Is the United States voting for a Palestinian homeland giving in to terrorism? For how many years did the US veto just that kind of thing in the Security Council? Was this round of violence the straw that broke the camels back? Do the terrorists see that terrorism might just work? It sure looks like it to me.
Most Israelis even support a US homeland. Even Ariel Sharon has said that the end goal of peace negotiations will be a Palestinian homeland.
Just because extremist elements of Palestinian society are dictating the actions of both sides right now does not mean that the moderates’ demand for self governance in peaceful coexistence with Israel is less valid.
erk I of course meant Palestinian homeland, not “US” homeland.
The question is not really whether there should be a “Palestinian homeland.” The question is what that means.
Most Israelis and most Americans think it means some areas of the territories occupied by Israel after the 1967 war, such as the Gaza Strip and part of the West Bank of the River Jordan.
Most Palestinians think it means the entire area, all of Israel. When they talk about “occupied territory”, they mean all the area occupied by Israel since 1948 when the state of Israel was created.
Arafat was very close to getting some territory for a Palestinian state, but then made it very clear that he wanted it all, all the land, and he wanted the Palestinian state to replace Israel. That’s when the current round of violence began, and the negotiations came to a screeching halt.
The “wonderful new plan” offered by the Saudis is nothing different from what the Arab states have said all along: Israel goes back to the unteneable 1948 borders, and the Arab states will “recognize” Israel’s right to exist. Bah.
It’s even worse than that because then Israel has to negotiate with the Palestinians on refugees, etc., after having given up all it’s bargaining chips.
In any event, the Saudi plan (unless I missed something) has one fatal flaw. The pre-1967 borders do not include the Temple Mount. I don’t think any Israeli leader would ever give up the Temple Mount, given what happened there and in the rest of the old city during the 19 years that Jordan controlled the area.
Zev Steinhardt
Let’s not forget that making these assertions will garner arab support toward us making certain portions of Iraq cease to exist. Even if we don’t go after Iraq it helps our standing with Arab nations in general, to whatever ends there may be.
Erek
I have to admit that is one of the better things I have read lately. Accidental but genius at the same time!
I definitely think the violence needs to stop but the timing does seem to lead one to believe that the terrorist have gotten their way. I can only think this will bring much more violence to our (U.S.) shores as a myriad of other groups try to get the U.S. to support their views.
Not only was the Saudi plan untenable, but it wasn’t serious. Several days ago at an Arab summit they changed the wording of the agreement to remove the phrase ‘normalized relations’ with Israel. That means that even if Israel withdraws to its 1967 borders the Arab world still will not recognize it as a legitimate state.
Don’t forget that Arafat was already offered a deal in which Israel basically returned to its 1967 borders, plus Jerusalem would have governance shared with the Palestinians. It is the best offer Arafat will ever get, and it went much farther than even the Israeli people wanted, because they voted Barak out of office in the next election and replaced him with a hawk.
Arafat turned the deal down flat.
I think we are making a grave error by chastising Israel. Israel is doing exactly what the U.S. would do under similar circumstances. Their tactics could be improved, though. But that’s a matter for Israel and the U.S. to discuss privately.
The U.S. is in danger of looking like a big hypocrite to the world if it chastises Israel for defending itself against essentially the same people that we have declared as the enemy.
So Sam Stone, first thing we should do is kill all the Arabs. Then Iraq and Iran should be next. Then the other countries, especially Indonesia, should be rid of all Muslims. I got ya.
Yeah, wow, the Palestinian terrorists managed to get the SAUDIS to give in and accept a Palestinian homeland. :rolleyes:
Doesn’t it make more sense to suggest that the Israeli hard-line has persuaded some of the Arab governments to accept the 1948-1967 borders and recognize Israel, something they were unwilling to do before.
The obvious problem with the Saudi plan is that it’s a big blank on key issues such as Jerusalem, the Israeli settlements on the West Bank, and the Palestinian ‘right of retun’ to Israel proper.
What I’ve always maintained is that the Israelis and Palestinians have to have a swap. It’s like, Jerusalem or the settlements, the settlements or Jerusalem. Take your pick, but you can’t have both 'cause that would be unfair to the other side. If the Palestinians expect hundreds of thousands of Jews to be forced out of their homes in the ‘Promised Land’ then they have to give up their dream of regaining Jerusalem as their capital. And/or vice-versa.
As for the ‘right of return’, the P’s want all refugees from 1948 and their descendants to be able to return. The I’s say nothing doing. Compromise: The actual refugees yes, their descendants no. If Israel is going to have to re-absorb shitloads of ex-settlers they can hardly afford any more. There’s some soon-to-be-vacated property on the West Bank I can show you.
Sorry, after today’s news I’m not feeling particularly warm about the Saudis.
