Is the Road Map the last chance for a Palestinian state?

Great Debates
1

Columnist Barbara Lerner has an interesting theory. She predicts that the Road Map will fail to end Palestinian terrorism, just as Oslo failed to do so. However, she suggests that if and when the Road Map fails, Bush will acknowledge the failure and move on to an entirely different approach – one that gives up on a Palestinian state.

Her analogue was Bush’s last chance offer to Saddam in Resolution #1441. In a way this looked like the many UN resolutions that proceeded it. However, Bush has now shown that he really meant that it was a last chance. When Iraq didn’t comply, Bush took action.

There was another parallel right before the Afghanistan War, when the Taliban were given a last chance to turn over OBL and throw out al Qaeda. In this case also, when the last chance wasn’t taken, Bush acted.

Lerner predicts that Bush take some different action if the Road Map fails. In particular, she believes he will embrace the Elon plan, of making the Palestinian people become Jordanians.

This sounds like wishful thinking to me. For decades, most of the world has embraced unrealistic peace plans in the middle east. Each failed unrealistic plan has been succeeded by another unrealistic plan. It would shock me if Bush went outside the box. Nor has he called the Road Map the “last chance”. YMMV.

I do think Bush has the clout to push through the Elon plan if he committed to it. His victories in Afghanistan and Iraq make him the big dog. However, there’s still the question of whether the Elon plan would be effective, assuming that Bush pushed it through.

So, we have four questions for debate:[ol][]If the Road Map fails, will Bush commit to a totally different approach?[]Will that approach be the Elon Plan?[]Will he get the Elon Plan into effect?[]If he does, will it lead to peace beteen Israel and its neighbors?[/ol]My answers are Maybe, Maybe, Hypothetical Yes (if #1 and #2 are Yes), Your Guess is as Good as Mine.

2

The Elon plan isn’t feasible. Even if Bush endorsed it, which I don’t see him doing, the Palestinians won’t accept it, Jordan won’t accept it, and Israel won’t accept it. Any plan that results in Israeli annexation of the entire West Bank will permanently set all of Israel’s neighbors against it, increase support for terrorism among the Palestinians a hundred-fold, and make Israel an international pariah. It will increase the threats to Israel’s national security, not decrease it, and every responsible Israeli political party knows that.

And US endorsement of the Elon plan will cause a permanent rift between the US and the Arab world. It will turn the Iraqi population entirely against the US, and make US reconstruction of Iraqi society infinately more difficult, and it will mean an end to our cooperation with Middle Eastern governments to root out Al-Qaeda and other terrorist cells.

3

So, perfectly qualified to preach to the people of the whole region then. Having finally waded through her extended written blow job to George Bush, the plan to which she is refering seems utterly unworkable and there is little indication that it could ever be implemented and none that it could ever succeed. So

(1) Not sure his attention span is that long
(2) No
(3) No
(4) No.

4

I think he is committed to the creation of a Palestinian state in the territories. It may be the Palestinian Authority’s last chance, but not the whole population. So imo he’s not even considering any other kind of solution.

5

I suspect it’s Israel’s best chance of achieving long-term security since, well, 1948.

The Palestinian struggle has no limits and no time-scale because it’s essential feature is a core human characteristic – social and ethnic injustice has provided motivation for groups of all religions and ethnicity throughout history; attempts at suppression just deepen the resolve of a suffering society because, as we know, the casue of ‘freedom’ is the greatest motivation of all.
The question might be; does Ariel Sharon (himself, maybe his Party) gain enough from his voting constituency to (continue) promoting peace ?

6

The Elon plan requires the cooperation of the government of Jordan and the acquiescence of the Palestinians, and seems impossible to implement. Even if Jordan agrees, the Palestinians would be in full war mode.

Barbara Lerner gets carried away when she dismisses the Palestinians by describing them as

Although there is a lot of truth to that description, a lot of the Palestinians were born in the West Bank, Gaza, or Israel proper.

On the other hand, the question BL raises, “Why did GWB do it?” is a good one. She claims the Road Map is such an obviously bad idea that the President must know that it won’t work. No evidence is offered that the President thinks that way.

It seems more likely that the President is pacifying the Arab world as a counterbalance to the Iraqi invasion and opportunistically taking advantage of the weakness of the Palestinian terrorists (now that Saddam is gone) to make a new Middle East. Likewise, the first Oslo plan followed the breakup of the Soviet Union, apparently in the belief that more progress could be made with a weakened opponent. Perhaps the second time it will work.

Even more puzzling, why does Hamas et al also want another run at Oslo?

The other good question is, what do we do if the Road Map falls apart into more chaos and violence?

