In the days leading up to the initial meeting between President Obama, Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas, the op-ed pages and blogs have been filled with opinion pieces about the dynamics of the upcoming peace process. Most of these analyses have simply provided an opportunity for advocates to argue that their preexisting positions are valid. Many of these positions are mythical and bear little relationship to the realities on the ground. Let me identify three pervasive myths.
Myth number 1: Securing peace with the Palestinians based on a two-state solution and the end of the Israeli settlements will bring about peace in the Middle East.
The reality: Myth 1 may have been true back in 2000-2001 when then President Bill Clinton and then Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians a state in all of the Gaza and on more than 95% of the West Bank, with a divided Jerusalem and a $35 billion "reparation" package for the so-called refugees. It is far less true today. A decade ago, the Palestinians could offer Israel the promise of real peace on all of its borders. Today, all the Palestinian Authority can offer is peace on Israel's eastern border with the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority has no control over Israel's southwestern border with the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip or with its northern border with Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon. Most importantly, over the past several years, Israel's greatest threat does not come from the Palestinians; it comes from Iran, over whom the Palestinians have little influence. The reality is that the Palestinian Authority has managed to marginalize itself since Yassir Arafat turned down the Clinton/Barak offer. The Palestinian Authority can now give less, but wants more.
Nor would an Israeli agreement to dismantle the settlements bring about a full peace. Indeed, when Israel dismantled every single settlement in the Gaza, that action only stimulated Hamas to redouble its efforts to make life miserable for Israelis by using the abandoned settlements as launching pads for rocket attacks against Israeli civilians. The goal of Hamas, and of an increasing number of anti-Israel extremists, is not a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians, but rather a one-state solution to what they see as the problem of Israel's existence as a Jewish democracy. Israel will never agree to a one state solution and the extremists will never accept Israel as a Jewish state. That is the sad reality.
Let me be clear that I hope the Israelis and the Palestinians do achieve peace and that the Israelis do dismantle the settlements (other than those which both sides agree should remain part of Israeli territory.) This would be good for Israel and for the Palestinians, and would contribute somewhat to overall peace in the area. But as long as Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran -- none of which recognizes Israel's right to exist, and all of whom oppose the ongoing peace process -- continue to pose military threats to Israel, there will be no real peace in the Middle East.
Myth number 2: The second myth is if Israel were to make peace with the Palestinian Authority, the threat from Iran would diminish, because the United States would have more leverage over the Ahmadinejad regime and could do more to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons. There is no truth to this linkage, and even more important, I have never met an Israeli leader who believes it.
The reality: The reality is precisely the opposite. If the United States could prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, Israel would be much more willing to accept significant compromises in its negotiations with the Palestinians. As Israel's Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, recently put it:
"In practical terms, if Iran gets the bomb it will deal a monumental blow to the peace process."
For Israel to be willing to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve peace with the Palestinians--sacrifices that will rip the country apart if force is required against recalcitrant settlers--Israel's security must be assured. It cannot be assured if Iran is allowed to develop the deliverable nuclear weapons it has repeatedly threatened to use against Israel.
Myth number 3: The Palestinians will offer real compromises for peace, because their current situation is intolerable.
The reality: The reality is that many, if not most Palestinians, believe that time is on their side because recent efforts, by the international community and radical academics to deligitimate Israel, are working. Read the statement recently issued by Hamas and several secular Palestinian groups, some of which had previously favored direct talks. The current position of these groups is to oppose negotiations and wait for Israel to be isolated even further. Here is the way the statement put it: "Insisting on direct talks throws a lifeline to Israel as its isolation deepens... A return to direct talks serves the US and Zionist aim to liquidate the national rights of the Palestinian people." By "the national rights of the Palestinian people," the groups that signed the statement mean the right of Palestinians to "return" to what is now Israel and to turn it into yet another Muslim-Arab state. Hamas leader Khaled Meshall praised this statement as "exceptional," because it united eleven disparate groups that he says represent a majority of the Palestinians.
Why negotiate from a position of relative weakness, the signers of the statement ask rhetorically, when the international community is strengthening the position of the Palestinians, while weakening Israel?
The sad reality is that an overarching Mideast peace is not entirely in the hands of the Israeli and Palestinian leaders who are meeting in Washington. That is no reason for not trying. But unless the threats posed by Iran and its surrogates, Hezbollah and Hamas, can be neutralized, the best that can be expected is what the Bible described as "peace, peace and there is no peace."
James S. Gordon: Trauma Healing in Gaza, the Forgotten Place
1) Their isolationists dropped the peace process on the floor..like Reagan.
2) When after decades India's nuclear program was legitimized
3) Clinton cultivated Iranian Moderates offered stopping hate rehtoric, put into the axis of evil instead
4) After 10s of thousand lit canldes for the US all over Iran.
5) Oil prices driving Cheney said "we'll have to get Israel to attack &deal w/the PR problem later."
6) Condalisa rice egged Israel on in Lebanon versus calling for modeation publicly,
7) The No Nuance and proud of it one insisted on elections with Hamas agains PA &Israeli wishes.
How many times must we endure the damage (and take over) by Republicans of Jewish and Israeli Institition that wouid make Israel's founders turn over in their graves.
