The Hidden Clauses of Oslo

[This piece has proven to be somewhat prophetic. It is based on a leak from Yossi Beilin’s staff assistant at the time.-DB]

One senior Israeli Foreign Ministry official has documented the Israel-PLO negotiations and through a second-party permitted them to be leaked to the Israeli media.

The story told is a shocking indictment of Deputy Foreign Minister Yossi Beilin’s, “Peace Team”, and was privy to the most highly-classified Foreign Ministry documents. And as a ranking diplomatic aide, he was a first-hand witness to the process and development of the secret Oslo negotiations.

The PISGA

The Foreign Ministry program for Israel’s future is outlines in a document authored by Beilin himself, called The Palestinian Interim Self-Government Agreement (PISGA). When first prepared, the document was classified by the Foreign Ministry as a proposal submitted by the Joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation to the Washington talks in order to obfuscate its authorship and true policy significance.

The PISGA has been incorporated into other local media reports about deception in the peace process. The main points are that the ultimate aims of the peace process are to roll back Israel’s territory to the 1949 borders; to create a Palestinian “entity”, which, after an interim period will be granted statehood; to accede to this state exclusive rights to underground water resources geologically shared by both states; and to permit the right of return for any Palestinian to the new nation.

The clauses of the PISGA describe a plan to disarm territorial settlers and force them to evacuate the West Bank and Gaza Strip, after which no Jews will be permitted to reside in the areas.

Parts of this plan may have already been put into force.

Illegitimacy

Beilin is said to have personally authored or authorized another policy paper revealingly titled, “The Illegitimacy of Israeli Sovereignty Over Jerusalem”. It outlines the government’s program for the future of Jerusalem. (see Inside Israel December, 1993) by calling for the division of the Old City into cantons whose border posts will be under UN control. Israelis will be barred from freely entering East Jerusalem, which access to West Jerusalem will be severely restricted for Arabs. In effect, Jerusalem will once again become a divided city.

Israel Started The Six Day War

One of Beilin’s greatest worries was that a future Likud government would short-circuit his plan for a Palestinian state during the interim period by resettling the remaining lands outside Jericho and the Gaza Strip.

To counter such a possibility, the program calls for Israel to pass a law declaring itself the aggressor in the Six Day War. To justify such a misreading of history, Beilin cited such legal texts as “Palestine and International Law” by Henry Cattan and Gerard von Glahn’s “Law Among Nations”, which stress the illegality of Israel’s presence in the Administered Territories.

The rationalization for the declaration of aggression is that if Israel took the disputed territories illegally it would have no right under international law in the future to settle or retrieve them.

American Cooperation

The on-going negotiations between Israel and the PLO are largely, theatrics. The peace program has already been written by Beilin, Peres and the PLO’s Abu Mazin. It was submitted for Washington’s approval in September ’93, was upgraded in November and formally, though covertly, authorized by Secretary-of-State Warren Christopher during his visit to Jerusalem in December.

The Americans promised to solve intractable problems; i.e. water. Beilin gave away the underground reservoir that supplies 30% of Israel’s water needs. To compensate for the loss, America offered to build Israel two large desalinization plants.

This solution did nothing to salve the anger of Israel hydrologists who observed that desalinized water could not be produced in quantities needed to run industry and agriculture and would up to cost of drinking water beyond the consumers’ ability to pay.

Keeping Shas In Line

Beilin was well aware of the flimsy nature of his government’s coalition as he prepared his program. He realized that if the Shas Party refused to support his plans, then they would fail. Since the constituency of Shas is largely opposed to closer or any ties with the PLO, a party decision to oppose Labor’s legislation was viewed as likelihood unless steps were taken to keep members in line.

The method of ensure control was organized blackmail. After an extensive investigation with the cooperation of the US Justice Department and the FBI, Israeli government investigators managed to trace some $600,000 of Shas leader Arye Deri’s embezzled funds to drug money laundering operations in the U.S. and Belgium. The government’s Justice and Police Ministries kept these crimes out of Deri’s indictments.

In the event that Shas chooses to throw Deri to the legal dogs someday, the Justice Department has prepared indictments against party spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s sons. Strong cases have been prepared against them for embezzlement in the $50 -100,000 range each.

The thorn in the Shas blackmail strategy at the time it was concocted was attorney-general Yosef Harish. He was replaced in the late fall of 1993 with a far more compliant politico, Micha Ben Yair. Since taking up his new post, Ben Yair has covered up the crimes off Shas and has been holding them in escrow until the day that Shas threatens to stop supporting the current peace process.

The Campaign Against the Settlers and Their Supporters

The Beilin plan calls for the removal of all Jews from beyond the Green Line. Before such a change can be implemented, opposition from the settlers of the Administered Territories is to be eliminated. Beilin is well aware that tens of thousands of Jewish territorial residents will fight his program and that they will have broad support throughout the country. Thus, if they are to be removed, he decided it will have to be in stages.

Stage one calls for the disarming of the settlers and the process has already begun in earnest. Last December, Israeli Police ordered all registered gun owners to test their weapons at licensed shooting ranges. Since the policy began, hundreds of guns have been confiscated from settlers, while notifications of license cancellations have been sent to many others.

Once the settlers become less able to defend themselves, army presence on the roads leading to their homes will be greatly diminished, leading to heavy terrorist casualties and a feeling of fear and helplessness. This will cause the more passive residents to panic, sell their homes and flee. With the resulting crash in housing prices, the government will offer to buy up the homes of all other settlers wishing to move, at the current market value. Thus, the settlers can be evacuated without paying the high cost incurred when the government gave up the Sinai in 1979.

Kafka Visits Hebron

Clearly, thousands of residents committed to staying in their homes will see through the plan and will resist it. Beilin’s program calls for instilling increased fear in the rebels and this will require a great deal of intelligence material to counteract their resistance.

To facilitate this need, Beilin requested and received a significant expansion of Army Intelligence (Aman), in order to supply the General Security Services (Shabak) with information required for total suppression of opposition voices.

New surveillance equipment installed at Beilin’s suggestion monitors all international phone and fax communications. The equipment is programmed to do real-time scanning for key-words which, when spoken or written, automatically switch on recording equipment. On a more personal level, the entire phone system of Hebron has been tapped, while hundreds of individuals living elsewhere are being listened to.

Aman has expanded its database of potential opposition activists to include detailed cross-checks, while the Shabak has infiltrated the settlements with dozens of spies.

Dehumanizing The Settlers

In order to take his program to its extremes, Beilin had to take precautions that violence against settlers would not provoke a sympathetic reaction from other Israelis which would be translated into opposition to the peace process as he created it.

Dehumanizing the settlers required, first, deligitmizing them. This was to be accomplished with a media campaign aimed at painting the residents of the territories as fanatics. Once such an image had been planted, the settlers would no longer be identified by most Israelis as one of them.

Then it would be easier to have a small number killed to break the moral of the rest.

To finance an expensive state-of-the-art PR campaign, Beilin turned to Peres who solicited the necessary start-up funds, some $6.5 million, from French millionaire and close friend, Jean Friedman.

A Few Extraditions For The Cause

Beilin’s plan called for the government to consider drafting a law which will permit the extradition of Jews to Palestine for crimes against Palestinians. There, they will be subject to Palestinian criminal law.

Beilin believes that Jewish retaliatory actions will be stopped cols if the perpetrators are sent to the Palestinian entity for trial and possibly, executed.

If any part of Beilin’s program has been put into effect, there may have been a backlash that led indirectly to the massacre last month at the Cave of the Mechpala in Hebron.