Building a freedom fence
Why is it then called a "wall"? To make it sound and look more forbidding, echoing the Berlin Wall. But the Berlin Wall was built to prevent people from fleeing to freedom. This fence is intended to preserve freedom--the freedom from terrorism Israelis have found in their democracy. This is why 83 percent of Israelis favor its construction.
True, the fence would impose a dual hardship, on those Israeli settlements located on the wrong side of the security fence and also on some Palestinians living adjacent to the fence. But the alternative to the barricade is continued violence, death, injuries, and retaliation. The calculation is simple: Fences are reversible; the loss of life is not. Eliminate the terrorism and the fence would not have to be built.
The location of the security fence with the security zones on either side would leave the Palestinians about 86 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of Gaza. This is a somewhat worse outcome for the Palestinians than what might have been negotiated--possibly an incentive for second thoughts. But to be effective, these security lines must follow the lines of bloodshed rather than the borders derived from lines of battle and of armistice. While the fence does deviate from the armistice line in some places, it is only to secure the high ground and safeguard substantial Jewish communities. In any case, those armistice lines now invoked have never gained true legitimacy, for in 50 years they were not accepted by the Palestinians and even now are not accepted as the border of a legitimate Israeli state.
Those who argue that the fence should be built exactly along the 1967 armistice line play directly into the Palestinian strategy of creating a de facto Palestinian state. Moreover, that state would be created without requiring the Palestinians to cease terrorism, to recognize Israel's right to exist in peace, or to abandon their "right of return"--let alone ending the conflict. It would vindicate the "terrorism pays" school of thought and would virtually guarantee that the Palestinians would revert to violence in future disputes.
Construction of the fence has also been inaccurately described as some kind of major land grab. The opposite is true. Land is being yielded, and the fence constitutes only a minor modification of borders, one that can be adjusted to some degree by future negotiations of other Israeli territory. It is not a project conceived and supported by the Israeli right but by the Israeli center, which does not want any part of ruling over the Palestinians yet sees no way reliably to negotiate with them. Nor will the fence be a permanent border. It is simply a response to murder in the compressed geography of Israel. Again, fences can be torn down; human lives are irreplaceable.
In fact, the fence can contribute to the ultimate aim of a two-state solution. It sets a provisional dividing line and makes a Palestinian state possible, even before a final settlement. It facilitates the Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian cities and the abandonment of checkpoints that have affected the dignity and convenience of Palestinian life.
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