LESSONS OF OPERATION DEFENSIVE SHIELD

What are we to make of the fact that just two months after Israel's major incursion into the West Bank it finds itself once more admist a wave of suicide bombings, and once more responded with a major incursion into Area A. Mickey Kaus is sure he knows: opponents of the Sharon policy (such as Robert Wright) were clearly right, and supporters (such as Charles Krauthammer) were prematurely triumphalist. Kaus' snarky critique however is just as wrong as Wright's analysis has always been, as just as premature as Krauthammers' punditry was last month.

The amount of Palestinian terror is a function of both the capacity (supply) of the Palestinians to commit terror and the desire (demand) of the Palestinians to do so. The Palestinian Terror Supply is roughly determined by the following factors: (1) organizational support and structure, (2) supply of explosives/weapons, (3) havens/bases of operation, (4) manpower, and (5) access to targets. The Palestinian Terror Demand is determined by (a) attitude/ideology towards Israel (b) potential costs and benefits of terror; and (c) cost/benefits of alternative approaches to terror.

Let's look then at the accomplishments of Operation Defensive Shield. First, it disrupted the terrorist organizational structure by arresting and killing militant leaders. Second, it was able to recover and destroy a vast cache of explosives and weapons. Third, while the operation was ongoing it eliminated terrorist access to West Bank cities as bases of operation and havens from Israeli attacks. Fourth, again during the operation it significantly reduced access to Israeli civilian targets. On the demand side, its unclear whether the costs of widespread destruction of PA infrastructure were seen as higher than the political gains of the PA in the diplomatic arena.

It's obvious from this analysis why the gains of the mission were only temporary. Once the IDF had pulled back - Palestinian terrorists regained access to PA territory as bases of operation and once more had access to Israeli targets through the porous West Bank-Israel border. Once they recovered sufficiently in terms of organization and supplies they were able to launch another wave of attacks. Similarly, the negative consequnces of terror for Palestinians were clearly bounded - the reoccupation was temporary, and Arafat was guarenteed protection from exile.

This analysis is widely different from that of Robert Wright, who (1) discounts any attempts to limit the supply of terror (by bizarrely positing manpower as the limiting factor) and (2) limits his demand analysis to the Palestinian attitude towards Israel. His conclusion, inevitably, is that Israel should respond to Palestinian terror with restraint and concessions - because this will somehow radically change Palestinian attitudes towards Israel and not be interpreted as validating the pro-terror policy. Krauthammer on the other hand focuses on the Palestinians capacity for terror, along with the cost/benefit analysis of the terror policy. Krauthammer's mistake in trumpeting the Sharon policy was his premature conclusion that a two week operation significantly impacted that capacity and the calculus of the Palestinian leadership.

Which brings us back to the current policy adopted by Sharon after the latest wave of bombings. Unlike the April incursion, this reoccupation is designed to be of indefinite length. This will both increase the IDF's ability to reduce terror capacity - and more importantly, change the cost-benefit analysis for the Palestinian pragmatists. If the reaction of Palestinian leaders (most notably the petition against suicide bombing signed by Sari Nusseibeh and Hanan Ashwari) is any indication, already this new policy has already had a positive impact. Only when the Palestinians have given up on getting land for nothing will they finally consent to land for peace.