With the recently published details of the Quartet?s ?Road Map? for Middle East peace, the shocking reality now evident is that the Oslo process is even more alive under Likud Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Christian Republican President George W. Bush than ever it was under Labor super-dove Ehud Barak and vacillating liberal leader Bill Clinton.
Many have argued that the hundreds of shattered Israeli families, and the thousands more whose lives have been traumatized by the violent outworking (not collapse) of the Oslo process, have effectively rendered it obsolete. Not so. Instead, shell-shocked Israel has watched unresistingly the discredited ?peace? plan morph into an even deadlier version of its former self. From Madrid to Oslo to the Road Map, the land-for-peace process has been no less a betrayal of Israel than Great Britain?s act of treachery towards Czechoslovakia was in 1938.
Together with Madrid - forced upon Israel at the point of a financial aid gun by the Bush-Baker team in 1991 - Oslo bestowed international acceptance and legitimacy on the flagrant Palestinian Arab effort to steal Israel?s biblical and historical land. Evil as these efforts were, they were at least predicated upon the Israelis and the Arabs working their problems out between themselves. And, insofar as this was the case, the control over Israel?s destiny remained in the hands of the country?s democratically elected leaders. But that situation was set to change.
Back in July 2001, US Secretary of State Colin Powell expressed his belief that as the process moved ahead, "there will be a need for monitors and observers to... make an independent observation of what has happened." Wrote Jerusalem Post columnist Saul Singer at the time, ?Pressure for an observer force is bound to increase. The international community will wonder why Israel should so adamantly refuse what seems like a sensible measure for its own security - unless, of course, Israel has something to hide.?
It has actually been many years now that the gentile world has sought to worm its way into the Jewish state and wrest final control over its destiny. The Road Map would finally accomplish this, placing that power in the hands of a third party - an arbitrator with the power of attorney as the prime decision maker on Israel?s ultimate fate. Were that party just, fair and honest, a powerful ally would be lined up behind Israel. But only one quarter of the Quartet has shown any inclination to support Israel in the past. And while the US has used its veto power in the Security Council in Israel?s defense when it has been in America?s interest to do so, its historically anti-Israel State Department is now a prime plotter of the Road Map. The pro-Palestinian track record of the other three quarters - the United Nations, the European Union, and Russia - is virtually unspotted by any show of empathy towards Israel. Under the new plan, writes The Jerusalem Post?s Caroline Glick, the Quartet will now ?determine the outcome of negotiations and Israel will be reduced to a bit player whose views will be ?taken into account.??
With the Road Map locking in the establishment of an internationally recognized Palestinian state by the end of 2003 - whether or not the Palestinians follow through on their obligations, and despite the accumulated mountain of proof that such a state would seek to destroy what is left of Israel - the Quartet?s plan poses a clear and present danger to the existence of the Israeli state. Not to mention what the plan does to the memories of the countless Jews who died for the lack of a homeland before 1948, and who have fallen in defense of that homeland since its rebirth.
By permitting the insertion of international observers, Sharon will be passing to the notoriously antagonistic (towards Israel) world the handle of the knife it has long been sharpening for the dismemberment of the Jewish homeland. The clamor - already being heard from the lips of such luminaries as Nelson Mandela - for the United Nations to deal with Israel as it has dealt with Yugoslavia and Iraq, is growing all the time. Once the Quartet has determined that a Palestinian state can be recognized internationally, the world body will demand that the UN enforce the creation of that state and ensure its protection against further Israeli ?aggression.?
By allowing the United Nations in, Israel itself will be opening the way for a UN-led coalition of forces to eventually come against her in war.
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Stan Goodenough is Editor of the Jerusalem Newswire.
Many have argued that the hundreds of shattered Israeli families, and the thousands more whose lives have been traumatized by the violent outworking (not collapse) of the Oslo process, have effectively rendered it obsolete. Not so. Instead, shell-shocked Israel has watched unresistingly the discredited ?peace? plan morph into an even deadlier version of its former self. From Madrid to Oslo to the Road Map, the land-for-peace process has been no less a betrayal of Israel than Great Britain?s act of treachery towards Czechoslovakia was in 1938.
Together with Madrid - forced upon Israel at the point of a financial aid gun by the Bush-Baker team in 1991 - Oslo bestowed international acceptance and legitimacy on the flagrant Palestinian Arab effort to steal Israel?s biblical and historical land. Evil as these efforts were, they were at least predicated upon the Israelis and the Arabs working their problems out between themselves. And, insofar as this was the case, the control over Israel?s destiny remained in the hands of the country?s democratically elected leaders. But that situation was set to change.
Back in July 2001, US Secretary of State Colin Powell expressed his belief that as the process moved ahead, "there will be a need for monitors and observers to... make an independent observation of what has happened." Wrote Jerusalem Post columnist Saul Singer at the time, ?Pressure for an observer force is bound to increase. The international community will wonder why Israel should so adamantly refuse what seems like a sensible measure for its own security - unless, of course, Israel has something to hide.?
It has actually been many years now that the gentile world has sought to worm its way into the Jewish state and wrest final control over its destiny. The Road Map would finally accomplish this, placing that power in the hands of a third party - an arbitrator with the power of attorney as the prime decision maker on Israel?s ultimate fate. Were that party just, fair and honest, a powerful ally would be lined up behind Israel. But only one quarter of the Quartet has shown any inclination to support Israel in the past. And while the US has used its veto power in the Security Council in Israel?s defense when it has been in America?s interest to do so, its historically anti-Israel State Department is now a prime plotter of the Road Map. The pro-Palestinian track record of the other three quarters - the United Nations, the European Union, and Russia - is virtually unspotted by any show of empathy towards Israel. Under the new plan, writes The Jerusalem Post?s Caroline Glick, the Quartet will now ?determine the outcome of negotiations and Israel will be reduced to a bit player whose views will be ?taken into account.??
With the Road Map locking in the establishment of an internationally recognized Palestinian state by the end of 2003 - whether or not the Palestinians follow through on their obligations, and despite the accumulated mountain of proof that such a state would seek to destroy what is left of Israel - the Quartet?s plan poses a clear and present danger to the existence of the Israeli state. Not to mention what the plan does to the memories of the countless Jews who died for the lack of a homeland before 1948, and who have fallen in defense of that homeland since its rebirth.
By permitting the insertion of international observers, Sharon will be passing to the notoriously antagonistic (towards Israel) world the handle of the knife it has long been sharpening for the dismemberment of the Jewish homeland. The clamor - already being heard from the lips of such luminaries as Nelson Mandela - for the United Nations to deal with Israel as it has dealt with Yugoslavia and Iraq, is growing all the time. Once the Quartet has determined that a Palestinian state can be recognized internationally, the world body will demand that the UN enforce the creation of that state and ensure its protection against further Israeli ?aggression.?
By allowing the United Nations in, Israel itself will be opening the way for a UN-led coalition of forces to eventually come against her in war.
--------------------------------------------------------
Stan Goodenough is Editor of the Jerusalem Newswire.