Valley of Peace Initiative

The Valley of Peace concept presented regional economic development as a complement to political diplomacy. In March 2008, Peres said that the Middle East had tried military and diplomatic approaches without successfully advancing an economic option, while presenting maps for joint industrial parks involving Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinians.[1] Later that month, he described the Valley of Peace as a workable economic project between Israel and Jordan that could also benefit the Palestinian Authority, adding that it might take less time than expected and would draw financing from nongovernmental sources.[2]

The sources do not provide a single definitive blueprint. Reports associated the Valley of Peace label with proposals for a Red Sea–Dead Sea canal, desalination, electricity generation, tourism and agricultural ventures, an airport, a railway, and industrial zones.[3][4] A related but earlier Jordan Valley master-planning process covered a broader area extending from south of Lake Tiberias to the Gulf of Aqaba/Eilat and linked Jordan, Israel, and the Palestinian Authority.[5] That plan observed that "the majority of development projects for the Jordan Valley have cross-border implications that highlight the benefits made possible by peace between Israel and Jordan."[5] The reviewed sources do not establish that every component of this earlier master plan was formally incorporated into Peres's later initiative.

Earlier Israel-Jordan planning supplied important precedents for the type of regional cooperation later promoted by Peres. Article 20 of the 1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty stated that the parties attached great importance to integrated development of the Jordan Rift Valley, including joint economic, environmental, energy-related, and tourism projects. It referred to terms developed through the Trilateral Israel-Jordan-U.S. Economic Committee for a Jordan Rift Valley Development Master Plan and called for continued planning and implementation efforts.[6] Article 23 separately required negotiations on joint development of Aqaba and Eilat, including tourism, customs arrangements, a free-trade zone, aviation, maritime matters, and environmental cooperation.[6]

The fifth meeting of the U.S.-Israel-Jordan Trilateral Economic Committee, held July 20–21, 1994, agreed to commission studies for a Jordan Rift Valley master plan, including consideration of a canal linking the Red Sea to the Dead Sea.[7] It also provided for follow-up bodies concerned with integrated development, binational parks, water, energy, and the environment. A proposed feasibility study addressed a road linking Jordan and Israel near Aqaba and Eilat, with 1995 identified as the target year for the start of construction; the source does not establish that construction began.[7]

A second-stage study funded with US $3.2 million from the Italian Government and implemented by the Harza Jordan Valley Group was completed in August 1997.[5] Its master plan was an informal advisory document intended to guide statutory planning, infrastructure integration, and project evaluation while informing investors, donors, and government agencies about opportunities in the valley.[5] The U.S. State Department separately reported that an 18-month integrated development study began in October 1995 and covered environment, water, energy, transportation, and tourism.[8] That record does not identify the master plan as the same initiative Peres called the Valley of Peace in 2007 and 2008.

Because the Valley of Peace was reported through overlapping proposals rather than a single published blueprint, its practical model can be understood partly through the related Jordan Valley master-planning framework. That framework centered on three themes: developing cross-border transport and corridor links; sustainably managing shared environmental resources connected with agriculture, industry, and tourism; and creating economic synergies through technology transfer, shared know-how, water management, and energy generation.[5]

Water was identified as the valley's most critical resource, and proposed projects were assessed for environmental effects. The plan emphasized protecting and reusing resources and rehabilitating degraded areas.[5] Its sectoral coverage included water and irrigated agriculture, energy, environment, transport, specialized industries, tourism, communications, and human-resources development.[7] For planning purposes, the subregion included the Dead Sea, the Southern Ghors, Wadi Araba, and the area north of the Gulf of Aqaba, within a broader development area extending from south of Lake Tiberias to the Gulf of Aqaba/Eilat.[5]

Projections through the 2020 planning horizon estimated an incremental population increase of 350,000–500,000 people in the development area and 110,000–146,000 additional primary and secondary jobs.[5] These figures were planning-stage projections, not verified outcomes.

Peres made regional economic cooperation a visible part of his public agenda, but the earliest documentary reference requires qualification. An INSS article contains a bibliographic citation to a work by Peres titled "Peace Valley," published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in April 1994. It does not provide the work's contents or establish that it described the same proposal later promoted as the Valley of Peace.[9]

By October 2006, Vice Premier Peres and Kazakhstan's Deputy Prime Minister Karim Masimov announced that Kazakhstan's oil fund would invest millions of dollars in economic projects in Israel and the Middle East, identifying the Peace Valley project shared by Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinians as the principal target. Masimov also expressed interest in the Red Sea–Dead Sea canal and a free-trade industrial zone.[10] In December 2006, Peres told Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg that he wanted Norway involved in a canal project from the Red Sea to the Yarmouk. Stoltenberg said Norwegian canal-construction companies could participate and welcomed involvement in Valley of Peace free-trade areas.[11]

