Between War and Peace: Dilemmas of Israeli Security

The nacent Arab-Israeli peace process has made Israel more secure than ever before. The war weariness underlying this process has rendered the threat of an immediate general conflagration highly unlikely and has given Israel a unique opportunity to conclude peace treaties with her Arab neighbours which over the long run can put her security on a new and more sound footing: once this contractual peace is given a chance to mature and strike root, it may produce a change of attitudes and perceptions at the grassroots level; this in turn is bound to make war far less likely - this time not only because of mutual exhaustion but because both Arabs and Israelis will have ceased to think of each other in terms of the demonized Other.
Yet the transition from contractual peace, which in itself has yet to be fully implemented, to genuine peace is anything but the risk-free scenario painted by the more naive proponents of the land-for-peace formula. The strategic and operational remedies to the security risks attending the transition to peace will inevitably be complex, costly and time consuming; the sooner Israeli policy-makers take the bull by the horns the better.
This collection of essays by a distinguished group of Israeli, American and British strategists assesses the balance of opportunities and risks confronting Israel at this critical juncture in her history and offers possible solutions to her pressing dilemmas. Among the issues discussed in this volume: the economic consequences of peace for Israeli security; the implications of the New World Order for Israel's strategic interests; military and strategic risks attending the land-for-peace formula and possible solutions, Israel's nuclear weapons and the problem of regional non-conventional proliferation; Israeli-Palestinian water conflicts and ways for their resolution; and, finally, the operational and strategic challenges posed by the Middle Eastern future battlefield.