The *FREE ARAB VOICE*
March 16, 2000

In this issue of the Free Arab Voice (FAV) we present two articles
under the theme of THE ECONOMICS OF ZIONIST PEACE:

1) "The Economics of Zionist Peace": an analysis of Zionist plans
to control the Arab region economically, and why opening up to
"Israel", even a seemingly non-racist, non-expansionist, and post-
Zionist "Israel", would necessarily generate the dynamics of
"Israeli" hegemony over the Arab region, by Dr. Ibrahim Alloush,
based on an article by Dr. Tahir Kanaan. 

2) "The War of Comprehensive Peace": why the high-tech
"Israeli" economy needs Arab financing and markets, by Rashid
Hassan, translated and adapted freely by Maha Abu Ghosh.     

############################################################

1) The Economics of Zionist Peace, by Ibrahim Alloush, based
   on an article by Tahir Kanaan

Introduction:
Economics as the Extension of War through Non-violent Means
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

In bygone days, the abundance of economic resources and a large
vibrant economy were crucial prerequisites for the finance of the
military effort in times of war and peace.  An economy served thus
as a strategic reserve, and helped project a nation's military power
and political will onto other nations through the sheer
formidability of its readiness for war. 

Every economy gained in this context a security dimension.
However, after the Second World War and the massive
introduction of nuclear and other unconventional weapons, new
interactions emerged in the synergy of the economic and the
military.  Nuclear détente meant that direct military conflict
between superpowers became a less viable option. Thus, economic
means in international conflicts ceased to play second fiddle
to military means and leaped to the forefront of the stage to
become the very instruments with which engagements and wars
between nations are fought.  

The defeat of the Soviet Union in the Cold War illustrates this
point aptly. The historical record indicates that it is not true
that the Soviet Union failed totally in the economic sphere. But
ultimately, it was in that sphere that the Soviet Union finally
found its defeat. In fact, the Soviet system succeeded in completing
the industrial revolution launched by Peter the Great and in providing
for the basic needs of the Soviet peoples through the mass-production
of homogeneous goods for food, clothing, and housing.

It succeeded furthermore in building superb technological
capabilities in the field of military industry. However,
where the Soviet Union failed crucially was in the economic
competition in the civilian sector. This was most evident
in the failure of central planning to mass-produce good
quality non-homogeneous or durable consumer goods (like
TV's, VCR's, PC's, autos, etc..). A weak civilian sector
meant a lower standard of living, and provided fewer resources
for military purposes or economic growth. The fact that the
Soviets preferred to divert scarce resources to the defense
industry despite this highlights the primacy of the economic
factor. Subsequently, the failure to keep up with the West
economically was aggravated by the severe depletion of scarce
economic resources in an arms race that was accelerated by
the West in the eighties specifically with the aim of bankrupting
the Soviet economy. The Achilles heel of the Soviet Union therefore
was not in its military, but in its economy.

Where the Soviet Union failed then was at peace, not at war.
It would have been very costly for the West to rely upon military
means to try to defeat a Soviet Union armed to the teeth with
nuclear and conventional weapons, especially after the West's
partial or total failures in Korea, Vietnam, and other regional
conflicts. Economics was therefore used as a means for the
perpetuation of war through non-violent means. The Soviet Union
fell without a shot being fired by the West. And ever since, a new
era in international relations emerged where economics, rather
than being a force to bind nations as neo-liberal theory claims,
became the war zone itself.  Military means are still occasionally
used as a supplement to reinforce the America's economic and
political dominance in international relations, but only when the
risk is low and the stakes are high. Economics as a tool of
domination in international affairs became thus a crucial aspect of
globalization under the auspices of the New World Order.

The Economics of Zionist Peace:
----------------------------------------
Why the Soviet Union failed to keep pace with the West in the
economic sphere, especially in the seventies and the eighties, is
beyond the scope of this article.   Understanding the contemporary
economic dimension of international conflicts is crucial, however,
to understanding the economics of Zionist peace, as propounded
by Shimon Peres in his book 'The New Middle East', for example.
In that book, Peres delineates 'a new vision for the Middle East'
where security [for "Israel"] rests upon economic rather than
conventional military or political considerations. Economic and
political hegemony through bilateral and multilateral agreements,
rather than strategic depth in the geographical sense, assumes the
geopolitical importance previously accorded to the direct occupation
of physical space. Buffer zones such as South Lebanon and the Golan
Heights, according to Zionists who embrace this view, need to become
outdated.

