[tw]

Originally posted by Undertoad
I feel like I should clarify where I stand on all of this... I do believe that Sharon is a dichead and war criminal. I do believe that the visit to the Temple Mount was intended to incite. (I also believe that, when someone is trying to incite you, becoming incited is really, really dumb. I don't believe that a visit to a piece of land should incite anyone to anything.)

I believe that there is not one speck of sense amongst the leadership of either side, and that whomever wrote the rules of engagement of the current invasion is an idiot and is also possibly a war criminal.

But more details make things interesting. Those details change all perspective. When Clinton was 'short' and pushing Arafat to settle for a bad deal (Camp David and Wye Plantation), and when Barak knew his time was limited, quietly, low level diplomats met, productively, in Taba, Egypt. No leaders tied to political agendas. This was discussion about peace, security, and the technical realities of regional life.

Unfortunately, two things happened. 1) Extremists replaced Barak. 2)Israeli extremists want annexation - thereby canceling or even making everything in Taba impossible. Sharon's agenda is annexation of the occupied territories - made obvious in how he has even openly annexed Palestinian lands negotiated in Taba. Taba is described in this week's (13 Apr 2002) The Economist which includes detailed maps, or at:
http://www.economist.com/displayStor...1%21%20%20L%0A

Palestinians start from the point that they have already conceded 78% of mandated Palestine to Israel, and should not be asked to concede more of the little that remains. ... In the West Bank, under the Oslo process, they have full control only over the cities, or 18% of the territory—and since the latest Israeli incursions, this has been lost. In Gaza, they controlled about 75% of the land before the intifada, but buffer zones and new roads have now reduced this to nearer 60%. The Israelis have about 200,000 settlers in the West Bank [illegal according to international law and multiple, previous US Presidents], and roughly the same number in East Jerusalem. They also have some 7,000 zealously guarded settlers in Gaza.

At Taba, the Israelis presented a map showing 6% annexation of the West Bank, the upper limit of Mr Clinton's suggestion. The Palestinians responded with a map showing 3.1% Israeli annexation in the context of a land swap. The Palestinians have argued that any land they get in exchange should be equal in quantity and quality to what they give up; the Israelis still insist that the swap should be symbolic only. So far, all the Palestinians have been offered is a strip of desert south of Gaza that is far smaller than any proposed annexation—and even this has now been snatched from them by Mr Sharon, who says he will build Israeli houses there. Israel also wants to hold a lease on a further 2% of the West Bank in the Jordan Valley region, for security reasons.

The 6% annexation proposed by Israel at Taba would accommodate about 80% of the West Bank settlers. The idea is that Israel should evacuate all settlements in Gaza and most of those in the West Bank. But two or three blocks of settlements would remain under Israeli sovereignty: one at Gush Etzion, south of Bethlehem; one at Ariel (meaning a deep finger of land stretching from the border into the West Bank); and one at Maale Adumim, east of Jerusalem. ...

Politically, Israelis assumed that withdrawal could be made palatable to the public at home if they stressed that most of the settlers, though not most of the 145 settlements, would remain under Israeli rule. But the Palestinians at Taba, though prepared to accept the blocks at Ariel and Gush Etzion, balked at the plans for Maale Adumim, and the stretch of land between this and Givat Zeev. A lot of Palestinians live in this area, which is also East Jerusalem's most important land reserve.

The numbers of settlers are still increasing, by less than before the intifada but still well above natural growth. ...

Not so the so-called “hillcrest settlements” farther west, which are populated by hard-core ideological settlers, most of them religious, and many of them belonging to the Gush Emunim movement which sets up Jewish outposts in the heart of heavily populated Palestinian areas. Israeli peace activists believe that a quarter of all settlers are now “ideological”. They would presumably be the hardest to remove, and some might forcibly resist. ...

Jerusalem, sacred to Muslims, Jews and Christians, arouses passionate emotion. Israel annexed East Jerusalem after the 1967 war, and greatly enlarged the municipal borders. But its annexation is unrecognised by the rest of the world [only El Salvador and Costa Rica have embassies in Jerusalem].

The city was high on the agenda at Taba, and discussions, even on the most sensitive subjects, reached an advanced point. Building on Mr Barak's softening of Israel's claim to Jerusalem as its undivided capital, there was agreement that the city would one day be the capital of both states: Yerushalaim, the capital of Israel; and al-Quds, the capital of Palestine. And the Israelis no longer argued, as they did once, that a Palestinian suburb, such as Abu Dis, should masquerade as al-Quds.

