 |
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.
|
|
|
|
By Dr. Aaron Lerner
June 1, 2006
While claims by retreat proponents that Israeli withdrawals only serve to benefit the Jewish State may serve to help them in the domestic debate, their arguments could very well seriously handicap future Palestinian leaders who might be interested in striking a workable bargain.
Any future workable deal will, by its nature, require Palestinian compromise on such issues as the right of return of refugees to within Israel's borders, force/weapons limits inside the Palestinian entity and airspace control, just to name a few.
If the time is ever reached that Israel finds itself dealing with a serious Palestinian leadership that delivers on its obligations, those Palestinian leaders are going to have to convince their constituents that Palestinian concessions were matched by Israeli concessions in the give-and-take of the bargaining table.
The retreat from Gaza already took the Gaza "chips" off the table. Remarks by Olmert, Peres and others that additional retreats would be an Israeli gain rather than a sacrifice do not go unnoticed by the Palestinian street.
They could readily set the stage for a future stalemate as Palestinian negotiators, interested as much in their own survival as in making a deal, find the Palestinian public unimpressed by Israeli territorial concessions even if they are truly bare-bones Israeli red lines.
Rather than promote the chances for peace, these retreat advocate are jeopardizing the chances of ever negotiating a workable deal.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
|
|
|
|
Click on the blue headline to read a Talkback comment and respond to it. Click on the  icon to send a private email to the talkback writer. The icon appears only if the writer has decided to be contacted. If no popup window appears, please make sure your popup blocker allows israelinsider.com.
|
|
| |
|
|
