Critique of ATFPA critique by Mazin Qumsiyeh of ATFP op-ed in the Jordan Times. My comments in bold and numbered (in case you want to send me back some feedback on specific comments).
OF ELECTIONS, STAGNATION AND PEACE
By Raafat Dajani
Jordan Times, Opinion (Jordan)
February 19, 2004
As the Intifada approaches its 3-year milestone at a cost of almost 3,000 Palestinian and 1,000 Israeli dead, the question inevitably arises as to what role the United States will assume in addressing this conflict, given the natural tendency of past administrations to avoid the potential negative electoral consequences of dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in an election year.
1) The Intifada was not the cause of 3000 Palestinian and 1000 Israeli dead. The occupation and colonization system (including its army) were responsible. Land confiscation, ethnic cleansing, violent murder of Palestinain civilians with its predictable consequences were the cause. 2) The part about “negative electoral consequences” simply presupposes that a president who watches for US as opposed to Israeli interests will be somehow punished. But even if one takes such a defeatist attitude, what precisely are we to draw as a conclusion? That we should let “electoral consequences” (i.e. Israeli lobby) dictate US policy forever?
President George Bush's Jan. 20, 2003, State of the Union address managed to disappoint even the much-lowered expectations of those
concerned with Mideast peace. The speech entirely ignored the issue, not even using the words “Israel” or “Palestine”.
This perception was reinforced by the president's Library of Congress speech on democracy in the Middle East, on Feb. 4. Once again, there
was not a single mention of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. All indications thus strongly point to the Bush administration's placing
the roadmap into deep freeze, at least until after the November 2004 elections.
3) The underlying assumption of this paragraph is that the United States plays a neutral or even a positive role in periods between elections. As any analysis of US policy would show, the US role has always been in support of the status quo -occupation and colonization . A good primer on this is Dr. Naseer Aruri’s book “Dishonest Broker” and Noam Chomsky’s “Fateful Triangle”
The president's public speeches indicating US disengagement from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict indicate that the US believes that the
ongoing conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians is a lost cause and a waste of time and political capital.
Nonsense. 4) The Bush administration has key people like Wolfowitz, Perle, Abrams and others who are towing the classic Zionist lines. They are not disengaged nor are they ignoring the issue. They are doing precisely what hey want to do. Witness the latest vetoes at the UN Security Council, the vote at the General Assembly, the objection to the International court giving an advisory opinion on the apartheid wall, the arm twisting in Europe to get the EU in line etc etc. 5) The reductionist approach to an Israeli-Palestinian conflict is far too simplistic. For example, there are many Palestinians (including me) who have more in common with many Israelis than we do with people like the Arafat crowd
The thinking is that the United States has achieved its strategic goal in preventing the spread of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to neighboring countries. In that vein, Washington's concern about preventing escalation means that it will keep close watch on Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for fear
that he will ignite the region through some excessive military action.
6) Is the US interest in maintaining low-level conflict consistent with International law or human rights. Did it make life better or worse for Palestinians in the occupied territories in the past 36 years or in the refugee camps in the past 56 years?
The US will pressure Israel quietly and privately, taking advantage of the close relationship it has with Sharon and with the knowledge that
he will not do anything to seriously endanger that. This has yielded limited results, such as a shift of the original route of the separation barrier in some areas closer to the Green Line, pressure on the settlement outposts and some change in the humanitarian situation in the territories.
7) The first part f this maybe true and in line of US governmental interests in maintaining status quo (meaning low level conflict and continued occupation and oppression). But the second part simply does not follow. It assumes things that are simply not there. Bush said “freeze settlements” and instead settlements are expanding with nearly 80 million extra allocated in 2003 (excluding 1.3 billion for the apartheid wall). The wall route adjustments, if they happen, have nothing to do with preventing “escalation”. They have to do with cosmetic attempts of Bush and company to garner some PR especially with European leaders. Fundamentally, there is no “close watch” on Sharon. There is (as both sides say privately and publicly) close cooperation and consultation on these issues. There is no evidence of pressure” and there will never be pressure on Israel (privately or publicly). The Bush administration “upgraded” the Israeli request for loan guarantees by one billion dollars and then cynically cut the loan guarantees by $40 million. How much more of a proof of lack of seriousness do you want.
The Arab world, divided and busy with the survival of its regimes rather than with concern for the Palestinians, will continue to pay only lip service to the issue.
