|
May 17, 2002
Alexander Cockburn
Israel and "Anti-Semitism"
May 16, 2002
Marylin Robinson
A Garden
in Tent City, But Where Do You Bathe?
Paul de Rooij
Worse than CNN?
The BBC and Israel
David Krieger
The Bush/Putin
Agreement:
Nuclear Dangers Remain
Steve Perry
Unsafe at Any Speed:
Youth, Sex and the Heresies
of Judith Levine
May 15, 2002
Ahmad Faruqui
Revisiting
Camp David
Rick Giombetti
Spiderman v. Pentagon:
Working Class Hero Battles Corrupt Defense Contractors
Stanton / Madsen
When the
War Hits Home:
Planning for Martial Law, Telegovernance and Suspension of Elections
May 14, 2002
Jacob Levich
Leaving the Truth Out?
Alternative Online Publication
Tells the Big Lie about Palestine
Michael Colby
Bush's
Cuba Blunder
Dave Marsh
Scapegoats: the Music Industry's War
on Cassettes
Jensen / Mahajan
US Power
Mideast Power Plays
May 13, 2002
Robert Fisk
Why Does John Malkovich
Want to Kill Me?
Mokhiber / Weissman
IMF
and World Bank:
Out of Control
Dean Baker
Will Darth Vader do Time?
The Enron Saga Continues
Nelson Valdés
American
Democracy:
A Lesson for Cubans
May 12, 2002
Bernard Weiner
Why Is America Acting Like This? A
Letter to European Friends
John Patrick Leary
Aiding Colombia
Kathleen Christison
Israel
and Ethics
May 11, 2002
Joady Guthrie
The Holy Lands:
A Peace Vision
Patrick Cockburn
Bombing
Iraq:
the Pentagon Prepares a Prolonged Campaign
George Sunderland
CounterPunch Special
Our
Vichy Congress: Israel's Stranglehold on Capitol Hill
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
Complete
Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
Photos by Allan Sekula
(Click Here to Order from CounterPunch
Online at 20% Off Amazon.com's price!)
INSIDE
EXCLUSIVE
TO
COUNTERPUNCH
SUBSCRIBERS
Published March 15, 2002
Read Whiteout and Find Out
How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
Buy
This Explosive
New Book at an
Amazing Discount!
Reviews of Gore:
a User's Manual
|
May
17, 2002
Clarifying the
Real Obstacles to Peace
by Hussein Ibish
Two events that took place Sunday illustrated
perfectly the elements of the diplomatic impasse that have prevented
any serious progress toward peace in the Middle East. Israel's
ruling party voted never to allow any form of Palestinian statehood
whatsoever, while three key Arab leaders reaffirmed their commitment
to normalize relations with Israel if it withdraws from occupied
Palestinian lands.
The Central Committee of the Likud, the
party that leads Israel's coalition government, voted that "No
Palestinian state will be created west of the Jordan (River)."
Supporters of the resolution, led by former Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, insisted that Israel would never permit an independent
Palestinian state of any kind in any part of historical Palestine.
The vote endorses permanent Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem,
the West Bank and Gaza Strip, which is the cause of the ongoing
conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
Netanyahu was no doubt attempting to
undermine Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, attacking him from an
extreme right-wing position and demonstrating that he, in this
case at least, commanded more votes in the Likud Committee that
determines party leadership. And it is certainly true that neither
Netanyahu nor Likud speaks on behalf of all Israelis.
However, the fact that Israel's governing
party would slam the door so completely on the one and only chance
of resolving the conflict peacefully is an indication of how
radicalized Israeli society has become in recent months. What
Likud was voting in favor of is a permanent state of apartheid
in the occupied territories, with Israel ruling millions of Palestinians
without allowing them independence but also without granting
them citizenship. As Netanyahu put it, "autonomy, yes --
statehood, no."
The problem is not simply on the Israeli
right. No Israeli government has ever been willing to seriously
consider ending the occupation and allowing the Palestinians
a completely independent state in the scraps of Palestine still
not fully colonized. No Israeli government has stopped or even
slowed significantly the settlement activity designed to entrench
the occupation.
The most Israel has ever been willing
to offer the Palestinians, as presented by Prime Minister Ehud
Barak at Camp David in 2000, was nominal independence within
a greater Israeli state: a fragmented "state" that
would not even have controlled its own borders.
The Likud vote simply underscores the
obvious point that as long as Israel refuses to fully end its
occupation, the conflict cannot end. As things stand now, 3.5
million Palestinians live under Israeli military rule as non-citizens
with no legal, political or human rights whatsoever. The commitment
of the Likud party to continue that situation indefinitely is
not only a prescription for endless conflict, it is an excellent
illustration of the extremist policies that have forced this
hideous conflict on Palestinians and Israelis alike and precluded
peace. The whole world, including the Bush administration, recognizes
that Palestinian statehood is the key to peace, yet Israel's
leading party remains implacably opposed to it.
In stark contrast, following a meeting
at Sharm el Sheik in Egypt, the leaders of Syria, Saudi Arabia
and Egypt reaffirmed their commitment to a peace plan adopted
unanimously by the Arab League which holds that all the Arab
states would create normal relations with Israel in the event
of an Israeli withdrawal from Arab lands occupied in the 1967
war.
The Arab League peace plan is the only
serious attempt on the table at present to rethink the peace
process and meet the stated needs of all parties in a fair and
reasonable manner. It would create secure and recognized borders
for both Israel and a Palestinian state. All that is being asked
of Israel by the Arabs in general is that it bring its troops
back inside its own country, and stop subjecting millions of
Arabs to colonization and foreign military dictatorship. The
outstretched hand is being rebuffed. Israel's ruling party has
rejected any form of Palestinian statehood whatsoever and committed
itself to a future defined by more colonization and permanent
inequality. That should provide clarity to all those who wonder
why there is and has been no peace in the Middle East.
Hussein Ibish
is communications director for the American-Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee.
|