"We must put a limit on the desire to imitate other countries," proclaimed Eli Yishai, a deputy Israeli prime minister from the ultra-Orthodox Shas party. He threatened to fine book distributors who violated the sabbath. But Israel's two largest book chains didn't listen. They went ahead and opened on a Saturday last July to join in the global Harry Potter launch as thousands gathered in Tel Aviv and its suburbs. That's because the majority of Israelis desire precisely what the deputy PM does not: normalisation.
In a nation where politics is a contact sport, Israel has found itself in an odd spot, where politicians across the political spectrum are in great disfavour. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's approval rating was down to 3 per cent before his recent incursion into Syria significantly raised his support for him (though he's still below 50 per cent). What the public does continue to support, however, is a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine, with a majority of voters unwavering on this principle for years now—even through the violence of the second intifada. That may be one reason that Olmert appears now to be vigorously pursuing negotiations with the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.
But there's something else. Today, when Israelis talk about a two-state solution they could just as easily be talking about a two-city-state solution: that is, Tel Aviv and Ramallah vs Jerusalem and Gaza City. To Israelis and Palestinians alike, Tel Aviv and Ramallah represent the secular cosmopolitanism that was much of the promise of the Oslo accords. Alcohol and partying thrive in both locales, but so do culture and commerce. Tel Aviv and its suburbs are the economic heart of Israel, even if Jerusalem is the religious head. And Ramallah is where a new Palestinian business class is struggling to compete in a regional and global marketplace, to win out over the dysfunctional politics and succeed even amid the Israeli occupation. Increasingly, businesspeople in Tel Aviv and Ramallah are seeking out each other, too.
One Palestinian friend told me that he feels more comfortable in Tel Aviv than the western part of his own home town of Jerusalem, since the city is still mostly segregated between the Palestinian eastern and the Jewish western half, and the Jewish population is increasingly Orthodox and right wing. That sentiment goes for many Israelis too.
Will the spirit of Tel Aviv and Ramallah win out and propel the two peoples, finally, toward a two-state solution? Can the fundamental religiosity of Hamas and the ultra-Orthodox Jewish settlers be beaten back with a different vision?
The emergence of the centrist Kadima party, which Olmert leads, represented both disillusionment with the polarisation of left and right (which in Israel mostly means dove and hawk, not necessarily huge differences on economics), and a desire to find pragmatic solutions to ending the occupation of the Palestinians. Yet another group of Israelis have begun to create their own facts on the ground towards reconciliation, even as negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis wobble back and forth. Ironically, while the British left and others call for a boycott of Israeli goods, the top businesspeople in Palestine seek to enhance ties across borders; indeed, to bust through the barriers that exist among the countless roadblocks and cement wall casings.
The Israeli-Palestinian Business Council (with whom Tony Blair is reportedly consulting) was founded last spring in Davos "to encourage… constructive co-operation between Israeli and Palestinian business leaders to reinforce economic relationship and help peace-building efforts."
Amos Shapira, CEO of the Israeli mobile phone company Cellcom and the Israeli co-chair of the council, recently discussed the group in an interview on Israeli radio: "I think the drama is in the absence of drama in this initiative… It's not an Israeli forum that is meeting with Palestinians. Rather, it's a forum composed of Israeli and Palestinian businesspeople. It's a forum that has two chairs. I'm the Israeli chair. On the Palestinian side, there's Walid Najjib, the Palestinian chair… If Israelis and Palestinians travel around the world and do business together, why can't they do it here? The businesses exist. All you need are the physical, logistical conditions… simple things—a succession of checkpoints, for example, for trade on both sides, not at the expense of security."
Jacob Ner-David, founder and managing partner of Jerusalem Capital, a new venture capital fund, put it this way to me: "We cannot live in a globalised economy and ignore everyone in a 500-kilometre radius. I have been looking to invest in start-ups that utilise the Palestinian hi-tech economy… not because it is the right thing to do—which it is—but because it makes business sense. We have outsourcing projects and development teams all over the world. It's time for us to look much closer to home. In addition, I am exploring a number of opportunities in the Jerusalem area together with my good friend Sami Abu-Dayyeh [owner of the popular Ambassador Hotel in East Jerusalem], that look toward the day when we celebrate a Jerusalem that services two states, but remains one economy."
In the Oslo era, Israelis depended on cheap Palestinian labour. But the impetus here is different. As Shapira told the Israeli audience: "This isn't a question of the exploiter and the exploited. I can tell you that everyone on the Palestinian side is intelligent and was educated abroad. They are very successful businesspeople. Some are billionaires on an international scale. They're not exactly the horse, and I'm not exactly the rider."
Abdul Malik al Jaber, CEO of Palnet, the Palestinian telecommunications conglomerate, is a founding member of the joint business council. He works with Cellcom, since his company and the Israeli company share part of their market. He told me that, "Business communities on both sides have maintained a practical relationship based on respect and common vision for a future that is free from occupation, bloodshed and humiliation."
Al Jaber, who grew up in Canada and returned to Ramallah in 1993 with the promises of Oslo, has advanced degrees from McGill and Northwestern Universities. He sits atop a business empire in a new glass high-rise building in El-Bireh, a Ramallah suburb. When I saw him there recently, our meeting was cut short because the driver he had sent for me got stuck in the checkpoints between Jerusalem and Ramallah; shortly after I finally arrived, he had to leave for a business meeting in Tel Aviv. "All of this is happening while we are not yet free as a nation or united as a people. Our diaspora communities are dispersed all over the world, yet they remain proactive and our people inside Palestine are eager for more development and change. Therefore, Palestine has more to offer than just its history of national struggle and ideological transformations; we are a nation of builders too and that generation of builders cannot wait to build its homeland in Palestine using best practice and standards they acquired worldwide."
One of al Jaber's Israeli counterparts is Yadin Kaufmann, a Princeton graduate who left America to settle in Israel. He's a founding partner of Veritas Venture Partners, a Herzliya-based venture capital firm. Kaufmann is exploring opportunities for co-operation with Palestinian businesspeople in the venture capital sector, he told me when I met with him in his Herzliya office. "I sense a broad and growing interest among many Israeli businesspeople in undertaking joint projects with Palestinians." Herzliya, a wealthy enclave just north of Tel Aviv, is home to many hi-tech and venture capital firms. It was named after the founder of Zionism, Theodor Herzl, whose cut-out stares somewhat comically from a billboard over the superhighway leading into town. It's inconceivable that Herzl ever imagined that his dream of a homeland for the Jewish people would be fuelled by the internet and venture capitalism, but it is.
Shapira, the telecommunications magnate, put it this way: "I feel obligated toward my children and grandchildren to act to promote the dialogue between the two nations and to contribute from my personal experience in an area I understand, with the hope that economic activities will also promote peace." But he's also practical: "We're not about to become the Garden of Eden," he told the Israeli media. "What we're telling politicians is that if you want businesses, there will be businesses. And you can do business even in an environment of security restrictions if you just have the will."
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