Could a Citizen's Assembly Solve the Israel/Palestine Conflict?

The Changing Map of Israel and Palestine

What is a Citizen's Assembly?

A Citizen's assembly is a panel of selected members of the public, who deliberate on a particular subject or issue, and, with the help of evidence and objective expert testimony, arrive at an informed decision. A Citizen's assembly can vary in size (anything from a handful of people to an assembly numbering in the hundreds or even the thousands), and could be formed to deal with any kind of issue.

Often a Citizen’s Assembly is called upon as an option because a subject is regarded as "toxic". This means that elected officials would have a lot of trouble dealing with this issue effectively, as controversial decisions that will harm their chances at the next election tend to be shied away from. One example is the issue of abortion in Ireland: a Citizen's Assembly was formed to deal with this, and it eventually recommended a referendum. 

In Britain, the environmental pressure group Extinction Rebellion is currently campaigning for a national Citizen's Assembly to deal with the issue of Climate Change. There was even a Citizen's Assembly formed to deliberate upon Brexit, though its recommendations were ignored.

It has been theorised that a Citizen's Assembly that is called a "Multi-body Sortition" could be used to replace conventional representative democracy as we know it and run a country.

How is a Citizen's Assembly Formed?

A Citizen's Assembly is formed by means of a process called Sortition, which is a kind of random selection method. Think of it as something not dissimilar to being chosen to do jury duty; or being chosen as a lottery winner. Your name or you address, or some identifying signification will be picked out, and you're in the Assembly!

If a Citizen's Assembly runs for a considerable length of time, or has been formed to deal with more than one subject, its membership is often "refreshed". Meaning some of its members will leave and other members will join. But a whole Citizen's Assembly is never completely refreshed. That is there is never a point where every single member of the Assembly is replaced all at once - and so in this way, and through the use of facilitators and subject expert advisors - continuity can be assured.

Is this a Revolutionary New Idea?

No, not at all. There were Citizen's Assemblies used in ancient Greece, and apparently they even had a special machine which performed the function of sortition and selected the people who would form the Citizen's Assembly.

The kleroterion - Sortition machine used in Ancient Greece

What are the advantages of a Citizen's Assembly?

Well, firstly a Citizen's Assembly is truly representative. This is not the case in our modern conventional democracy, where only those people on the electoral role get to vote. This usually means that certain demographics - say those of a young age, or the homeless, or refugees (often referred to as “the 10% hard to reach”), will be under represented, while other demographics - say, white middle class males - will be over represented.

A citizen's assembly can ensure that every demographic can be represented in its proper proportions. Say 5% of your country or region's population are females of Indonesian origin aged 20 - 30. That means 5% of the Citizen's Assembly will be composed of that demographic.

Now, you may be asking yourself at this point, "Hold on a minute, if Sortition is a process of choosing participants entirely at random, then how could we guarantee a proportion like 5% of the Citizen's Assembly being composed of females of Indonesian origin aged 20 - 30?"

There is a way! Keep reading!

Secondly, it is much less likely that a member of a Citizen's Assembly will have a conflict of interest. This phenomenon is a stain on modern parliamentary politics, and often politicians are accused of having a vested interest in making sure that, say fossil fuel corporations, or certain pharmaceutical companies will not suffer penalties or even have to pay taxes. A good example of a conflict of interest is the fact that many British MP's are also landlords that rent out multiple properties, meaning that it may not be in their interests to pass laws that improve the rights of tenants. The aforementioned process of regularly "refreshing" the Assembly members also helps in this regard, as it prevents the build-up of power and vested interest.

Thirdly, the fact that decisions are evidence based is a perhaps the biggest advantage. Subject Matter Experts are used as advisers, though they do not make pronouncements ("Experts on tap - not on top"), and the findings and recommendations produced by the Citizen's Assembly are informed and objective evidence based decisions ("Public Judgement - not public opinion").

Random Stratified Sampling

The way we get a truly representative Citizen's Assembly is through the method of stratification. This "weights" the random sampling - or Sortition - procedure to ensure that the makeup of the Citizen's Assembly is truly representative (or to put it another way, this is the way you make sure that 5% of your Citizen's Assembly is composed of females of Indonesian origin aged 20 - 30, if that is appropriate).

