The Historical Secrets for Israeli-Palestinian Peace

"Eternal peace" requires a paradigm shift, not a press conference.

photo: Timon Studler/Unsplash

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This is a guest essay by Daniel Clarke-Serret, author of “Exodus: The Quest for Freedom.”

You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.

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U.S President Donald Trump’s 21-point plan for ending the war in Gaza has been hailed by the man himself as the dawn of “eternal peace.”

It’s fair to say that the president isn’t a student of history, otherwise he wouldn’t have dared fallen into such a hubristic trap.

The historical precedents for “eternal peace” haven’t been all that promising. (That’s a British understatement.) A treaty with precisely that appellation was signed in 1686 between Poland and Russia. Its clauses included the ceding of Kiev to Russia and, as all irony-allergic readers are aware, the status of that city has never been in doubt again.

In reality, Russia and Poland have been in constant conflict ever since, to the point where Poland completely ceased to exist for a short time. She has been occupied by Russia in the context of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, and to this day Poland feels it necessary to be a member of an American-led defence alliance to ward of the possibility of the bear’s attack.

Meanwhile, Ukraine, of Kiev fame, is currently engaged in an existential war with her ever-aggressive neighbour lurking menacingly on her territory. So much for eternal peace.

Lest we think this phenomenon is limited to Europe, we would do well to remind ourselves of the events of the Early Middle Ages. There, in the heart of the Northern Middle East, the Eastern Roman Byzantines and the Persian Sassanians finally came to terms.

In a famed treaty of 532 CE, known alternatively as the “Perpetual Peace” or “The Treaty of Eternal Peace,” Byzantine Emperor Justinian I and the Sassanid King Khosrow I agreed to a permanent cessation of hostilities between the two warring empires. It was meant to endure indefinitely, but needless to say it broke down in short order. A mere eight years later, the Persians breached their treaty obligations by resuming their hostilities against the Byzantine Empire. It is in this light that Trump is perhaps unwise to toast his diplomacy with a poisoned chalice.

Yet none of this is to say that his peace efforts are unappreciated. True enough, he is motivated by the baubles of a Nobel Peace Prize, and he has an ego which challenges the Mongol Empire for size, but, nonetheless, his efforts may indeed lead to the release of all the hostages, that being the condition of just the first stage of the plan. If indeed he triumphs in this regard, we will gladly thank him for his intervention. Nonetheless, what he’s most unlikely to realise is eternal peace and just like the ominous 532 CE precedent: Hostilities are sure to return in the near future.

Is this cynicism? Shouldn’t we just give peace a chance? To be sure, the precedents in Ukraine and the Middle East are far from rosy, but isn’t it a council of doom to despair before the starting whistle has been blown?

I should state most emphatically that eternal peace between two nations is entirely possible and, as this essay goes on, we shall unveil one particularly prominent example of it. Indeed, in the Byzantine-Sassanian case, a perpetual unity of sorts did eventually come — just not in the way that either empire expected. With the arrival of Islam, both polities were utterly crushed and their territories were joined as one under the tender sword of the Umayyad Empire. This case study shows us that peace is possible, but it takes an unprecedented paradigm shift — in this case, the crushing defeat of both powers by a third party.

But is there another way? Can perpetual peace come to pass without the mutual destruction of the two warring parties? In a famous essay of the same name, Immanuel Kant discusses this very issue. The German philosopher conceived of a world without boundaries or frontiers, a cosmopolitan “soulless despotism” where states became a thing of the imagined past.

In his own prose, he dismissed the idea of a world government, but the consequence of his position makes it a logical necessity. Kant famously believed in the concept of moral universalism, that we owe duties to all human individuals equally as human individuals and that it was wrong-headed to impute specific duties towards family, friends, community, and state as other philosophies have traditionally done. We see the fruits of this thinking today in the “Woke” movement and in talks of open borders.

It would be improper to dismiss Kant’s essay out of hand, but as a recipe for perpetual peace, it is naively wanting, even undesirable.

So, what options are left for eternal peace?

Is it a pure utopian dream only imaginable in the biblical book of Isaiah? Is it a fantasy only capable of realization through crushing military defeat — thereby bringing additional problems in its wake?

I say, again, that eternal peace, at least between some nations, is entirely possible and the historical record confirms as much. Nonetheless, as stated previously, there needs to be a thus far unconceived paradigm shift.

The best example of such a realignment taking place, leading to two centuries of peace, with a near certain prospect of eternal peace onwards into the future, is the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom. Although they fought a bitter Revolutionary War, followed by an encore in 1812, the two nations soon came to peaceful terms. Why?

