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Final Paper of International Politics | 070810531

Final Paper of Politics and International Security Subject (SOH-302)

” Theory of War and Its Implementation in Palestine-


Israel Case”

Written by:

Kurnia Sari Nastiti (070810531)

Department of International Relations


Faculty of Social and Political Science
Airlangga University
©2010

Theory of War and Its Implementation in Palestine-Israel Case


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Final Paper of International Politics | 070810531

War is the most fundamental manifestation of conflict as a systemic process in international


relations. Ever since Thucydides’s account of the Peloponnesian War over 2,400 years ago
(Strassler, 1996), scholars from a wide range of disciplines have studied war in the hope of
facilitating efforts to prevent its occurance, reduce its frequency, or mitigate its consequence. The
study of war in political science varies enormusly in theoritical orientation, methodological
approach, ontological assumptions and empirical domain. Thus, there is now a greater diversity in
the study of war in international relations. Here, through this writing, I would like to explain the
theory of war from various scholar in order to widen our understanding about war theory and its
implementation in a real case.

I. Theory of War

The term “war” has been defined differently by some international relations scholars. Carl
von Clausewitz (1989) for example, he defines war as an act of force to compel our enemy to do
our will. Meanwhile, Graham Evans (1998) states that war is direct, somatic violance between
state actors. Whilst, Martin Griffiths (2001) defines war as the use of armed forces in a conflict
which should culminate in at least 1,000 battle deaths, especially between countries.

From those various descriptions,it can be concluded that war is an act of force which is
usually characterized by the use of armed forces to compel our enemy to do our will and it mostly
happen between state actors.

Furthermore, besides understanding its definition, it is also important for us to know about
the nature of war itself.

Nature of War

Based on several references, I may conclude that there are several basic nature of war,
including:

(1) War is an political instrument, and the political object is the goal of war. When
whole communities go to warthe reason often lies in some political situation, and the
occasion is always due to some political object. Thus, war is an act of policy. Clausewitz even
emphasized this by saying that war is not merely an act of policy but a true political
instrument, a continuation of political intercourse, carried on with other means (Clausewitz,
1989:98). Moreover, the political object is the goal, war is the means of reaching it, and means

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can never be considered in isolation from their purpose (Clausewitz, 1989:99). It is now clear
that war should never be thought of as something autonomous but always as an instrument of
policy.

(2) Forces are the means of war, and the enemy is the war’s object. War is an act of
force, and there is no logical limit to the application of that force. Thus, force is the means of
war to impose our will on the enemyits object (Clausewitz, 1989: 83).

(3) War is never an isolated act. This because war never breaks out wholly
unexpectedly, nor can it be spread instantaneously (Clausewitz, 1989:87). There must be
something that cause the war. The actor’s motives can be considered as the basic instinct that
cause actor to wage war.

(4) War varies in line with the characteristic of the actor’s involved, their motives, and
the situation happened. Character of each actor (state) involved could influence the warthe
less involved the population and the less serious the strains within states and between them,
the more political requirements in themselves will dominate and tend to be decisive
(Clausewitz, 1989: 91). Furthermore, war must vary with the nature of the actor’s motives and
also of the situations which give rise to them (Clausewitz, 1989:100).

(5) The goal of war can also move on. War moves on its goal with varying speeds, but
it always lasts long enough for influence to be exerted on the goal and for its own course to be
changed in one way or another (Clausewitz, 1989:98).

(6) Suspension of action in war is something possible. It means that the process of war
can be interrupted even for a moment. One of the reason for suspending the war for instance is
the principle of polarity. The principle of polarity is valid only in relation to one and the same
object, in which positive and negative interests exactly cancel one another out (Clausewitz,
1989: 93). On the contrary, polarity does not lie in attack or defense but in the object both
seek to achieve.

(7) The result of war is never final. It since the ultimate outcome of a war is not always
to be regarded as final. The defeated state often considers the outcome merely as transitory
evil, for which a remedy may still be found in political conditions at some later date
(Clausewitz, 1989: 89).

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Basic Instinct and Motive of Waging the War

Actually, there is no consensus as to what cause the war are, what theories and what
methodologies are most useful for identifying and validating those causes. Yet, there are still some
theories that been argued by some scholars about the cause of the war.

Walter (2005) ensured in his writing that Sigmund Freud, Hans Morgenthau, and Konrad
Lorenz mentioned that aggressive instinct is the main cause for the actor’s to wage war.
Meanwhile, Clausewitz assumes that there are two different motives make men fight one another,
those are: hostile feelings and hostile intentions. War may not spring from those two things
sometimes, but they will still affect the war to some degree (Clausewitz, 1989: 85). To what extent
it affects the war will depend not on the level of civilization but on how important the conflicting
interests are and how long their conflict lasts. Even the advance of civilization has done nothing
practical to alter or deflect the impulse to destroy the enemy, but there is no doubt that intellegence
has played a larger part in affecting the method of warfare and has taught the actor about the more
effective ways of using force than the crude expression of instinct.