8)Agreed but you should add that most of these leaders are propped up by Washington and they rule against the wishes of their people. Most Arab people want Palestine free and US imperialism out of the area. Such will be the status of Arafat. In actuality, Bush had placed the “Palestinian authority” on indefinite probation which will be lifted only when they prove they can act just like other US vassal leaders in the Arab world. Only then will they be allowed to have a portion (10-20%) of historic Palestine for a demilitarized and dependent statelet. At least 80% of the land will be and most of the natural resources will be reserved for the “only state for the Jewish people”> This Jewish state will continue with full sovereignty, discriminatory laws, the fourth strongest army in the world, and nuclear, biological, and chemical arsenal. But the history dictated by political leaders and army generals is not the same as the history of people.
The White House, meanwhile, rejects claims of negligence, repeating the mantra that “the president is involved” and promising that the coming new order in the region will reinvigorate the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and bring democracy and freedom to the Arab world.
The problem with this approach is that the facts on the ground aren't waiting for either the coming new order or for Arab democracy. Meanwhile, vital US interests in the region continue to be damaged.
9) Whose interests and which part of the US are you talking about. US military industrial complex interests are certainly advanced. US taxpayer interests is harmed. Jobs will continue to bleed and the threat to our economy continues and increases by the policies of this administration (will not be any better under Kerry BTW so vote Green).
Despite Sharon's using the word “occupation” for the first time recently and despite his acceptance of the inevitability of a Palestinian state, most analysts believe that he is determined to prevent the establishment of a politically and economically viable Palestinian state based on the June 4, 1967, lines. He is willing, for the time being, to accept a Palestinian state comprising roughly 45 per cent of the West Bank because he knows that such a state will be weak and neither economically nor politically viable. Israel will surround
the area, controlling all points of access and will be able to intervene militarily at will.
10) But that is not just Sharon’s plan. That is also Peres and Bush and Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld. Focusing on Sharon is as foolish as focusing on Arafat.
To realize this plan, Sharon has a multitude of weapons at his disposal: the separation barrier, which has already resulted in the annexation of 16 per cent of West Bank land, the building of settlements and construction of Israeli-only bypass roads intersecting Palestinian land, and the destruction of Palestinian civil, political
and educational institutions. The resulting despair will create the conditions that will force the Palestinians to leave “voluntarily”.
These Israeli actions are continuing and even accelerating as the 2004 US election approaches, since the post-election landscape is unknown and may not be as friendly. Sharon's most recent statements regarding a Gaza pullout are not inconsistent with this plan and have consequently been greeted with a great deal of scepticism.
11) By whom? The Palestinian people do not greet these plans (not Sharon’s but Zionist in general) with skepticism but with certain knowledge acquired from history of what such Zionist leaders have done.
A Financial Times editorial on Feb. 4 stated that “appearing to give up so much will make it easier to take elsewhere — from the West Bank”. The division of the West Bank envisaged under the security barrier is consistent with the map Sharon drew up for the West Bank in 1982, known as Military Order Number 50. This was echoed the next day in the Israeli English-language daily Haaretz. In an opinion titled “Gaza in exchange for the West Bank”, Aluf Benn writes: “Sharon is prepared to pay with the evacuation of Gaza for American consent to Israel's continued control over a large part of the West Bank.”
12) If we both agree on this, why is the Palestinian authority and Arafat begging to meet with Sharon without any reference to Palestinian rights or International law?
The attacks of Sept. 11 triggered a diplomatic effort on the part of the United States to improve its image in the Arab and Muslim worlds, especially with the youth. Radio Sawa has developed a wide audience for its music in the Middle East, an Arabic-English magazine, “Hi”, avoids politics to inform the Arab world of American culture and life, and a
satellite television station “Al Hurra”, meaning “The free” in Arabic, was launched in mid-February. Experts on the region, however, have pointed out that audiences in the Middle East are generally sceptical about this and other US government efforts to improve America's image, because a clear distinction is made between American words and deeds. While the music played on Radio Sawa is enjoyed, not much credence is given to the hourly news broadcasts, considered “American propaganda”.
13) The attacks of September 11 were also cynically used to advance preexisting agendas that invove violence and violation of International and humanitarian law. See http://www.al-awda.org/thewaroniraq/
The Palestinian issue remains and will continue to remain the main sore in the Arab and Muslim psyche, and until the US takes vigorous and
balanced steps to push for a peaceful two-state solution, the tens of millions of dollars spent on improving America's image will be wasted.
14)There is no such thing as a viable two (sovereign) state solution now and the one and a quarter state solution will never work. See http://qumsiyeh.org
Moving towards a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict requires a robust and active process of reengagement by the US. For this reengagement to succeed and be perceived by the Arab and Muslim worlds as sincere, it must consist of the following components: — A clear and unequivocal articulation by the United States of an “end-game” for the process, not limited simply to a Palestinian state, which even Sharon has accepted. What such a statement needs to include is the words “based on the 1967 borders”, for it to have legitimacy among the Palestinians and provide them with a firm political horizon. Just as importantly, it will invigorate the large majorities of Israelis and Palestinians who support a two-state solution. — Engage, recruit and encourage a “constituency of peace” of Jewish Americans, Israelis, Arab
Americans and Arab states who support this vision.