At the end of this article, we will try to show that the
characteristics of "Israel's" economic and technological
strength will generate "Israeli" economic hegemony in the
region EVEN IF "Israel" managed by some miracle to rid
itself of its racist, expansionist, and militaristic
essence. However, "Israel" is not about to rid itself of that
intrinsic essence as Peres demonstrates in his aforementioned
book. In fact, these Zionist characteristics are undergoing a
metamorphosis in which they assume an inherently more sinister,
yet seemingly more benign form. The conventional appearance of
Zionist aggression is about to be dropped in exchange for a
post-Zionist economic and political hegemony that is not any
less dangerous. Here once again, economics is viewed as a
battlefield, as the perpetuation of war through cheaper and
currently more effective means. In the meantime, the value of
the economic prize of normal and peaceful exchange relationships
with "Israel" were summarized by a group of authors in a study in
Hebrew (Israel 2020, A Comprehensive Plan for the New Millenium,
1996). According to that report, there are five reasons why the
so-called peace treaties with Arab regimes are shoring up the
Zionist entity economically in the short-run. These are:  

1) Lightening the security burden on the "Israeli" economy

Since the mid-eighties, the share of military expenditure
to GNP (gross national product) decreased steadily. In 1967,
the percentage of military expenditures to GNP was 6%. During
the war of attrition with Egypt in the late sixties that
percentage rose to 10 then 14 percent. After the October War
in 1973, it rose to 15% and 18%. This percentage began to
decline again after the Camp David Treaty with Egypt, and
the subsequent invasion of Lebanon in 1982, to eventually
reach 8% in 1995 after the signing of Oslo and Wadi Arabah.
There was a qualitative benefit to these treaties as well,
manifesting itself in the transfer of highly skilled workers,
engineers, and scientists from the army to the civilian sector.
The lightening of the military burden was not affected by the
Egyptian military buildup in peacetime either, since the primary
source of Egyptian weaponry has been the friendly United States,
according to the "Israeli" report. The same report moreover adds
that after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Syria lost its main
source of arms supplies. Combined with a weak economy, that made
Syria stop trying to pretend that it was remotely close to
achieving 'strategic balance' with "Israel".  [Of course, keep in
mind that the last two conclusions with respect to having Syria
and Egypt under control should be taken with more than a grain of
salt since the inculcation of defeatism in the Arab psyche has been
a long-standing Zionist objective - FAV].

2) Expanding "Israeli" exports to previously closed markets

Indeed, after the signing of peace treaties, "Israeli" exports
[and diplomatic relations] expanded to previously closed markets.
In traditional export markets in North America, Western Europe,
and Southeast Asia, "Israeli" exporters gained renewed confidence
and a more enthusiastic reception. For the same reasons, tourism
to "Israel" flourished, with the exception of the years of bus
attacks by Hamas.

3) Lowering the cost of borrowing on international credit markets

After the Madrid Conference, and after the United States government
agreed to grant "Israel" ten billion dollars of loan guarantees,
international credit markets opened up enthusiastically to the
"Israeli" government. Risk ratings for "Israel" were re-estimated
downwards. As a result, "Israel" had access to loans much greater
than the value of the American loan guarantees, and at much lower
rates of interest than before. In 1995, Moody's, and Standard and
Poor, gave the "Israeli" government a credit rating of 'A'. Naturally,
a higher credit rating has given "Israel" access to more funds at
lower rates of interest. [The rule for credit markets in capitalism
is: the less you need a loan, the more likely you are to get it, the
lower your rate of interest, since the higher the risk of default,
the higher the interest charged, if you manage to get the loan at
all that is - FAV].

4) Decreasing the minimum necessary rate of return to coax foreign
   investment into "Israel"

One of "Israel's" biggest enticements to foreign investments,
especially in the field of high technology, pertains to the
abundance of highly skilled labor in the Zionist state.
Nevertheless, foreign investment flows to "Israel" were meager
for many years, not exceeding half a billion dollars annually,
compared to local investments reaching about twelve billion dollars
annually in the early nineties.

