‘A source of considerable annoyance’: an Israeli–Palestinian backchannel in the efforts to release the blocked Palestinian bank accounts

In addition to the great emotional toll that the Nakba inflicted on the Palestinian people, the 1948 exodus occasioned substantial material losses for the refugees as well. As the 1948 War ground to a halt, the international community had to decide how to deal with all of this, and in the early 1950s the matter of the so-called ‘blocked’—or frozen—Palestinian bank accounts became one of the main issues on the UN Palestine Conciliation Commission’s agenda. Initially, its effort included the government of Israel and the British-owned Barclays Bank. As things progressed, however, Israeli diplomats also engaged a group of Palestinian refugees in an informal backchannel. This article sheds light on this largely overlooked episode and shows how the channel was established, and how the Palestinian group faced nothing but strong international opposition, most notably from the British Foreign Office. Protecting the interests of its regional ally Jordan, as well as those of Barclays Bank, the Foreign Office did what it could in order to make sure that this particular Israeli–Palestinian backchannel was promptly closed.     

The Israeli collective memory and the Masada Syndrome: a political instrument to counter the EU funding of Israeli non-governmental human rights organizations

The EU’s practice of funding Israeli non-governmental human rights organizations (hereinafter ‘HRNGOs’) has in recent years encountered a counter-strategy, pursued by certain Israeli NGOs and members of the Israeli government, media and academia. This counter-strategy has succeeded in discrediting the HRNGOs and the EU and rendering their mutual collaboration less effective. The purpose of this article is to contextualize the counter-strategy within the sphere of Israel’s collective memory. The article analyses the manner in which certain politicians and various members of the Israeli society (agents of memory), who themselves are the product of the evolving Israeli collective memory and identity (structure), attempt to draw on Israel’s collective memory/structure in order to advance their particular political agenda.     

A Balancing Pretence: The Johnson Administration’s Policy towards Jordan, 1964–1967

King Hussein of Jordan was often at odds with his less conciliatory counterparts in the Arab world. He was one of the few Arab leaders who engaged and communicated with Israel. The administration of US President Lyndon B. Johnson wanted to ensure the continuation of Hussein’s moderate line towards Israel and sold weapons to Jordan. However, providing military support to an Arab state when the vast majority of Americans favoured Israel involved significant political costs. As the Johnson administration saw it, openly favouring only Israel would negatively affect the USA’s position and interests in the Arab world. Therefore, Johnson pursued a policy of seemingly balancing Israeli and Jordanian interests. This article argues that the USA supported Jordan primarily to ensure Israel’s security, but ultimately, the Johnson administration lacked the will and understanding to properly address Jordan’s concerns and failed to prevent King Hussein from joining the Arab side of the 1967 War against Israel.     

Ideo‐theology and the Jewish state: from conflict to conciliation?

The assassination of Israeli premier Yitzhak Rabin provided the most vivid demonstration to date of religious‐nationalist opposition inside Israel to the principle of exchanging land for peace. This article sets out to explore this world view and its intellectual origins, exploring in the process how the use of sacred Judaic texts have become both the monopoly of religious‐nationalism and the template for politically inspired violence against those in Israel suspected of condoning territorial compromise. This article concludes that if the ideo‐the‐ology of religious‐nationalists is to be assuaged, a religious discourse supporting territorial retrenchment has to become part of the political fabric of the centre‐left in Israel.     

Pilgrimage to Mecca

The February 2009 elections mark a water-shed in Israeli politics and highlight an increasingly rightward drift in Israeli politics: Labour had its worst ever result. The violent intifada shattered belief that negotiations with the Palestinians could ever be successful and the security barrier seemed increasingly necessary if Israel was to remain both Jewish and democratic. The coalition government constructed by Binyamin Netanyahu was carefully balanced and looks durable, the more so as, somewhat surprisingly, it includes Labour and Barak as defence minister. Kadima could face some hard days in opposition unless Netanyahu falls out with Washington, or the coalition collapses.     

