As I reflect on the nearly fifty years I have reported on the Arab-Israeli conflict, one thing becomes clear - the Middle East has become a very different place. Once most Israelis and their political leaders yearned to be accepted by the Arabs as a legitimate part of the Middle East - while most Palestinians dreamed of their own independent state. The high water mark of that era was the historic Israeli-Egyptian Peace Treaty of 1979, brokered by President Jimmy Carter.
Most Americans keep looking for a continuum of that process to get us to a final agreement. The problem is that so much has changed in the region, that such expectations are no longer realistic.
Today, I would like to address one such significant change. It is not the only reason a Middle East peace is stymied. But it’s an important one.
One of the consequences of the end of the Cold War, was that Soviet President Mikael Gorbachev threw open the doors for Soviet citizens who wished to leave. Among those who did so in large numbers were Soviet Jews - roughly one million of whom went to Israel between 1989 and 2006. They joined 165 thousand Soviet Jews who had moved there in the seventies and eighties. This was a huge number of new citizens to absorb, given that in 1990 Israel’s population was less than five million.
For the new Russian immigrants assimilation was a real struggle. Housing was a challenge. As most did not speak Hebrew - and even today only about half do - finding jobs was difficult. This problem was compounded when Russian education degrees were often not recognized in the Israeli private sector.
So, no surprise - the Russians tended to stay together. They created their own neighborhoods. Seven Russian language newspapers emerged. Eventually, there was a Russian-Israeli television network. But most significantly, the Russians formed their own political parties which became the powerful new voice in Israeli politics – one that supports a hardline policy toward the Arabs, be they Palestinian or Israeli.
The largest Russian party now is Yisrael Beiteinu - which means “Israel is Our Home.” It was founded by Avigdor Lieberman, a Soviet Jew who emigrated in the 1970s. In 2009 his party won 15 seats in the Israeli Knesset, and its support made Benjamin Netanyahu Prime Minister. In last year's election, Lieberman’s Russian Party and Netanyahu’s Likud ran on a joint slate and won enough seats to become the ruling coalition. Lieberman is the foreign minister, his party has three other important cabinet posts, and by the way, Vladimir Putin is his friend.
Lieberman’s idea of a two state solution for the Israeli Palestinian dispute is for Israel to keep its settlements on the West Bank and give to the Palestinians those parts of Israel, now home to Israeli Arabs - effectively ridding Israel of much of its Arab population.
This is not remotely a formula for peace with the Palestinians - nor quite evidently, is it meant to be.
