), and fought bitterly against the return of the Sinai to Egypt. Its members are very active in the settler move- ment which is gradually colonising the con- quered territories.
On 24 June, before he became a minister, Professor Yuval Ne'eman wrote an article for the Jerusalem Post in which he said:
`Israel has an excellent opportunity to establish a new order in Lebanon . . . The IDF (Israeli army) must be prepared for a long stay in Lebanon. In the in- terim Israel will have an opportunity of reaching a stage of socio-economic and technological development in the nearby region which, geographically and historically, is an integral part of Eretz Israel . . . It is also perhaps possible that Israel could integrate the strip south of the Litani with its friendly citizens into Israel's development plans.'
Here, at last, two Israeli dreams come together: the dream of getting the Litani river and the water resources necessary for expanded settlement and immigration, and
the dream of moving Israel's border north- wards in order to supply and protect the West Bank. That, though very few peoPles, recognised it at the time, was the purpose° Israel's annexation of the Golan Heights last year. From there, Lebanon and the Litani rivet were an easy mark. It thus may not be a coincidence that an El Al airlines office has opened in Sidon, or that the office of the Chief Rabbi of the Israeli army, Aluf Gad Navon, recently produced a map of Lebanon which showed it as 'the territory of the tribe of Asher', and which Hebraieal" ly translated Beirut into Be'erot. ()mina! ly, Mr Begin made a speech at about the same time in which he mused on the fact that cedar for ancient Jewish temples was brought from Tyre. It looks rather as if the old cycle of biblical pretext and military ambition is about to do to Lebanon what it has already done to the West Bank. Actually, this ambition goes back long before the foundation of the PLO. In th,e. 1950s, according to the diaries of Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett, David Ben Gurion and Moshe Dayan pressed him to authorise an Israeli incursion into Lebanon. Dayan at one point exclaimed: `The Israeli army will enter Lebannoj will occupy the necessary territory, an will create a Christian regime which WI" ally itself with Israel. The territory from the Litani southward will be totally an,", nexed to Israel and everything will be an right.'
`Everything will be all right.' That was on 16 May 1955, a while before Arafat had hoisted his colours. Sharett, who was what, might be called 'a dove', made a prophen,, objection to the Dayan/Ben-Gurion scheme. Again I quote from his diaries as prime minister: `The plan is based on tearing away from Lebanon the Muslim provinces of Tyre, the Beka'a and Tripoli. But who can predict that these provinces will actually give up their ties to Lebanon and Melt political and economic connection to Beirut? . . . Who will vouch that the bloody war that will inevitably explode as a result of such an attempt will he limited to Lebanon and not drag Syria into the battlefield?'
These memoirs make it possible to read recent Lebanese history in a rather in" teresting light. They also remind us that Israel has never said where it wants Its borders to be. For Israel, the question of the PLO's physical destination is a secon- dary one. While the world was watching the drama of Beirut, the opportunity was taken for securing the real prizes — south Lebanon and the West Bank. And, while newsmen were asking Arafat if he would recognise Israel, Mr Begin was appointing and promoting the leaders of a party whicli, does not even recognise the existence ° Palestinians.
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