Massacre of the Doves?: Interpreting Israel's 2003 Elections

This article argues that Israel's 2003 elections are best understood as a deeper embedding of neoliberalism in the Israeli polity. It is argued that the most accurate characterization of the elections is as an articulation of Polanyi's Phase I of the double-movement. The argument is developed in four stages. First, the Israeli elections are understood as a local reaction to the multilayered processes of globalization. The Israeli state and its elections are located in the neoliberal ideology which underwrites the phenomenon broadly defined as globalization. Second, the election results are reviewed. Third, the dominant interpretations of the elections are critically examined. Specifically, representations of the elections as a defeat of the parties of peace and as a rebuke of Sephardim/ultra-Orthodox influence in Israeli government are interrogated. Fourth, the coalition negotiations of February 2003, the constitution of Israel's 30^th government and some of the initiatives undertaken by Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are explicated through deployment of Polanyi's double-movement framework.     

The Origins of the Redemption in Occupied Suburbia? The Jewish-American Makings of the West Bank Settlement of Efrat, 1973–87

Founded primarily by Jewish-American immigrants after the 1973 Arab–Israeli war, Efrat has emerged as one of the most highly recognizable settlements in the occupied territories. Drawing on archival materials, the periodical press, and interviews never before brought to light, this article both explores the untold history of this ‘city on a hilltop’ as the product of a quadrilateral relationship between American–Israelis, the Israeli government, the native Israeli settler movement, and local Palestinian communities, as well as reconstructing the discourses in the making of Efrat, which combine religio-political imperatives alongside a deeply Americanized vision of building new, utopian, suburbanized communities in the occupied territories, during its formative years between 1973 and 1987.     

FIGHTING WITHOUT WEAPONS: PALESTINIAN DOCUMENTARY FILMS AND ACTS OF RESISTANCE

Film production has for a long time been a prominent medium for Palestinians to resist Israeli occupation and create a cultural memory. Though there are some academic studies on the subject, a critical framework of analysis for such films remains underdeveloped. This article argues that Palestinian film production has surged particularly in recent years as part of an increasingly globalised dimension to Palestinian resistance, alongside such initiatives as the Electronic Intifada and the BDS movement. Early Zionist rhetoric asserted the non-existence (or invisibility) of Palestinians. Several decades later, when the Arab revolt was shut down, the Israeli official propaganda largely shifted to a discourse of “emergency”, which decontextualizes the anti-colonial nature of Palestinian resistance. The films 5 Broken Cameras (2011) and Private (2004) both engage with Israeli colonialism and the state of emergency by acting as tools of witnessing, laying bare the occupational strategies the Israelis use under emergency law and revealing the arbitrary nature of such practices as the Separation Wall. The films challenge Israeli authority through their depictions of predominantly non-violent forms of resistance, which counters their historically constructed invisibility as a people, as well as the colonialist narrative of “terrorism”. Non-violent resistance makes the recognition of Israeli authority problematic, as the settlers cannot use brute force to drive out the Palestinians if there is no documented incident in context to justify violence. Furthermore, the article argues that the form of the films – pseudo-documentary and especially “talking witness” documentary – enables their emotive content to reach out to an international audience, which could potentially respond. Thus, the films not only contain acts of resistance, but they significantly are tools of resistance in the conflict.     

Arab Nationalism and British opposition in Dubai, 1920–66

The article examines the armistice talks between Israel and Jordan (March–April 1949) from the perspective of the UN mediator, Ralph Bunche, who coordinated them. The period described was stormy and complex: at its start, Israel took control of the southern Negev. Later, the two countries conducted formal talks in Rhodes, under Bunche's watchful eye, in parallel to informal negotiations, without UN involvement, in Jordan. The article, based to a large extent on Bunche's unpublished diary, explains why Bunche, who maintained rigorous control of all of the other armistice talks, behaved differently in this case, giving his post factum seal of approval to the Israeli takeover of the southern Negev and allowing Israel to pressure Abdullah to hand over the Triangle. The thesis is that Bunche, who could have put an end to the talks by resigning, or drawn the US into the crisis (as he did in the other rounds of negotiations), recognized the complexity of the relations between Israel and Abdullah and chose to act in a way that would prevent a new eruption of hostilities. In effect he was protecting Abdullah, who would have been likely to lose the West Bank to Israel in another round of fighting.     

