They called it the “deal of the century”. Kushner and Trump wanted to you to know exactly what they could do for the Israeli Palestine conflict. For them this is all about business. Because for them, business is everything.
The emphasis was on deal and any solution would indeed be all about business. It is perhaps telling that Kushner was taking input on the conflict from Saudi Arabia, another nation that has learned the lesson that business and money will get you almost all you want on the world stage. “Peace for Prosperity” was, sadly, what is said it was, nothing more, a vision of buying a resolution. This shouldn’t really be a surprise. Trump and the right leaning politico in the US have versions of this as both personal goals and world vision.
It is a world view solidified by right wing US politics in the great economic success of their youth (or for the older ones, their formative years), that of the defeat of the Soviet Union. The collapse of the Soviet Union was celebrated, not just in the US, as the validation of one economic model above another, indeed above all others. And whilst this is true up to a point it is often taken, especially, this time, by the US right, at a very surface level. Instead of championing the underlying morals, goals, culture and creativity that allowed this model to work and flourish, the end itself became the be all; that is more money equals success, to the exclusion of all else. Russia, itself, sadly took this limited view on board; fledgling democratic and independent legal and cultural institutions were steam rollered in the bloody pursuit of financial accumulation. They learned the lesson, not that the value of the West was in its intellectual creativity, legal impartiality and myriad of hard-won cultural freedoms that allowed its economy to succeed, but that being able to get the money and the stuff was the success. That a nationally-individual protectionist world economy was the way to obtain goods but also allow the cutting out of any changes to culture or politics which you may not want. It is this world view which underpins the mainstream approach to capitalist populism.
Hence you see the reaction to climate change or more nakedly in arms sales to Saudi Arabia. Trump tells you straight up, the value of sales and money is greater than any moral, political, philosophical or indeed just nuanced approach to the regional situation that any may have. So deals are done, hands shaken and questions dodged when money and economic competition are on the line. This is even more straight forward at non-governmental level where with no electorate or base to placate or appeal to, any conceivable difference is set aside when money is to be made.
Trump, as won’t come as a surprise, is somewhat of an extreme outlier. Look at his response to brewing conflict with Iran; personal financial restrictions upon individuals. This is because in Trump’s world, surely Hassan Rouhani must care more about his personal wealth than all other considerations. There is an interesting psychological point here perhaps, that underlying motivators are presented (subconsciously) through proximate behaviours and beliefs. But this is not what Trump means. He thinks that literally selfishness and self-aggrandisement are the most important motivators and that the most you give up to any other factor is that of “visuals” or how it presents in the press to others.
This, then, is the difference between the standard right leaning realist world view and that of Donald Trump. He sees everything is a negotiation, a deal to be won, nothing that is off limits. However, most others do not think it goes that far. The glaring examples are that even amongst the nations where money is seen as being the primary motivator, such as the US, Russia and Saudi Arabia (amongst others), they all of a sudden drop this façade as soon as issues which they feel are off limits to dealing or negotiation. Russian nationalism, US abortion laws, Saudi Arabian women’s or human rights, the list goes on. What should be clear is that money and business are not the sole motivators of behaviour for most.
So, what does this mean for the proposed Israel Palestine peace deal? What Kushner and co have overlooked is that while economics are a great requirement of and bringer of peace, it was not a process of simply providing one thing and the other arriving as a consequence. They go hand in hand in development, and if not solidified through the process of creation, are easily undermined. Even then it is the institutions, culture and beliefs that are fostered during this dual development that are the key to truly changing interactions and fostering true peace and prosperity. It is the sad truth of history that at any point of economic challenge or hardship, cultures and communities revert back down the line to smaller groupings of cooperation, and it remains the challenge of rational liberalism to have intellectualism and shared learned cultural dynamics over-ride those of ethnic or religious or national groupings. As a side note, one of the fascinating things about crime and money is that it very readily cuts across these other groupings, those drawn to money at any cost really have no qualms about money at any cost, even if that means dealing with the other side in vicious ethnic civil wars or supposedly intransigent national foes. Which brings us back to Trump. He is at heart an individualist. He cannot conceive of others not taking what is directly best for just them at the expense of others. Tax breaks? If it is good for me, then who cares about societal or cultural impacts, it is the immediate selfish payoff that is of import.
The challenge then is beyond the Trump administration’s new proposal for Israel and Palestine, and indeed beyond even Trump and the US in a wider sense. It is about moving beyond a national-first interest where money and economics are seen to eclipse other interests and motivations, to explaining and promoting the values, culture and laws which allowed the hard-won prosperity of the West to take hold and gain the many admirers it has in other systems around the world. This is a system which allows an individual to prosper but also enshrines that individuals are accountable and not above any other person or group. A system which is under threat not just from exploitation and weakness of application but from outside by those that wish to go back to a national and protectionist world, one which restricts and blames others in order to benefit the few. It is again a choice between staying with the ideas of the past, that led disastrously to two world wars and stagnated economic growth, or choosing to embrace the cultural and ideological changes that have and are taking place, and create, ultimately, a richer and freer world.