And this is where we come to Israel/Palestine, where the stratification exercise would be a fascinating challenge.

Let's stratify! 

Citizen's Assembly Process Map

Holy Land Stratification

First, let's get 50% male, 50% female.

Next we go 50% Israeli, 50% Palestinian.

Then things start to get thorny - religious splits. Across the Holy Land we must take the correct proportions of Jewish, Muslim, and Christian citizens. Then also take the correct proportion of those of other faiths and of no faith.

Then things get even more complicated. For instance on the Palestinian side we must take the correct proportions of those who live in Gaza and those who live on the West Bank. If they are Muslim we must take the correct proportions of Sunni and Shia, Khawarij and other schools of thought. Should we stratify further? In Gaza the government is Hamas, but there are other factions present there also. Should they be represented? Same with the West Bank, where Fatah by no means enjoy blanket support.

Then we go to Israel, and we stratify by Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Sephardic, Orthodox and other strata of the Jewish population. We must also take the correct proportion of the Palestinian-Israeli population, before we go to other groups like the Druze.

And we haven't even started on stratifying by age groups, income ranges, suburban dwellers versus country dwellers, more detailed ethnic compositions and so forth.

By now I'm sure you can see things are getting involved, and I believe we would need a fairly large Citizen's Assembly in order to get something like a correct representation of the various factions and groups that live in this land of trauma.

A Question of Experts

This poses a potential roadblock - not because there are no subject matter experts on the issue of Palestine and Israel: there are many. However what we need are objective experts. Or should I say, what we need are experts that are perceived to be objective. This is quite a challenge considering we are talking about the most polarised of subjects.

A Question of Settlers

The illegal Israeli settlers who occupy Palestine’s West Bank would be another potential stumbling block. Should they be represented and given a say in a Citizen's Assembly? This is a problematic issue, since the presence of the settlers is illegal under international law and they are widely viewed as one of the biggest stumbling blocks in the way of any kind of peaceful outcome. Also, there is a strong chance that the settlers would not be interested in any kind of treaty that most of the world would view as just and equitable, due to their absolutist stance.

Having said that, the point of a Citizen's Assembly is to bring together those who may have seemingly unbridgeable differences, so we should not abandon all hope at the start. And besides, solutions have been proposed that do take the presence of the settlers into account in a constructive manner.

Conclusion: The Need for a New Approach

For any of this to go ahead, we would need to have the political will to search for a peaceful, just solution to this conflict rooted in a deadly cocktail of quarrels over land, history, politics and religion. Pushing for a solution does not seem to be in Israel's interests at present, however, as it is sitting pretty with the backing of America's government, which grants it such boons as the recognition of Jerusalem as its capital while asking for nothing in return.

But ultimately - and even from the start, going right back to the Balfour Declaration - this conflict is a testament to how conventional politics has been and is still failing us. We need fresh approaches to these seemingly intractable dilemmas.

Otherwise all we can do is carry on looking the other way while our fellow human beings suffer and perish.

For more information on Citizen's Assemblies and Sortition, please visit https://www.sortitionfoundation.org/

Protect Local Democracy

Or

Against All Odds

Please allow me to introduce myself...

I opened the latest Ealing 38 Degrees meeting with the following words:

I’ve always been a strong believer in environmental issues – protecting the earth and finding cleaner ways of generating energy.  In the past few years I have become more and more aware of the struggle of the Palestinian people for freedom and justice.  And I have become aware of how important local democracy is, and how local politics affects people’s lives.  All of these issues have been brought sharply into focus by the new law that this government wish to impose upon us.   This is a rule designed to prevent local authorities from making ethical choices when they decide where to invest their money.   This means barring them from boycotting Israeli firms that operate in the West Bank of Palestine, or weapons manufacturers, or corporations that they believe operate in an unethical manner.  With me to discuss these matters further are Ben Jamal from the National Executive of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Joel Benjamin of Community Reinvest and MoveYour Money, and Alex Goldhill of the Unite Community in Ealing.

