For Israel, Land or Peace

Jimmy Carter – The Washington Post -- November 26, 2000

An underlying reason that years of U.S. diplomacy have failed and violence in the Middle East persists is that some Israeli leaders continue to "create facts" by building settlements in occupied territory. Their deliberate placement as islands or fortresses within Palestinian areas makes the settlers vulnerable to attack without massive military protection, frustrates Israelis who seek peace and at the same time prevents any Palestinian government from enjoying effective territorial integrity.

At Camp David in September 1978, President Anwar Sadat, Prime Minister Menachem Begin and I spent most of our time debating this issue before we finally agreed on terms for peace between Egypt and Israel and for the resolution of issues concerning the Palestinian people. The bilateral provisions led to a comprehensive and lasting treaty between Egypt and Israel, made possible at the last minute by Israel's agreement to remove its settlers from the Sinai. But similar constraints concerning the status of the West Bank and Gaza have not been honored, and have led to continuing confrontation and violence.

The foundation for all my proposals to the two leaders was the official position of the government of the United States, based on international law that was mutually accepted by the United States, Egypt, Israel and other nations, and encapsulated in United Nations Security Council Resolution 242. Our government's legal commitment to support this well-balanced resolution has not changed.

Although the acceptance of Resolution 242 was a contentious issue at Camp David, Prime Minister Begin ultimately acknowledged its applicability, "in all its parts." The text emphasizes "the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war and the need to work for a just and lasting peace in which every State in the area can live in security." It requires the "withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent [1967] conflict" and the right of every state in the area "to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force."

It was clear that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories were a direct violation of this agreement and were, according to the long-stated American position, both "illegal and an obstacle to peace." Accordingly, Prime Minister Begin pledged that there would be no establishment of new settlements until after the final peace negotiations were completed. But later, under Likud pressure, he declined to honor this commitment, explaining that his presumption had been that all peace talks would be concluded within three months.

There were some notable provisions in the Camp David Accords that related to Palestinian autonomy and the occupation of land. A key element was that "the Israeli military government and its civilian administration will be withdrawn as soon as a self-governing authority has been freely elected by the inhabitants of these areas to replace the existing military government." This transition period was triggered by an election in the occupied territories in January 1996, approved by the Palestinians and the government of Israel and monitored by the Carter Center. Eighty-eight Palestinian Council members were elected, with Yasser Arafat as president, and this self-governing authority, with limited autonomy, convened for the first time in March 1996.

It was also agreed that once the powers and responsibilities of the self-governing authority were established, "A withdrawal of Israeli armed forces will take place and there will be a redeployment of the remaining Israeli forces into specified security locations."

We decided early during the Camp David talks that it would be impossible to resolve the question of sovereignty over East Jerusalem, but proposed the following paragraph concerning the city, on which we reached full agreement:

"Jerusalem, the city of peace, is holy to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and all peoples must have free access to it and enjoy the free exercise of worship and the right to visit and transit to the holy places without distinction or discrimination. The holy places of each faith will be under the administration and control of their representatives. A municipal council representative of the inhabitants of the city shall supervise essential functions in the city such as public utilities, public transportation, and tourism and shall ensure that each community can maintain its own cultural and educational institutions."

At the last minute, however, after several days of unanimous acceptance, both Sadat and Begin agreed that there were already enough controversial elements in the accords and requested that this paragraph, although still supported by both sides, be deleted from the final text. Instead, the two leaders exchanged letters, expressing the legal positions of their respective governments regarding the status of East Jerusalem. They disagreed about sovereignty, of course, but affirmed that the city should be undivided.

As agreed, I informed them that "the position of the United States on Jerusalem remains as stated by Ambassador Arthur Goldberg in the United Nations General Assembly on July 14, 1967, and subsequently by Ambassador Charles Yost in the United Nations Security Council on July 1, 1969." In effect, these statements considered East Jerusalem to be part of the occupied territories, along with the West Bank and Gaza.

The Camp David Accord was signed by all three of us leaders with great fanfare and enthusiasm. President Sadat and Prime Minister Begin embraced warmly at the White House ceremony, and the final document was overwhelmingly ratified by their respective parliaments.

With the inauguration of President Ronald Reagan, there was a period of relative inactivity in the Middle East, except for the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the subsequent expulsion of PLO forces from Beirut. President Reagan used the announcement of this event on Sept. 1, 1982, to address the nation on the subject of the West Bank and the Palestinians. He stated clearly that "the Camp David agreement remains the foundation of our policy," and his speech included the following declarations:

"The Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza will have full autonomy over their own affairs."

"The United States will not support the use of any additional land for the purpose of settlements during the transition period. Indeed, the immediate adoption of a settlement freeze by Israel, more than any other action, could create the confidence needed for wider participation in these talks. Further settlement activity is in no way necessary for the security of Israel and only diminishes the confidence of the Arabs that a final outcome can be freely and fairly negotiated."

In 1991 there was a major confrontation between the governments of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and President George Bush concerning Israeli settlements in the West Bank, with U.S. threats of withholding financial aid if settlement activity continued. A conference was convened that year in Madrid with participants of the United States, Syria, other Arab nations and some Palestinians who did not officially represent the PLO. At a press conference on Nov. 1, Secretary of State James Baker said, "When we negotiated with Israel, we negotiated on the basis of land for peace, on the basis of total withdrawal from territory in exchange for peaceful relations. . . . This is exactly our position, and we wish it to be applied also in the negotiations between Israelis and Syrians, Israelis and Palestinians. We have not changed our position at all."

Norwegian mediators forged an agreement in September 1993 between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Arafat committing both sides to a staged peace process. Although U.S. officials were not involved in this effort, our government commemorated the Oslo Accords in a ceremony at the White House, and built subsequent peace talks on its terms and those of the Camp David Accords. So far, these efforts have not succeeded, and this year there has been a resurgence of violence and animosity between Israelis and Arabs unequaled in more than a quarter of a century.

