SPECIAL REPORT: Annapolis, Palestine, Israel and the Middle East

After virtually ignoring the enduring and explosive Palestinian-Israeli conflict for seven years, the Bush Administration sponsored the Annapolis Mideast conference. In this special issue we get views of several Arab and African commentators on the conference itself and the wider conflict and its history.

 

From Balfour to Bush

That the Palestinians would be the losers at Annapolis was a foregone conclusion, writes Saleh Al-Naami

 

Shaul Goldstein, leader of the Israeli settlers in the West Bank, had only praise for his prime minister, Ehud Olmert, after hearing the speeches of US President George W Bush, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) and Olmert at the Annapolis meeting on Tuesday. Speaking to Israeli television Channel 10, this stalwart of Israel's far right hailed the outcome of Annapolis as positive because it would allow settlements to expand in the West Bank. Goldstein's glee is in stark contrast to the feelings of most Palestinians who, reading the text of the speeches, could be left in no doubt that they are the losers.

 

The joint declaration read by President Bush at the start of his speech reiterated Israeli demands that the meeting would not issue a binding document of principles but instead a "declaration of intent". The statement underlined how far Abu Mazen had retreated from his earlier promises to the Palestinians that he would not go to Annapolis before agreeing on a declaration of principles that would address fundamental issues in the conflict, including the status of Jerusalem, five million Palestinian refugees and borders. The Palestinian negotiating team had also vowed not to travel to Annapolis until Olmert announced the freezing of Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian territory, a halt to construction of the apartheid, and the removal of military checkpoints around the West Bank.

 

As expected, the joint declaration failed to announce any deadline for the completion of negotiations. Bush promised to exert "great effort" to ensure that negotiations would end before his presidential term but failed to provide any details of the mechanisms that would make such a goal possible.

 

If Abu Mazen should be tempted to consider the Annapolis meeting, attended by representatives of 50 countries, as a success for the Palestinians on the grounds that the participating states will pressure Israel to adopt less intransigent positions, the joint statement, which stressed that negotiations between the two sides will be bilateral, with the American administration monopolising the role of adjudicator, must surely temper his optimism. The US administration, after all, has been monopolising the same role for 14 years.

 

More alarming, perhaps, is the fact that the declaration considers the roadmap the sole reference for the negotiating process, suggesting that talks between the two sides could continue indefinitely.

 

Bush may have stressed that both Israel and the Palestinians must fulfil their commitments outlined in the plan but the Americans and Israelis hold that these commitments must be successive. What this means in fact is that the PA must first fulfil its obligations and, if it succeeds, it will be the turn of Israel to meet its obligations. The PA then must succeed in the impossible task of disarming Palestinian resistance movements before Israel is obliged to lift a finger.

 

According to the Israeli media, both Bush and Olmert told Abu Mazen in their tripartite meeting that he must regain control of Gaza and halt the firing of missiles. It is a scenario that holds out the prospect of a Palestinian civil war.

 

Two months ago, Abu Mazen promised to work towards unifying the West Bank and Gaza. Now it seems the goal of unity is not to be pursued via dialogue with Hamas. Speaking to Israeli TV following Olmert's opening speech in Annapolis, Israeli deputy premier Avigdor Lieberman said that, "Abu Mazen and [Prime Minister Salam] Fayyad appeared more eager for Israel to reoccupy the Strip than the residents of Sederot [the settlement subjected to Palestinian shelling from Gaza]."

 

Difficult as it is to count the incidents of Palestinian failure at Annapolis, one of the most chilling moments came when Bush described Israel as the "national homeland of the Jews". The significance of the statement is not just that it presupposes the Palestinians will concede the right of return, it also paves the way for Israel "to expel the 1948 Palestinians", as Benny Alon, head of the Israeli Moledet Party, stated. Even Abdullah Abdullah, head of the political committee of the Palestinian Legislative Council and a close associate of Abu Mazen, thought the statement was "catastrophic".

 

"This means uprooting hundreds of thousands of our people from their land," he told Al-Ahram Weekly.

 

Hamas spokesman Salah Al-Bardaweil told the Weekly that Bush's statement was tantamount to a "new Balfour promise", while to Abdul-Sattar Qassem, professor of political science at An-Najah University, it represented an "attack on the collective consciousness of the Palestinians... They want us to protect the Israeli occupation and its institutions with American money."