Alex spoke first, and gave us a summary of some of the historical precedents that contributed to the juncture at which we have arrived.  The battles between the Thatcher government and local authorities in the 1980s; the boycott movement that had risen to oppose Apartheid South Africa; and  George Osborne's insincere efforts to persuade us that there would be a "Devolution Revolution".  He also touched on the fact that spending cuts have savagely cut local government budgets - although Conservative run authorities have received more help from their government that councils run by other parties.

Destroying Revenues for Local Councils

Joel Benjamin was up next, and immediately gave us an eye opening statistic that less money is spent locally in the United Kingdom than in any other country in the West.  The vast majority of funds spent locally are from central government.  But things have become considerably worse over the last few years.

Cuts to council budgets from central government, and restrictions over the way that councils can seek loans to plug the resulting gaps in their balance sheets have lead to the rise of the "LOBO (Lender Option Borrower Option) Loan".  It is this kind of loan that has put private banks in charge of local authority debt, rather than the more stable local government loans that councils have been deterred from taking out.  These loans can appear to be much more reasonable at first, but after the initial fixed term ('teaser rate') has expired, the lender has the option to increase its Interest Rates, which puts the council in question at the mercy of private financial interests.  This means, in practice, that local authorities such as Hackney are currently spending 80% of their council tax revenues on servicing their debt to banks such as RBS, HSBC and Barclays.  There are some local authorities in Scotland whose debt repayments now stand at 100% of their council tax revenues.

And yet...

... despite this growing debt trap, and despite the centralization, and despite the broken devolution promises, local authorities remain rich reserves of spending and bastions of local democracy that are more accessible than their central government counterpart. And they can use their autonomy to pursue courses of action that may not chime with official government policy. And indeed why should they blindly follow policies they may not agree with? A council ward may be part of a Conservative constituency but may elect a Labour or a Liberal Democrat councilor - or a Green, or UKIP or maybe an independent. And so locally, within the limits of its influence, politics may work differently. That's localism; that's democracy. These are the principles that George Osborne and the Conservatives paid lip service to when they came to power.

What is BDS?

One of the ways that local democracy can practice its independence is through the peaceful tactic of Boycott, Divestment and Sanction. BDS for short. If an organization, or a corporation are providing services or manufacturing goods for a government that are repressive towards their own, or part of their own, or another country's population, then you do not avail yourself of their services or goods; and you withdraw any funds you may have invested in that organization. This "destroys a firm's cultural license to operate", and hopefully will change the behaviour of that organization or corporation, who may in turn find themselves forced to withdraw their services or investments from the country with the repressive government. And this in turn, hopefully, will change the behaviour of the repressive government. It's like a virtuous cycle.

Or sometimes it's just about the wish to be more virtuous. After all, can one sleep easily knowing that one's pension fund could be used to manufacture weapons that may target civilians? Would it not feel good to know that one's pension is not tied into the fumes of an oil refinery belching carbon into the atmosphere and warming it up? Or a fracking operation, poisoning the water and causing earthquakes?

And local governments in Britain have begun to use this BDS option. Leicester council have boycotted goods manufactured from the West Bank. Reading council have announced that they are divesting from fossil fuels.  Apart from the ethical issues, this is common sense: everyone knows how the price of oil is currently crashing (though £14 billion in British public service pension money is sill tied into fossil fuels); and the government's own guidelines warn of the risks in investing in settlements that break international law.

But councils were never going to be allowed to take these kind of actions with impunity. Not in a country that has become, as a friend of mine has dubbed, The Prostitute State.  A country where ministers mouth platitudes about protecting the environment while sitting on the boards of fracking companies.  A country where inquiries into tax evasion are themselves headed by tax evaders. These monied interests looked upon the actions of recalcitrant local authorities, and they did not like what they saw.

A New Law to Target BDS

Ben Jamal, from the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign now addressed the meeting.  He told us of new measures were announced in a press release on 7th October 2015 on the eve of the Conservative Party conference that month.  By sheer coincidence Jeremy Corbyn, a known sympathiser to the cause of Palestinian liberation, had been elected leader of the Labour Party a few weeks before.  Drafted by Greg Clark, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government.  It spoke of the "divisive" nature of BDS that posed a "risk" to local communities, and that "measures" were going to be introduced to "oppose" BDS.  Matthew Hancock, Minister for the Cabinet Office, formerly introduced the measure during a trip to Israel.  They were implemented without a vote in the House of Commons.  One person who would have been very satisfied with this outcome is Gilad Erdan, who is Benjamin Netanyahu's no. 2 in the Israeli government, and has been tasked with coordinating the "Anti" BDS movement around the world.

