The Last Page
Mort, Jo-Ann
ISRAELI POLITICS is an excellent example of why term limits can be a good thing. In a country where losing consecutive elections for decades doesn't cost politicians their party leadership, let...
...Israel's economy is increasingly fueled by high tech and globalization, drawing on the instincts of young entrepreneurs and businesspeople who desire some sort of normalized climate in which to work...
...But the truth is that the dynamism in Israeli life today comes from the marketplace, and financial interests are leading the way...
...Amos Shapira, CEO of Cellcom and former CEO of El Al, co-chairs the Council...
...There's nearly no difference among the big parties on economics...
...Ramallah is the place where a new Palestinian business class is struggling to compete in a regional and global marketplace, to win out over the dysfunction of local politics, and to succeed even in the midst of the ongoing Israeli occupation (not to mention the Hamas stranglehold over Gaza...
...For an economy weaned on— and off—socialism, and one in which income distribution is more unequal and poverty more pervasive than they have ever been, this isn't all to the good...
...In a country where the terms "left " and "right" have long meant that you are a dove or a hawk, not a socialist or a free-marketeer, you can be a dovish business leader, pursuing peace by nonpolitical means...
...in the end, they all support some form of a liberalized free market...
...Three cheers for capitalism...
...I can tell you that everyone on the Palestinian side is intelligent and .. . educated abroad...
...He recently told an Israeli radio audience, "This isn't a question of the exploiter and the exploited...
...128 n DISSENT / Winter 2008...
...The interests, of course, are political and social as well as economic...
...Today, when Israelis talk about a two-state solution they could just as easily be talking about a twocitystate solution: that is, Tel Aviv and Ramallah—and not Jerusalem and Gaza City...
...And this means support for a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians...
...They're not exactly the horse, and I'm not exactly the rider—nothing like that...
...Well, yes, actually...
...All in all, there are common interests here...
...The Israeli-Palestinian Business Council, founded last spring under the umbrella of the Davos World Economic Forum, is an example of a natural evolution, as businesspeople from both sides of the border started to meet in Israel and around the world...
...They are very successful businesspeople...
...In Israel today, -making business deals is progressive politics by other means...
...Jacob Ner-David, founder and managing partner of Jerusalem Capital, a new venture capital fund focused on Israeli-related technologyenabled service companies that support Israeli and Palestinian start-ups put it this way to me last summer: "We cannot live in a globalized economy and ignore everyone in a fivehundredkilometer radius...
...Some are billionaires on an international scale...
...Still, it's hard not to admire a business class that sees its own self-interest aligned with peace and statehood for the Palestinians...
...To Israelis and Palestinians alike, Tel Aviv and Ramallah represent the secular cosmopolitanism that was so important in the promise of the Oslo Agreement and of Israel's new president Shimon Peres's Nobel vision for a "new Middle East...
...An earlier and longer version of this article appeared on the Web site for the UK-based Prospect magazine...
...BUT WHILE Tel Aviv and its suburbs are the economic heart of Israel, even if Jerusalem is the religious head, in Jerusalem, too, Israeli and Palestinian business people are coming together even as politicians dither...
...It's an entrepreneurial effort based on personal relationships that have been fostered among Palestinian and Israeli businesspeople...
...In a country where losing consecutive elections for decades doesn't cost politicians their party leadership, let alone their ability to serve as government ministers or members of Knesset, the political class has grown incredibly stale...
...Party labels mean little, with the socialism of the Labor Party long gone and some leaders of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party aiming to sustain a permanent welfare state, at least for their own constituents...
Vol. 55 • January 2008 • No. 1