 

Bush snubbed the Arab delegations that attended the meeting when he failed to make any reference to the 2002 Arab initiative, offering full normalisation with Israel in return for withdrawal to the 1967 borders, effectively draining their participation of any meaning. He then made matters worse by referring to his letter of guarantees sent to former Israeli premier Ariel Sharon as the most important reference point for the negotiations. The letter blocks the right of return, withdrawal to the 1967 borders and allows Israel to annex settlements built on occupied land. Syria, which was obliged to attend the meeting, was rewarded with no mention of the occupied Golan Heights in the speeches of either Bush or Olmert.

 

The subtexts to Bush's talk of "extremists" and the "forces of darkness", and Olmert's call for Arabs to participate with Israel in the war against fundamentalism, were clear to all, not least Dan Schueftan, head of the Israeli national security research centre. The Annapolis meeting, he said, had never been about resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but was convened to pave the way for an American strike against Iran in cooperation with the Arabs and Israel.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly

 

 

The Day After

The dust may have settled in Annapolis, but not in the Middle East. Dina Ezzat examines the aftermath of a controversial peace meeting

 

Arab and Israeli delegates who took part in the Annapolis diplomatic fiesta should be coming down from the excitement of the world-observed event to the sad truth of reality on the ground: continued Israeli occupation of Arab territories faced by a mix of deep resentment and outright resistance.

 

The Israeli delegation, however, is coming back with a victory: photos and signs of nascent normalisation with Arab countries and promises, declared and undeclared, of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Israel and member states of the Arab League. Over half of the Arab League's 22 states were represented, mostly at the foreign ministers level, in Annapolis.

 

The participation of Saudi Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, in particular, is a success story for the Israelis, despite the fact that Saudi envoy Prince Bandar Bin Sultan turned up at the 1991 Madrid peace conference and that Saudi delegates were present at some rounds of talks launched as part of the Madrid process.

 

Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, whose organisation is in theory the custodian of the Arab boycott of Israel pending a comprehensive and final peace deal, was also there. Moussa, who said he was attending under the umbrella of the Arab Peace Initiative and a "no normalisation before peace" understanding, is the first of the six secretary-generals of the Arab organisation to sit down at the same table with Israeli negotiators.

 

Hamas and many Arab public quarters expressed shock and dismay at the wide Arab participation and declined to accept the rationale offered by Moussa's speech in Annapolis that this participation is designed to support the Palestinian delegation and to impress upon the international community that it must act to secure at least some preliminary Arab demands, especially a freeze on Israeli settlement construction in the occupied Palestinian territories.

 

Meanwhile, Israeli and US officials praised the wide Arab participation, especially by countries with no diplomatic relations with Israel. In his opening ceremony speech, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert addressed present Arab -- as well as Islamic -- delegations and demanded normal relations with them. The demand had been repeatedly pressed on the eve of Annapolis and was seconded by Bush's inaugural speech.

 

ISRAELI GAINS ABOUND: The Israeli delegation is also coming back with renewed US acknowledgement of Israel as a "Jewish state" and "homeland for the Jewish people", as affirmed three times by US President George W Bush in his inaugural speech Tuesday. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warmly applauded the Bush speech. In his speech that followed he did not object to the characterisation of the "Jewish nature of Israel" nor its impact on the fate of 1948 Palestinians and the right of return of Palestinian refugees. Sources in Annapolis tell Al-Ahram Weekly that only a constrained Arab rejection of such characterisation was offered in the closed meetings that followed the opening.

 

Also in the bag for the Israeli delegation coming back from Annapolis is a televised promise of Abbas that his authorities will do whatever it takes to combat all forms of "terrorism" against the state of Israel in line with the roadmap plan for peace. "Unless otherwise agreed by the parties, implementation of the future peace treaty will be subject to the implementation of the roadmap, as judged by the United States," read a joint statement adopted in Annapolis.

 

Abbas, who albeit referred to continued Israeli occupation as the main cause behind "terrorism", added with a nod to a proud Olmert and smiling Bush that any act of "terror", irrespective of its rationale, remains inexcusable though international law affirms the right to resist belligerent occupation by all means, including armed struggle.