The most important field for foreign investments was indeed in
hi-tech industry where "Israel" enjoys a comparative advantage.
However, even there, many of these investments were motivated
as well by non-economic incentives such as adherence to staunch
Zionism by the owners or managers of some Transnational Corporations.
Examples include the managers of Intel, and the owners of Vichi Israel.
Other heavy foreign investors in "Israel" include Motorola, National,
and Semiconductor. Another remark in this regard is that Zionist
capitalists outside "Israel", as well as devout pro-Zionist Jews,
preferred generally to donate money to "Israel" than to invest
their money there.

However, since the signing of Oslo and the Paris agreements with
the PLO, many changes began to take place. Foreign investment
flows that were less than half a billion dollars annually in the
early nineties increased dramatically in 1995 to two billion dollars,
then to $3.1 billion in 1996, and to more than five billion dollars
in 1997. Because of its many advantages, it is expected in the future
that Transnational Corporations will prefer to locate in "Israel" than
in Arab countries, provided they have easy access to its Arab neighbors.
The point is that with decreased risk, a lesser rate of return on
investment is necessary to entice investments. Therefore with the
signing of the peace treaties, a lower rate of return than before
became necessary to attract foreign capital to areas in which "Israel"
enjoys a competitive advantage such as hi-tech, and to other areas in
the "Israeli" economy.

5) Reaping direct benefits from normal economic relations with
   oil-producing Arab states

"Israel's" reliance on safe and guaranteed sources of oil from
Arab states will enable it to reduce the cost of maintaining its
huge caches of oil that it keeps on reserve. Think about it like
this: if you keep large stocks of any good for long periods of
time, that would be like freezing money equivalent to the value
of these stocks at any particular point, instead of investing that
money or depositing it in a savings account to gain interest.
Furthermore, there is the additional cost of maintaining these
stocks, in terms of warehousing and personnel. As for easy "Israeli"
access to Arab natural gas, that will revolutionize the generation
of electricity which currently relies on oil and coal, which will
lower the total cost of generating electricity in addition to keeping
the environment clean.

In short, peace treaties do not imply the end of the Zionist project,
but represent a new phase in that project in which "Israel" resorts
to economic tools to achieve Zionist objectives rather than (or
alongside) military ones. But note that the "Israeli" report did
not make any mention of lightening the burden of supporting "Israel"
on the United States government, which has to send several billion
dollars of American taxpayers money annually to the Zionist entity.
 

The Long-term Effects:
-----------------------------
Normal economic exchange between the Arab states and any type of
"Israel", even a seemingly non-racist and non-expansionist one,
will have to be analyzed in terms of the three dimensions below:
1) The movement of goods and services,
2) The movement of labor, and
3) The movement of capital

Looking at those dimensions one by one will inevitably reflect
the uneven terms of exchange that will necessarily arise between
an advanced and technology-driven "Israeli" economy, and the
underdeveloped Arab economies, whether oil-producing or not.

1) The movement of goods and services:
Eliminating tariff and non-tariff barriers before trade with
"Israel" will bring about a division of labor between "Israel"
and its Arab neighbors that will reflect the comparative advantages
enjoyed by the "Israeli" economy, especially in the area of high
technology. This will eventually lead to the creation of a
center-periphery type of relationship with an advanced regional
"Israeli" metropolis that controls large swaths of the backward
Arab periphery. The advantage of geographic proximity will lower
transportation costs, thus enabling "Israeli" products, made in
"Israel" or by "Israeli" owned firms, to replace local products
and other foreign imports. In the case of light industry and
agricultural goods, trade with adjacent Arab neighbors will lower
the cost of importation for "Israel" thus improving its balance
of trade deficit, before leaping forth to control these economic
sectors financially. The volume and value of trade with "Israel"
will increase perhaps to the point of creating dependency on
"Israel", and will strengthen its economy to the point of dwarfing
neighboring Arab states economically and politically.

Thus the New Middle East is achieved!

This process does not need to take place directly. As Arab
states join trade organizations in which "Israel" is already
a member like the World Trade Organization or the Agreement
of European Partnership, impediments to trade between Arab
states and "Israel" are effectively removed without the political
fuss that accompanies direct agreements between "Israel" and Arab
states. Hence we should view the linkage between globalization and
the Zionification of the Arab World.

On the other hand, Arabs could reap the benefits of specialization,
mass-production, and large markets by simply establishing an Arab
common market, or by joining other economic associations that do
not include "Israel". In fact, it is "Israel" that needs the Arabs
much more than the other way around.  