15) See above regarding “reengagement by the US”. But why “based on the 1967 borders”? Why not simply “based on International law” and “human rights”; key words missing from the road map and all US initiatives for simple and Zionist/racist reasons. 16) It is simply not true that a majority of Palestinians support the two state solution as envisaged by Bush or the Geneva accord. I know very few Palestinians who support a “Jewish state for the Jewish people” on 78% of Palestine (with all the discrimination codified in Israeli basic laws (Israel has no consitution but a set of basic laws to ensure it remains a state for and by “Jewish people everywhere”). Unfortunately many of those Palestinians who have internalized defeat are in key positions in the Palestinian “authority” thanks to Zionist/US imperial interests. None of them lost anything in the last three years and most are not subject to Israeli restrictions as are other Palestinians.
Polls have consistently shown a majority of both Palestinians and Israelis in support of a two-state solution. A Baker Institute poll in
November 2003 found that a majority of Israeli and Palestinians (53.3 per cent of Israelis and 55.6 per cent of Palestinians) supported a
two-state solution based on the 1967 lines, with minor mutually agreed upon adjustments.
17) The devil is in the detail. No info here given about the right of return, a sacred human right and codified by international law (whether under one or two state solutions). The poll did not include the vast majority of Palestinians who were ethnically cleansed
A Zogby International poll of 500 Jewish and Arab Americans, taken in mid-January 2004, found that Arab and Jewish Americans back US engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, but are also disappointed with Bush's performance in the region.
18) Why do you use the classic Zionist formulation of “Jewish and Arab.” There is no such equivalency and certainly there are Arab Jews (Jews whose mother tongue is Arabic). Judaism is a religion. Arab refers to anyone who speaks Arabic regardless of his or her ethnic or religious background.
Seventy-six per cent of Jewish respondents rated Bush's performance as negative, compared with 75 per cent of Arab respondents; 73 per cent of Arab Americans and 72 per cent of American Jews said they would be more likely to support a political candidate who says the United States must be actively engaged in trying to bring peace between Israelis and Palestinians. — Appoint a high-level US presidential envoy to the Middle East to work full-time on Israeli-Palestinian peace. Such an envoy would need to be, and perceived to be, empowered by the president. He or she would oversee each side taking reciprocal steps with close monitoring. On the Israeli side, this would include a complete cessation of all settlement activity, an end to targeted assassinations, a removal of checkpoints, a freeze on sections of the separation barrier encroaching on Palestinian land, and the creation of conditions for the Palestinians to fulfill their security and political obligations. On the Palestinian side, this would include the holding of Palestinian elections, a clear announcement of the end of the Intifada, a prompt and effective end to all acts of violence, and a consolidation of the
security services.
19) This is like sending the red fox to monitor the dialogue between the chickens and the black fox. When Dennis Ross was appointed US envoy to the region after working for the Israeli lobby in Washington DC. Like Martin Indyk working for AIPAC and then becoming US ambassador t Israel. Like Ellion Abrams and other really “neutral” envoys
Contrary to popular myth, such an effort on the part of the United States, although not guaranteed to succeed, will be appreciated in both the US and the Arab and Muslim worlds, and will not come at a political cost for the president. It would be highly advisable for the announcement of such an effort to come in the form of a presidential address to the nation. During this address, the president would articulate why it is in the critical national interests of the United States that an independent and viable Palestinian state be established. A Palestinian state is critical in the war against terrorism, critical for Israel's long-term security and critical for the flowering of democracy in the Middle East.
20) This is precisely what Bush and company hope to see. Quislings who talk and dreams and rub shoulders with the power centers but have no power. Uncle Tom.
The writer is executive director of the Washington-based American Task Force on Palestine.
21) As I critique this, Israeli forces continue ethnic cleansing, building apartheid walls etc. Palestinian resistance (as in all such resistance movements to colonization) seems to be classically bell-shaped. Tiny number of collaborators, some non-existent, Most non-violent, some violent, smaller extreme violence (suicide bombings included). The underpinning (etiology) of these syndromes needs to be addressed. The core of this is the theft of land from native people to build an exclusionary system based on promoting members (practicing or not) of one religion at the expense of others. Without facing this reality head on, there will not be a durable peace. Mazin http://qumsiyeh.org
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