By Yoram Getzler. For years now I have attended seminars, workshops and other “peace” events, at which various Palestinian officials, including Nabil Sha’ath has assured the audiences present, largely Israelis, that a “peace” agreement was just months or even only weeks away from completion.
On at least one occasion an important well known Israeli politician echoed that hopeful and fanciful sentiment.
Palestinians, Israelis UN bodies and various members of the international “Quartet” assured us that “everybody knows and agrees what the final agreement will look like!” and any delays were only an Israeli ploy. All this of course in English to Israeli, European and American ears.
This Final Agreement “everybody has seen, knows and agrees to” just needed some tees crossed, and a few i’s doted, no big thing! It was understood and often stated that this agreement included flexibility on the part of the Palestinians to the Right of Return issue, and would require Israel’s acquiescence. “We all knew” as well from the Israeli negotiators, press and government, that Israel would never agree to the return of the millions of Palestinians who somehow qualified for refugee status.
NOTE: In every other refugee situation on this planet, in modern history, the only refugees who qualified for the designation as refugees, and therefore assistance and/or a right of return, were the individuals who were expelled. NOT their families and relatives ad infinitum.
Here the Palestinians have managed to qualify endless generations for assistance and legal desegregation as refugees, and thereby eligible for “return”. In this and future generations; why are the Palestinians different from all other refugees?
Anyway as of this week in April 2011 the PA in the person of its chief negotiator has officially and in English stated clearly that the agreement we “All knew” is and was in fact a fantasy. And is officially rejected! PERIOD
PA, Hamas, reject any peace plan without right of return By KHALED ABU TOAMEH Sunday 23/04/2011
“Sha’ath: “Right of return is basic right Palestinians couldn’t give up”; Hamas says strongly opposed to new US peace initiative.”
http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/PrintArticle.aspx?id=217641
Another important component of this Final Agreement “We all accept and know” was that the large Israeli communities built in the last forty years adjacent to the armistice/cease fire lines of 1949 would become a recognized part of the state of Israel, in return for which the Palestinians would receive equal areas of territory from west of that green line. In other words a land exchange. The logic of this “agreed known” (“that everybody accepts”) accord is that 2/3 of the Jewish population living in what is agreed will become the Palestinian state live in these few communities, also known as “settlement blocks”
Only problem, all this has been said/known in English.
The last (Fifth) official meeting of the Fatah Revolutionary Council (conducted in Arabic) was held in November 2010. At that council, Fatah, the “moderate” and controlling component of the Palestinian political establishment, voted and passed a number of resolutions. Not only were “Land swaps as part of a peace agreement …ruled out”, but in a resolution pertaining to the most basic, foundational component that “we all know and accept”, the Fatah council derogatorily rejected recognition of “the so-called Jewish state”. It also “reasserted the “right of return” which, if implemented, would facilitate the end of a Jewish majority within the pre-1967 Green Line by allowing about four million Palestinian refugees and their offspring to settle in Israel proper.
So what are we left with, that “we all know and agree on”, not much of the previous assumptions it was claimed we all knew and adreed.
We still know that the Palestinians will declare a policy of compromise in English to the international community and to Israel. We still know that in Arabic to their own community they will insist on standing firm on all their demands, which include non-recognition of our legitimate rights of statehood and the Right of Return for all “refugees”. After that, all the small stuff, like borders, water issues and settlement blocks, etc are meaningless commentary.
The changes we need to effect in our presence west of the Green Line (1949 to 1967 armistice line between Israel and the Arab world) are not to be confused with “peace”. We need to remove/withdraw the Israeli civilians from their communities in Judea and Samaria, with the exception of the “Settlement Blocks”. At minimum this will lessen the daily confrontation and irritation with the local Arab population and reduce the need for some of our military activity and expenditures . I know this is meaningless to the official leadership of the Palestinian people, Fatah, Hamas, and the international community as well, but they are actions that are OUR imperative. Its all we can do.
The imperative is to enhance our situation here and in the wider world, knowing full well the uncompromising nature of our enemy.
We must not allow Palestinian Arab duplicity to lock us into a situation which only serves to weaken, endanger, de-legitimate us to ourselves, other Jews and others in the world especially when it also distract us from our holy mission.
We much concern ourselves with our health and let the Palestinians deal with theirs while at the same time ensuring their inability to harm us.
