The economic part of the "deal of the century," as it was presented this week in Bahrain, raised an interesting paradox: that one of the diplomatic assets the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is paying a heavy price for is the continued separation and isolation between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, and fostering the schism between Hamas, which rules the former, and the PA, which controls the latter. To protect it, Israel has for years refrained from a full-scale incursion into Gaza that would toppled the Hamas leadership there.
According to this policy, keeping Hamas in power in Gaza is a necessary condition of keeping the Palestinians factionalized and staving off the danger of a Palestinian state. The price is indeed high, some say insufferable: hundreds and even thousands of missiles, mortars, and arson balloons aimed at communities in the Gaza-adjacent western Negev over the years, and sometimes even at central Israel.
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Now we have an American administration that is more in step with Israel than any before it, and whose economic plan includes one element that is completely contrary to Israeli policy: the investment of some $4 billion to build roads and train tracks to support "the flow of goods and people between Gaza and the West Bank."
The Israeli security and defense establishment is greatly discomfited by this plan, mainly out of concern that a connection between the West Bank and Gaza will make it much easier for Hamas, which seized control of Gaza in 2007, to execute its plans to do the same in the West Bank. Hamas, one senior security official warns, "is just waiting for an opportunity like this." The same official does not hesitate to dismiss the idea of linking Gaza to the West Bank as "disconnected from reality."
The desire to connect the West Bank to Gaza is nothing new. The idea was included in the Oslo I and II Accords, and their corollaries, known as "the safe passage," and various engineering options were mentioned: tunnels or raised highways.
But for Israel, "safe" means safe from terrorism. The Palestinians meant "open" – a corridor that would provide free passage between the two parts of their future state. When the first papers about the safe passage were signed, Israel was still present the Gaza Strip, and the PA was in charge there.
In October 1999 Israel and the PA signed the "Protocol Concerning Safe Passage between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip." It was then partially implemented at the Erez Crossing, along Highway 4 to the Ashkelon intersection, and from there on Highway 35 to Tarkumia, all in Israeli territory.
Through Ashkelon and Kiryat Gat
In the first four months it was open, use of the safe passage was limited and only 115,000 people, 6,500 taxis, 1,700 buses, and 2,100 cars made use of it. In the months that followed and until the outbreak of the Second Intifada, during which it was closed, use of the passage increased only slightly. Gazans traveled to the West Bank and West Bank residents traveled to Gaza, traversing the cities Ashkelon and Kiryat Gat, as well as the Hof Ashkelon, Lakhish, Shafir, and Yoav regional councils.
Even then, the security risk existed. A committee of experts submitted a report about options to the minister of regional cooperation, which explicitly noted the dangers: "The transfer of attackers and illegal weapons from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank;" "An attack on Israeli targets and facilities near the corridor during passage;" or "hostile entities slowing infiltrating Israel."
MK Uzi Dayan, who at the time was finishing his term as deputy IDF chief of staff and starting out as head of the National Security Council, stressed this week that it would be dangerous to reopen the safe passage corridor now.
"The passage can be operated for the Palestinians' economic benefit only when one entity – the PA – is in charge of Gaza and the West Bank, and only when the crossings and the [security] fence are in place and complete. That isn't the reality right now. A passage of this kind could allow a terrorist from Gaza to find a haven in Hebron and a terrorist from Hebron to hide in Gaza," Dayan said.
Dayan is convinced that "even the Americans understand that in the existing circumstances it is impossible to build routes and roads that connect Gaza to the West Bank."
He warns that financial aid earmarked for the Palestinians could leak to Hamas and other terrorist organizations.
"The lessons of the past demand that we oversee the money," he explains.
Maj. Gen. (res.) Giora Eiland, another former head of the NSC, also thinks that currently, "it is not in Israel's national interest to create a new link between Gaza and the West Bank and turn them into a single political entity."
Eiland, who used to represent Israel in negotiations with the US and the Palestinians, clarifies: "If this one element [of the plan] is isolated, Israel must object to it. On the other hand, if the passage is part of a broader picture and peace deal, it should be examined and not rejected out of hand."
The danger, Eiland explains, "also exists with the tens of thousands of Palestinians Israel allows to work inside its borders. Alongside the risk, there is a security benefit: tens of thousands of Palestinians who are kept away from violence and terrorism."
'Without land rights'
Either way, the return of "safe passage" appears unrealistic in the reality of 2019. Even if vital adjustments are made, they seem forced, especially given two important statements made this week that bear weight on the discussion of the safe passage corridor.
Pinhas Inbari, a senior analyst at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs who has researched Palestinian issued for years, told Israel Hayom straight out what senior Palestinian officials only dare whisper: that PA President Mahmoud Abbas "is hesitant about the 'safe passage' idea and renewed ties with Gaza. He won't say it publicly, because it goes against the Palestinian national consensus, but he understands that Gaza today is radical Islamist territory, a hotbed of terrorism, and that – unlike in the past – he has no reason to be there."
A top legal scholar who was asked about the safe passage issue this week also warned about the possibility that Palestinians would use a corridor through Israeli sovereign territory to create "a right to the land."
He explained that this would be "a right to the land created through continual use of it; a right that is independent of any agreements; a right that cannot be revoked or canceled except by the side that enjoys it – the Palestinians."
The top political echelon is in possession of a legal opinion that presents examples from all over the world in which political agreements led to a "right of passage" being interpreted as legal rights to the land. Given that, legal scholars are warning that no matter what happens, any safe passage earmarked for use by the Palestinians must be defined as a "temporary arrangement to be renewed periodically," or even explicitly defined as an arrangement that does not include any rights to the land.
