During a meeting on April 3 with members of the Shinui opposition party, Prime Minister/Defense Minister Ehud Barak admitted that a unilateral withdrawal of the Israeli Army from the security zone in southern Lebanon might result in increased Hizbullah hostilities.
So now even Barak is admitting that all the Pollyanna Peres-ian posturing regarding peace and tranquility after Israel conducts its unilateral pullout of Lebanon is poppycock. In fact, Barak and his entourage know what is coming. They know the Syrians and their Hizbullah puppets will conduct ethnic cleansing and will massacre the Southern Lebanese population, which is why Barak is suddenly scrambling to find refuge sites in Israel for them.
So what happened to the idea that the whole problem is the Israeli military presence in southern Lebanon? I thought the Osloids know that the Hizbullah will behave itself after the withdrawal since, after all, it will have no further reason to dislike Israel or shell it. Oh, and since Barak knows the Hizbullah will behave, how come the sudden panic and drive to build bomb shelters and trenches in all the villages and kibbutzim along the border? I thought we had Barak's scout's honor that the Hizbullah would not shell Israel. After all, why should they? Israel will have withdrawn unconditionally from Lebanon and that is all the Hizbullah is fighting for, right? Could it just possibly be that Barak knows what the rest of us know? That a bloodbath is coming?
Meanwhile, all this can be regarded as yet another proof that all of Oslo "thinking" may be summed up as an application of the theory of the "J Curve." Let me explain.
In economics, there is a commonly-accepted theory about certain things called a "J Curve." The
basic idea is that when something changes, it may
first make the problem worse and then make it better later.
That is why it is called a "J Curve", going down a
while and then up. For example, if a country has a
problem with a deficit in its balance of trade, a devaluation of
its currency first makes the deficit worse and then
better. "J-curves" are always counter-intuitive. Linear
trend lines are the simpler and thus preferred
explanation except where overwhelming evidence exists to the con-
trary. Occam's Razor usually favors linearity.
The entire "theory" of Oslo has by now been reduced to an assertion of a "J Curve" relationship in the Middle East. Every single gesture and concession by Israel has made the situation worse until now. Israeli concessions produced a bloodbath of terrorist atrocities, PLO calls for Jihad, the Engineer, PLO open threats to eliminate Israel, PLO calls to Saddam to an-nihilate the Jews with chemical weapons, PLO calls to the Arab countries to wipe out Israel, Arafat's beatifying suicide bombers, demands that Israel give up Jerusalem, Holocaust denial by PLO officials, escalation in Lebanon, radicalization of Israel's own Green Line Arabs, etc. etc.
But Oslo advocates dismiss all this as merely the "J Curve" in action. It is expected, indeed wonderful, beautiful. A few more concessions and the curve will reverse itself. Just wait and see. True, until now Israeli concessions and goodwill gestures produced violence and xenophobia, down to and including PLO praise for Hitler, but a few more concessions and we will cross the Rubicon, invert the "J Curve," and the PLO and Assad will pursue peace and coexistence.
In other words, Israel can buy peace, they insist, in exchange for 300 well-defined concessions, including, of course, withdrawal to the 1949 borders and creation of an armed belligerent PLO state with Jerusalem as its capital. And the problem is that Israel has only made 299. So according to "J Curve" theory, the first 299 of these concessions only make the Palestinians and Syrians more bloodthirsty, but that last 300th will turn everything around. That last one will bring peace, tranquillity and the brotherhood of man.
And the only reason we do not have peace and tranquillity now is because the obstinate opponents of Oslo and peace are resisting making that 300th concession.
So we need more Peace Now bumper stickers. We need to nudge the doubting Thomases of Zion into making those remaining concessions so as to ride the "J Curve" to peace. And Arafat and his storm troopers and the rest of the fascists of the Arab world will then allow us to live in peace ever after. Which is why the first six years or so of Oslo have produced nothing but deterioration and increasingly clear Palestinian blood-lust and extremism. All part of the plan you see. Things have to get worse before they get better.
This is the alternative offered by the Oslo camp to "linear thinking".
Steven Plaut teaches at the University of Haifa.
Outpost - 8 - April 2000