It is easy to dismiss the special relationship on the basis that both countries are English-speaking, have a similar heritage and indeed, in the decades prior to independence, were one country. Lest we forget that the casus belli of the contest was the belief that Crown-in-Parliament was failing to respect the liberty of British subjects.

Yet, despite the close pre-war relationship between Britain and America, the eternal peace that we see to this day was never a sure thing. It was the actions of the leadership, George III, John Adams, and particularly George Washington that allowed the parties to stride towards the future in confidence and peace.

George Washington had the bearing of a general and the stature of a leader without the avaricious ambition to match. To be sure, he did not display the meekness of Moses: When the Continental Congress was in the process of selecting a Commander-in-Chief, Washington unsubtly showed up in a military uniform. He did want the job. Yet his mild presentation of candidature was married with a genuine humility.

Upon being mocked by newspaper cartoons as president, the normally self-controlled Washington flew into a rage, balling that he didn’t want the position in the first place. Furthermore, in an act entirely unprecedented and unexpected, he resigned his military commission immediately upon winning the Revolutionary War.

The latter point cannot be emphasized enough. In an oft repeated tale, Thomas Jefferson had reacted with profound shock when Alexander Hamilton pronounced that he admired Julius Caesar. It moved him so that it became his go-to dinner party anecdote. And what was the issue with Caesar for Jefferson? That he embodied the sum of all fears for a nation contemplating Republicanism.

The Founding Fathers had an abiding anxiety born of history, namely that a successful military commander, with a loyal and all-conquering army, would seize the levers of power as a tyrant. That, after all, had been the historical experience of Republican government. That, after all, had been the lesson of Caesar, the moment that he crossed the Rubricon. Would that be fate of America?

So, when George Washington resigned his position and returned to civilian life, he instantly became a hero. He had bucked the precedent of Caesar and ultimately became the power-unhungry president that the new nation so desperately needed. In a letter which changed all of history.

At last, the hour of republicanism had come — with the meekest of generals who knew when it was time to go. Everyone had expected Washington to seize power, but through his resignation, his awe-struck citizens knew what they had to do: They needed George Washington as the figurehead of the new nation. No more would the Monarch’s birthday be celebrated. Instead the meek, victorious general would take his symbolic place as a spiritual father figure. Indeed, from as early as 1778, Washington was spoken of as the father of the country.

The actions of Washington that day in stepping away from power literally changed the world. They were the paradigm shift that was needed for eternal peace, both internally within a liberty-loving America and in terms of its relationship with the former mother country.

Prior to the resignation, but hearing of its unprecedented possibility, King George III allegedly said that such an action would make Washington “the greatest man in the world.” So, when it actually happened, the King presumably thought that he was witnessing history in the making; an extraordinary act of humility that changed the perception of American Republicanism in the eyes of the British state. It laid the foundation for eternal peace, a near-utopia that was sealed in the events to come.

In 1785, when John Adams met King George III as America’s first minister to Britain, he expressed his nation’s desire for lasting friendship and mutual respect. The King, remarkably gracious in defeat, replied that though he had opposed separation, he now fully accepted American independence and wished for enduring peace based on their shared language, faith, and heritage. Their exchange marked an unprecedented moment of dignity and reconciliation between former enemies.

These two gentlemen show us the path to peace.

In life and history, conflict is inevitable. War, as a last resort, is sometimes unavoidable. But the war having being won, it is incumbent on the victor to be gracious and for the loser to accept the result. Though they may have lost the battle, the vanquished is charged with the responsibility of looking to the future, building a shared destiny of co-operation and friendship.

What was achieved by Adams and the King that day is a lesson that the Arab states in general and the Palestinians in particular have so singularly failed to learn. Instead of accepting the result of Israel’s War of Independence, which the Arabs themselves initiated, they have persistently acted with aggression and hostility towards the modern State of Israel.

No George III has risen up to say, “I was the last to consent to the Separation, but the Separation having been made and having become inevitable, I have always said, as I say now, that I would be the first to meet the friendship of Israel as an independent Power.”

In short, there has been no paradigm shift. Instead we have seen history on rinse and repeat. So, while the United States and Britain are family happily united, the Jews and the Arab world are family unhappily estranged.

When Donald Trump speaks of eternal peace, it is, of course, possible, but it would require the Palestinians to take upon the lessons just articulated: Acceptance, forgiveness, leadership and a complete paradigm shift. Perhaps too much for the President to stake his reputation upon? Very probably.

Yet, there is at least one opportunity that should be seized forthwith: Trump would do well to read his history books and finally follow the example of Washington: a man of modesty, humility, and a refusal to grasp for power. These are the actions that can change the world and finally, possibly, lead to eternal peace.

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