As one Republicans might have said: Ya make peace with the situation you have
-- whose damages I might add has been predictable and a torture to watch as they unfold.
And since more countries than ever now believe that efforts at peace matter...this can no longer be discounted as it once was as not being fact based.
As for the weapons of Iran...Hezbola &Hamas thanks God the ones who do do Nuance are in the White House and God help us our standard of living if these IL Duce types take the House of Representatives again!
From: On Israel and Bombing
- http://www.corax.com/bookshelf/page.html >> [ - follow links - ]
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Russell's humanism applies objective standards to justice whereas Alan Dershowitz....
“Arab-Israelis are descended from people that have been there since Britain controlled the land. They have lived there ever since and continue to do so today as FULL CITIZENS with FULL CITIZEN RIGHTS. These are REAL PALESTINIANS along with the Jews who were already living there during the British rule. The refugee "Palestinians" are mostly descended from people from neighboring countries. THOSE NATIONS HAVE ADMITTED THEY DID THIS. They have admitted they closed their border and locked out their own people. How do you not believe THEIR OWN statements. Further how do you account for multiple statements of Arab academics that in terms of lineage the vast majority of "Palestinians" can trace their roots back to Jordan, not British Palestine”.
Clearly specious racist gibberish & phony history. Palestinian refugees (approx 800,000 total) were expelled from homes/villages by Jewish terrorists in 1948 (Irgun & Stern Gang) & over 400 villages immediately bulldozed so “there would be nowhere to come home to” – pre-meditated ethnic cleansing of Palestinians to empty land to be for Jews only. The denier claim that Palestinian refugees “are not really Palestinian” shows their racism. Israeli ethnic cleansing began again in earnest during/after the ’67 “war” & continues unto this day.
http://prrn.mcgill.ca/background/index.htm
http://www.mediamonitors.net/edna45.html
http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Right-Of-Return/Story432.html
http://wrmea.com/jews_for_justice/
I warn you that the statement in long by common internet "sharing" standards; but it is one that should be read and shared.
The "jewish holy war for land in Palestine" ???
"It has no interest in trading land it covets for a peace that might thwart further territorial expansion" ???
Mr Ambassador ltake your thumb out of your a$$hole
Does the word Gaza mean anything to you because it contradicts your idiotic theories
Point 3 in particular is clearly true. The Palestinians are being asked to make many compromises over the soveriegnty of their future state - control of water supplies; control of airspace; control of exports etc. are all threatened.
The demographics of the situation mean that it's not in their interests to accept a poor deal now, when their position will only strengthen over time.
"Asked in a March poll to name the "most urgent problem" facing Israel, just 8% of Israeli Jews cited the conflict with Palestinians, putting it fifth behind education, crime, national security and poverty. Israeli Arabs placed peace first, but among Jews here, the issue that President Obama calls "critical for the world" just doesn't seem — critical."
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2015602,00.html#ixzz0yNRJzs9x
Ah- actually - I've just realised who you are, now that you've changed your avatar. That explains it.
Talk about unachievable preconditions! NO ONE's security is ever assured. That is the messy fact of life. The security of the United States is not assured right now, nor is the security of Great Britain, or Spain, or Pakistan, or South Korea, or Guam, or that guy walking past my office right now.
Reality is messy, and has no assurances of any outcome. More likely to be secure -- sure. Assured -- impossible, and obviously so to any objective observer.
After Israel takes all the pieces they want, then they might want peace.
This used to be a place where there was a rough consensus around the common sense notion that Israel-Palestine is an ugly, complicated tangle of conflicting narratives and age-old grievances. Now what passes for common sense here nearly equates Alan Dershowitz, who by the way has supported Palestinian statehood since before many of the Palestinians' so-called friends and sponsors, with the likes of Baruch Goldstein. It treats Norman Finkelstein and mondoweiss as impartial sources, and it flags as abusive almost every comment that suggests Palestinians may share some of the responsibility for their plight.
Congratulations. If creating an echo chamber where Israel is a cartoon bad guy and Palestinians are all innocence and light, you've got one. Enjoy the epistemic closure.
Could the over-all stance of comments have anything to do with the actual state of affairs in the Palestinian-Israeli fight?
Sometimes reality does play a role - especially when its not coming from news outlets that have an agenda or fear attack for certain views, but instead from citizens with no goal except truth.
Think about the USSR and the USA. Two very different and highly opposed systems forced to the negotiating table by threat of mutual destruction.
The world should shun Israel until it recognises international law and removes its prescence and settlements from the occupied territories. The International Criminal Court has ruled that the settlements are Illegal. Israel is not making a concession by removing itself from the illegal occupation.
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=110714522318685
Israel has made concession after concession after concession while the Palestinians have made zero concession to date. The Israeli's have also offered the Palestinians two proposals for their own State which they rejected. Upon the complete withdrawal of Israel from Gaza, they were greeted with rockets and mortars and a population that voted for the party that guaranteed endless war and no recognition.
The parties that really ough to be shunned are the Iranian proxies in the neighborhood ie Hezbollah and Hamas
Was this meant to be as hilarious as it is ?