The way these new measures work is by "second guessing". Say a council decides it no longer wants to invest in Hewlett Packard, which is known to be deeply involved in supplying the Israel Military in its blockade of Gaza and in the illegal occupation of the of the West Bank.  This could also apply to a council that decides to divest from companies that export weapons to, say, Saudi Arabia.  George Osborne could extrapolate that the true reason for divestment from this company is because of that company's actions in Israel, or that weapons manufacturer's intent to trade with the Saudis - and force the council to continue its investments. 

What is being done to fight this new law?

Firstly, a debate was finally called in the House of Commons concerning the fait accompli that had been presented to them in the shape of this new law.  The transcript for the debate can be read below:

http://www.palestinecampaign.org/local-government-ethical-procurement-debate-in-parliament/

I am glad to say that two MP's from my local area, Stephen Pound and particularly Andy Slaughter, stood strongly in opposition to the legislation.  Ben also told us of how Newcastle Council are planning a legal challenge to the government to resist these changes.

See below for some ways you yourself can not only join the fight against this law, but also ways you can find out how much your council owes in LOBO loans, or how much money your council has invested in fossil fuels.

Will justice prevail, or will the government's pernicious actions continue to damage human rights and the environment?  I cannot say, but the important thing is that we don't take this lying down.

"Every generation has to fight the same battles for peace, justice and democracy. And there is no final victory nor final defeat."

Tony Benn

 

Actions You Can Take

Protect Local Freedom to Boycott - Petition to David Cameron

Protect Local Democracy - Write to your MP and ask him or her oppose this new law

Go Fossil Free Local Gov Pensions Tool - Find how much your council pension fund has in fossil fuels 

Community Reinvest - A Report on which councils are divesting from fossil fuels and reinvesting in community energy

Debt Resistance UK - local authority debt audit - Find out how much bank LOBO Loan debt your council has & oppose it....

ShareAction Information on your pension and advice on lobbying and pressuring companies to clean up their act

Divest London Information on local government divestment campaigning across the Capital

A Selection of Further Reading

http://www.palestinecampaign.org/conservative-plans-ethical-investment/#sthash.CNb0cjJo.dpuf

http://lada.debtresistance.uk/what-is-a-lobo/

http://www.ianfraser.org/how-city-banks-and-brokers-stitched-up-local-authorities-with-lobo-loans/

http://wire.novaramedia.com/2015/07/osbornes-budget-surplus-lock-is-a-scam-to-encourage-more-borrowing-from-the-city/

http://www.thecanary.co/2016/03/16/osbornes-budget-contains-nasty-surprise-local-services/

https://electronicintifada.net/content/billionaire-donor-using-british-council-combat-israel-boycott/15991

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/blogs/politics/21545-uk-governments-attack-on-bds-part-of-wider-offensive

From the River to the Sea

Or

Why #ISupportPalestine

The Gaza Strip

One of the most effecting films I've ever seen is the brutal, black and white and brilliantly heart rending Schindler's List - a harrowing account of Nazi atrocities during the Second World War Holocaust, and one brave man who did what he could to help.  One of the settings of the film is the Jewish ghetto of Krakow, in Poland.  Many attrocities and degredations are visited upon this ghetto, which are terrible to behold, and never has man's inhumanity to man been more powerfully depicted on the silver screen. If you're one of the many people who have seen this film yourself you'll know what I mean.

Thinking back to the way the people of Krakow suffered, trapped in that dismal place with nowhere to escape to, I have a question: what would you have thought if some of the Jews of Krakow had assembled, or gained access to, a rudimentary rocket launcher?  And had then had begun launching rockets in the general direction of the German controlled areas of Poland?

Perhaps you would think them stupid, because of the retribution they would suffer, and the possibility that they might kill some of their own with their primitive, directionless technology? Perhaps you would have thought their cause hopeless, surrounded as they were on all sides by a much greater force?

But would you think them evil? Would you consider them terrorists?