Moreover, political objective could also be considered as the original motive for commiting
the war. The political objectthe original motive for the warwill thus determine both the
military objective to be reached and the amount of effort it requires (Clausewitz, 1989: 90).

The Aim of War

One of the most common aim of the actor for waging the war will probably to disarm the
enemy. As Clausewitz contend in his writing, if you are to force the enemy by making war on him,
to do your bidding, you must either make him literally defenseless or at least put him in a position
that makes this danger probable (Clausewitz, 1985: 85).

Strategy of War

According to Clausewitz (1989), there are several strategic elements that had usually been
considered by the actor in waging the war. It could be classified into various types, including:
moral (intellectual and phsycological qualities); physical (the size of armed forces, armaments, and
so forth); mathematical (calculation obout geometric matter); geographical (consideration about
terrain, river, and other territory during the war); and statistical (involves support and maintenance
from another actor or third party).

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II. Implementation of War Theory in Palestine-Israel Case

After considering the theory of war as has been explained above, here I try to apply those
theories in the case of Palestine-Israel War.

As it has been explained above, war is an act of force which is usually characterized by the
use of armed forces to compel our enemy to do our will and it mostly happen between state actors
and had culminated in at least 1,000 battle deaths. According to this definition, the case between
Israel and Palestine can be classified into a kind of war since it involves the use of force: the armed
forces (using rocket-bomb, tank, and other armaments) and even traditional forces (using
stone,and other patch up equipments); and had cause more than 1,000 battle deaths since its first
outbreak. The case between Palestine and Israel actually can also be classified into a kind of
“conflict” as Graham Evans (1998) contended that in international relations conflict behavior can
also be observed as a warboth as a threatened outcome and as an existansial realityand
bargaining behavior short of violent idiom. Yet, as the author of this writing, I prefer to consider
this case as a war since according to its definition,the term“conflict” itself can only be defined as a
social condition that arises when two or more actors pursue mutually exclusive or mutually
incompatible goals (Evans, 2000: 93) which means that the use of force does not always exist in
conflict condition, whereas in the case of Palestine-Israel the use of force always exist.
Furthermore, I prefer to classify this case into a kind of war since there are too many conflict
involves in the case of Palestine-Israel. The Palestine-Israel case does not only consist of territorial
conflict, but also civilian conflict, and even inter-religion conflict in which each party wants to
preserve the authority of their own religion in a disputed land (Palestinian territories).

Tracing back to its history, the war between Israel and Palestine was caused primarily by the
return of the Jews (which was previously scattered in various region in the world due to the
colonisation of Assyrian people in around 721 BC) to Palestine, the land that they claimed as the
“promised land” for the Jews according to Torah or Taurat (Gabriel, 2007:5). Unfortunately, the
land has been inhabited by Palestinian society for over 2,500 years but the Jews still wanted to
move there and used their theological claim as the instrument to legalise their return to Palestine.
The return of the Jews to the Palestinian territories was provoked by Theodor Hertzl who held
Jewish Congress in Switzerland in 1985 and spread Zionism thought which emphasized that Jews
cannot be equated with other nations so that it was important for them to have their own homeland
in Palestine that had theological closeness with them. The Jews’ first exodus to Palestine happened
in 1917 after British as the party who controlled the Palestinian territories at that time supported
Jewish people, through “Balfour Declaration”, to return back to their homeland in Palestine with
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the promise that Jewish people would never violate the right of Palestinian society who had
already lived there (Katz, 1997: 12). However, in its practice the Jews broke their promise to
British. The Jews movement did not only seek for a living land in Palestine anymore, but more
than that the Jews wanted to rule Palestinian land as a whole. They began their effort to rule
Palestine by buying the land in Palestine, built a number of settlement for Jewish people, and in its
climax the Jews declared the establishment of Israel country unilaterally in 1948. These conditions
undoubtedly has made Palestinians furious. Since that time, the Palestine-Israel war related to
territorial dispute broke out. Moreover, the Palestine-Israel war became heaten up since the
declaration of Israel independency had also made Arab countries like Egypt, Lebanon, Jordania,
and Saudi Arabia who had cultural and religious closeness with Palestinian angry. It then caused
the outbroke of Arab-Israel war in 1949’s.

