It is not often that a comprehensive, carefully researched and
readable book appears smack in the midst of events, destined to
lead to radical changes in the history of a whole region and in
future relations between its peoples. Syria and Israel is just such
a work, and to say that it is a timely and highly topical work
almost amounts to an understatement.
Nothing is missing here. Professor Moshe Ma'oz, a noted authority
on modern Syria, and the author of several books and studies on
various aspects of its history and political structure, has managed
to cover the ground fully and meticulously. He opens with a brief
but adequate sketch of the historical setting, in which the
100-year dispute between Arab nationalists and Zionists is
perceived as alternately dialogue and conflict between two
nationalist movements.
Where Syria itself as part of this dispute was concerned, a slight
chance can be said to have existed for an accord between the two
parties during the French Mandate. However, when the Mandate was
terminated and Syria became an independent republic in 1946, the
Pan-Arabs there gained the upper hand, as did the view that
Palestine, Arab Palestine, should be an inseparable part of an
all-Arab unity. Thus ended whatever measure of dialogue had gone on
between the Syrians and the Zionists - who in the meantime had
unwittingly helped to complete the circle by publicly set¬ting
themselves what appeared to be new goals, "not only of pursuing
free Jewish immigration to Palestine, but also of the establishment
of a 'Jewish commonwealth' there."
And so, by the mid-1940s, the respective positions of the two
parties tended to harden, and chances for any kind of meaningful
dialogue reced¬ed completely. The 1948 war, too, ended in a
standstill, and all subsequent efforts to reach a peace agreement
failed for reasons for which both sides were to blame in equal
measure, though some observers, including Israelis in key
positions, put much of the blame on the Israeli side. All of this
resulted inevitably in what Ma'oz calls a zero-sum conflict between
Jerusalem and Damascus.
The domestic, regional and global factors at play in this conflict
are bared in what for this reviewer are the most instructive and
enlightening chapters of the book. For, after all is said and done,
it was in the first few years that followed the final failure of
peace negotiations, in May 1953, that the Syrian-Israeli conflict
crystallized into the impasse that was to continue for four long
decades and more. As the author puts it, "While the
Ben-Gurion-Dayan hard line towards Syria (and other Arab states)
con¬tinued to predominate .. .Syria's attitudes towards Israel
became, after 1954, more militant, owing to significant domestic
political changes, as well as to regional and global
factors."
As far as Israel and Israeli attitudes are concerned, the domestic
political factors analyzed by the author are largely focused on
differences of approach between Ben-Gurion and his foreign
minister, Moshe Sharett. While he takes fully into account the
Syrian - and Egyptian ¬growing hostility toward Israel, Ma'oz
considers as "no less crucial" what he terms "the predominance of
Ben-Gurion's activist, hawkish approach over Sharett's moderate,
diplomatic line." "Whereas Sharett considered [peace with the
Arabs] Israel's first priority and advocated the use of diplomacy,
Ben-Gurion relegated it to a secondary position while continuing to
employ force against the Arabs."
The global factors at play in this zero-sum conflict - the Soviet
Union, the United States, and the United Arab Republic (Egypt) -
are dealt with in a separate chapter, after which we come to the
establishment of a radi¬cal Ba'ath party regime in Damascus in
March 1963, by means of a military coup. From there on it was, in
the words of the title of one of the book's chapters, "Ba'athist
Extremism and Israeli Activism," and the all-but unstoppable march
toward the Six-Day War was started. According to the author, the
major cause for the Syrian-Israeli escalation into that war was the
diversion of the River Jordan, "which Israel was determined to
pursue and Syria to arrest." When the issue was subsequently
compounded by Syrian-sponsored guerilla operations inside Israel,
Israeli retaliatory raids against Syria, Egyptian threats and
Soviet accusations, war became almost inevitable, and hostilities
duly broke out on June 5 of 1967.
With the defeat suffered by Syria in this war, the Syrian-Israeli
conflict reached'its highest point. This is because, as Ma'oz puts
it, "in addition to its ideological antagonism, its commitment to
the Palestinian plight, and its search for domestic legitimacy, the
Syrian regime now had other crucial motives for its conflict with
Israel: the painful defeat of the army, the loss of the Golan
Heights, and the deployment of Israeli troops 40 miles from the
Syrian capital."
From there, just a little more than six years after the victory of
the six days came the Yom Kippur War of 1973, dubbed by General
Dayan as "an earthquake." The consequences of that war, at least as
far as Hafez al¬Assad of Syria was concerned, can best be
described as a paradox. On the face of it, the Syrians definitely
were the losers in that war on the battle¬field, their
advancing forces swiftly and effectively pushed back and the
capital, Damascus, coming within easy reach of the Israel Defense
Forces.
And yet, Assad ultimately managed to turn this military reverse
into a substantial victory, at least in the eyes of the majority of
Syrians and many Arabs. This is attributed by the author to Assad's
"bold conduct of the fighting, his decision to carryon without
Egypt in a war of attrition against Israel, his tough and skillful
negotiations with Kissinger." Assad indeed left such an impression
on the outside world that many Syrians and other Arabs now
considered him the new Pan-Arab leader and Gamal Abdul Nasser's
worthy successor, "while several Arab states offered Syria
military, diplomatic, and financial support, and various Western
leaders, including Nixon, acknowledged his influential position in
the Middle East." In contrast - and to make the paradox complete -
Israel, despite its sweeping military victory, "emerged from the
war ... deeply shaken and hurt."
It was thus that a brand-new chapter was opened in the history of
the conflict between the two countries. Following Golda Meir's
resignation from the premiership in April 1974, Yitzhak Rabin as
the new prime minister seemed in many ways a perfect match to
Assad. The two had at least one thing in common: "Both ... were
former military leaders and war heroes - Rabin in 1967 and Assad in
1973. Assad's achievements in 1973 gave him the status of an
unchallenged leader with all-Arab prestige. Rabin, the first
Israeli-born prime minister, owed his ascendancy to his able
conduct of the 1967 victory."
Strange as it may now sound, the peace-making process between
Israel and Syria got under way almost immediately after Rabin
appeared on the stage. "If we are to achieve further progress with
Egypt," Rabin declared in his first speech as prime minister, "it
will be necessary to examine whether Syria is ready to sign a peace
treaty with Israel" This was said 22 years ago almost to the day,
and it is a somber thought to reflect that throughout those long
years the question as to whether Syria did want to sign a peace
treaty, and if so what kind of peace that treaty would
envis¬age, was asked abnormally frequently. Assad kept his
cool and refused adamantly to join a peace process which seemed to
pass him over, leaving him alone in the arena with Israel.
However, as Ma'oz reminds us, right at the opening sentence of his
Preface, "No Arab-Israeli war is possible without Egypt, and no
Arab-¬Israeli peace is possible without Syria." Now that a
peace treaty between Syria and Israel seems to be in full sight,
Ma'oz in his concluding remarks refers to "the major historic task
and challenge still ahead" for both Jerusalem and Damascus to face
- namely, "to transform a political agreement...into genuine peace
and normalization between the two peoples by shattering the
psychological barrier of mistrust, hate, and fear through
education, cultural exchange, and economic cooperation."
These, obviously, are not easy tasks to set, especially where the
Syrians are concerned. But they are not impossible to perform -
given the will.