 

An informed American think-tank analyst told the Weekly from Washington that the US administration reassured Olmert, over and over, that a Palestinian state would not come to life until Israel is sure that Palestinian leaders -- be it President Abbas or someone else -- would be able to properly run such a state in line with Israel's security agenda. Any future Palestinian state, Bush said in his opening speech, should be able to contribute to the security of its people, of Israel, and that of the entire region.

 

Meanwhile, US/international promises of involvement in advancing Palestinian/Arab-Israeli talks were traded for Arab promises to advance signs of normalisation with Israel, instead of waiting for the conclusion of a comprehensive peace as stipulated by the Arab Peace Initiative. "Arabs need to get off the fence and understand that normalisation is not a prize for Israel," Tzipi Livni, Israeli foreign minister said in Annapolis.

 

In Annapolis too, the foreign minister of Bahrain said that a request made by his Israeli counterpart for diplomatic relations between Manama and Tel Aviv would be considered in the wake of Annapolis.

 

As such, the conditions set by Moussa -- and for that matter Al-Faisal -- on linking normalisation with a comprehensive peace deal were directly challenged in Annapolis -- despite the fact that both Arab diplomats declined to pause for cameras and handshake shots with Israeli officials. Moreover, statements made by Syrian officials suggesting that their delegation would firmly oppose any premature signs of normalisation were simply overruled.

 

Even more alarmingly, informed diplomatic sources told the Weekly that Olmert gained Palestinian and Arab assurances that only the symbolic return of a few hundred refugees would be included in a final status agreement. One source suggested that Canada is heavily involved in an accommodation plan for the majority of refugees that will be presented when the time is ripe.

 

Moreover, Arab diplomats privately said that several Arab capitals, including many those directly involved in the Arab-Israeli negotiations process, believe it "a waste of time" to dispute the "Jewish nature of Israel". As for East Jerusalem, Arabs are aware that as they were affirming their participation in Annapolis, the Israeli Knesset adopted a resolution stipulating that any change on the unified nature of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel would require the approval of 80 -- up from 61 -- of the 120 Knesset members.

 

In Annapolis, Olmert declined to grant his host's wish to launch final status talks in Washington, DC -- not even an elementary negotiations round would be allowed -- only a ceremonial inauguration was granted by the Israeli prime minister. It is back in the Middle East, Olmert said, that negotiations would start, on a bilateral level. According to the Annapolis joint statement, the first session of negotiations shall take place on 12 December.

 

Indeed, the maximum that Olmert gave in Annapolis was to sit quietly while Abbas made his speech and demanded a negotiated deal on core issues, as perceived by the Palestinian side, including a reference to East Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state "that will be open to West Jerusalem" and a reference to UN General Assembly Resolution 194 on the right of return, or to compensation, for Palestinian refugees of 1948.

 

Indeed, the joint statement of Annapolis does not make even a reference to an end of Israeli occupation of territories seized in 1967, or the land-for-peace principal that used to be the guideline of Arab-Israeli negotiations. The reference made in the statement to the loose 2008 deadline for the settlement of final status issues is as non-committal as it could be: "We agree to engage in vigorous, ongoing and continuous negotiations and shall make every effort to conclude an agreement before the end of 2008."

 

The Israeli delegation, meanwhile, is coming back having made a loose promise to ease adverse conditions for Palestinians on the ground, though always in line with the Israeli security priorities that were re-acknowledged by the Annapolis meeting. In establishing those security priorities, Olmert said clearly that he would not exclude the liquidation of wanted Palestinian militants -- in other words, targeted assassinations -- nor would he eschew military intervention in principle. On the eve of Annapolis, Israeli occupation forces killed six Palestinians.

 

EMPTY ARAB HANDS: In contrast to the Israelis, Arab delegates are coming back with mere assurances of US/international support for Palestinian-Israeli final status talks, as well as possible negotiations on the Syrian/Lebanese tracks. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice promised to exert a similar level of effort to that in the lead up to Annapolis. Such promises, however, are not coupled with a commitment to intervene should Israel fail to live up to the requirements of peacemaking.

 

"However, we are coming back to a different political context. It is a context whereby the clinically dead Palestinian and Israeli negotiation process is coming back to life. We are now talking about final status negotiations," commented a senior Arab diplomat who participated in Annapolis.