In case you haven’t heard, 15 young girls burned to death today. The building they were in caught fire, and they ran out in ‘inappropriate dress’ perhaps underwear, or even just comfortable clothes without complete covering. So the Saudi religious police forced them back into the burning building.
And then they wouldn’t let firemen into the building to save them, because the religious police was worried that they might see females without their Abayas on. So they made everyone stand around while the girls burned and died.
Lovely country.
Oh, and they removed the wording from their offer which promised normalized relations with Israel. All they are offering now is ‘peace’, which means absolutely nothing. So in other words, Israel is supposed to give up everything, return to their 1967 borders, and in turn the Saudis promise that they won’t attack them. Whoopee.
As for the right of return… Israel isn’t going to offer it, because it would allow Palestinians back into the country where they could agitate, form cells, and in general cause havoc. And of course, the complete right of return means that Palestinians would become the political majority and could vote to eliminate Israel as a state.
Sqweels: I was just curious if you were aware that half off the settlements in question are IN Jerusalem.
The Saudi plan was a joke from the beginning. It’s not a new concept, and it came at a time when it would be politically beneficial to Saudi Arabia without actually having to do anything.
As to Sam Stone: They didn’t vote out Barak because they preferred a Hawk, the voted out Barak because they felt that he wasn’t able to deliver, and they voted in Sharon because he was in the best position. If they thought that they could have had an effective Dove they probably would have voted him in because at that time Israel was pretty Dovish. I wouldn’t mind seeing Peres get another shot over there. However it’s most likely going to be Netanyahu who gets back in power, and from what I’ve heard he seems much less squeamish about pulling the trigger than Sharon.
Erek
Yes , I am aware that Eastern Jerusalem is being ‘ringed’ with settlements, but in my hypothetical plan, these would be included in the Jerusalem metro area and go to Israel in exchange for all the outlying West Bank and Gaza settlements being given up.
(Just to clarify , Mswas, by ‘in Jerusalem’ do you mean within the area that was annexed by Israel immediately after the 6-day war?)
Well, Zev and Dex and Sam have given their rendition, although it doesn’t seem to match my understanding based on what I’ve read. Perhaps they have confidential sources?
In re the Saudi peace plan, I thought from the trial balloon floated by none other than Thomas Friedman that their concept was complete withdrawal to 1967 borders. Unless I am failing to understand all public commentary to date, 1948 doesn’t enter into this. Perhaps they could kindly point me to some substantive commentary which explains this dichotomy, unless of course they are simply extrapolating based on their **pre-existing ** – how to say it? World views? Based on what I read, this article in the ever so officious al-Ahram (english weekly version, by a British journalist) http://www.ahram.org.eg/weekly/2002/575/fr3.htm captures the present ambiguities. It does not appear on its face that the proposal is rejectable, it has all the initial ambiguities of a trial balloon.
At the very least we can say we have on display some of the characteristic open-mindedness and trust between the two sides (and coming from both sides) which has so far done so much to advance the peace process.
Now, if I may be so bold as to question a few items:
Many people here frequently like to characterize what all Palestinians think and want in the starkest terms. I am impressed by this ability, as I, speaking multiple dialects of Arabic and trying to keep up on the region, frequently have trouble following the complex evolution.
My own impression had been that a central core around the PLO, the secularists of various stripes, had more or less reluctantly resigned themselves to Israel’s existence. True, al-araadi al-filistiniyah al-muhtellah –the occupied Palestinian lands is frequently used and said without definition and often in a demagogic manner such that the speaker and writer leaves it unclear as to whether they mean 1948, 1967 or something else.
But my reading and convos lead me to the impression up to about 2000 that a sustainable majority (but unfortunately volatile and unstable) of Arabs and even Palestinians –except in Gaza, which is a real hellhole— were willing to recognize Israel up to the 1967 borders. The settlements, definitely not, but 1967 borders, yes. Not happily, not enthusiastically, but willing to let it go. It was always unclear to me how right of return was being used, it should be noted. I usually thought it was a negotiating level more than a real demand – albeit real in the sense of genuinely felt – but it’s always hard to tell. Jerusalem was the real stumbling block and despite the descriptions by Sam et al, the Palestinians were not offered a good deal there. Shared sovereignty did not, to my understanding of the texts, mean the areas which everyone cares about, the holy grounds. Now, I think it is right to put blame on Arafat for not being proactive and essentially being a 100% reactive negotiator(*) – bloody regional trait in my opinion but that’s another matter.
There was just a thread which provided, in IM not humble opinion, much more balanced information including better perspective on what drives Palestinian perspectives and perceptions such as the expansion of settlements at the same time as negotiations. There has been quite a lot of sharp operating all around.
