"The chances of reaching an agreement with the Palestinians are not high," Maj. Gen. (res.) Amos Yadlin, the man who by virtue of his former position as head of Military Intelligence earned the moniker "the nation's assessor," said this week in a special interview. "As a matter of fact, the chances are quite low," he said. Today, Yadlin heads the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv. He "commands" a number of senior researchers at the prestigious institute who analyze events in the Middle East. At the annual conference staged by the INSS, appearances were made by the president, the prime minister, and various cabinet ministers, army officers, diplomats, and academics. The top echelon came to make statements, but also to listen to assessments that allow them to pause and them take stock of ongoing processes, possibilities, risks and opportunities. Yadlin offered his analysis of the two most pressing diplomatic processes taking place at the moment -- the Palestinian question and the Iranian nuclear issue. Reading his statements brings a better understanding of the significance of those four words often said when discussing these issues: "The situation is complicated." "The odds of reaching an agreement with the Palestinians are low, since each side needs to accept three painful concessions," he said. "Israel is required to accept the partitioning of the land and the establishment of a Palestinian state. Now, it's true that this is a principle that has already agreed upon, supposedly, but it appears that when one gets down to details, the situation is much more difficult. "Also, Israel needs to agree to a Palestinian state based on the 1967 lines with territorial swaps, when just 60 to 90 percent of settlers need to be included in the settlement blocs. Finally, Israel will also have to agree to a Palestinian presence in Jerusalem to the point where the Palestinians realize their goal of establishing a capital in the city. When it comes to the last two concessions, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has yet to get there, and he is certainly not prodding the nation to get there. "As for the Palestinians, [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud] Abbas needs to agree to three critical concessions of his own. First, he needs to declare an end to the conflict, an end to all claims, and to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Secondly, he needs to renounce the right of return of refugees. Thirdly, he needs to agree to limits on Palestinian sovereignty in deference to Israeli security arrangements. "Abbas will try to find a way out of all of these commitments and obligations because from a Palestinian perspective, if he agrees to all of them, it would be tantamount to a recognition of Zionism. "As for the return of refugees, Abbas, personally, has given up on his demand to return to Safed, as he has said. But he added that all of the other refugees needed to be individually asked whether they would agree to give up the demand to return to their homes. This, of course, is unacceptable to us. What is needed is an agreement between the peoples on the issue of refugees, and not to keep the issue open. What is needed is an agreement that won't include the right of return of Palestinians to territory on which the Jewish people established their state. "As such, the Palestinians will have to understand that they will have to make concessions and accept limitations on their sovereignty to meet Israeli security arrangements. We thought that of all of the core issues, the matter of security arrangements would be solved quite easily, but the Palestinians were quick to reject the American proposals drafted by Gen. John Allen." Do the security arrangements focus on the Jordan Valley- "The focus placed on the Jordan Valley misses the point entirely," Yadlin said. "It's not that the issue of the Jordan Valley isn't important, but besides the valley we must also deal with defense elements in western Samaria, since that is where the most danger lies given that the coastal plain is most vulnerable to enemy fire from there and there is also the matter of security arrangements for Jerusalem. "Any future agreement will have to take into account the mistakes that were made in the Oslo Accords thus far. The lesson that was learned from the Gaza withdrawal, from leaving the Philadelphi Route along the Sinai-Gaza border vulnerable to Iranian weapons transfers from Sudan and Libya, must be internalized and implemented in the Jordan Valley as well. "We don't want a situation where a Palestinian state arises and we see the presence of radical elements in Judea and Samaria who will use the territory as a base to launch missiles at Israel. So the valley needs to be tightly protected. "But, as I mentioned earlier, that's not the only problem. The more serious problem is whether the Palestinian Authority will be strong enough to deal with terrorist organizations. Will it survive after Israel withdraws from the territory or will Hamas take over just like it did in Gaza? The security arrangements need to provide an answer even in the scenario of a coup in the Palestinian state and whether we are dealing with a weak Palestinian state that either doesn't have the will or the strength to deal with terrorism. "If this is the situation, then most of the terrorism will come from the western side, in Samaria, and that's where we need to put the focus. That's a part of the landscape from which they could launch shoulder-fired missiles at airplanes that land at Ben-Gurion Airport and take off from it as well. They could also fire at cars on Route 6 [the main trans-Israel highway]. As such, we must also focus on security arrangements for Jerusalem. We need to see that we are not replacing a good security situation with one that involves constant terrorism, which is what we had during the Arafat era from 2000 until 2003." To ensure security, what other concessions on sovereignty will the Palestinians need to make- "Control over air space and electromagnetic fields, for example. There is very limited wiggle room here. In order to ensure control over airspace, we need to have a shared field with the Palestinians. There's no need to blink here. Without Israeli control over airspace, the chances of attaining real security are very slim." How is it possible to partition Jerusalem without risking the security of neighborhoods that would be left vulnerable to enemy fire, as we saw in Gilo during the last intifada- "In Jerusalem, the discussions could be divided into three dimensions. The negotiators need to delineate the territorial borders, the political arrangements (on the Temple Mount, among other places), and then to begin work on the security arrangements that would address all the concerns regarding the territorial and political questions. Jerusalem is one of the key obstacles to a deal. It is anticipated that the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem will be under Palestinian control. The State of Israel has no interest in controlling Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem and adding another 250,000 Arab residents to its citizen registry. A unique political arrangement will have to be implemented on the Temple Mount and we will need to come up with security solutions to these two issues." What possible security solution