2) The movement of labor:
Needless to say, the movement of labor does not mean at all
allowing Arab workers to migrate permanently to Palestine.
"Israel" has been following the policy of taking good advantage
of cheap Palestinian-Arab labor from the lands occupied in 1948
and 1967. Nowadays, "Israel" is beginning to make good use of
cheap Jordanian labor within the restrictions imposed by security
considerations.  

In the case of total normalization with "Israel" however, large
reserves of unemployed Arab workers would become available, under
the threat of extinction, to "Israeli" investors across the New
Middle East. Surely, some claim that it is better to have these
workers employed than unemployed. But it is NOT only sub-minimal
wages, like the ones paid by "Israeli" employers to female workers
who toil from dawn until dusk at el Hassan industrial park in Northern
Jordan, that is of utmost concern here. What is of concern, in fact,
is the establishment of a permanent neo-colonial relationship with
"Israel" in which Arabs sell cheap unskilled and semi-skilled labor
to "Israelis" in "Israel" or the Arab World, instead of pursuing an
economic development plan of their own. Relieving the pressures of
Arab unemployment this way could be detrimental for the Arabs in the
long-run as the economic and technological disparity grows between
them and "Israel". Countries are better off exporting the goods and
services that currently unemployed workers can make, than exporting
the unemployed workers themselves to the metropolis to increase the
value added of the products that "Israel" will just turn around to
sell them back.

3) The movement of capital:
Leveling all obstacles before the inflow of foreign and "Israeli"
capital to the Arab countries is touted as an ambitious goal by
those who think that this will turn their Arab states into another
Singapore or Hong Kong!  But in fact, capital movements worldwide
are not a homogenous whole. Neither are all capital movements devoid
of political agendas. And assuming that the inflow of capital is
motivated by pure profit motives, where would it choose to locate
itself: "Israel" or the Arab states?

To begin with, the size of the "Israeli" economy, and hence the
"Israeli" market, is larger than that of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and
Jordan combined.  Furthermore, the size of a market is not measured
by the size of the population per se, but by the size of the residents'
average income. Henceforth, "Israeli" per capita income is twelve
to twenty times greater than that of Arab states, with the exception
of a few small Emirates. The disparity in technology, advanced
industry, and infrastructure between "Israel" and the Arab states
was not bridged by the very slow growth rates in the eighties and
the nineties. Cheap labor in many Arab states, on the other hand,
is a necessary but insufficient condition to attract direct foreign
investment in light industry for example. But other factors, such as
the size of a market, or the availability of good infrastructure and
a well-developed institutional setting (such as a court-system, state
bureaucracy, and relevant laws) that is congenial to business, might
be just as important as cheap labor. Therefore, provided with easy
access to Arab markets from "Israel", direct foreign investment is
more likely to locate in "Israel" to feed peripheral Arab demand
than the other way around.

This factor is exacerbated by the fact that skilled and highly
skilled labor is more plentiful in "Israel" and at a lower pay
scale than in the West. This is a decisive factor in the location
decision of companies seeking to invest in the production of
technology-intensive, engineering, and computer products. Indeed,
direct foreign investment in Arab natural resources such as oil
or phosphate might be attracted to some Arab states. But those
investments roaming for environments rich in specialized or
high-productivity inputs, or for the local ability to produce
high-quality intermediate goods that increase the value added
to final output, would rather head for "Israel" than for the
Arab states.

Furthermore, there is another aspect in the problem of attracting
foreign capital that many Arab and Third World states don't seem
to give enough attention to. The investment decisions of
Transnational Corporations are centralized decisions that are made
on the basis of strategic considerations that have led to the
generation of a new division of labor on an international scale.
hird World and Arab states have been competing to attract foreign
capital by liberalizing their economies and removing all restrictions
on free [foreign] enterprise among other things. But the fact that
these measures to liberalize the economy have been adopted EQUALLY
by most countries in the world has made investment in more developed
countries more attractive on the average. Consequently, in spite of
all these liberalization efforts, developed countries continue to
receive the lion's share of direct foreign investment worldwide, and
developing countries are still marginalized. Subsequently, the
experiences of Singapore and Hong Kong, and the Asian Tigers in
general, are not necessarily replicable. For these economic success
stories were partially the result of Cold War considerations which
led to the heavy transfer of capital from Japan and the West into
southeast Asia to make the masses of China, Indo-China, and the
Korean Peninsula marvel at the greatness of capitalism. They were
also, especially in second-generation success stories like China,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and South Korea, the result of
internal factors such as careful government planning and
coordination, efficient systems to build human capital through
education, and a set of social and cultural values which
emphasized saving and hard work. 