The major issues still to be resolved remain unchanged: the final boundaries of the state of Israel, the return of, or compensation for, Palestinians dislodged from their previous homes and the status of Jerusalem. It seems almost inevitable that the United States will initiate new peace efforts, but it is unlikely that real progress can be made on any of these issues as long as Israel insists on its settlement policy, illegal under international laws that are supported by the United States and all other nations.

There are many questions as we continue to seek an end to violence in the Middle East, but there is no way to escape the vital one: Land or peace?

Former president Carter is chairman of the Carter Center in Atlanta

As peace process lives, Mideast peace is dying

Mazin Qumsiyeh – The Boston Globe – November 23, 2000

WHILE NEWSWIRE STORIES repeat Israeli spin, attempting to justify the killing of Palestinians, truth is once again added to the list of victims.

No maps are given to show that this killing is in illegally occupied areas, and we read few explanations as to why Palestinians are demonstrating.

Investigations by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, the United Nations, and Israeli Human Rights groups go unreported. All have condemned Israel's use of force over the past two months resulting in the death of more than 230 Palestinians (including 60 children) and injuring thousands.

Even details of what happened at the negotiations are still under wraps, except the oft-repeated myth that Barak made unspecified ''far reaching concessions.''

To understand how we arrived at this sorry state of affairs, we should examine the role of the Henry Kissinger-codified US foreign policy of the 1970s. This includes our ''unique'' relationship with Israel, massive foreign aid (currently several billion dollars per year), commitment to keeping Israeli military superiority to any combined regional force, and commitment to do nothing against Israeli interests.

President Bill Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, and Texas Governor George W. Bush repeatedly emphasized this latter point by pledging never to pressure Israel (not even when US interests are at stake).

Even as the Israeli forces escalated attacks on civilians recently, Congress approved additional military aid and passed a resolution supporting Israel. Clinton just asked for an additional $255 million in military aid to Israel.

For Palestinians in the streets, events after the ceremony on the White House lawn in 1993 showed that Oslo was part of the problem and not part of the solution. Under Oslo, Israel continued to expand settlements, confiscate more Palestinian land, demolish Palestinian homes, build bypass roads, keep thousands of political dissidents in jail, and tighten the economic strangulation of the Palestinian population centers.

These actions were accelerated under Ehud Barak's government.

Contrary to media reports and emboldened by US support, Barak did not propose anything new to what Israel proposed since the mid-1970s (centered on Israel's perceived self-interest to relieve Israeli forces from policing Palestinians while maintaining Israeli rule). Barak never agreed to relinquish settlement blocs, which, combined with the bypass roads between them, would leave only 60 percent of the area of the West Bank and Gaza (or about 13 percent of the total land mass of Palestine) to return to the Palestinians.

Barak was uncompromising on Jerusalem. West Jerusalem was illegally occupied by Israel in 1948 (Palestinian owners were expelled), and East Jerusalem was illegally occupied in 1967. UN Security Council Resolution 242 reaffirmed the illegality of holding territory by force. A better frame of reference is UNSCR 181, which provided for partition in Palestine, with Jerusalem to be held under international rule.

Barak's concept of Palestinian autonomy (do their own garbage collection!) while keeping Jerusalem is not an acceptable solution. By revoking residency rights, demolishing homes, preventing refugees from returning, barricading the city from surrounding Palestinian areas, and other acts described as Judaicizing the city, Israel has forfeited its potential as a fair ruler in Jerusalem.

Finally, Barak denies any Israeli responsibility for the Palestinian refugee problem and will agree only to token ''family reunification'' with no time limits. According to Israeli historians, the refugees (now numbering millions) fled by a process of ''ethnic cleansing'' by Israeli forces.

Palestinian Right of Return to their homes and lands is protected by UNGA 194, reaffirmed practically every year with universal consensus except for Israel (and lately the United States). The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 13) also affirms the right of every individual to leave and return to his country.

The interests of peace are not served by a ''peace process,'' whose goal is to legitimize occupation and dispossession or by keeping truths hidden from the public. The inalienable rights of refugees, self-determination, true sovereignty, and simple human rights cannot be bargained away by ''negotiations'' between a strong Israel aided by the United States and a weak and old Arafat.

Any agreement that fails to correct injustices will be short-lived and will not give Israelis and Palestinians peace or security. Israel's versions of apartheid will not succeed any more than those tried in South Africa.

The United States is bound by its Constitution to support human rights and freedom and not to support ''ethnic cleansing'' and religious intolerance.

Mazin Qumsiyeh is chairman of the media committee of the Palestine Right to Return Coalition.

This story ran on page A27 of the Boston Globe on 11/23/2000.
© Copyright 2000 Globe Newspaper Company.

What We Want

Saeb Erakat -- November 8, 2000 – The Washington Post

The past five weeks have been among the most tragic and unsettling in the 52-year history of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. More than 180 Palestinians--most of them unarmed civilians, many children--have been killed by heavily armed Israeli soldiers, and thousands more injured. Their "crime" was protesting the Israeli occupation of their land and the daily humiliations they suffer at the hands of Israel--the most immediate example being Ariel Sharon's arrogant and provocative march up to the Haram al-Sharif.

Many people are asking why this recent uprising happened in the context of a peace process that seemed to be making progress, or at least had not come to an end. Indeed, just 24 hours before the uprising, I was meeting in Washington with my Israeli counterpart, and earlier that same week, Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak dined together at Barak's home. Many commentators have concluded that the violence must have been orchestrated by Arafat, and say it proves that he and others within the Palestinian leadership do not really want peace. This is utter nonsense. The Palestinian Authority remains committed to a peaceful, negotiated resolution to its conflict with Israel, and to the goal of a two-state solution based on U.N. Resolution 242.

Not only did we not orchestrate the recent violence, we plaintively urged Barak to prevent Sharon from marching on the Haram al-Sharif, because we feared it would spark such violence. Barak ignored our warning, only to express surprise and dismay when our predictions proved accurate.

But why did events cascade so rapidly and precipitously out of control? And, more important, where do we go from here? Violence between Palestinians and Israelis is a reflection of a peace process that did not produce. Unfortunately, such violence also is inevitable so long as Palestinians suffer under the frustration and humiliation of occupation and domination, and so long as Israel insists on maintaining a military and security presence in Palestinian territory.

