New York Post Commentator Urges Arabs To Recognize Israel

Arabs in the Middle East must have a “change of heart” before peace negotiations with Israel can continue, said New York Post commentator Daniel Pipes ’71 in a speech last night in Emerson Hall.

Pipes, speaking to an audience of more than 50, said that until Palestinians and Arab neighbors fully accept Israel’s right to exist, Israel must return to the strategy of deterrence it followed before the 1993 Oslo peace accords.

“They have the burden to be tough,” Pipes said. “If they aren’t going to accept that burden, they may as well give up.”

Pipes is the creator of Campus Watch, a controversial website that details what he calls pervasive anti-American and anti-Israeli sentiments on college campuses across the United States.

Harvard was among Campus Watch’s original list of 14 colleges and universities to watch when the site was launched Sept. 18—the day after University President Lawrence H. Summers gave a speech suggesting that anti-Semitism was a serious problem at the University.

In his speech last night, Pipes rejected what he described as the conventional view of the Arab-Israeli conflict—that the current violence is simply a “distraction” from the peace process.

“I think this is a war,” Pipes said. “It should be seen as war, with war goals and a battle of wills for victory.”

Pipes argued against Israeli concessions or more agreements that he derided as mere “pieces of paper.”

“It’s like 1942 and discussing what postwar Germany would look like with the Germans,” Pipes said.

He said the “conventional view” of the conflict became popular after the decisive Israeli victory in the 1967 Six-Day War. U.S. leaders came to believe that “Arab rejectionism” of Israel was over and that the conflict could be resolved with the right mix of Israeli concessions.

Pipes said neither the Bush administration’s call for new Palestinian leadership nor the Israeli plan to build a wall between Israel and the West Bank would work, as neither would change Arab opinion on the status of Israel.

Pipes argued that Palestinians would be better off economically if they accepted Israel’s existence and ended the intifada.

“Much as Israel needs victory over the Palestinians, the Palestinians even more need to be defeated,” he said. “It is not win-lose, it is win-win.”

During a question-and-answer period after Pipes’ speech, an audience member asked him to comment on the controversy over Irish poet Tom Paulin—who was invited to speak last month by the Harvard English department, then uninvited after he drew criticism for violent anti-Israeli statements, then reinvited.

Pipes argued that anti-Semitism has increasingly moved from the political right to the left, and he attributed the department’s reinvitation to the liberal nature of the nation’s campuses.

“The universities are the most liberal institutions in this country, with the possible exception of the mainline churches,” Pipes said. “Of course, the more elite the university, the more left-wing.”

In response to another question, Pipes said he believed the campaign calling for universities, including Harvard, to divest from Israel was losing steam.

Though there were a couple of pointed questions from the audience, no one protested Pipes’ speech, despite the anger sparked by his website earlier this fall.

Wasim Quadir ’03, president of the Harvard Islamic Society, wrote in September that the website appeared to be part of a program to “intimidate” critics of Israel on campus by suggesting they are anti-Semitic.

Pipes said the site aims merely to critique Middle Eastern studies programs that exhibit “intolerance and extremism” and that he is not trying to suppress anyone’s free speech.

“We’re simply saying ‘badly done,’” he said.

Pipes’ speech was co-sponsored by Jews for Conservative Politics, Harvard Students for Israel and the Harvard Republican Club.