The Israel Defense Forces and the Shin Bet were in rare agreement this weekend that the resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process was good for Israel, from a diplomat and a security standpoint alike. Nevertheless -- and while both the IDF and the Shin Bet lauded the practicality of the move -- neither seemed overly optimistic about the prospects of the renewed peace talks.
The rationale is clear: Over the past few years, in the absence of a diplomatic process, Israel has been backed into a corner in the international arena. The situation manifested through pro-Palestinian resolutions by the U.N.'s General Assembly, anti-Israeli resolutions by various U.N. bodies and by the European Union and most notably, with a steady decline in Israel's legitimacy in the public, political and media theaters worldwide.
One can claim -- and rightfully so -- that the world is hypocritical and that the Palestinians are used as a tool to express ingrained anti-Semitism, but Israel still seeks to be a part of that world and it does not want to be mentioned in the same breath as the lepers from Tehran and Pyongyang.
The road to remaining one of the "good guys" travels through negotiations with the Palestinians, which could have far reaching results.
Many of the benefits the negotiations are expected to yield will likely pertain to security: Any strike in Iran, or even broadening the sanctions imposed on Tehran, would require international support, to say nothing of a military campaign in the Gaza Strip or in Lebanon. Maintaining Israel's policies where Syria is concerned also requires the international community's support, as does, above all, the desire to avoid a new wave of violence in the West Bank.
GOC Central Command Maj. Gen. Nitzan Alon had warned recently of the security perils entailed in a prolonged stalemate in the negotiations, some of which have already been evident in the steady and significant increase in riots across Judea and Samaria.
Resuming the peace talks at this time will shine a light on two issues: Gaza and the West Bank. In Gaza, Hamas finds itself in a vise of sorts, caught between the loss of the support it was given by Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and Fatah's newfound power, leading to concerns that in its attempt to assert its position, Hamas will forsake any semblance of restraint and resume its terror activities in the West Bank.
In the West Bank, security forces are bracing for the possibility that extreme rightists will try to derail the talks via "price tag" acts. Those are likely to become a reality if it turns out Israel had agreed to impose a moratorium on settlement expansion in Judea and Samaria and release Palestinian prisoners.
Israel is expected to agree to the gradual release of Fatah prisoners -- a process that will coincide with the negotiation's progress -- although it is not too far-fetched to assume that the Palestinians have already garnered explicit guarantees to that effect, as they have as part of dozens of futile talks in the past.
This is why security officials have not been asked for their opinion on the matter at this time. The opinion of IDF and Shin Bet officials on the issue of prisoner release is a matter of record and most believe that the security threat of releasing prisoners who were jailed prior to the 1993 Oslo Accords is minimal, and that they can be monitored relatively easily.
With the decision on these prisoners' release being purely a political one, many senior defense establishment officials have expressed their support for the move, as a trust-building exercise vis-à-vis the Palestinian Authority. Such a move can bolster its position among the Palestinian people, especially considering the power Hamas had gained from the 2011 Gilad Schalit prisoner exchange deal.
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