Even during peace negotiations over the past seven years, Palestinians have suffered human rights abuses at the hands of Israeli security forces on a daily basis. We have watched helplessly as more and more of our land was confiscated by Israel; as 50,000 new Jewish settlers--many of whom are violent extremists--moved into the West Bank and Gaza Strip since the Oslo agreement was signed; and as Israel exerted harsh and total control over all aspects of our economic lives and our freedom of movement.

Even in the period since the Camp David summit, as diplomats on all sides talked hopefully of peace, life for Palestinians under occupation changed very little. Moreover, given Israel's history of violating and ignoring the string of interim agreements reached over the past seven years, many Palestinians were skeptical that any agreement with Israel ever would be implemented.

The recent uprising by Palestinians was thus a symptom of a chronic disease--Israel's continuing control over the Palestinian people, occupation of Palestinian land and impulsive resort to military power to get its way. Until the disease is cured, the symptom will periodically flare up despite our efforts to maintain calm, and despite Israel's heavy-handed efforts at suppression.

The first step in moving forward is for Israel to recognize and acknowledge the nature of the disease instead of trying to squelch the symptom. Palestinians do not seek the destruction of Israel, despite the views of some hysterical commentators in the United States and Israel. All the violence over the past several weeks, and all the stones that were thrown, were in occupied Palestine, not in Israel. (The only fatalities that occurred in Israel were among Israeli Arabs killed by Israeli police.) This conflict is not about the destruction of Israel; it is about the independence of Palestine. It is motivated by Palestinians' desire to be free, not by a desire to "kill the Jews."

The next step in moving forward is to recognize and acknowledge that a permanent settlement must be viable if it is to last. President Clinton was quick to publicly blame Arafat for rejecting Barak's offers at Camp David. But all Arafat was saying was that the proposals put on the table at Camp David would not have produced a viable agreement, because they would have been unacceptable to the Palestinian people (and, in the case of the Jerusalem proposals, to the broader Arab and Muslim peoples as well).

The Palestinian requirements for a real and viable peace with Israel are not complicated. We simply want what Egypt received and what three Israeli governments were prepared to offer Syria: the implementation of U.N. Resolution 242 (to which the United States is a party). Israel must carry out a withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines, including East Jerusalem, and acknowledge that Palestinian refugees have the right of return.

There will be no peace between Palestinians and Israelis until there is an end to Israel's military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, to Israeli control over the infrastructure (roads, water, etc.) in the West Bank and Gaza, to Israeli settlement activity, and to Israel's economic and political apartheid over Palestinians.

I continue to have faith that our two peoples can live in peace and good neighborliness. But only if it is a peace of equals, not one determined by brute military power; and only if it is peace with dignity, not one imposed by an occupier on a vanquished people.

I also continue to believe that the United States remains an important partner in the peace process. The Palestinian people have great respect and admiration for the American people. But U.S. influence is effective only as long as it is objective and is based on the principles of justice, freedom, self-determination and basic human rights for all people in the region.

The writer is chief Palestinian negotiator and the Palestinian Authority's minister of local government.

Might Vs. Right

Daoud Kuttab -- October 23, 2000 – The Washington Post

RAMALLAH, West Bank –– When I passed by the bombed out police station in the center of the Palestinian town of Ramallah, I felt sad. What has happened to the peace process, that Israel has to use U.S.-made Apache helicopters to shell one of the few signs of peace with the Palestinians? The Palestinian Authority's police station was bombed on Oct. 12, after two Israeli soldiers were killed by a mob of Palestinians who wanted to take revenge for the more than 100 Palestinians killed in the past two weeks by Israeli soldiers.

At another time and under different circumstances, I might not have felt so sad. After all, it was in precisely that police station that I was detained for seven days after the television station I was running in 1997 had broadcast live a session of the Palestinian Legislative Council dealing with corruption in the Palestinian Authority. But the sadness I have now is shared by most Palestinians who believe that the peace process, with its hope of freedom and independence, has crumbled back to the same old situation of an occupying power (Israel) using excessive force to dominate a rebellious population.

Sure, Israeli spin doctors have been trying to put all the blame on the Palestinians. It is the fault of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for not putting down the revolt himself, they say, thus forcing the Israeli army to do the dirty job. Some have even used racist undertones by attacking Palestinian mothers as being sub-human because, unlike normal mothers, they send their children to be killed. Such statements continued even after the damning pictures of a father trying to protect his 12-year-old son from being killed by Israeli gunfire.

The trouble in the peace process began in the first months after the 1993 signing of the Oslo accords. The late Yitzak Rabin refused to make the first withdrawal, saying, "There are no sacred dates." The hesitation of consecutive Israeli governments to return Palestinian territories in accordance to the schedule of the agreement caused many to start doubting Israel's commitment to it. Arafat started sounding like a broken record as he repeated the same statement, "All we are asking for is the accurate implementation of what has been agreed upon." Israeli continued to waver in returning territory, relaxing border crossings, releasing prisoners, opening safe passage ways, rescinding Israeli-issued military orders and abolishing their civil administration. What was even worse for Palestinians was the continuation of Israeli settlement building and the opening of bypass roads on Palestinian territories that were intended for Jewish settler use.

The Israelis and their American allies would respond to complaints about these matters by asking Palestinians to wait for the permanent status agreement. After seven years of waiting, the Israelis were still holding on to their four negatives: no to the return of the 1967 borders, no to the right of return, no to allowing a foreign army on the Jordan River and no to the division of Jerusalem. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and many of his Labor Party supporters said that they were disappointed with the Palestinians' lukewarm response to the offers he made at the Camp David II talks. Although the Barak offer was in fact better than any offer made by previous Israeli leaders, it fell way short of Palestinian aspirations.

The seven years of wait had not produced the kind of change in Israel that would allow for a viable independent Palestinian state. And key issues that no Palestinian leader can bypass, such as Jerusalem and the right of refugees to return, were not adequately addressed in the Israeli offer. That is why Palestinians responded angrily to the visit of Ariel Sharon to al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam.

