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Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of , Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict.
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By Dr. Aaron Lerner
April 17, 2005
"Talk now, comply later -- if ever." That's what PA head Mahmoud Abbas and others pressing for immediate final status really mean.
Well maybe Israel should take Mr. Abbas up on his offer.
But instead of basing its negotiating positions on the negotiating on the apparently unrealistic assumption that the Palestinians will ever honor their obligations -- in particular their security obligations -- Israel could approach final status talks with the refreshingly sober attitude that, photo-opportunities and wishful thinking notwithstanding, the Palestinians are never going to be serious about dropping the terror and violence option.
And there certainly has been a lot of wishful thinking.
President Bush and his teams certainly talk the talk about wanting the Palestinians to honor their security obligations, but they bend over backwards to praise Mahmoud Abbas -- carefully ignoring that he wants to integrate the terrorists into the PA security forces rather than disarm them.
And it doesn't end there.
Last Wednesday White House Spokesperson Scott McClellan went so far as to explain that it was OK if Hamas took over control of the PA via the ballot box since the Hamas candidates would be "business professionals --- not terrorists."
[Question: In the event that Hamas, a terrorist organization not yet disarmed by the PA, wins a majority in the legislative PA, will the Bush administration still send $350 million U.S. taxpayer dollars to the PA, or not?
McCLELLAN: It's - the one thing that you see when people have elections that are free and fair is that they tend to choose people who are committed to improving their livelihood, not people who are committed to terrorist acts. And I think if you look back at the previous Palestinian elections, the people that were elected, while they might have been members of Hamas, they were business professionals. They were people that ran on talking about improving the quality of life for the Palestinian people and addressing their economic needs and addressing other needs that are important to them -- not terrorists.]
I wonder if Mr. McClellan had to see a chiropractor after delivering that line.
Unfortunately, it seems that the Bush White House has embraced the Clinton White House's "no failing grade" policy when it comes to Palestinian compliance.
And that's not all. The White House also has only praise for Egypt, the nation that serves as the conduit for almost all the weapons flowing into the Gaza Strip. The fact that Egypt only finally got around to detaining one person associated with anti-aircraft missile smuggling as Prime Minister Ariel Sharon made his way to Crawford speaks volumes about what they haven't done.
What could Israel accept in final status talks based on the assumption that the Palestinians will never honor their security obligations?
Certainly not an entity with such elements of sovereignty as control of their borders and ports.
Certainly not an entity with armed forces of a size or strength beyond the scope required for the maintenance of domestic order.
And certainly not an entity with a geographic configuration that could facilitate both a bloody war of attrition against the Jewish State as well as an effective diversionary campaign to bog down Israeli forces in the event of an Arab invasion.
Talk now - Palestinian compliance never? Only if the citizens of Israel can be certain that their representatives at the talks will have their eyes wide open and the intestinal fortitude to act accordingly.
Unfortunately, given Mr. Sharon's recent track record and the front-running midgets now vying to replace him it is doubtful that this condition can be met for the foreseeable future.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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