The Oslo disaster 30 years on

Abstract

Thirty years after its euphoric launch, the ‘Oslo peace process’ between Israel and the PLO stands as the worst calamity to have afflicted Israelis and Palestinians since the 1948 war, and the most catastrophic strategic blunder in Israel’s history. By replacing Israel’s control of the West Bank and Gaza Palestinians with corrupt and repressive terrorist entities that indoctrinated their subjects with burning hatred of Jews and Israelis, as well as murdered some 2,000 Israelis and rained thousands of rockets and missiles on their population centres, the Oslo process has made the prospects for peace and reconciliation ever more remote. By deflating the combative ethos of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), it has weakened Israel’s national security and made the outbreak of a multi-front war a distinct possibility. By transforming the PLO (and, to a lesser extent, Hamas) into internationally accepted political actors without forcing them to shed their genocidal commitment to the Jewish state’s destruction, it weakened Israel’s international standing. And by deepening Israel’s internal cleavages and destabilising its sociopolitical system, it has created a clear and present danger to the Jewish State’s thriving democracy, indeed to its very existence.