By: Joshua Plaschkes

Georgetown University Professor Dr. Daniel Byman’s discussion on his new book, “A High Price,” analyzes Israel’s fight against terrorism in order to determine if the U.S. should incorporate Israel’s counterterrorism strategy into the asymmetric wars of Iraq and Afghanistan. Although Israel has been extremely successful operationally, Dr. Byman points to several significant costs associated with their counterterrorism approach. One of the greatest obstacles for Israel is countering the international community‘s negative perception. Once a counterterrorism operation is underway, Israel closes off media access, giving only the Palestinians a chance to voice their recollection of events to the international media. Palestinians tell stories of massacres and the killing of innocent, while Israel remains largely silent and fails to keep a significant record of operational events. Israel’s main goal is to stop an active or potential terrorist attack before it occurs, then worry about how it will appear to those outside of the operation. Dr. Byman explains that Israel has been effective in adapting to the terror threat in terms of intelligence and military operations, but the domestic impact and international perspective is not discussed during operational planning. The need to voice the Israeli side of events is essential so the use of force Israel uses is deemed proportional, or else they run the risk of being de-legitimized. As the retraction of the Goldstone Report shows, the international community will condemn Israel with very little knowledge of what actually occurred during an Israeli military operation, making it essential for Israel to integrate a discussion of the potential domestic and international perspectives before an operation is performed.

Although Israel’s counterterrorism operations have been incredibly successful in preventing potential terrorist attacks, Dr. Byman believes Israel’s approach has been harmful to the peace process. After the Oslo Accords in the 1990’s, Palestinians largely policed themselves against terrorist organizations attempting to attack Israel, but once Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, Hamas began bombing Israel, epitomized by the bombing of the Park Hotel during a Passover Seder, breaking the trust that the Palestinians were doing all they could to stop Palestinian terrorists. Yasir Arafat was seen as someone uncommitted to making peace with Israel, leading to the derailment of the peace process. Israel then reoccupies the West Bank and begins to implement several measures to prevent future terrorist attacks. Aerial bombardments of terrorist locations and the erection of several checkpoints were all steps to disrupt terrorist activities. This slowed down active threats, allowing the Israeli military more time to prepare. Although this has been extremely effective in the arrest and killing of terrorist leaders, leaving less experienced members to fill in top positions, it has created substantial hardships for ordinary Palestinians. Trips that should only take a short amount of time become day long experiences. Dr. Byman believes these preventive measures have largely undermined Palestinian moderates politically, a group Israel should do everything to support in order to combat the growing voice of terrorist organizations in Palestinian communities. Without a strong moderate perspective, Palestinians may look to history, seeing that negotiating with Israel over the years has not produced a Palestinian state, but the use of terrorism in Lebanon led to the removal of Israeli forces. This gives greater voice to Hamas and other terrorist organizations who want to create a Palestinian state through asymmetric warfare.

The changes Israel has had to make in order to adapt to the terrorist threat has had negative operational effects as well. As the intelligence community grew, Israel has increased the internal cooperation of various intelligence agencies. This has led to more intelligence personnel at all levels to be deeply involved in operational secrets, making it harder to keep secrets internal. Also, occupying the West Bank has been financially draining because of the large military and intelligence presence needed to successfully counter terrorist threats. These costs can have major repercussions for the stability of Israel itself.

Based on Dr. Byman’s analysis of the benefits and costs associated with Israel’s counterterrorism approach, I believe the U.S. should use many of the same counterterrorism techniques in the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan, with a twist. One of the main obstacles Israel faces in its counterterrorism operations is having to do the job solely through Israeli means. Checkpoints, intelligence operations, and other military activities have no local participation, presenting an us versus them scenario. The U.S. should and has tried to change this perception by placing a large emphasis on training locals to perform security operations on their own. The important distinction to make is the U.S. plans to eventually leave these two wars, while Israel must face the threat of terrorism from Palestinian extremists into the unforeseeable future. Also, having a coalition of nations removes some of the issues associated with perception, since it is not just one nation performing military operations against terrorists embedded in Afghan/Iraqi communities, as well as removing some of the cost burden. Unfortunately, Israel does not have the luxury of one day leaving a distant nation to come home to a stable homeland, have a willing coalition to fight in the decades long war against terrorism that constantly threatens the New Jersey sized nation, or use a superpower status to manage the international condemnation of its essential counterterrorism operations . Yet, the effectiveness of their intelligence community, their ability to adapt militarily to an evolving terrorist threat, and the successful record of protecting their civilian population is something the U.S. should emulate. What the U.S. needs to change from Israel’s approach is to have a better focus on a grand strategy to defeating terrorism, similar to the war of ideologies during the Cold War, instead of focusing solely on the next threat. It is essential for the U.S. to support the moderates of Iraq and Afghanistan who can one day lead their nations towards peace without a large U.S. military presence. Israel’s counterterrorism approach provides many lessons for the U.S. in its fight against terrorism.