Re: NP Bushspeak

on 27/6/02 12:20 PM, [email protected] at [email protected] wrote:
> 
> Isn't Israel breaking all kinds of international treaties and agreements as
> it is?  The occupation, the settlements, suspected war crimes and massacres.
> Everything they've been doing lately breaches some agreement or other.

Perhaps. You'd need to be more specific I guess, but you're probably right.
Atrocities are being committed by both sides. And it has to be acknowledged
that Bush is quite critical of Israel in the speech too:

"As we make progress towards security, Israel forces need to withdraw fully
to positions they held prior to September 28, 2000. And consistent with the
recommendations of the Mitchell Committee, Israeli settlement activity in
the occupied territories must stop."

But I don't think that it progresses the push for peace to keep trying to
fix the blame onto one side or the other, or to compare death tallies. The
point remains that a peace deal won't be effective until it is binding on
both sides, and it won't be binding on both sides until there is unity
amongst the Palestinians. If that's all it will take, then - for the sake of
the Palestinian people if nothing else - Arafat or someone needs to
guarantee that unity. It might be that he needs to organise a leadership
council where the factional militants have a say in the way the deal is
worked out, or it might mean one of the Hamas or Hezbollah principals needs
to take over. It doesn't matter who the leader is - Bush doesn't name anyone
in either camp, note - as long as the agreement is binding on both sides.
Arafat's certainly been around as Palestinian "leader" for long enough now:
either he's no longer regarded by his people as their representative
statesman or else he's happy for the bloodshed and retaliations to continue
as they are.

I'm not a "supporter" of the Israelis or the Palestinians or Bush or the
anti-Bush lobby. Most reasonable people aren't that dogmatic or
simple-minded, and it's not a soccer match after all. What I do support are
those initiatives working to eliminate terrorism and those which are seeking
a resolution of the current conflict in the Middle East. America and its
allies (the EU, Arab nations, and "key regional states", as Bush points out
in his speech) have a crucial role to play in working towards a lasting
solution, and peace - potentially. I don't agree with Monica - the example
of Afghanistan clearly demonstrates the current US Administration's capacity
and willingness to initiate "viable action" at a global level, and it's
foolish to underestimate what they can and will do. I can certainly
understand Paul's cynicism, and it is probably idealistic to expect a happy
resolution any time soon. But at least an effort is being made - I'd say
that any move to broker a peace deal in the Middle East is better than
letting things go on as they are or leaving it up to the parties involved to
try and effect a solution to the conflict. And I can certainly imagine the
hue and cry from the alternative media blowhards if the US and its allies
decided to just let it all go on without doing anything! If someone comes up
with a better idea to achieve peace in the Middle East then I'm happy to
hear it, and "support" it, but I'm not at all interested in the monotonous
whine of the sad and irrelevant little Campaign Gore 2000 losers still
bawling into their Farina.

http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/06/24/bush.mideast.speech/index.html

best


> It's
> disgusting when either side does it, but where I see the "main difference"
> is Israel's murder is State sponsored (and do I mean State!) and Palestine's
> is desperate rag tag rebels that Arafat could never get control of, least of
> all when his water and electricity are shut off, and his compound is
> surrounded by tanks. The only way to get them to stop is to let their lives
> be tolerable enough so death is not the better option than life.
>