August 14, 1997
Thank you for inviting me to speak here. I view this opportunity to address you as one of the special privileges afforded a Prime Minister.
This is the 24th graduating class of the National Defense College, and as we approach Israel's 50th Anniversary we must ask ourselves, "Must the sword consume forever?" Are we doomed never to fulfill Isaiah's prophecy, "nation shall not lift up sword against nation and neither shall they learn war any more"?
I believe we can achieve peace, provided we define for ourselves the kind of peace that can be reached in our region. The Middle East is unstable, filled with danger and, with the exception of Israel, sorely lacking democratic regimes.
In this region, peace is not anchored in the will of the people. In the countries surrounding us, decisions on all issues - including the cardinal ones of war and peace - are not in the hands of the citizens. The Iraqi people did not decide to declare war, Saddam Hussein did. And it was not the popular will but the defeat of Saddam's army which ended the war.
Moreover, leaders of this region exercise great - and in some cases absolute - control over the media and the vehicles of propaganda and communication which influence the people's will and shape their opinions. None of the Arab-Israeli wars was initiated by the will of the people, but rather by the will of their leaders. In the absence of internal restraints, namely the people's resistance to their leaders' military adventurism, the true guarantee for a lasting peace in our region must come from the creation of external restraints to such adventurism.
These restraints find their expression in the balance of power, the deterrent effect of a decisive military edge, of security arrangements and security zones. In the absence of true democratic regimes around us, the normalization process, while desirable and important, cannot substitute for the balance of power as a guarantor of peace. This is true, not only in our relations with our neighbors, but in their relations with each other.
The Middle East is saturated with inter-Arab peace treaties and declarations of friendship and fraternity which can last for many years and then disappear overnight. We cannot expect that the peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors will be of a higher quality than that which exists among the Arabs themselves.
Normalization, communication, trade relations, and cultural exchange are important and desirable. But they cannot substitute for Israel's clear military advantage as a guarantee for the achievement and maintenance of peace. I also wish to clarify that normalization is conditional, partial, vulnerable and reversible. If the political process weakens Israel, normalization itself will be endangered.
To achieve peace in our region we must preserve and increase our strength. This is not a new concept. For 50 years the United States maintained a de facto peace with the Soviet Union, the strongest non-democratic region in history. The US moved toward normalization and gradually thawed the relationship. There were obstacles, ups and downs, and confrontations, but the US proceeded slowly, while consistently preserving the military edge of the NATO peace over the Warsaw Pact. Only after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise of a new kind of government did the need for a military edge change. The military layout is different now. Today the Warsaw Pact is being absorbed by the NATO pact, and everything has been reshaped, because the current peace between Russia and the US is no longer based on deterrence and military advantage, but on a gradual transition to shared values of democracy, openness and pluralism.
As long as this change has not yet occurred in our region - and I cannot predict when it will occur - the type of peace that is possible in the Middle East is a peace based on power. We must nurture our strength and capabilities if we wish to achieve and preserve peace and prevent the violation of its provisions. The prevention of such violations must be an integral part of the foundation of peace agreements.
The core of the initial Oslo Agreement was the Palestinian Authority's commitment to act against terror organizations from areas under its jurisdiction. In all honesty, we must state that during the four years since the agreement was signed, the PA has not acted against these organizations. From the very beginning, movements such as HAMAS and Islamic Jihad have systematically gained strength and amassed power - their armed people moving freely and stockpiling ammunition and explosives. They attend mass rallies, enlist new recruits, and operate practically unhindered. They continued to gains strength.
The Oslo Agreements have created bases and havens for terror organizations in our immediate vicinity. Our policy since the establishment of the State of Israel has been to distance such bases from our borders. But the PA's violation of the agreement creates an untenable situation. No country can exist with terrorist bases and havens five minutes from its main urban centers. No nation can tolerate this, and no peace can withstand such conditions.
And so, if the PA wants to save the peace, its immediate task is to gain control over terrorism. That is why we insist that implementation of this fundamental component of the agreement must be the first step in the continuing process. The late Yitzhak Rabin made it clear, even before signing the Oslo Agreements, that the Palestinians must vigorously battle terrorism and amend the Palestinian Charter, before Israel can undertake withdrawals from territories. For the past four years, our partners have completely ignored these commitments.
I, together with the Minister of Defense and the entire Cabinet, wish to continue the process. But we are unable to do so unless the PA fulfills its commitments under the Oslo Accords - to dismantle the terror infrastructure, disarm the organizations, extradite terrorists wanted for the murder of Israelis, stop the daily incitement and the demonstrations involving the burning of the Israeli flag, cease the official glorification of murderers, and educate for peace and the acceptance of Israel's legitimacy. Children who learn from maps in which the word "Israel" never appears, will never learn to live peacefully with Israel; and this is but one small example.
It is equally important that we do not allow wishful thinking to undermine our view of reality - the reality being that as long as the surrounding regimes are not by nature democratic and peace-seeking, we cannot afford agreements in which the security component is not dominant. No agreement will last unless we preserve security and defense zones. We must keep the Jordan Valley as the strategic border, as our strategic buffer. We must guarantee free and safe access to the Jordan Valley, widen the demarcation lines in our coastal areas and prevent our return to the 1949 cease-fire borders.
Under the present conditions, no arrangement is possible which does not guarantee our control over the type and quantity of arms entering the territories under PA jurisdiction. It is clear that we cannot tolerate an entity with a large army equipped with heavy artillery or non-conventional weapons, abutting our population centers. We also cannot allow the existence of an entity able to form alliances with regimes such as Iran, Iraq and Syria. Under no circumstances can we permit a hostile entity to control our airspace and water resources.