Presently, as to what the Palestinians in general would accept and what they mean, I have no idea. Angry war rhetoric is everywhere, and it’s hard to say what is meant and what is intended. Certainly I am hearing a return to uncompromising, drive them into sea language, but also plaintive complaints about the peace process. It strikes me that aside from the Islamist hard core, there is a base to build on. But what do I know, I only speak the language. I hope that damage can be repaired.
One way or another, there will have to be negotiations leading to some mutually acceptable compromise. Or ethnic cleansing. Just two real choices. One can wring one’s hands about terrorism and tactics (collective punishment for example), but the stark reality is that there are but two sides and one can’t always choose who to negotiate with.
BTW Sam, there is a thread on the girl’s school issue. You might want to inform yourself a bit further before using this to beat the Saudis insofar as it is in the end an irrelevancy in re the subject on hand.
(*: meaning he likes to say no to proposals more than coming up with constructive alternatives himself. My read on it.)
I too would like to see a cite where the Saudi proposal has been taken off of the table. It seems that according to what I read, Cheney was discussing it with the Saudis only a few days ago.
Withdrawal to the 1967 borders with subsequent full recognition is of course a ideal situation for a perfect world likely never to be matched. It sounds indeed like a trial balloon, or a framework for future negotiations. What is most encouraging are not the specifics, but rather that Saudi Arabia has raised its voice for the first time when it is not squarely against any incarnation of Israel. This is bound to encourage some Israelis and Palestinians. The Israelis now will feel less like there is a united Arab League against their very existence, and the Palestinians will now feel that they may be able to get a more fair deal on the table with Saudi behind them.
According to second hand accounts, Arafat refused the Jerusalem compromises of Camp David and Taba because he felt pressured by the weight of a billion Muslims not to compromise on Jerusalem. If Saudi Arabia, with the backing of the Arab League, can now hammer out a compromise on Jerusalem, that problem is now fixed. The Palestinians, the Israelis, and the rest of the Jews and Muslims in the world can live with the solution.
In further response to Collounsbury, I would say that I try very hard not to present Palestinian opinion as monolithic. But I will say that the PA has seemed to quash moderate opposition since the uprising began, and that they have found no reason (or had no ability) to reel in extremists. This seed took hold in a fertile landscape of Israeli bulldozing, checkpoint closures, curfews, incursions, assassinations, etc.
Arafat can’t or won’t make an effort to change this. And that is what exasperates the Israelis. When the situation gets more violent, Arafat isn’t broadcasting on PA radio and TV to calm down. He is making speeches glorifying shaheeds. He isn’t arresting known militants, even within his own party who have sworn allegiance to him, or breaking up known terror infrastructure. He hasn’t made even token measures like formally removing clauses from the PLO charter causing for destruction of Israel, or making a speech in Arabic on PA TV calling for calm and peace.
For the cycle of violence to stop, Israel has been searching for “outs” which will allow them to break the action-reaction cycle without looking weak. Even tenuous ones – the Saudi proposal, the current Zinni visit, op-eds by Arafat in the New York Times, are seized with enthusiasm, sparking rounds of not-so-secret meetings. But no equivalent action is ever taken on the other side of the Green Line, and the next terror attack starts the cycle anew.
I honestly believe this shows how much Israeli society wants peace. I think it shows healthy democracy – Sharon is clinging to dwindling right wing support by shifting more towards the left. He can’t have Labour leave and watch the coalition fall apart.
Israel will complete its withdrawal from Ramallah and PA territories. Cease fire negotiations will start, and violence will abate for a week, maybe more. But after the cease fire comes Tenet, which calls for Palestinian arrest and outlaw of known militant organizations before Israeli action. Things will stall there until a large suicide bomb or shooting in a pizzeria/nightclub/bar mitzvah/wedding necessitates an Israeli response. Labour’s objections will be temporarily drowned out, and the cycle will start again.
Without reciprocation from the Palestinians – here I use a monolithic view because it is only the PA’s views that matter – nothing will ever go forward.
Edwino:
I do think you do an excellent job of providing a balanced perspective and I rather agree with your overall commentary. I was certainly not thinking of your comments present or past when I wrote my critique.
However, I don’t believe that PA has actually had to quash moderate opposition, moderate opposition had its feet cut out from under it by the events as they spun out of control.
Sadly, I think the PA learned a ‘correct’ lesson. They can only get folks (read outside of the region and esp if they come from Texas) to pay attention to them, for better or for worse, through violence.
Of course there are actually other methods, but Arafat et al are blind to them. Arafat above all is a prisoner of his past. Sadly, very very blind to other options to Israeli actions. As you have correctly pointed out, Arafat really hasn’t reacted to Israeli moves in a positive manner at all.