After months of talk about this sacred site, the feeling among Palestinians was that Sharon's visit was aimed at legitimizing Israeli control. And instead of the Israeli government understanding the basis of the Palestinian frustration, it attempted to crush this popular protest. And with every Palestinian who was killed or injured by this excessive Israeli response, more Palestinians came out to demonstrate. And with more Palestinians killed, Arabs and Muslims around the world became angry and started joining the Palestinian plea for independence and freedom.

Instead of trying to calm the situation, Israel started demanding that Arafat crack down on his own people. When Arafat insisted that an independent inquiry be established to determine the cause of what happened and to create a mechanism for protecting the Palestinian population, Israel decided to declare war on Palestinians. They moved tanks and armored carriers against the civilian Palestinian population. Ultimatums were issued and helicopters were used to bomb Palestinians into submission.

The United States has always stated that it supports Israel because of shared values. These values, I assume, are those of democracy and respect for human rights--in short, the principle that right is might. Shooting at demonstrators, harassing ambulances, bombing a civilian population and placing 3 million people under siege are clear violations for human rights and international law. Shelling the police station of a party you have peace talks with is nothing more than an attempt to get political results by using bully tactics. When might becomes right, the United States must have the moral courage to kindly tell its friend no. Doing anything else will not be a true sign of friendship.

The writer is director of the Institute of Modern Media at Al-Quds University in Jerusalem. He is one of 50 recipients of the World Press Freedom Hero Award given by the International Press Institute.

The way a settlement might look if both sides get past the bitterness

Mubarak Awad and Abdul Aziz Said – October 18, 2000 – The Philadelphia Inquirer

The violence in the Middle East dramatically demonstrates that traditional approaches to peacemaking there have failed. Below, we offer eight steps to peace.

Apology and Forgiveness. Israelis should extend an apology to the Palestinians for Israeli abuse of Palestinian basic human rights. Palestinians should apologize to the Israelis for Palestinian violence against Jews. Both must forgive, and accept apology graciously.

Recognition and Acceptance. Palestinians and Arabs have to accept Israel as a Jewish state. Arabs also need to acknowledge the tragedy of the Holocaust. And they must acknowledge that the Jewish people have a historical connection to the Old City of Jerusalem (including the Temple Mount) and accept Israel into full membership in the Middle East region. Israel must be included in Arab maps, sports and regional gatherings.

At the same time, Israelis have to accept that there is a Palestinian people, not merely "West Bankers," and acknowledge the history of the Palestinians. The Israelis should stop referring to Palestinian land as Judea and Samaria and recognize the Palestinians' just claim to their land. Israelis, too, must come to terms with a past that includes acts of repression and dehumanization. Israel must also see itself as a Middle East country, not as a superior Western country, oblivious to its actual geography, an attitude that rekindles Arab resentment.

A Non-adversarial Relationship. Israelis and Arabs need to move away from their present adversarial posture toward a cooperative relationship. The Israelis need to abandon the practice of exploiting inter-Arab tensions. In international forums, Israel needs to refrain from voting against Arab states. In Arab countries, in public discourse, Israel should be treated as a neighbor rather than an enemy.

Sharing Progress. Israeli society and industry are technologically sophisticated, but Israel has not demonstrated willingness to help Palestinians. Israelis should pursue policies that promote Israeli investment in Palestine and development of the Palestinian economy. Encouraged by the Palestinians, Arab countries must end the economic boycott of Israel and promote trade and commercial transactions.

Rights of People, not States. Israelis and Palestinians need to recognize the rights of each other's people. Israel should acknowledge its role in creating the plight of Palestinian refugees. Those refugees should be given the choice to live where they want. Jewish settlers should be granted similar rights to settle in the West Bank. Palestinians should be compensated for the property that they lost, as Jews are now being compensated in Eastern Europe. The same applies to the compensation of Jews who lost property in Arab countries.

If Israel were to accept the return of Palestinian refugees, only a small percentage of the refugees would return. It is generally agreed that a significant number of Palestinian refugees would remain in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria if these governments were given incentives and were willing to integrate them into their societies.

Mutual Religious Tolerance. Judaism, Christianity and Islam need to acknowledge one another. Israel needs to recognize the legitimacy of Islam, rather than view Islam as the enemy and move away from a clash of civilizations and toward a dialogue of civilizations. By recognizing one another's narratives, Jews, Christians and Muslims prevent the discourse of their respective fundamentalisms from becoming instruments of foreign policy, as is presently the case.

Education and Communication for Peace. Both Palestinians and Israelis need to change curricula, textbooks and other learning sources to accept the new truth. Israeli and Palestinian youth have more in common than their grandparents did. By confronting their differences, they will discover their similarities, as some are already doing.

Jerusalem. We need to take politics out of the Old City of Jerusalem. Jews, Christians and Muslims have equal rights in Jerusalem and should recognize those rights. The Old City should be administered by a council representing the respective religious communities and have a rotating leadership. Inhabitants should have the choice of Israeli or Palestinian citizenship. Security responsibilities should be shared between Israelis and Palestinians.

Capitals could be located outside the Old City, either in West or East Jerusalem. The illusory borders within metropolitan Jerusalem could disappear. Embassies could be located anywhere in greater Jerusalem and serve both Israelis and Palestinians. Finally, were the Arab world unequivocally and sincerely to recognize the right of Israel to exist as a brother nation in the Middle East, the symbolism of Jerusalem as the key national identity marker for Israelis would diminish.

This is not idle dreaming. The journey toward peace requires a great awakening.

Mubarak Awad is chairman of Non-Violence International and national director of the National Youth Advocate Program. Abdul Aziz Said is director of the International Peace and Conflict Resolution Program at American University and holds the Mohammed Said Farsi Islamic Peace Chair.