... The Palestinians were ready to discuss Israeli sovereignty over all Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem, except for those, such as Har Homa, that were built after the signing of the Oslo agreement in 1993. In the abstract, both Israelis and Palestinians favoured the idea of Jerusalem being an open city, without division. But while the Palestinians argued for an open city encompassing the full municipal borders of West as well as East Jerusalem, the Israelis, their minds on security and the sanctity of West Jerusalem, wanted to restrict the openness to the Old City and nearby.

This is what Sharon had to stop. This could have resulted in a final peace settlement.

The Economist continues with information not known to most Americans. Again, I complain about how the US public remains ignorant as Liza Thomas Laurie and Jim Gardner - while maintaining emotional opinions. For example, I suspect most here have heard of Har Homa only from a previous 'The Cellar' post - and not from their domestic news sources. Har Homa has long been center to news of Jerusalem. But how many ever heard of Taba? Did you know how close the little people came to a final and lasting settlement?

Mass murder extremists could not let peace happen. When peace was visible, then extremists openly called for and got the murder Rabin. When peace was visible, those same extremists restarted the Intafada. Sharon's desecration of Temple Mount was not the only action that restarted the Intafada - it was just the only incident that was reported by most American news. However 60 Minutes also demonstrated how Jewish extremists would march though Arab neighborhoods on Muslim Sabbath banging pots and pans - as but one example of how to create violence. Land outrightly stolen for access roads to extremist right wing Israeli West Bank settlements (I believe that was NBC News). Death by one billion pin pricks, almost none reported in America, is akin to outright military attack without the corresponding TV pictures. Those are the same reasons why Colonials signed a Declaration of Independence and then conducted a terrorist campaign against the British (and why British signed up Indians to do same against the Colonials).

In short, Sharon got exactly what he wanted - all negotiations quashed because the alternative was no annexation of occupied territories. Bottom line: Annexation, including ethnic cleansing, is the objective of Israeli extermists - even if it means never having peace.

Right wing extremists will do anything, incite any violence, blame anyone else, even lie outright, and 'finger fly' to a direct order by a US President - in order to make annexation a de facto reality.

Did you know about Taba? To understand this conflict, one must appreciate reams of details. To appreciate who is guilty, one must have known about Taba. Instead most Americans have the Daily News / Channel 6 Action New / Hardcopy version.

I read a Philly Daily News article and reach a conclusion. Then read the same story in the Inky that provided the details. Because of those details, I reach a 100% different conclusion. The Daily News outright lied by telling half truths. Details of the Middle East demonstrate one thing. All conflicts would have been resolved if extremists - instead of Rabin - were massacred. One extremist group with a plan to intentionally destroy any peace process is Likud. The man with that plan of destruction is Sharon. The violence we have today was explicitly part of his strategy. The current violence is trivial compared to Sharon's past mass murders. Sharon had to escalate violence because things like Camp David, Wye Plantation, Oslo Accords, Madrid, and Taba were his enemy.

Sharon's strategic objective is the annexation of all occupied territories. That fact makes every Sharon response predictable. After every news story, ask yourself, what will Sharon do next?

Middle East peace will never happen if Palestine is not a sovereign and independent nation. IOW someone or something has to kill Sharon - or thousands of Israelis must die in numbers equal to or greater than dead Palestinians. It is a lesson of history. When extremists drive all moderates into extremist positions, then only massive death rates can bring sanity back to any negotiation table.

BTW, that is the purpose of war - to return negotiation to the table. Terrorism is war just as guerilla attacks and saturation bombing of cities (the US and UK in WWII).

I hope Colin Powell fails miserably. He cannot be successful enough to do anything but prolong the existing, painful situation. A ceasefire without concrete settlements and negotiations is counterproductive. Sharon will never negotiate when his only intention is to annex the occupied territories.

Either a fully independent Palestine is created, or the violence must escalate in numbers sufficient to drive intelligent people back out of extremist mindsets. Without the outright murder of Sharon, then the only other alternative is daily terrrorism that makes current death rates pale. Ironically, violence is the only path remaining for peace because most intelligent people (the moderates from both sides) are now working for rather than condeming the extremists.

The sooner we have massive deaths on both sides, then the easier it will be to settle peacefully. Ironic? Cold-blooded? Heartless? Callous? Maybe. But then emotion was never part of my analysis. My bottom line is a sincere and lasting peaceful settlement. There is no place for emotion in understanding the Israeli - Palestinian conflict.