Another aspect of the competition to attract foreign investment in
the nineties is that it has not led to the inflow of direct foreign
investment to developing countries, but to heavy movements by
short-term capital seeking to turn quick profits in speculation, in
stocks, bonds, derivatives, and foreign exchange. Short-term capital
inflows are not associated with beefing up the productive capacity of
nations since they don't lead to an increase in the quantity or quality
of factories, farms, freeways, or finished products that a nation
possesses. In fact, short-term movements of capital can cause a lot
of instability in the national economy as happened in Southeast Asia
in 1997, and in Russia and Brazil in 1999. 

Conclusion:
---------------
 Opting for regional blocs in and amongst the developing countries,
such as an Arab Common Market, an African Common Market, A Latin
American Common Market, and so forth, might be easier and cheaper
than restructuring the economies of the developing countries in a
European or an international framework dominated by the West
and Transnational Corporations. In fact, even the attraction of
direct foreign investments will be more likely within these regional
blocs as they will have a larger size and benefit from economies of
scale.  

As for the Arab countries opening up to "Israel", even a non-racist
and a non-expansionist one in the conventional sense, the above
indicates that it would multiply "Israel's" strength and make it more
difficult to deal with. The dynamic of this relationship will lead to
"Israel" becoming a leading technology-based industrial node in
whose orbit Arab peripheries revolve. This will not happen as a
result of a conspiracy of any sort. "Israeli" hegemony will arise
out of the specific features that constitute the points of strength
of the "Israeli" economy today if these were given free reign to grow
unfettered at the expense of the Arab World.

###############################################

2) The War of Comprehensive Peace, by Rashid Hassan, translated
   and adapted freely by Maha Abu Ghosh

Why "Israel" seeks to build a false partnership between its technological
economy and Arab money?

Conventional wars between the Arabs and "Israel" may be coming to
an end; however, a fiercer, more complicated war with far-reaching
ramifications has already started on all strategic levels, in the
economic, technological, political, cultural, media and other arenas.
In this "Peace War", Arab society shall find itself within a very
short period of time facing down the offensive of a dynamic "Israeli"
society with a great deal of financial, commercial and technological
potential, and with an economy closely interwoven with western economies,
especially the American and European. This settler-invader society now
has companies working vigorously to expand in the Arab "lebensraum"
(i.e., necessary strategic space outside one's borders). The objective
of that expansion is nothing short of becoming the biggest economic power
in the region, not only through the personal momentum of the "Israeli"
economy, but also through "Israeli" companies, supported and financed
by Jewish money and media overseas. 

 "Israeli" society, despite its many contradictions, possesses many
of the characteristics of developed societies on the political and
civil institutional levels, as well as in the level of development
of the economy, especially in the fields of telecommunications and
programming. The "Israeli" economy has developed qualitatively in
recent years, and is now brimming with new projects, especially in
high-tech fields, financed by venture capital, and with a host of
computer companies and electronic equipment industries at its command.
Today, "Israel" has a developed arms industry that was expanded to
include security, medicinal, pharmaceutical and agricultural industries
as well as modest beginnings in the field of genetic engineering.
"Israelis" boast that their country includes 135 engineers for every
10,000 employees in the labor market compared to 85 in the United
States, and 70 in Japan. They also boast that the local dissemination
of the personal computer exceeds that of other countries, with 250,000
having been sold in "Israel" in 1997 for example, compared to 103,000
computers sold in Egypt in the same year, where population exceeds 65
million people. 

Local spending on information technology was estimated to be about
2.4 billion dollars in 1997, with a growth rate of about 12 to 15
percent per annum. But despite this tremendous number of experts,
programmers and engineers, "Israel" suffers a shortage in technicians
due to the high demand on them from American companies and the
temptations of quickly earned wealth in the Internet field. 