In its continuity, the war was not only heaten up but also became more complicated since the
both sides, Palestinians and Israelis, were very difficult to reconcile in a peace negotiation. Once
they agreed on a peace negotiation, each side seemed to find a way to betray the agreement so that
Palestine and Israel have never reached a perpetual peace until now. The Oslo agreement in 1993
for example, through this agreement Israel committed to approve the establishment of Palestine
National Authority (PNA), while the Palestinians promised to recognize Israel's sovereignty
(Katz,1997:12). As the follow up of this agreement, Israelis then got a sovereignty recognition
from Palestinian people and as a return Israelis promised to give Gaza Strip, Jericho, West Bank
and Tel Aviv to Palestine. However, in its development, betrayal of this agreement began to occur.
Israelis were not willing to withdraw from Gaza Strip. It immediately made Palestinian especially
people who joined HAMAS (the Islamic Resistance Movement), which actually did not want to
acknowledge Israel’s sovereignty, became angry. Members of HAMAS then attacked Israel’s
troops with rocket-bomb and supported by Intifadha group who attacked Israelis army with stones
and any other patch up equipments. HAMAS and other Palestinian people were then getting more
angry since Israel’s troops hit them back by attacking on a number of Moslem worship places, and
also murdered Palestinian children. Since then, the war between Palestine and Israel expanded in
its scope. It was no longer about a mere territorial conflict, but it is now also a civilian conflict
(Palestinians versus Israelis) and even inter-religions conflict (Islam versus Jew). It then shows us
that “war varies in line with the characteristic of the actor’s involved, their motives, and the
situation happened; and the goal of war can also move on”, just like Clausewitz’ war theory
which mentioned that “war must vary with the nature of the actor’s motives and also of the
situations which give rise to them (Clausewitz, 1989:100)”, and “war moves on its goal with
varying speeds (Clausewitz, 1989: 98)”. It was shown by the shifting on Israel’s goal, which at the
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first time it was only seeking for territorial control, but nowadays Israel also seek for religious
power and victory in civilians conflict with Palestinians. Regarding to these complicated and
overlapping conflicts, and also the use of forces that have never been absent during the conflicts, I
have no doubt to say this Palestine-Israel case as a war, a REAL WAR.

In recent year, the war between Palestine and Israel is not getting better. Even if there might
be a declining tension of war in 2002 due to the existence of the Palestine-Israel peace proposal
which was proposed by the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, the
declining tension seemed to be only a war suspension since Palestine-Israel war took place again
in 2008 marked by Hamas rocket attacks into Israeli residential areas. These conditions has proven
that Clausewitz theory about war suspension is true. He mentioned that “suspension of action in
war is something possible and it means that the process of war can be interrupted even for a
moment (Clausewitz, 1989:93)”, and these really happened in Palestine-Israel case. Yet, we should
pay attention that even if suspension undoubtedly marks a declining tension of war but it doesn’t
mean a declining level of hatred and hostility between the party involved in war. Contrarily, the
hatred tension between Palestinians and Israelis are getting worse as Clausewitz contended that
“as long as the actors remain under arms, the motive of hostility must still be active (Clausewitz,
1989:92).” Thus, it becomes logic that the case between Palestine and Israel seems to be
everlasting since the hatred between them is deeply embedded. These conditions then made me
also agree with Clausewitz statement that actually “the result of war is never final (Clausewitz,
1989:89)”. It has been proven in Palestine and Israel case. For instance, after the battle of
Palestinians and Israelis due to Israel’s declaration of independence, another battle came out
namely Arab-Israel war in 1948, and after the end of that war (Arab-Israel war) another battle took
place again between Palestine and Israel in 2008, and until now the progress of war between
Palestine and Israel have never meet its final result.

Conclusions:

War is a continuation of politics by other means. It is undoubtedly that war is an instrument


to advance political interests. As has been explained above, there are several common natures of
war and each war will have its own specific cause, aim, and strategy. In the case of Palestine-Israel
War, something that primarily be the cause of this war is the return of the Jews to Palestine, a land
that they (Jew) claimed as the “promised land” for Jewish but it has been inhabited by Palestinians
for over 2,500 years. The war between them emerged since the return of the Jews did not only seek
for a living land in Palestine, but more than that the Jews wanted to rule Palestinian land as a
whole. Thus, the aim of both side (Palestine and Israel) in waging the war is to win the right to
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control over Palestine territories. Yet, in its continuity, the war between Palestine and Israel
expanded in its scope since Israel applied the new strategy to conquer Palestine by bombing
several Moslem worship places, and also murdered Palestinian children. Since then, the Palestine-
Israel war was no longer about a mere territorial conflict, but it is now also a civilian conflict
(Palestinians versus Israelis) and even inter-religions conflict (Islam versus Jew).

All the explanation above has shown us about how important to deal with the theory of war
is, since it is really applicable in a real case. By understanding the theory, we could analyse any
war case and even we could hopefully find an effort to prevent another war occurance, reduce its
frequency, or mitigate its consequence someday.

References:

Carlsnaes, Walter. et.al. ed., 2005. Handbook of International Relations. London: SAGE.
Clausewitz, Carl von. ed., 1989. On War. New Jersey: Princeton University Press
Evans,Graham. 1998. Dictionary of International Relations. Oxford: Penguin Group.
Gabriel, Mark A. 2007.The Unfinished Battle ISLAM and the Jew.s.l
Griffiths, Martin. 2001. International Relation: The Key Concepts. New York: Routledge.
Katz,Jacob et.al. 1997. Sejarah Pertumbuhan dan Perkembangan Zionisme. Surabaya: Pustaka
Progressive

*Any comment for this writing? Please send to kurnia.nastiti@yahoo.com or facebook at


nia.bong2@yahoo.com

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