It's been a while since we last discussed the Middle East peace process; not
that there is really anything new to report. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu is being just as hard-nosed as he was the last time that he was
Israel's PM. He was bad news then, and he continues to be bad news now.

The truth is, as I've said before, the so-called peace process has been dead
for a long time, and both sides are just going through the motions of
pretending that there is an ongoing peace process. All there really is, is a
stalmate which is leading nowhere.

In fact, there really are no "both sides", because the Palestinian side is
now fractured between the Palestinian Authority -- headed by Abbas -- and
Hamas -- which now runs the Gaza Strip.

But the reason for this message is to call your attention to the following
editorial which appeared in today's edition of the New York Times. Yes, that
liberal, Jewish-run newspaper that everyone here just loves.  :)

What is interesting about this article is that it was written by a rare
breed; that is, a fair-minded Jewish writer who is willing to see both sides
of the issue in a calm level-headed manner. Cohen -- which is the
Americanized version of a Hebrew word which means "priest" -- exposes the
sins of both the Israeli Jews, as well as the Palestinians; and he has a few
words to say to Obama as well.

All in all, I agree with at least 90% of what he states here. Now if only
the leaders -- and all affected parties concerned -- would take heed to his
wise advice.


Hard Mideast Truths

By ROGER COHEN - NYT

February 11, 2010


NEW YORK -- For over a century now, Zionism and Arab nationalism have failed
to find an accommodation in the Holy Land. Both movements attempted to fill
the space left by collapsed empire, and it has been left to the
quasi-empire, the United States, to try to coax them to peaceful
coexistence. The attempt has failed.

President Barack Obama came to office more than a year ago promising new
thinking, outreach to the Muslim world, and relentless focus on
Israel-Palestine. But nice speeches have given way to sullen stalemate. I am
told Obama and the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, have a
zero-chemistry relationship.

Domestic U.S. politics constrain innovative thought -- even open debate --
on the process without end that is the peace search. As Aaron David Miller,
who long labored in the trenches of that process, once observed, the United
States ends up as "Israel's lawyer" rather than an honest broker.
The upside
for an American congressman in speaking out for Palestine is nonexistent.

I don't see these constraints shifting much, but the need for Obama to honor
his election promise grows. The conflict gnaws at U.S. security, eats away
at whatever remote possibility of a two-state solution is left, clouds
Israel's future, scatters Palestinians and devours every attempt to bridge
the West and Islam.

Here's what I believe. Centuries of persecution culminating in the Holocaust
created a moral imperative for a Jewish homeland, Israel, and demand of
America that it safeguard that nation in the breach.

But past persecution of the Jews cannot be a license to subjugate another
people, the Palestinians. Nor can the solemn U.S. promise to stand by Israel
be a blank check to the Jewish state when its policies undermine stated
American aims.

One such Israeli policy is the relentless settlement of the West Bank. Two
decades ago, James Baker, then secretary of state, declared, "Forswear
annexation; stop settlement activity." Fast-forward 20 years to Barack Obama
in Cairo: "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued
Israeli settlements." In the interim the number of settlers almost
quadrupled from about 78,000 in 1990 to around 300,000 last year.

Since Obama spoke, Netanyahu, while promising an almost-freeze, has been
planting saplings in settlements and declaring them part of Israel for
"eternity." In a normal relationship between allies -- of the kind I think
America and Israel should have -- there would be consequences for such
defiance. In the special relationship between the United States and Israel
there are none.

The U.S. objective is a two-state peace. But day by day, square meter by
square meter, the physical space for the second state, Palestine, is
disappearing. Can the Gaza sardine can and fractured labyrinth of the West
Bank now be seen as anything but a grotesque caricature of a putative state?
America has allowed this self-defeating process to advance to near
irreversibility.

In fact, it has helped fund it. The settlements are expensive, as is the
security fence (hated "separation wall" to the Palestinians) that is itself
an annexation mechanism. According to a recent report by the Congressional
Research Service, U.S. aid to Israel totaled $28.9 billion over the past
decade, a sum that dwarfs aid to any other nation and amounts to four times
the total gross domestic product of Haiti.

It makes sense for America to assure Israel's security. It does not make
sense for America to bankroll Israeli policies that undermine U.S. strategic
objectives.

This, too, I believe: Through violence, anti-Semitic incitation, and
annihilationist threats, Palestinian factions have contributed mightily to
the absence of peace and made it harder for America to adopt the balance
required. But the impressive recent work of Prime Minister Salam Fayyad in
the West Bank shows that Palestinian responsibility is no oxymoron and
demands of Israel a response less abject than creeping annexation.

And this: the "existential threat" to Israel is overplayed. It is no feeble
David facing an Arab (or Arab-Persian) Goliath. Armed with a formidable
nuclear deterrent, Israel is by far the strongest state in the region. Room
exists for America to step back and apply pressure without compromising
Israeli security.

And this: Obama needs to work harder on overcoming Palestinian division, a
prerequisite for peace, rather than playing the no-credible-interlocutor
Israeli game. The Hamas charter is vile. But the breakthrough Oslo accords
were negotiated in 1993, three years before the Palestine Liberation
Organization revoked the annihilationist clauses in its charter. When Arafat
and Rabin shook hands on the White House lawn, that destroy-Israel charter
was intact. Things change through negotiation, not otherwise. If there are
Taliban elements worth engaging, are there really no such elements in the
broad movements that are Hamas and Hezbollah?

If there are not two states there will be one state between the river and
the sea and very soon there will be more Palestinian Arabs in it than Jews.
What then will become of the Zionist dream?

It's time for Obama to ask such tough questions in public and demand of
Israel that it work in practice to share the land rather than divide and
rule it.



Jeff Snyder, SysOp - Armageddon BBS  Visit us at endtimeprophecy.org port 23
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