After becoming president in July 2007, Peres named the Valley of Peace as one of four priorities alongside Jerusalem, the Negev, and the Galilee.[12] In January 2008, he asked Google co-founder Sergey Brin to support what Ynetnews described as a joint Israeli-Jordanian-Palestinian endeavor intended to increase regional stability through economic development.[13] In March, Peres presented maps and plans for joint industrial parks to French President Nicolas Sarkozy.[1] Sarkozy later told the Knesset that France would support Peres's regional development projects and described shared water among Israel, Palestine, and Jordan as a symbol of peace.[14]

A central element of the proposal reported in April 2007 was a canal between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea. Peres asked Israel's Government Companies Authority to establish a government company to manage the Peace Valley project, with responsibility for the canal and for joint Israeli-Jordanian ventures in tourism, agriculture, water desalination, and electricity production.[3] A January 2008 account said the government had approved Peres's Economic Peace Corridor project in March 2007. It described a canal running mostly through Jordanian territory as part of a broader plan including desalination facilities, fish ponds, and recreation projects, with estimated investment of $5 billion. The account said the World Bank had indicated it would finance the project if a decision to build it was made.[4]

Businessman Yitzhak Tshuva publicly supported the canal and described it as a NIS 3.5 billion project that could produce electricity and promote settlement in the Negev.[3] A 2016 retrospective described a historical Peres proposal for a canal along the Israel-Jordan border, carrying Red Sea water to the highest point in the Arava near Be'er Menucha before descending to the Dead Sea.[15] The same article discussed delays affecting later southern-route projects, but it did not establish that those later projects were officially identical to the Valley of Peace initiative.

Other elements reported in April 2007 included a joint Israeli-Jordanian airport at Aqaba, a railway between Beit Shean and Irbid, and a joint Israeli-Palestinian industrial zone in northern Samaria.[3] The Government Companies Authority said it would consult the relevant ministries before taking a position on the proposed management company.[3]

A separately named regional-cooperation project developed in the West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria — near Jericho under Japanese government auspices. A 2014 account called Japan's flagship initiative the "Peace and Prosperity Valley" and said it encouraged joint ventures among Israel, the Palestinians, and Jordan adjacent to Jericho's Agro Park.[16] A 2018 account described an industrial zone near Jericho as the intended flagship of a "corridor for peace and prosperity" between the Palestinian Authority and Jordan. It was intended to process Palestinian agricultural products and encourage agriculture, while the Israeli Civil Administration planned its roads and infrastructure network.[17] The sources do not establish that this separately named project was an implementation arm of Peres's Valley of Peace.

A 2009 Israeli government report said MASHAV, Israel's international development agency, was expected to conduct capacity-building work within the Japanese-led framework. The project involved the agriculture ministries of Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority and anticipated follow-up activity in Judea and Samaria and Jordan.[18] A 2014 Jerusalem Center account characterized Japan's approach as seeking to give the peoples of the Middle East "an acquired taste of prosperity and the good life." It also reported that Japan announced a $200 million contribution for the Palestinian Authority for 2014 and that its aid since the Oslo Accords had reached $1.5 billion.[16]

The Jericho zone had an employment target of about 7,000 workers. A 2018 account reported that it then contained five factories employing fewer than 1,000 Palestinians.[17] The gap between the target and reported employment illustrates the implementation difficulties faced by this particular regional-cooperation project.

The Valley of Peace proposals encountered environmental and administrative objections. National Infrastructures Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer opposed the proposed government company and Peres's involvement, arguing that the canal should not proceed before completion of a World Bank-financed environmental survey. He cited expert warnings of possible significant harm to the Dead Sea and the Arava region.[3]

At a 2014 retrospective on the Israel-Jordan peace treaty, Jordanian participants criticized the gap between promised economic cooperation and reported results. One participant said that projects discussed by Peres and Israeli businesspeople had not materialized, citing plans for 100 projects presented to King Hussein and tens of millions of dollars spent on feasibility studies. Israeli Ambassador Dani Nevo offered a contrasting assessment: he acknowledged that grand Israeli projects were not implemented and that Jordanian trade-union boycotts contributed to the difficulties, but maintained that economic cooperation and concrete projects existed.[19] The account therefore records disagreement about the results of post-treaty economic cooperation rather than a settled conclusion.

A further documentary challenge is that the sources use overlapping labels for several regional-development concepts. The earlier Jordan Rift Valley master plan is not identified by the State Department as the Valley of Peace initiative, while the Japanese-backed Jericho project was called the Peace and Prosperity Valley or the Corridor of Peace and Prosperity.[8][16] Later canal routes were likewise not conclusively identified as the same project promoted by Peres.[15] The reviewed sources establish proposals, planning, advocacy, and limited individual projects, but do not establish that the canal, joint airport, railway, and comprehensive industrial-zone network envisioned under the broader Valley of Peace framework were built.