The Oslo Accords in the mid-1990s conferred international esteem and praise on the archmurderer Yasser Arafat, cost more than a thousand Israelis their lives and many more their limbs, provided Judeocidal gangs access to military-grade explosives, and allowed armed terrorist militias to deploy within mortar range of our nation's capital.
Until Monday, we knew these appalling accords, which brought so much death and destruction to Israeli streets, bus stops, cafes and restaurants, owed their existence to a convicted drug smuggler who betrayed the voters who had sent him to the Knesset to prevent precisely the measures he permitted.
Since Monday, we know that not only was he someone who dealt in drugs and who betrayed his voters, but someone who, it seems, betrayed his country and his people.
Segev and Oslo: Ethical parallels
There are many parallels between disgraced former cabinet minister Gonen Segev and the Oslo Accords.
Indeed, in many ways, they are the moral (really, immoral) reflections of each other.
While Segev himself represents a mark of shame on Israel public life and a point of singularity in terms of deceit and duplicity, so too do the Oslo Accords represent a mark of shame on our national history, a reprehensible nadir of broken promises, deception and self-delusion.
Moreover, in many ways, neither Segev nor Oslo would exist without the other and without the essential symbiosis between them. After all, without Segev and his uninhibited proclivity for treachery, there would be no Oslo. So too, without Oslo and the desperate desires of those who concocted it, Segev would not have been in a ministerial post, which gave him access to the information he allegedly supplied to the enemy.
Just as Oslo embraced bitter enemies, so did Segev.
In large measure, Oslo was a point of inflection in the history of Zionism, after which nothing was as it was before. Everything that was previously a hallowed virtue, such as settlement expressing attachment to the Jewish homeland, became a heinous vice.
So too, Segev in large measure became a point of inflection in Israeli politics, a point beyond which a sense of shame disappeared as a constraint on the behavior of elected representatives, after which prostitution of the profession of politics became acceptable, even expected. Political pledges became worthless and ideological principles and commitment nothing more than bargaining chips to be swiftly exchanged if and when a more personally advantageous opportunity appeared.
Unbridled individual ambition became the supreme value, pushing aside any obstacle and consuming any moral inhibition of conscience.
A personal perspective
I first encountered Segev in early 1992 when I was secretary general of the Tsomet movement. He appeared out of nowhere, after he had not been seen for years participating in any of the movement's activities, to compete for second place in the Tsomet list for the Knesset. Tsomet was a secular hawkish party that vehemently opposed the "land-for-peace" concept on which the Oslo Accords were based.
To many people – apparently including Tsomet's chairman, former IDF Chief of Staff Rafael ("Raful") Eitan – Segev appeared to be "the salt of the earth," a sturdy, good-looking young man, charismatic and charming, with a medical degree and a record of IDF combat service. Many people, apparently including Eitan, were led astray by Segev's deceptive charms, which eventually led to the demise of the movement and the decline in public support for its principles.
Similarly, to many – apparently including former IDF Chief of Staff and then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin – the Oslo Accords were perceived as a refreshing and innovative initiative, a masterstroke of far-reaching and far-sighted statesmanship, ushering in a new era of regional peace and prosperity in an EU-like "new Middle East" stretching from Kuwait to Casablanca. Many people, apparently including Rabin, fell prey to Oslo's deceptive allure (or rather, sinister spell) and allowed themselves to be led astray by a noble vision that quickly disintegrated.
Compulsive liar
Without wishing to be immodest, unlike many, I was not deceived by Segev's ample guile. On the contrary, I quickly identified him as a compulsive liar. As proof of this, the moment he was elected to the No. 2 slot on the Tsomet list, in place of my good friend the late Yoash Tsiddon, one of the most outstanding parliamentarians the Knesset has ever known, I withdrew my name from the list of contenders for other slots in the list and resigned from my post of secretary general.
The rest is history. At times, I wonder how different that history would have been if others had followed my lead.