More to the point, why does anybody think that founding a Palestinian State would avoid violence? Yet everybody does. The question must be asked, why don’t the Palestinians sign on to whatever State they can get, such as the Barak plan, use it to build up their forces, and then just attack from a stronger position? The answer seems to be that the Palestinians know they must adhere to the letter of any agreement they sign. Is this due to ethical or military considerations? That whole issue puzzles me.

Observation tells us that the Palestinians prefer war to having a state, what I don’t understand is why they are mutually exclusive.

7

What december is pimping the Elon idea again? I guess he didn’t like the responses he got in the prior thread, 2 weeks ago on the exact same topic with his little hedges ‘disclaiming’ interest in the plan.

Yet for the third thread in relationship to the peace plan, he pimps the idea that the Palestinians don’t belong in the West Bank (recall Palestinians as colonials thread) and the idea of ethnic cleansing.

I believe those of us with some critical bones in our body can read between the lines for the hidden agenda. He’s too shy of the reaction to actually front on promote ethnic cleansing, so although he likes the idea, he brings it up with caveats and plausible deniability.

Wonderful standards.

As to facts

Quite the contrary, there is no truth at all to the assertion. The empty Palestine myth was debunked by historians - I have cited to works in this connection, e.g. by the Israeli historian Beny and others in the past on this board, I am sure someone can drag them up.

Why, because you get pretty consistent data that tells one so.

Palestinians in the West Bank in polls consistently indicate such.

There will be a minority who will be for violence come hell or high water, however the only way to isolate them, deprive them of their resources is to give people an option. My sense from living and owrking in the region is that given a dignified peace, not a Versailles Victor’s peace, 80% of the pop will go along. 10% won’t and 10% will go along with nothing. Better to get the 80% bought into a system of peace, and thus opposed to the 20% than to have 99% sympathizing with the violence because they see no other choice.

Because it did not meet their minimum requirements, very simply. Despite the blather about 90% of what they wanted, an Israeli judgement which was rather obviously self serving, it left settlements in place, did not address Jerusalem etc.

The Taba plan, subsequent, seems to have hit the nail on the head, however Sharon ditched it. Yet I never

Observation says no such thing, if one is actually observing.

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december, lest you forget, Bush is limited to two terms. So no, the Road Map is not the last chance because even if Bush gives up on the idea, someone else will come along and pick it up.

9

First of all, let’s stop talking about the “Elon Plan” as if Benny Elon is anything but a racist pig and that his plan is anything but to ethnically cleanse not only the land occupied by Israel in 1948 (Israel’s internationally recognized boundries) but also the land occupied in 1967. It’s something that should be denounced by every person with half a soul.

I’ll nitpick on this one. Many Israeli leftists (Israel Shahak most prominently, groups like Matzpen and recently One Democratic Secular Repblic) as well as Jewish-American leftists (Noam Chomsky, most notably) support the same thing that many Palestinian leftists (Azmi Bishara, Edward Said… even the DFLP, which had contact with Matzpen and meetings that have been described as an “orgy of enthusiasm”) wanted, which is a bi-national and/or secular state for Israelis and Palestinians.

Even people who support the two-state solution often talk about the states developing parity and then perhaps joining together in a EU-like union (Uri Avnery).

Anyhow, my point is, it’s damn well possible for Israel to annex the territories and have peace and normal relations, as long as at the same time it grants citizenship to the inhabitants and reforms itself to provide equal rights (a constitution could help) for all its citizens, regardless of background. That won’t happen in the forseeable future, unfortunately, but we’re working on it.

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Who’s “we”? Are you presenting the POV of some particular group or organization?

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No. I’m speaking for like-minded leftists in general. I noticed that of all the things I said, december, you were only able to comment on the last line. Avoiding my criticism of Benny’s “Plan?”

12

Yeah, remember back in 1948 when the Israeli Army invaded Israel?

13

What explaination do you have for the vast disparities between Zionist Jewish land ownership in Cisjordan 1947 and the amount of land that fell under Zionist (now Israel) control by the armistice lines of 1949?

The War of 1948 was Zionist forces taking up land that they did not own and in lots of cases were not recommended to have by the UN. If you want to call this “the Israeli Army invading Israel” you’re welcome to, I suppose. But realize it’s not that simple.

14

That wasn’t meant to a comment. It was a sincere question.

I don’t have any great expertise on the Elon Plan. I actually don’t agree with the article cited in the OP. My reading of President Bush is that he is truly committed to a Palestinian State, or, at least, to the opportunity to form a Palestinian State. AFAIK Israel doesn’t even support the Elon Plan. It’s quite a stretch to imagine Israel embracing that plan AND selling Bush on it, especially since it would be quite an effort to force various other parties to accept it.