could ensure quiet in Jerusalem- "If there will be a Palestinian government that will want to keep the peace and fight terrorism, we will have to test its ability to do so. Every security arrangement will have to be tested over a length of time. Israel can't leave after three years, as Abbas has proposed. We are talking about arrangements and an agreement that are arrived at after 2,000 years in which the Jewish people returned to their land and after 120 years of conflict with the Palestinians. So, 20 years, for example, is not a long time. "We need to test the Palestinians over a period of time to determine whether they are providing security as we hope they will. We need to test whether they are proving themselves in terms of controlling events on the ground, if they are capable of proving that they could fight terrorism, prevent weapons smuggling, and when there's something going on and our intelligence detects that something's up, they need to do the right thing. This wasn't the situation when Arafat was in power. Like I said, this time the security arrangements need to provide answers to all possible scenarios and correct the shortcomings that were exposed in the Oslo Accords and during the Arafat era, when he was in charge of security." You mentioned a number of factors that limit sovereignty and a lot of conditions. Which Palestinian leader will be ready to accept them- "There are many countries that have accepted limits on their actions due to the geopolitical situation as reflected in their region. The Palestinians have a tendency to portray themselves as the weak party going up against mighty Israel, but the picture is skewed. If one were to look at things correctly and realistically, it is Israel that is very small, and it is facing 57 Muslim countries. The State of Israel cannot take the risk of forfeiting its security by failing to adequately provide safeguards, because it cannot afford to lose a war." What about Abbas? Is he a partner- "He certainly is a partner, and as evidence, one can point to the fact that is currently negotiating with Israel. He sincerely believes in peace and he is of the opinion that terrorism has led the Palestinians to a place where they were much worse off and strategically placed them in a very problematic position. On the other hand, he is a very tough opponent at the negotiating table. He doesn't want to give up the Palestinian people's right of return, he has a difficult time declaring an end to the conflict, and he has a hard time recognizing Israel as the state of the Jewish people or agreeing to its security demands. He is a partner for negotiations, but is he a partner for signing a peace treaty? We will find out in the next year." If Iran reaches a stage where it is capable of assembling an atomic weapon, it will remain an existential threat to Israel. Is this still true today after the interim agreement- "Iran has declared that the State of Israel is an illegitimate state and that it needs to be erased from the map. This is a country that combines an extremist ideology with an extreme weapon that enables it to destroy Israel, creating a potentially existential danger. As of this moment, they do not have this lethal weapon, but it is a potential danger. "Its nuclear program was indeed halted at Geneva, but it was halted at a point that is very, very close to the point in which the Iranians could decide to make a dash to the bomb that would take a matter of months. So the place where they stopped is a dangerous one. If the Geneva agreement becomes a permanent deal, or if similar parameters will be included in the final deal, and the agreement is extended indefinitely, then it will be a bad agreement. "Iran has placed itself in a position of a nuclear threshold state, where the only thing separating it from the bomb is a decision by the leadership and the taking of steps that cannot be implemented given the limitations of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which Iran is a signatory to them, particularly the limitations on enrichment of high-level uranium and the use of enriched uranium in warheads. "The State of Israel cannot accept a situation in which the Iranians will be that close to the bomb. The prime minister is demanding as do UN Security Council resolutions -- that they cease uranium enrichment completely and dismantle all of their nuclear facilities. I assume that the final agreement will not include that. The index by which it should be measured is how much is Iran distanced from the nuclear threshold. It needs to be years, not months [before they could sprint to the bomb]." How would you analyze the U.S. conduct in the negotiations with Iran- "I was surprised by the Americans' willingness to concede some very important points on this agreement, very clear points that were mentioned in the Security Council resolutions. It seems as if the sanctions weren't imposed on Iran, but on the west, which is more eager to strike a deal than the Iranians are. I think that the U.S.'s strategic goals are very similar to Israel's strategic goals: that Iran doesn't go nuclear. "But the manner in which the Americans went to the Geneva conference and the way in which the agreement was forged [gives me pause]. I fear that the Americans are losing two key levers that they could have used to reach a reasonable deal with Iran: the sanctions regime and the credible threat of military force. Perhaps the sanctions regime is falling apart. We are now seeing countries who were party to the talks running to Tehran [to do business]. "There was talk about an agreement to buy $20 billion worth of petroleum from Russia. That's three times the sanctions relief that the Americans gave to the Iranians. If this agreement is implemented, I believe that the Americans will be left without the leverage afforded them by the sanctions. There is concern that the leverage provided by the threat of military force has been significantly weakened by virtue of the statements and actions [by the U.S.] in the Middle East these past two years." Is the prospect of an Israeli attack still in play- "The Israeli military option must be on the table. It was this option that spurred the sanctions and their efficiency. I am among those who believed that the sanctions would work, and they did indeed work. The Iranians came to Geneva not because they suddenly realized they needed to halt their nuclear program, but because their economy was hampered by the sanctions. The regime began to get the sense that the economic situation was endangering its rule. I never talk about the details of the military option. The only thing I could say is that the Israeli military option is still possible. "Either way, in the next six months, because of the Western powers' talks with Iran, the legitimacy of an Israeli attack has fallen. Fundamentally, a reasonable agreement with Iran is preferable to an attack on Iran. Israel needs to take into account what the U.S. thinks about an Israeli attack. Yes, we have never asked the Americans for a green light, and we will never ask. On the other hand, when the red light is flashing brightly in Washington, the right thing to do is carefully weigh the options. We need the Americans not for the attack itself, nor do we need them for the chaos that would ensue after it. But we do need them for the decade after the attack."
