This week marked 20 years since the death of Yasser Arafat. In Israel’s national memory, his name is etched in infamy as a bloodthirsty terrorist.
Yet, based on my personal acquaintance with the man, I am haunted by a seemingly theoretical question: How would history have remembered Arafat if, upon returning from the signing ceremony of the Oslo Accords on September 13, 1993, he had been assassinated by a Palestinian counterpart of Yigal Amir?
It is not far-fetched to imagine a Palestinian assassin deciding that Arafat deserved death for betraying his people by recognizing Israel and, in doing so, abandoning their right to return to their homeland and liberate it entirely from Jewish control. Had such an imagined assassin succeeded, Arafat would have joined the list of Palestinians who paid with their lives for daring to walk the path of compromise and peace.
A single bullet could have upended the prevailing interpretation of Arafat’s doctrine. Scholarly commentators would no longer have confidently explained, with their typical authoritative tone, that Arafat embraced the Oslo process as part of a cunning ploy to deceive Israel, guided by the “phased plan” to dismantle the Zionist entity step by step.
Intelligence analysts often adhere to models that attribute rationality and coherence to the actors operating within the arenas they seek to explain. According to this approach, beneath Arafat’s keffiyeh lay a sophisticated strategist who meticulously calculated cost-benefit scenarios and adjusted the intensity of conflict with precision to achieve one ultimate goal: the elimination of Israel.
My impression of Arafat differs. In the meetings I attended, he appeared as a tyrannical, megalomaniacal leader, far from mentally stable. To me, he seemed like a man capable of dreaming two entirely contradictory dreams in a single night. In one, he signs a final peace agreement with Israel, stands on a stage in Oslo with an olive branch in hand, and accepts another Nobel Prize. In the other, he casts all Israelis into the sea, returning his people to a homeland free of Jews.
Arafat would wake up without the slightest hangover and without being troubled by the inherent contradiction between his two dreams. His personality is far too complex for analysts who insist on imposing rationality upon an erratic individual lacking psychological balance. He does not fit models assuming that the subjects of analysis are guided by (Western) rational calculations. In my view, Oslo reflected Arafat’s conflicting feelings and desires: both a historic compromise enabling his people to achieve sovereignty and self-determination alongside Israel, and a component of a phased plan to destroy it.
Arafat basked in the prestige he received in the halls of global power, celebrated as the hero of the “peace of the brave,” yet was simultaneously plagued by a sense of regret—haunted by the possibility that history would remember him as the man who shattered the Palestinian dream and fell victim to Israeli cunning.
Israel does not choose the leaders it faces. It must learn to extract the maximum benefit from them to advance its interests. Would a Palestinian leader less megalomaniacal than Arafat have signed the documents recognizing Israel, explicitly affirming that “the PLO recognizes Israel’s right to exist in peace and security”?
Arafat’s decision at Oslo marked a dramatic U-turn. In practice, he abandoned the three “no’s” of Khartoum (1967): no recognition, no negotiations, and no peace with Israel. The consequences of this historic decision resonate even today. He paved the way for the Arab Peace Initiative (2002), whose potential Israel foolishly ignored (the initiative was also approved by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation). By recognizing Israel, Arafat legitimized subsequent peace efforts: the peace treaty with Jordan, the Abraham Accords, and the possibility of normalization with Saudi Arabia.
This lesson must guide us moving forward. The successors of the current Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, may be figures with dubious pasts (Marwan Barghouti, Jibril Rajoub, and others). Yet, if they meet our conditions for negotiating a settlement and can lead their people toward compromise, we should not dismiss the opportunity to engage with them. Ironically, it is precisely their “baggage” that lends them the popular legitimacy necessary for a Palestinian leader determined to achieve reconciliation with Israel and to confront internal opposition.
We must not deceive ourselves into believing that our counterparts will abandon their attachment to past dreams. The fantasy of the “phased plan” will continue to soothe the cognitive dissonance caused by their betrayal of the vision of a full return to Palestine. Israel must deploy a broad range of tools to gradually erode the hostility toward us. The message of the “Iron Wall”—that Israel is strong and cannot be defeated—is essential but insufficient. We need a “smart Iron Wall.” Alongside military strength, we must implement political, economic, and social measures to reinforce the Palestinian interest in cooperating with Israel and refraining from violence. These measures include a credible political framework leading to a permanent agreement, avoiding actions that undermine the possibility of compromise (such as expanding settlements in areas designated for Palestinian sovereignty), sustained economic development aid, improving the quality of services for the Palestinian public, and other “anchors” to demonstrate the tangible benefits of peace.
The necessity of pursuing this difficult path to peace is not born out of naïve idealism. It is the only practical way to prevent a descent into a binational reality that would undermine Israel’s Jewish character. If our goal is a Jewish and democratic state, we must divide the land. For that, we need a Palestinian partner. Groups like Hamas, dedicated to Israel’s destruction, will meet our unyielding and decisive force. But those willing to end the conflict are partners worth engaging.
When the day comes and an Israeli leader shakes the hand of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the name of peace, we will remember that this man was responsible for the murder and dismemberment of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. We will not forget, yet we will still shake his hand, just as we shook the hand of Anwar Sadat, under whose leadership 2,700 of our soldiers were killed. In this cruel world, heartbreaking decisions are sometimes necessary to give our children a chance to escape the burden of endless conflict.
As long as the actions of our counterparts serve our interests, we must not be deterred by the dark dreams that may still visit them at night. The challenge of Israeli policy remains as it was: to “wake” Arafat and his successors to dreams that align with Israeli interests and to walk with them as far as possible toward our ultimate goals.