Scene of recent stabbing attack in Hebron. It's a matter of education
Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Office
There is no military solution to terror
Op-ed: The thousands of police officers and soldiers filling the alleys of Jerusalem and Hebron are evidence of 30 years of terror. If there is a military solution, can anyone explain the recent stabbing attacks, the many attacks that came before them, and the ones that will likely follow?
Rafael (Raful) Eitan served as IDF chief of staff in the early 1980s, and was one of the greatest fighters and whistleblowers, primarily against his defense minister, Ariel Sharon. But there was at least one point they both agreed on: There is a military solution to terror. They pulled the wool over then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin's eyes, promising to drive terror away from the northern border. Begin, who saw every military person as God's deputy, eventually fell for their lies and ordered the army to go to war.
At the time, Raful and I developed a friendship based on interests, which stemmed from the need to disrupt Sharon's success story and ended solely because of Raful's blooming belief that there was a military solution to terror. Our arguments ended in a major quarrel when he gave an interview to Yedioth Ahronoth and promised that there was a military solution to terror. Later on, we found ourselves inside Lebanon.
Israel has launched big and small wars and thousands of operations, arrested tens of thousands of Palestinians and destroyed hundreds of home, but has failed to find a military solution to terror (Photo: AFP)
Since Sharon and Raful invented the military solution, we have launched big wars and small wars against terror and thousands of operations, we have arrested tens of thousands of Palestinians, destroyed hundreds of homes, and invented the "encirclement" and the "curfew," but we have failed to find a military solution to terror. The thousands of police officers and soldiers filling the alleys of Jerusalem and Hebron today are evidence of 30 years of terror. If there is a military solution, how can anyone explain the recent stabbing attacks, the many attacks that came before them, and unfortunately, the ones which will likely follow?
How is it possible that the Jews, the persecuted and extremely smart people, have yet to find the right formula for the military solution? Why are tens of thousands of Jews looking over their shoulders to see if there is a Palestinian terrorist lurking?
The reasons are painfully simple: The Palestinians are the active side on this matter. We defend ourselves, they attack. The Palestinians have the goal and the determination, they are the initiators, they choose whether to give up or act, whether to live or die.
They say modern history includes only one or two cases of a military solution to terror, and the Brits in Malaysia are always mentioned in this context. All other attempts – dozens and hundreds – to break the backbone of terror through military measures have been unsuccessful. There have been time outs of a calm, which sometimes lasted years, but the volcano always erupted, and almost always at the wrong time. That's what happened in the first intifada, which broke out while almost all institutional bodies were saying that "our situation has never been better."
The solution to terror will likely not be a military solution. It's a matter of education. We must go on like this for many years, some will say even 30 or 40 years, in order to stop giving good reasons to the terror organizations and to the feeling of suffocation in their lives, in order to remove the looks of murder from their eyes. It's a combination of education and a diplomatic solution, which will only bear fruit in one or two generations. Is that a lot? Certainly, but look, 30 years have already passed since the first intifada.