Jordan’s self-fulfilling prophecy: the production of feeble political parties and the perceived perils of democracy

This article analyses the depiction of political parties in a ‘hybrid regime’ so as to explain how state-sponsored articulatory practices contribute to the discrediting of potential opponents. Through an examination of textbooks, speeches and government documents combined with semi-structured interviews and participant observation, it dissects how tropes concerning party weakness or extremism make Jordan appear unprepared for democracy. Making the legal opposition seem menacing or incompetent helps the Hashemite regime legitimize the haphazard pace of political reforms. It is a crucial strategy through which the monarchy maintains the backing or tepid compliance of foreign and local supporters. Yet still, the discursive features of authoritarianism, in Jordan and elsewhere, continue to receive short shrift. Far from epiphenomenal, the monarchy’s discursive practices shape the conceptual universe and institutional contexts in which politics takes place.     

Public–Private Partnershipping as a Tool of Government: Exploring its Determinants Across German States

Despite considerable public and scholarly interest in public–private partnerships (PPPs) as a tool of government in Germany, there is no quantitative empirical study exploring the motivations behind policymakers' decisions to (not) use this type of privatisation policy. This article contributes to filling this gap by investigating the extent and determinants of the PPP activities of the 16 German states' governments over the period 2002–09. For that purpose, a PPP Activity Index is constructed which not only includes official PPP project figures but also state governments' programmatic, institutional, and advisory activities regarding PPP. Using this index, we statistically analyse whether fiscal stress, government partisanship, and other factors can help to explain the considerable differences between Länder governments' PPP activities. Among other things, it turns out that partisanship only matters if Socialists are part of a coalition government, and that fiscal transfers have a negative impact on a state's PPP activity level.     

Yarmouk,Jordan, and Disi basins: Examining the impact of the discourse of water scarcity in Jordan on transboundary water governance

Extensive literature has shown the impact of water scarcity discourses on national policies, however the impact of water scarcity discourses on transboundary water governance has been overlooked. This article contributes to filling this gap by investigating the impact of the water scarcity discourse in the case of Jordan, specifically on three cases of transboundary water governance: the Yarmouk River, the Jordan River and the Disi Aquifer. This article shows that the water scarcity discourse is not enough to explain transboundary water governance, as it needs to be contextualized in the broader context, considering national security, regional geopolitics, inter-sectorial interests, and power asymmetries. This is particularly true when considering that the Arab region has most of its surface waters originating outside of its countries, and transboundary waters represent over two thirds of its overall water resources.     

Coercive Diplomacy: Israel,Transjordan and the UN—a Triangular Drama Revisited

The Arab states suffered humiliating defeats at the hands of Israel during the first Arab–Israeli war. Immediately following the war, Israel made brilliant and shrewd use of diplomacy to achieve its goals at the negotiating table, much as it had previously used armed force. Israel refused to negotiate with a united Arab negotiation team, preferring to isolate the states, picking them off one after the other. The Israeli–Transjordanian talks differed radically from the other armistice negotiations. Here, two parallel tracks were followed. At Rhodes, the two countries negotiated openly under UN auspices, while in Jerusalem and at King Abdullah's palace in Transjordan, representatives of the two countries held secret bilateral talks. Israel masterfully used the context of these talks to maximise its gains, using military operations to create ‘facts on the ground’, combined with direct coercion in the shape of blackmail, while taking full advantage of international power structures and abusing the trust that King Abdullah had placed in personal relations. The UN Acting Mediator, Ralph Bunche, was aware of the secret back channel, where the clearest cases of coercion took place. Physically and mentally exhausted by the protracted negotiations, he allowed the secret talks to progress despite his dislike of the outcome. The British government, at the time the protector of Transjordan, was unable to assist its client for fear of falling out with the USA, while the US government, in many ways the protector of Israel, maintained an equally ‘hands off’ stance because the talks concerned only an armistice, not a peace treaty. Already at this early stage in their relations, the power asymmetry between Israel and the Arab states was the main reason the parties could not arrive at a peaceful, sustainable solution. This article reinvestigates this diplomacy by using a combination of US, Israeli, British and UN archives, as well as the almost untouched Ralph Bunche diary.     

Leavening Neoliberalization’s Uneven Pathways: Bread,Governance and Political Rationalities in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan

Techniques of governance in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan do not follow a single or unifying logic. Despite a more than decade-long shift towards a neoliberal orientation, market-disciplinary policies coincide with important exceptions. This article employs a modified variegated neoliberalization approach to explore one such exception. Specifically, it analyses the recent debate over the country’s bread subsidy to elucidate key elements of Jordan’s socio-economic transformation. The persistence of this long-standing welfare programme is linked to the uneven pathways of Jordanian neoliberalization and two potent political rationalities imbricated in this process.     