Since the eighties, "Israeli" strategic planners found that it would
be in their best country's interest to turn military supremacy in
times of war, to scientific and technological supremacy in times
of peace. It is safe to say that "Israel" made headway in achieving
its strategic goal of turning itself into a base or arsenal for
advanced industries in general and technological industries in
particular. This is manifested in the continuous increase of the
technological industry's contribution to "Israeli" exports. In 1997,
high-tech exports reached about 5.6 billion dollars, equaling 28
percent of the total industrial exports, which amounted to 20 billion
dollars, and 17 percent of the total "Israeli" exports which registered
32.4 billion dollars in 1997.

The "Israeli's" focus on technological industries is clearly revealed
in the examination of the volume of finance allocated to research and
development (R&D) which reached about 815 million dollars in 1997,
considered one of the highest in the world as a percentage of National
Income. More important is that over 90 percent of the total resources
allocated to research and development in "Israel" go to technological
industries. In fact, there is a unique phenomenon called the "Chief
Scientist Bureau" in the Ministry of Trade and Industry that offers
grants of 400 million dollars a year to a selected list of research
and development projects. 

In order to preserve the momentum of growth in the advanced industries
sector, "Israeli" authorities at first focused on providing generous
financing for start-up companies in the field of technology, through
the Chief Scientist Bureau, and the Magnet Project for Financing New
Technology.  Later on however, many new projects were 'sold' to foreign
companies, thus transferring the bigger burden of financing new
technology to the investment funds or "venture capital" formed by
contributions from Transnational Corporations, mainly American and
European, and on a smaller scale, Japanese ones. These currently amount
to 70 investment funds, 50 of which were specifically formed to finance
new projects in the field of high technology, thus contributing about
two billion dollars in less than seven years.   More important is that
these projects were able to attract for "Israel" companies like Intel,
Microsoft, IBM, Siemens, France Telecom, Panasonic and others.
What is remarkable furthermore is the increasing percentage of
foreign participation in venture capital projects from 50 percent
in the early nineties to about 80 percent in the second half of the
decade (especially after Oslo Agreement).  International companies
invest in "Israel" through other means as well, including the purchase
of "Israeli" companies whose initial success is mostly based on new
technology, but who are nevertheless unable to seriously compete in
the currently small "Israeli" market, and therefore choose to sell to
big international companies. Of course, that is another problem that
will be potentially resolved if Arab markets open up!

Although the overture towards technology has put it among the more
developed countries technically, "Israel" nevertheless craves a
continuous and abundant flow of foreign investments.  For only a
small segment of these newly formed "Israeli" companies have managed
to stand up on their own feet and succeed commercially, while the
remainder has been sold to international companies. Meanwhile, "Israelis"
continue to explore new ideas and technologies with generous financing
from international banks and finance corporations. "Israel's" need for
foreign financing stems from the great annual deficit in the "Israeli"
balance of trade which reached over 11.5 billion dollars in 1997,
whereas it did not exceed 5.3 billion dollars in 1990, during which
time "Israel's" external debts jumped to 18.7 billion dollars. In 1998,
"Israel's" external debt leaped to 36 billion dollars, while the current
account balance remained in the red.

The False Partnership

The ambition for technological supremacy will propel "Israel"
and "Israeli" companies to tap Arab financing resources as an
easier substitute for other international resources. The current
liberalization of Arab money markets and the admittance of Arab
country after another into the World Trade Organization, in addition
to the Internet revolution and other instruments of globalization,
will pave the way for "Israeli" companies to get hold of Arab money.
"Israeli" strategies in the future could thus include establishing
alliances with Arab financial corporations, purchasing controlling
interests in important Arab institutions, or even purchasing those
outright where possible.

In simple terms, the future equation for the " Peace War" from an
"Israeli" point of view, is a false and unmatched partnership between
Arab money and "Israeli" technology. The total indicators of "Israeli"
economy reveal the urgent "Israeli" need, not only for Arab money, but
also to increase "Israeli" exports and to redirect a large part of
commercial activity towards the Arab region. If Barak gains support
for the peace project with Syria and Lebanon, "Israel" shall have
obtained a complete and comprehensive recognition of its existence
and borders.

Eventually, the ensuing normalization of relations with "Israel"
purports to nourish the illusion of it being a natural state blending
well into the Arab geographic and economic environment, with all the
rights and opportunities that this entails. This is what will be in
fact the effect of 'normalization', achieved by accepting "Israel" as
a "normal partner" to the countries of the Arab region.

################################################

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