These are minimal - not maximum - requirements. These are realistic requirements for a realistic peace with the Palestinians. If we want a lasting peace, we must insist on the battle against terrorism as a pre-condition, and we must have provisions in the final status agreement that will guarantee the permanence of this peace. I do not promise the peace which exists in Western Europe. We are not in Western Europe. Ours will not be the peace which exists between the United States and Canada, or the Netherlands and Belgium. But it will be a peace with which we can live, and through which we can gradually alter reality until we reach - so we hope - better relations with the Palestinians and our other neighbors.
As long as our region is characterized by non-democratic regimes, we must pursue a policy which will enable us to maintain our deterrent ability, and not surrender vital and strategic security assets. I believe that these principles can also guide us in our quest for peace with Syria and, consequently, with Lebanon: principles which place security as the primary and most important foundation for the achievement and maintenance of peace.
But, I must stress, even as we progress, despite many obstacles, towards peace with the most immediate circle of neighboring countries and regimes, we are witnessing a deterioration in the outer circle. The arming of the Islamic states continues to grow, and today it includes both accurate, long-range surface-to-surface missiles and non-conventional weapons. Our qualitative edge over our neighbors has diminished in certain spheres, and a number of regional entities have remained outside the process and continue to seek Israel's destruction. In the past, our primary concern was conventional, frontal warfare. Our victory in the Six Day War substantially reduced this risk, although not eliminating it completely.
But in recent years the threat has changed and grown. Iran, a one-time ally of Israel, currently poses the greatest threat to peace in our neighborhood. The possibility that Iran could obtain non-conventional weapons, in addition to its long-range missiles, should be of great concern not only to us but to all those responsible for world security. The Iranian threat is not confined to Israel, nor to this region. It is a global threat.
These are the negative developments. But we can also point to no less significant positive developments.
In recent years our economy has undergone dramatic changes. Today, Israel's economy has much greater potential due to its transition to knowhow industries. Such industries and a free economy make a very powerful combination. We must nurture knowledge as well as economic freedom. The two will merge spontaneously. Our economic strength is greater than that of our neighbors, and the gap will widen. Of this there is no doubt. Israel's technological capabilities and military power are also on the rise.
In the area of security, Israel enjoys American backing and assistance as an integral part of US policy. I have mentioned the collapse of the Soviet empire and, although there is no doubt that Russia is a global power whose strength and influence will be evident in our region, the danger of a flare-up between Eastern and Western blocs has virtually disappeared.
This is a welcome development, as the Soviet Union was a major contributor to the fostering of our neighbors' military capabilities. In effect, it delivered them from the price of defeat. Each time they would wage war against us - and after each defeat - the Soviet Union would rush to their rescue, rebuild their potential, grant them unconditional backing and give them hope for another round. Even though our neighbors and several of the states with which we have not yet made peace can find new suppliers, none will replace the Soviet Union's strategic backing and battlefield support.
Our current task is to strengthen our defenses against both the immediate and the outer circles. In the former we must do so to complete the circle of peace; and in the latter to at least prevent the deterioration toward
war. We must do this with confidence, and not be seduced by wishful thinking. Our need for preparedness and deterrent ability has not passed, nor is it likely to disappear in the foreseeable future.
We all know the necessary components. They include preservation of our conventional capabilities and readiness to face non-conventional threats. The security services must adapt to new needs and increase efficiency, and they have been doing both. This is a hard and painful process. It is important that the fat be trimmed without causing damage to the muscle, for if we cut too deep, the muscle tissue may be impaired.
In the discussions on increasing efficiency in the face of threats, it is crucial that the Minister of Defense, the Chief-of-Staff and the IDF generals deliver their assessments honestly, based on their vast experience, and with the professionalism for which they are known. Their presentation to the political echelon must be direct, blunt and confidential. These discussions do not belong in the public arena. It is crucial that they remain restricted to the highest decision-making levels.
We must maintain our military intelligence abilities and regain what was lost in recent years. We must remain determined and call on our inner strength. Openness, media exposure and the intervention of the courts are basically positive factors, but we must not allow them to undermine the consensus on security matters and weaken public backing for steps vital to our defense.
A major component of our inner strength is the relationship with our minorities. The Druze, Circassians and Bedouins play an important role in national defense. We must expand this circle. We should not abandon the field to those who deny their Israeli identity and incite Israeli Arabs to adopt Palestinians or Syrian loyalties.
We will continue to nurture our relations with the major powers, particularly the US, where we have found an encouragingly receptive ear for our position on terrorism and the primacy of the security issue in the promotion of peace. Only yesterday, Secretary of State Albright stated that the PA must demonstrate 100% effort in the fight not only against the manifestations of terrorism, but also its infrastructure.
We will continue our pursuit of peace with our neighbors. Despite disappointments and risks, there can be no doubt that dialogue is better than no dialogue, and that only negotiations can lead to a satisfactory solution and peaceful coexistence.
Obviously we would prefer democratic partners who share our concept of peace, but we must accept the reality of what we have. It is not our intention to intervene in the way our partners order their political affairs. We can only hope that the values of peace and freedom which have brought magnificent prosperity and growth worldwide will affect them, and they, like us, will aspire to a true and lasting peace.
Between "rose garden" dreams on the one hand, and paranoia and isolation ont he other, there is a golden path of realism, of realpolitik. This is the path that Israel chose beginning in the Ben-Gurion era, and this must be our choice today. If we know when to compromise, when to grasp opportunities and when to display determination and decisiveness, we can bring peace with security to our country and our people.