Reproducing ‘hegemony’ thereafter? The long-term political effects of the Gezi protests in Turkey

ABSTRACT

This study examines an understudied aspect of the Gezi protests: its long-term effects on the hegemonic politics of the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalk?nma Partisi, AKP) government. Building on the insights of Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe, and Stuart Hall on hegemonic struggles and populism, it contends that the Gezi protests forced the AKP to reformulate its hegemonic strategies by deconstructing the relation formed contingently between the AKP and democratization, and thus, exposing both the limits of the neoliberal and Islamic/conservative hegemonic politics of the AKP, and the authoritarian tendencies of this government. The article maintains that the AKP, in response, turned to focus its efforts on becoming not hegemonic, but dominant by adopting a full-blown authoritarian populism, which, rather than entailing the closure of all democratic channels, favours retaining some for mobilizing popular support for its increasing authoritarianism. It is demonstrated that this popular support has been secured by the AKP through the articulation of a discourse that ignites fear and anxiety among the conservative religious and conservative nationalist segments, by portraying all opposition as detrimental to their interests and lifestyles. The article concludes that counter-hegemonic movements like Gezi may lead to significant political changes in the long run, even if they are repressed.     

The Arab‐Israeli peace process: A house built on sand?

While the Declaration of Principles agreed between the government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization in September 1993 was widely welcomed as the major breakthrough in the seemingly intractable Arab‐Israeli conflict, progress proved to be difficult, uncertain and, at times, bloody. This article places the agreement in the context of previous peace endeavours in an attempt to explain why the apparent early promise proved so difficult to sustain.     

A Unique Denial: Israel's Foreign Policy and the Armenian Genocide

This article focuses on the Israeli politicization of the Armenian genocide from the perspective of foreign policy. Since the early 1980s Israel's official position has been to not recognize the Armenian genocide. The issue of recognition came to the surface in 1982 after Turkey put pressure on Israel to cancel a Holocaust and genocide conference. This article shows that Israel agreed to pressure the conference organizers to cancel the conference in order to secure protection for Jews fleeing Iran and Syria through the Turkish border. This article also explores the role of informal ambassadors in shaping Israel's position on this issue. Using recently declassified archival documents and oral interviews with key Israeli stakeholders, this is the first investigation into the role of informal ambassadors, specifically the Jewish minority in Turkey, and the American Jewish pro-Israeli lobby. The article also addresses a secondary incentive for Israel's refusal to recognize the genocide: ethnic competition between Jews and Armenians as victims of genocide.     

Overcoming Phobias and Asymmetries in Israel and Palestine

This article argues that in order to reach future breakthroughs, vis-à-vis the Israeli political and discursive limitations, two main principles would need to be approached. Firstly, any future formula will need to correspond with the changing reality (the physical impossibility of the old-fashioned two-state solution) by pushing forward a political solution that highlights a safe Jewish existence in the region of Israel/ Palestine, irrespective of whether this safety will be highlighted in relation to a one-state, confederative or a parallel two-state solution. Secondly, it will need to acknowledge the attachment – be it historical, religious or legal – of Jewish-Israelis to the land. These principles are related to the Israeli phobias mentioned and analyzed in the article, and are crucial for any future solution that will see Jewish-Israelis and Palestinians living either side by side or on the same side, but with equal citizenship, a paradigm that can happen in two parallel states, in a state of all of its citizens, or in two states with open borders and joint institutions.     

Anti-Intellectualism and Israeli Politics

Anti-intellectualism is a discrete social phenomenon which eschews spatial or temporal boundaries. While it defies a restrictive definition, it is commonly understood as a populist disdain of individuals who speak of certain universal values and engage in the pursuit of knowledge from reason; conversely, an anti-intellectual is a person who is not a ‘dealer in ideas’ and is not committed to the ‘life of the mind’. This article focuses on anti-intellectualism as a defining characteristic of the Israeli ethos which predates the establishment of the Jewish state. The article begins with a terminological discussion and a brief historical survey of the prevalence of anti-intellectualism in contemporary societies. It then traces the roots of Israeli anti-intellectualism and examines their manifestations in the case of Abba Eban, Israel’s most quintessential diplomat, an orientalist scholar, a Cambridge don, a polyglot and a public intellectual. The article concludes by pointing to the uneasy fit between the political and intellectual spheres in Israeli politics and the challenges posed by the former to the latter.