To Stop the Violence, End the Occupation

HUSSEIN IBISH – October 18, 2000 – The Los Angeles Times

   The explosion of anger that has rocked the cities of the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories was predictable and inevitable. The latest "cease-fire" agreement--as if this has been a conflict between two armies--is unlikely to produce anything more than a temporary lull in the protests. The Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza is the violent context that makes such protests inevitable. There is, in the final analysis, only one way to "stop the violence," and that is to end the occupation.
     The desire for liberation will, eventually, always bring an occupied people out into the streets, stones in hand, ready to face the might of powerful armies, preferring to risk death than live in bondage. This is not extreme nationalism or racism or religious fervor. It is the need to be free.
     Americans seem stunned by the uprising, but few have any real grasp of what living under Israeli military occupation since 1967 has meant for Palestinians.
     It means a reality of unending violence. It means being surrounded by an abusive foreign army that enforces a social system indistinguishable from apartheid; confiscations of land that is then given to hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers in Jewish-only communities linked by Jewish-only roads; home demolitions; torture; cities cut off from each other, closed down, besieged on a regular basis. It means living in a massive prison, bereft of all normal civil, human and national rights.
     The seeds that produced the new uprising were sown seven years ago at the White House Rose Garden. If American foreign policy lies in ruins, it is because it was based on a fundamentally false premise: that the Palestinians would accept something less than their own freedom. At Camp David this summer, the Palestinians were told bluntly they could expect nothing of the kind. Israel, they were told, would keep large chunks of the occupied territories, including the Old City of Jerusalem; would continue to control all the borders and the water; and would have a veto on many policies of their "state," the territories of which would be a patchwork lacking any geographical coherence. This, they were told, was "generous" and the best they could ever get from any Israeli. In other words, forget about liberation.
     The predictable result was the massive uprising of recent days.
     Since 1967, there has been only one workable solution to the conflict. The plan is articulated in U.N. Security Council Resolution 242, which sets up a two-part "land for peace" solution. Part one holds that Israel must withdraw from the territories occupied in 1967 (land). Part two calls for all states in the region to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries (peace).
     Every "peace process" document, from the Madrid Summit to the final Camp David communique, reiterates that the aim of the negotiations is the implementation of 242. The Palestinian obligations under 242 were fulfilled years ago. The Palestinian Authority recognized Israel in its 1967 borders and its right to live in peace and security in those borders.
     The Israeli obligation, withdrawal from the occupied territories, is utterly unfulfilled. Any doubts that the occupation continues in all its grim brutality were irrefutably demonstrated in recent days. Israel simply refuses to end its occupation, especially of Jerusalem, as Ariel Sharon's invasion of the Muslim holy site was intended to show. The original sin of the U.S.-dominated Oslo process is that it pushed aside international law and the U.N. in an attempt to provide cover for Israel to avoid complying with 242. We have witnessed the results of this shortsightedness over the past weeks. The latest agreement in Egypt continues this fatal error by allowing the United States to monopolize the international investigation into recent events.
     But 242 is a solemn commitment by the international community to the Palestinian people. It is the key to security for Israel, liberation for the Palestinians and peace for the Middle East. Until the international community, including the United States, seriously commits itself to ensuring the complete implementation of 242 by all parties, and ending the occupation, the "peace process" is going to keep producing results that look a lot more like war.

Hussein Ibish Is Communications Director of the American-arab Anti-discrimination Committee

The fallacy of peace in the Middle East

Osama Shabaneh – October 18, 2000 – The Seattle Times

During a recent trip to the West Bank, I happened to share a taxi ride from Bethlehem to my hometown of Hebron with a few Palestinian laborers. Throughout the hour-long trip, the laborers discussed their day at work and their plans for the next day. As I understood from the discussion, these men were construction workers who had just finished their day shift in the Israeli settlement of Har Homa, or Jabal Abu Ghneim in Arabic.

When the Israeli government in 1997 approved building in this settlement, there was not only a Palestinian but also an international outcry since the settlement was construed as changing the status quo of the boundaries of Jerusalem. Three years later, the Palestinians themselves are helping build the settlement.

Can these men be branded as traitors for helping Israel expand by usurping more Palestinian land? Or are they more victims of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that appears to be on the edge of collapse?

The 1987-93 Palestinian uprising against the Israeli military occupation of Palestine ended with the signing of the Oslo peace accord between the two sides. I was very much in support of the peace moves that halted, for a while, the bloodshed that characterized the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for so many years. As a Palestinian, I had experienced the Israeli occupation firsthand, and I hoped that the peace accord was the beginning of giving the Palestinians their rights and freedom they had sought for a long time. I wanted my family, still back in the town of Hebron, to feel safe in their home, to have hope of a better future, and to live in peace with no Israeli soldiers around.

I grew up in Hebron accustomed to the sight of those soldiers, in their military jeeps or on foot, patrolling the streets of the West Bank, sometimes enforcing curfews on Palestinian residents and occasionally stopping and slapping or arresting Palestinians who had forgotten their identity cards, which were issued by the Israeli military authorities. Every Palestinian over 16 years of age had to obtain these orange-colored identity cards, and had to have it on them at all times.

I remember having to skip school the day I turned 16 in order to go to the Israeli military headquarters in Hebron to obtain my card. It was 1971, and it was the first time I had to undergo questioning by the Israelis about my political beliefs. I was too young to have any of those beliefs. I always took the Israeli presence for granted, and I had never imagined what freedom felt like. For many years following my 16th birthday and, in fact, until now, I have a recurring dream of me leaving my house in Hebron without my orange identity card, and being stopped by the Israeli soldiers. No peace can wipe out the scars of occupation.

Since 1993, the Israeli-Palestinian peace process has had its ups and downs. My family and friends in the region were euphoric when the prospects of peace were first offered to them. But as the years passed, they became more gloomy and dejected, and I could see why during my visits. As a consequence of the peace process, the Israeli army redeployed its forces away from heavily Palestinian-populated areas, but its presence was felt as strongly as ever.

The Palestinians came to the realization that the peace process was just a ploy by the Israelis to convince the world that Israel was granting the Palestinians self-determination, while at the same time maintaining their presence in and around every village, every town, every city, and every refugee camp in the West Bank and Gaza. Israel, during the so-called peace process years, continued killing more Palestinian civilians, confiscating more Palestinian land, arresting more people for their political beliefs, controlling every thoroughfare in Palestine, and overseeing every aspect of Palestinian life, except the mundane.

