From: Center for Policy Research <cpr>
Subject: Unconventional peace proposal


A unconventional proposal for peace in the Middle-East.
---------------------------------------------------------- by
			  Elias Davidsson

The following proposal is based on the following assumptions:

1.      Fundamental human rights, such as the right to life, to
education, to establish a family and have children, to human
dignity, the right to free movement, to free expression, etc. are
more important to human existence that the rights of states.

2.      In the event of a conflict between basic human rights and
rights of collectivities, basic human rights should prevail.

3.      Between the collectivities defining themselves as
Jewish-Israeli and Palestinian-Arab, however labelled, an
unresolved conflict exists.

4.      This conflict has caused great sufferings for millions of
people. It moreover poisons relations between communities, peoples
and nations.

5.      Each year, the United States expends billions of dollars
in economic and military aid to the conflicting parties.

6.      Attempts to solve the Israeli-Arab conflict by traditional
political means have failed.

7.      As long as the conflict is perceived as that between two
distinct ethnical/religious communities/peoples which claim the
land, there is no just nor peaceful solution possible.

8.      Love between human beings can be capitalized for the sake
of peace and justice. When people love, they share.

Having stated my assumptions, I will now state my proposal.

1.      A Fund should be established which would disburse grants
for each child born to a couple where one partner is Israeli-Jew
and the other Palestinian-Arab.

2.      To be entitled for a grant, a couple will have to prove
that one of the partners possesses or is entitled to Israeli
citizenship under the Law of Return and the other partner,
although born in areas under current Isreali control, is not
entitled to such citizenship under the Law of Return.

3.      For the first child, the grant will amount to $18.000. For
the second the third child, $12.000 for each child. For each
subsequent child, the grant will amount to $6.000 for each child.


4.      The Fund would be financed by a variety of sources which
have shown interest in promoting a peaceful solution to the
Israeli-Arab conflict, including the U.S. Government, Jewish and
Christian organizations in the U.S.  and a great number of
governments and international organizations.

5.      The emergence of a considerable number of 'mixed'
marriages in Israel/Palestine, all of whom would have relatives on
'both sides' of the divide, would make the conflict lose its
ethnical and unsoluble core and strengthen the emergence of a
truly civil society. The existence of a strong 'mixed' stock of
people would also help the integration of Israeli society into the
Middle-East in a graceful manner.

Objections to this proposal will certainly be voiced. I will
attempt to identify some of these:

1.      The idea of providing financial incentives to selected
forms of partnership and marriage, is not conventional. However,
it is based on the concept of affirmative action, which is
recognized as a legitimate form of public policy to reverse the
perverse effects of segregation and discrimination. International
law clearly permits affirmative action when it is aimed at
reducing racial discrimination and segregation.

2.      It may be objected that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
is not primarily a religious or ethnical conflict, but that it is
a conflict between a colonialist settler society and an indigenous
colonized society that can only regain its freedom by armed
struggle. This objection is based on the assumption that the
'enemy' is not Zionism as ideology and practice, but
Israeli-Jewish society and its members which will have to be
defeated. This objection has no merit because it does not fulfill
the first two assumptions concerning the primacy of fundamental
human rights over collective rights (see above)

3.      Fundamentalist Jews would certainly object to the use of
financial incentives to encourage 'mixed marriages'. From their
point of view, the continued existence of a specific Jewish People
overrides any other consideration, be it human love, peace of
human rights.  The President of the World Jewish Congress, Edgar
Bronfman, reflected this view a few years ago in an interview he
gave to Der Spiegel, a German magazine. He called the increasing
assimilation of Jews in the world a <calamity>, comparable in its
effects only with the Holocaust. This objection has no merit
either because it does not fulfill the first two assumptions (see
above)

4.      It may objected that only a few people in
Israel/Palestine, would request such grants and that it would thus
not serve its purpose. To this objection one might respond that
although it is not possible to determine with certainty the effect
of such a proposal, the existence of such a Fund would help mixed
couples to resist the pressure of their respective societies and
encourage young couples to reject fundamentalist and racist
attitudes.

5.      It may objected that such a Fund would need great sums to
bring about substantial demographic changes. This objection has
merits. However, it must be remembered that huge sums, more than
$3 billion, are expended each year by the United States government
and by U.S. organizations to maintain an elusive peace in the
Middle-East through armaments. A mere fraction of these sums would
suffice to launch the above proposal and create a more favorable
climate towards the existence of 'mixed' marriages in
Israel/Palestine, thus encouraging the emergence of a
non-segregated society in that worn-torn land.

I would be thankful for critical comments to the above proposal as
well for any dissemination of this proposal for meaningful
discussion and enrichment.