Now let's fast forward to the present - to the Palestinian ghetto of Gaza. It was Labour peer Lord John Prescott (I'm sure he'd agree that calling him by that title is a bit weird considering he's a very down to earth Northerner, but I digress) who censured Israel for acting as “judge, jury and executioner” in its quest to mute Hamas “terrorists,” turning Gaza into what he says is a “concentration camp.”

He also said that the Nazi Holocaust should have given the Jewish people of Israel “a unique sense of perspective and empathy with the victims of a ghetto”.

Is he right or wrong?

Like 85% of my countrymen, I've come to the conclusion that he is correct.

Because it is Israel that is now the occupying power, in Gaza and in the West Bank.  Because of its vastly superior weaponry, which should bring with it greater responsibility for seeking a peaceful solution, and the for huge difference in the respective number of casualties on both sides - over 1000 deaths (and climbing) on the Palestinian side compared to less than 60 on the Israeli side at the time of writing (though I realise even one death is one too many).

So there is my opinion. I have chosen a 'side'. I have chosen to support the people of Palestine.

Does this conclusion make me antisemitic?

It is Roger Waters, ex of Pink Floyd, who I believe answered this charge very well:

"I will say this: I have nothing against Jews or Israelis, and I am not antisemitic. I deplore the policies of the Israeli government in the occupied territories and Gaza. They are immoral, inhuman and illegal. I will continue my non-violent protests as long as the government of Israel continues with these policies."

I will go further than this and voice my disquiet over other developments that have reached me:

"... reports about gangs of Muslims chanting 'death to Jews' on the streets of France, and attacking synagogues and setting fire to Jewish-owned stores. Eighteen people were subsequently arrested in the suburb of Sarcelles, just outside Paris, where this particular outpouring of violence happened. The stunned local mayor says the Jewish community is now living in fear.
Anti-Semitism is on the rise in Germany, too. In Essen, 14 people have just been arrested, accused of plotting an attack on a synagogue. Protesters at a rally in Berlin turned on two Israeli tourists (identifiable by the man’s skull-cap) so viciously that they had to be protected by the police. The city’s authorities have also had to ban pro-Gaza protesters from chanting anti-Semitic slogans and are investigating a sermon last week by Abu Bilal Ismail calling on worshippers at Berlin’s Al-Nur mosque to murder Jews. Jews, not Israelis."

I absolutely reject and abhor this kind of virulent hatred, just as I abhor the act of a suicide bomber boarding an Israeli school bus, or an Israeli tank or bomber targeting a Palestinian school or hospital, or an Israeli missile slaughtering Palestinian boys playing football on a beach.

Naama Abu al-Foul - a 2 year old Palestinian girl

Perhaps most distressing of all is the seemingly insurmountable barrier that seperates those on both sides of this. We are seperated by ideology, by race by religion and by history. Sometimes even the hint of sympathy for the 'other side' can provoke the most extreme reponses, and  I was recently told I needed an "exorcism to drive out whatever evil is possessing my soul"!

But I welcome the courage and the grace of the people like the Palestinian doctor, Izzeldin Abuelaish, who lost half of his family to this conflict, but chose to forgive when it would have been so easy not to.  If someone like him can let go of his anger, after what he and his family have been through, then there is always hope, even in the darkest times.  And right now, things are very dark indeed.

Almost exactly one hundred years ago, the First World War began. What followed was an unprecedented slaughter that lasted more than 4 years and left 37 million people dead. I sometimes wonder if we will ever learn anything.  But as I stated, in the darkest hour, they say, there is always hope.  Maybe.

A letter to UK Prime Minister @David_Cameron calling for sanctions to halt Israel's attacks on #Gaza - http://act.palestinecampaign.org/petition/camerongaza

Petition: Call on the British government to work towards a ceasefire in Gaza - https://campaign.actionaid.org.uk/page/speakout/Gaza?subsource=ACT1407GAZ&source=SSS

Petition: call on the UN Secretary General to do all he can to put a ceasefire in place. - See more at: http://www.savethechildren.org.uk/stop-killing-children-gaza-israel?utm_campaign=gaza&utm_medium=fb&utm_source=gazapdfb#sthash.4TrKPf0X.dpuf