The Palestinian passport that Israel allowed the Palestinian Authority to issue to Palestinians includes, on the first page, the same ID number that is found on the Israeli-issued orange identity card. Now occupation had a new face and a new color, green instead of orange. Yet, freedom for the Palestinians remained a dream.

Take the inflammatory issue of Jerusalem. Israel has been claiming that it grants freedom of worship to all Palestinians. For 13 years now, Jerusalem, which includes one of the holiest places for Muslims, has been sealed off to most Palestinians. Israeli checkpoints at every junction around Jerusalem prevent Muslims and Christians from entering the city to worship without a special permit. The Israelis do a detailed security check on every applicant, and usually reject, without justification, issuing any permits.

I called my family in Hebron a few days after the outbreak of violence in the West Bank. With the echo of bullets in the background, my mother told me to worry about myself and not to worry about them. She said that only God could help them in their current situation. I could not agree more. Watching TV that night, and every night, I flip through the news channels of the American media, and all I see are reports, analyses, politicians and experts - all but very few blaming the Palestinians for driving the region to the brink of war, and portraying Israel as the peace-seeker.

The utter denial of the Palestinians' humanity has characterized the media for a long time, and now it is no different. It took a peace process littered with suffering and death for the Palestinians to realize that the world just doesn't care about their struggle for freedom and self-determination.

The Palestinian laborers wanted to feed their children, and building a settlement for Israelis was the only way they found before them. This is a tragic consequence of an unjust peace. As long as Israel insists on controlling the will of another nation, as long as it keeps looking down at Palestinians as unequal peace partners, as long as it keeps confiscating Palestinian land and holding political prisoners, peace will remain a fallacy. There is only one way out, and that is not by more summits and meaningless discussions. The only way out is for Israel to set the Palestinians free, and let them be.

Osama Shabaneh is a Palestinian American who works and lives in Redmond.

Talk to Me, Mr. Barak

Michael Tarazi -- October 11, 2000 – The Washington Post

As a Palestinian American, I have watched the violent events in the Middle East of the past two weeks with horror and disbelief. Jewish friends and I, only days ago waiting anxiously for what seemed an inevitable final peace accord, instead witnessed Palestinian frustration--over what should have been viewed by all as an insignificant visit by an insignificant man to the Noble Sanctuary/Temple Mount--explode into violent clashes that have seemingly erased any hope of a peaceful resolution. Why are my fellow Palestinians, as legitimate as our cause is, yet again playing into the hands of our critics?

The answer is fairly clear for those who really care to know. After a seven-year "peace process," Palestinians are actually worse off now than they were before Oslo. We have recognized Israel's right to exist (and received no such mutual recognition from Israel in return), we have obliterated the offensive provisions from our national charter, we remained quiet and docile to help get Ehud Barak elected prime minister, we jumped through every American and Israeli hoop put before us like trained circus animals and received what in return? Fifty thousand more settlers in the West Bank and Gaza, continued land expropriation, the strangulation of Arab East Jerusalem by Jewish settlements, Jewish expansion into Jerusalem's Muslim quarter (with no mutual right for Muslims to live in the Jewish quarter), increased travel restrictions, unyielding "security" detentions and torture, complete economic dependence on Israel.

Oslo has been exposed for the charade it is--a mechanism by which Israel can retain control of the territories it illegally occupied in 1967 while allowing Yasser Arafat and his Palestinian Authority to design postage stamps, collect garbage and parade in uniform--that is, when he and his cronies were not too busy embezzling funds or torturing their own citizens. Admittedly, a Palestinian resort to confrontation with Israel's formidable military is ultimately self-defeating, but it is all too easy to understand why the Palestinians feel they have no choice.

But if there is another choice, which certainly there must be, now is the time to state it loudly and clearly to Barak:

You must approach the Palestinians as human beings worthy of the same peace and security that you seek for Israeli citizens--not as a subjugated people to be bombed into submission. Give the Palestinians something other than tanks, attack helicopters and silly ultimatums designed to show right-wing critics that you can be "tough with the Arabs." Like Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator who so courageously admitted Palestinian mistakes with regard to the shameful desecration of Joseph's Tomb in my mother's hometown of Nablus, Israel too must be brave enough to admit its mistakes. Go to the grieving parents of 12-year-old Mohammed Aldura and express your regret and sorrow at his tragic slaying.

We are desperate for an indication that you are the peacemaker we hoped you would be. Give us a reason to believe that we will be granted independence, the settlements will be evacuated and the refugees will be able to return. Blaming Arafat, as if he has a magic wand that can make Palestinians protest or stop at his whim, is too easy and only reinforces Palestinian suspicions that you, like your predecessor, are simply looking for an excuse to back away from the peace negotiations. Forget Arafat and his corrupt and incompetent leadership and address the Palestinian people directly. If you are, as others assert on your behalf, offering us an independent state with full sovereignty over East Jerusalem, including the Christian and Muslim quarters of the Old City, then state so loudly and unequivocally. Go to Ramallah, to Bethlehem, to Gaza and tell the people that you recognize Palestine's right to exist--you will then discover how peaceful we can be. But absent such bold and morally courageous moves, we, the Palestinians, have every reason to distrust you and the peace process.

The writer, a lawyer, is a former intern with the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.