This in part I think is tied to (a) an immense feeling on the P side that folks like Netanyahu and Sharon have screwed them in the past and will again if they let up (b) an ugly undercurrent of (false) ‘lessons’ from the Lebanon experience © a sense that Sharon isn’t actually ready to negotiate.
Sadly enough one can find mirror image perceptions on the I side, each with a bit of truth in them. I do think that Israel has been trying much harder than the PA but the depth of distrust now is hard to overcome.
It strikes me that the present American Administration near idiocy in dealing with the Middle East, or indeed their tactical and strategic ham-handedness in general in regards to sustaining the immense good-will post 11 Sep-- has fed into this. When have negotiators come, when has the present Administration intervened – after violence has reached a boil and threatened to up-end the otherwise overriding obsession with “Saddam the actually irrelevant” and Iraq to the detriment of other issues. Having in mind al-Qaeda (however folks like Woolesley et al want to find strained ties) and the PA-Israel conflict where I feel both sides are being done a disservice, and perhaps indeed Israel more so.
Please note that I didn’t say that the Saudi Plan was withdrawn. I said that they made a change to it which removed the wording ‘normalized relations’.
By the way, as I type this, “Hardball” just flashed up a poll of Palestinians chosen at random - 87.5% supported continued terrorist attacks, 87.5% were still calling for a return of ALL of ‘Palestine’, and 67.5% disapproved of Zinni’s return to the Middle East.
If that poll is accurate, then it’s clear that we’re not just talking about a militant minority. Palestinians don’t just want Israel out of the occupied territories - they want Israel GONE. And they are happy to use terrorism to do it.
Until that attitude changes, there will be no peace.
Here are a couple of articles by Victor Davis Hanson which I offer as ‘food for thought’, without necessarily agreeing with it all. But they are very interesting.
Anyone else see the hypocrisy in this, given Israelis’ claim to Israel? God knows how many scores of generations that goes back.
Nor do I think it is fair to expect to split up families in a culture in which family support and extended families are far more integral than in western societies. So parents can go back, but must leave behind children/grandchildren?
istara:
It is not hypocrisy, because the Zionists actually bought the land that they settled on in Palestine, rather than merely relying on ancestral claims. While Collounsbury has mentioned (on the temporary message board) circumstances that somewhat murkifies the legitimacy of some of those sales, it cannot be said that today’s Israelies claim ownership of the land based primarily on their forefathers’ having lived there.
Istara, I don’t see hypocrisy or not really being relevant. The issue is finding a solution that allows forward looking development. There are enough over-lapping claims as to drive one insane, so no degree of justification is going to work out logically. What it comes down to is Israel has the state, it is not going away, 1967 borders make a valid point of compromise. And there is no way, if I were an Israeli leader, that I would allow any right of return, too much risk regardless of justice or not. Compensation is the way to go.
Now, in re what I wrote on the temp board, what I noted was in re Zionist settlers buying lands. There was some discussion about that, I simply observed that land title under pre-modern administration is a real nightmare. And in fact continues to be so in the Arab world (and elsewhere for that matter) with overlapping claims, unregistered sales etc etc etc. I noted that while it is likely that land sales between incoming Zionist settlers and ‘property owners’ probably involved the usual modicum of human sharp dealing all around, what probably complicates things is just this, someone selling the land who might not have had clear title(*). Now, as I noted, the Zionists, coming from states where affaires were much more regular can’t be blamed for this, although doubtless some exploited the situation. Humanity is humanity whatever the creed and I would be rather surprised if both sides of a deal didn’t try to get one over on the other from time to time.
I opined that all things considered the Zionist settlers probably tried to do a good job, but that Palestinian complaints had some underlying justification insofar as given the lack of legal clarity in the region (sadly to this day, see below) no doubt some buying and selling was less-than-kosher, so to speak, if only by accident. The point was simply to suggest that the Palestinian complaints in re getting done out of land were not entirely fabricated out of whole cloth (although surely there is that going on).
But none of that goes to the guys who fled their lands in ’48 out of fear or whatnot. If I understand correctly, the state expropriated much of that. Well, in many respects tough as one can come up with legal justifications. In a political view, a settlement will likely have to include some symbolic ‘return’ but I would favor a compensation fund. I fully support the Israeli POV that ‘right of return’ literally taken is a deal breaker. It just can’t work. But on the other hand, I also think the ’48 folks do need to get compensation.
(*: e.g. just try acquiring (long term leasing even) a property in Egypt, say for situating a pharm research fac. Bloody nightmare. Why no clear title: different rulers giving grants to the same damn property, exercise of ‘eminent domain’ by diff rulers, perhaps the tenants don’t recognize such unless the Sultan’s troops are around, poor record keeping, contradictory claims bec of conflicting inheritances etc. All the wonders of 3rd world property. )