As Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert prepared to go to
America to meet with senior US officials and to address the
US Congress, the US sent him a clear message: Do not ask for
any money at this time.
According to the Jerusalem Post, this message was
conveyed to Olmert by Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice
chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American
Jewish Organizations, in a meeting held in Jerusalem on
Sunday.
Earlier, in an apparent attempt to lower expectations for the
visit, the US announced that President George Bush will not
discuss the details of the convergence plan when he meets
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, but would allow him to outline
his "vision."
"There will be no maps and there will be no exchange of
letters," National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley told a
group of Jewish leaders Monday, according to sources who were
at the meeting to help prepare for the upcoming trip.
Israeli officials said that they had not planned to discuss
any requests for funds.
There was an understanding that the US would provide some $2
billion as a result of the Disengagement from the Gaza Strip
area last summer. That was later reduced to $1.2 billion,
with the money allocated only for the development of the
Negev and the Galilee. After the US was struck by major
hurricanes on its Gulf Coast last fall, this money was
quietly put on hold.
The estimate most commonly given for the cost of Olmert's
Convergence Plan is $10 billion. However this should be
regarded as a lowball estimate since it assumes only av
average $100,000 per family for the estimated 10,000 families
involved. In the case of the Disengagement from Gush Katif
the costs as detailed publicly came to an average of more
than $200,000 per family. If so, that would put the price tag
for Convergence at $20 billion. That is a full 20 percent of
Israel's yearly GDP and a very large amount for it to fund on
its own.
The US is in a strained situation as far as its government
expenses are concerned, with very large budget deficits. It
is not clear how able it will be to foot such a large bill,
even if it was inclined to do so.
The US was not enthusiastic about Sharon's Disengagement
Plan, but it went along. It remains unconvinced by Olmert's
Convergence Plan, but for the moment is not opposing it.
It is the unilateral aspect of the approach that most
traditional people of the Israeli Left find unsettling. Their
dream was always to end the Israeli presence in the areas of
Palestinian settlement and to conclude a binding and final
agreement with the Palestinians. The Sharon-Olmert approach
takes steps towards the first of these goals but at the
expense of abandoning the second.
Political analysts have been warning that it will not be easy
to muster a Knesset majority for the plan. Much of the
proposal has not been spelled out, and different
possibilities suggested could spell trouble for the plan.
For example, 10,000 families will need to be moved and
resettled. It was no easy matter to find land to build
housing for the 1,500 Gush Katif families. This will be
harder by at least eight times. Some of the suggestions
involve confiscating Arab land that is closer to existing
Jewish communities, but doing so would certainly alienate the
Leftist Meretz parties and the Arab MKs.
Labor still remains committed to a negotiated settlement, and
the coalition guidelines that it signed stipulate that before
any unilateral move (such as advocated by Olmert) the
government will make every effort to reach an agreement with
the other side. This preserves Labor policy of pursuing an
agreement while exacting only a vague commitment to agree to
unilateral moves — but only if no agreement is possible
with the other side. When no agreement is possible is
something that will have to be judged by the political
parties, and they may well reach differing conclusions.
Labor leader Amir Peretz certainly still hopes to be prime
minister of Israel some day. It has no doubt occurred to him
that Olmert will be a much weaker opponent in any future
election if the Convergence Plan that he touts so strongly is
a resounding failure.