Israel Must Submit to a Multinational Investigation

DAOUD KUTTAB – October 9, 2000 -- Los Angeles Times

     There are plenty of reasons why Palestinians insist on the need for an independent inquiry into the violence of the past two weeks that has resulted in the killing of more than 80 civilian Palestinians, many of them children. The United States should support this request, which will surely calm the situation on the ground.
     Israel wants Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to act like its puppet and order his own people not to protest the illegal occupation of their land. But Arafat is under tremendous public pressure not to allow Israel to get away with this kind of criminal violence against civilians. He will have to produce concrete results before any thought of a return to a peace process can get a footing. An investigation and an effective mechanism to ensure the protection of the civilian Palestinians is not only necessary but it is the right of people under military occupation according to international law. If Israel is innocent, it should have no reason to worry about the results of such an independent inquiry.
     The U.S. abstained Saturday when the U.N. Security Council approved a resolution condemning Israel's use of force and backing "a speedy and objective inquiry" into the fighting. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has not even sent her condolences to the innocent Palestinians who were killed by Israeli soldiers using U.S.-made machine guns.
     The situation has been brewing for the past few months as Israeli negotiators have been refusing to accept any agreement in which they would have to give up sovereignty over the third-holiest mosque in Islam, Al Aqsa mosque. In recent negotiations at Camp David, Palestinians agreed to cede sovereignty over the Western Wall and the Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem to Israel, as part of a peace agreement. U.N. Resolution 242, which is supposed to be the basis for the talks, calls on Israel to withdraw from areas it occupied in the 1967 war.
     This holy hill called the Temple Mount by Jews is usually filled with thousands of Muslim worshipers every day. On special religious occasions the number of worshipers praying in the mosque and surrounding areas reaches more than a quarter of a million people. Muslims have been praying at this site continuously for more than a thousand years.
     Palestinian leaders have been warning for some time that the situation is very tense. Aware of the sensitivities around this holy site, a senior Palestinian official a month ago called on Israel not to turn the political conflict into a religious one. Within days came the visit by Ariel Sharon, the right-wing Israeli leader, to Haram al Sharif. (Sharon is the general who was chastised by an Israeli inquiry for his role in the massacres of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon in 1982.) Instead of Israel's leaders admitting their present mistake, and attempting to calm their own soldiers who are using live ammunition, they brought in tanks and helicopters with the expressed aim of trying to crush the popular Palestinian revolt. Later they offered to withdraw the tanks if Arafat ordered the protests stopped. They have continuously refused any multinational scrutiny in the criminal actions of their own occupation.
     This is not the first time that Israel used exaggerated force against Palestinian demonstrators and then turned around and blamed the victims. Ten years ago, Israeli soldiers killed 17 Palestinians at the Haram al Sharif compound. I helped a "60 Minutes" team determine what happened. Their results completely contradicted the Israeli version of events. Mike Wallace and his team found that the rabbi of the Western Wall had lied to the press when he claimed that loud speakers from the mosque were saying "idbah al yahood" (kill the Jews). An amateur video shot by an American tourist and later shown at the U.N. shows that all the Muslim leaders speaking on the public address system had been trying to calm the Palestinians by asking them to stop throwing stones and not to endanger their own lives.
     The "60 Minutes" team also showed that Benjamin Netanyahu, then a senior official in the Likud government, had misled the press by showing huge rocks that he said had been thrown by Palestinians. A visit by "60 Minutes" to the mosque and a camera shot of the 20-foot-high wall belied the possibility of any person being able to throw such huge rocks. Months later, an Israeli government inquest backed up what the "60 Minutes" team had discovered.
     The international community should not allow Israel once more to get away with murder. Israel has another choice--simply admit its mistakes, ask for forgiveness and come to the peace table with proposals that comply with international law and can become the basis for a true peace.

Daoud Kuttab Is the Director of the Institute of Modern Media at Al Quds University. E-mail: Dkuttab@amin.org

Helen Schary Motro – October 8, 2000 – The Boston Globe

T FIRST I STARED with the rest of the horrified world at the photo of the anonymous Palestinian father holding his anonymous Palestinian son - father wounded, son dead. Only after reading the description in the newspaper did I realize he was not anonymous to me. The boy's father was our Jamal. Our Jamal, who had helped build my Israeli house at the height of the Intifadah and worked in my home afterwards maintaining it.

I knew Jamal by his first name. This week, reading his story, I learned his whole identity: Jamal al-Durrah. I had just had my baby when I met Jamal; his wife was pregnant with their first child. I tried to give him my old maternity clothes, but Jamal turned his back, too proud to accept them. The terrified boy the world saw screaming in the crook of his father's arm and slumped dead a moment later was the child Jamal's wife had been carrying.

In 1988 Jamal was an angry young man. Tall, thin, and glowering, he spoke in monosyllables and refused the coffee I took out to the workers. He would go silently to the periphery of the unfinished patio and brew his own over a tiny portable gas heater.

One day Jamal carved his name in English into the wet cement of the wall he was building in my garden: ''Jamal '88,'' in a loping schoolboy's hand. I complained to the contractor, his Israeli boss. The next morning there were fresh swirls in the cement. Jamal's signature was gone. Ten years later I hired the same contractor to repaint my house. The Jamal who walked up the garden stairs was a changed man. He was 35 but looked 50. He limped and his hair was flecked with gray.

For a decade Jamal had been rising from his bed at 3:30 a.m. to take the bus at 4 to the border crossing, then board a second bus an hour later out of Gaza, to begin work at 6. This backbreaking cycle of physical labor was a journey he prayed to make; without it there would be no work at all.

Jamal smiled, and I did too. There was something of friends in our greeting, but even as I say that word, I know it is not true. Beyond the economic inequality, we could never look at each other without nationalities in mind. His Arabness hung in the air, as did my Jewishness.

I wondered what could I, transplanted to this soil from another place, represent for Jamal.

Now Jamal drank my coffee, and he laughed, I hope this is real coffee - not Jewish Nescafe.

After the paint job was finished Jamal had time before the bus pickup taking him out of Israel before sundown back to occupied Gaza. He helped rehang my diplomas on the freshly white wall.

With difficulty Jamal made out the Gothic letters, and he read out loud, New York University. With a hundred tiny nails he repaired the old wood frame of the reproduction of Renoir's ''Girl with a Watering Can'' hanging in my daughter's room. Jamal told me he now had six children. This time he accepted the bags of used clothing and discarded toys I left for him to take.

Jamal's children wore my children's sweaters and played with their Lego. My daughter is 12, as Jamal's boy was. Jamal's boy loved to swim in the sea; my daughter is on a swim team. My daughter walks to school beside cypress trees, amid bougainvillea. Her pet dog waits impatiently for her to come home. Jamal's son had pet birds. But had his son lived to be a grandfather, he and my daughter would never have met.

Jamal lies with multiple gun wounds in a Jordanian hospital, his son killed by an errant Israeli bullet. And from his hospital bed, everybody in Israel heard him say live to them on radio: ''I am a man of peace. We two peoples must live together. There is no other possibility, no other possibility.'' A little later, Jamal spoke to me, too, from his hospital bed. I asked him what he wishes for his remaining children. My children?

''To grow as all the children in the world,'' his voice broke. ''That they will be surrounded by all good things and nothing bad.''

The Renoir he fixed is still hanging in the next room. I sit in my garden looking at Jamal's wall, recalling his defiant young man's graffiti. It is an old wall by now. We are all caught in the crossfire. Jamal's life has become a tragedy. And I try to understand: What is the meaning of his tragedy to my life?

Helen Schary Motro is an American lawyer and writer living in Israel.

A child's death only one reason for repentance

Rabbi Arthur Waskow – October 4– The Philadelphia Inquirer

In Gaza, on the first day of Rosh Hashanah, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a 12-year-old Palestinian boy as the boy's father begged them to stop shooting.

For some Jews on the first, and for some on the second day of Rosh Hashanah, we read the story of Abraham's near-sacrifice of his son Isaac. The account in Genesis 22 ends with this line: Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, do not do anything to him!

Must a child - and more than 50 others - Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs and Palestinians - die so that in the person of Ariel Sharon, the Jewish people can insist on political sovereignty over the rock where Isaac was bound and where the angel saved him?

We have barely begun the Ten Days of Tshuvah - which means repentance - and already as a people we must face our responsibility for the death of this young man and of other Palestinians. And for the deaths of Israelis as well, who are still sent to die - to occupy the territory that must be the grounding of a Palestinian state if there is ever to be peace.

We also must be responsible to say to the Palestinians that precisely because we understand their rage we believe they must express it in nonviolent ways, if their rage and Israeli fear are ever to be resolved in a decent peace.

We must speak to our own deepest selves. For all Jews who have any serious spiritual commitments, is it not idolatry to make physical possession of the rock on which Isaac (according to the story) was almost sacrificed, such a central element of Judaism that we are prepared to die and to kill for it?

We must speak to the official American Jewish leadership, many of whom have criticized even the limited compromises Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak has offered for sharing sovereignty over the Temple Mount. And to the Israeli government, which did not prevent and did not condemn Sharon's arrogant visit; which did not restrict soldiers to tear gas but allowed the use of lethal weapons in addressing protests by outraged Palestinians; and which has for months been fueling a growing rage among Palestinians. For even while the peace negotiations continued, the Israeli Army was still demolishing Palestinian houses, driving roads through Palestinian lands in ways that isolated different sections of the emerging Palestine from each other, and allowing more settlers to arrive on the West Bank. And to the American government, saying that Jews do not support the smashing of Palestinian homes and the cementing of Palestinian farmland.

Perhaps this Yom Kippur is when Jews need to make ourselves the angels, messengers of the Most High, to face the Israeli and Palestinian leadership. At noon this Sunday, on the day before we gather in our synagogues, let us gather at Israeli and Palestinian offices, embassies and consulates - wearing Yom Kippur white clothing, sounding the shofar of alarm and tshuvah, to say:

Do not stretch out your hands against our children!

Killing the bud of Mideast peace

By Mary Ellen McNish – October 4, 2000 – The Philadelphia Inquirer

An Open Letter to the governments of Israel, Palestine and the United States.

Today marks the 131st anniversary of the birth of Mohandas K. Gandhi. While the world remains a place of violent conflict between nations and peoples, his example of nonviolence in the face of oppression is an enduring and powerful message. The American Friends Service Committee, founded on the Quaker principles of nonviolence and the transforming power of love, is particularly mindful of his legacy today, even as we witness the unfolding of another tragedy for the peoples of Palestine and Israel.

According to press reports, over the last five days, at least 40 Palestinians and two Israelis have been killed and hundreds injured in violent confrontations that erupted following a visit to the Haram al Sharif plaza/ Temple Mount in East Jerusalem by Israeli Likud Party leader Ariel Sharon and a phalanx of Israeli troops. At this critical moment in the interrupted negotiations between Israel and Palestine over the status of Jerusalem, no single act by an Israeli leader could have been more provocative or more effective as a means to torpedo those negotiations.

Even if Mr. Sharon didn't intend for there to be a sustained violent reaction, especially after more than a week of escalating tension, inflammatory rhetoric and sporadic violence between Palestinians and Israelis, he should have known that his presence within the confines of the Haram al Sharif would provoke a strong reaction among the Palestinian people - and not only Muslims who revere it as one of Islam's most holy sites.

This is not the first time that Mr. Sharon has shown indifference to the fatal consequences of his actions when those fatalities are Arabs. His culpability in the massacre of hundreds of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon in 1982 has not been forgotten by Palestinians and may help explain the intensity of Palestinians' reactions.

Mr. Sharon's actions must be condemned in the strongest language. The government of Israel also bears significant responsibility by not stopping Mr. Sharon before the fact, by not rebuking his action after the fact, and then by reacting to the Palestinian outbursts with an unmeasured and disproportionate show of force.

At the same time, AFSC does not condone the violence shown by Palestinian civilians and police against Israelis. We urge the Palestinian government to call an immediate cease-fire and to take steps to avoid further armed confrontations with the Israeli forces.

We call on the government of Israel to re-enter negotiations with the Palestinian Authority as soon as possible with the intent of reaching an agreement with regard to Jerusalem which respects the national rights and interests of Israelis and Palestinians.

We urge both Palestinians and Israelis to show restraint and not abandon the course of peace.

We call on the United States government to take the lead in bringing the parties together and to deepen its commitment to promoting and facilitating just and lasting peace for Palestinians and Israelis.

It is not too late. On this, the anniversary of Gandhi's birth, we reaffirm our belief in the power of active nonviolence to end injustice and our commitment to the peoples of Israel and Palestine to accompany them in their journey to a just peace and reconciliation.