 

In statements on the eve of and during Annapolis, Bush, Rice and every American diplomat stated in no uncertain terms that no imposition would be put on Israel to undertake measures deemed incompatible with its security priorities and "Jewish nature". Avigdor Lieberman, Israeli strategic interests minister, summed up Annapolis with remarkable candour: it was "a terrific cocktail party and a fantastic photo opportunity with no chance of a breakthrough".

 

One additional secured outcome for the Israeli delegation was restated US-Israeli agreement on the need to step up pressure on, and perhaps even opt for military action to halt, Iran's nuclear activities. Moreover, agreement was affirmed between Israel and the US, with the support of some Arab delegations, on the need for further regional cooperation to contain pro-Iranian groups, especially Hamas and Hizbullah, who joined Tehran this week in rejecting Annapolis as a futile exercise in submission.

 

If it can be called a success, Arabs are coming back with promises by the international community -- especially usually generous European donors -- that financial support would be promptly offered to the Palestinian Authority (PA) for "early state institutions building", with an unmistakable emphasis laid on bolstering -- and likely reforming -- the PA's security apparatus to ensure that it effectively implement the demands of Phase I of the 2003 roadmap plan: curtail Islamist militant resistance groups.

 

Palestinian/Arab demands of a total freeze on Israeli settlements, an end to changes on the ground in East Jerusalem, and a firm and detailed international commitment to a more comprehensive peace process, were all but overlooked in Annapolis. Meanwhile, the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories is worsening. An already suffocated and starved Gaza is under threat of collective punishment by Israel in its plans to deny the impoverished Strip significant power supplies within a few days.

 

Karen Abu Zayd, head of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), said she hoped a high- stakes Israeli-Palestinian peace conference in Annapolis would improve living conditions in Gaza. She added that the UN wanted to see a neutral body monitoring crossings in and out of the occupied Palestinian territories. "One thing we can say hopefully about Annapolis is that this is an internationalisation of the problem," she told a European Parliament committee. "Let us hope that something comes out of [Annapolis] to show that."

 

Abu Zayd described new Israeli restrictions on movement in the West Bank, requiring Palestinians, including UNRWA staff, to obtain crossing permits and to enter and leave East Jerusalem on foot through mechanised terminals, as "crippling".

 

Hamas, provoked by and critical of the decision of Abbas to go to Annapolis without prior consultations with its leaders or those of other "opposition" Palestinian factions, is qualifying the Annapolis meeting as an attempt to encroach on legitimate Palestinian rights, especially in relation to East Jerusalem and the fate of refugees. The Palestinian people are not forced to honour any commitments that Palestinian negotiators make in Annapolis, Hamas leaders said this week during meetings in Gaza.

 

Wider Arab public opinion is not particularly supportive of Annapolis or its outcome either. Extensive live coverage carried by Arab satellite channels and polls conducted by many Internet sites reflected hardly any hope that the Annapolis meeting would stem the misery of the daily lives of Palestinians, much less kick-start final status talks. Still, Abbas called it "an opportunity that might not occur again".

 

POST-ANNAPOLIS STRATEGY: In a report issued on the eve of Annapolis, the International Crisis Group (ICG) acknowledged the regional and international political difficulties that are likely to defy the chances of building on whatever political momentum the Annapolis meeting secured to advance the seven-year stalled negotiations process. "The process that [was] launched [in] Annapolis may not quite be do-or-die for the Israeli- Palestinian peace process, but at the very least it is do-or-barely-survive," argued the ICG report, entitled The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Annapolis and After.

 

"To maximise the chances of success and minimise the costs of failure, the Israelis and Palestinians need to seriously confront permanent status issues, while taking steps to improve the situation on the ground," argued the report. It added that the "US and other international actors need to adopt a more proactive role, proposing timely compromises as well as imposing accountability for both sides' actions." The report suggested, moreover, the need for "a different approach towards those [principally Syria and Hamas] whose exclusion jeopardises any progress."

 

"While virtually all attention has been given to [the Annapolis] gathering itself, what truly matters is what follows it," the ICG report stated. The "day after" Annapolis may bring the beginning of final status talks between Palestinians and Israelis, and may even bolster chances for wider Arab-Israeli talks. However, the report warns that failure to build on post-Annapolis momentum could effectively risk the entire Arab-Israeli peace process.

 

"The stakes are extremely high. Failure of this process could discredit both the Palestinian and Israeli leaderships while further undermining faith in negotiations," said Ezzeddine Choukri-Fischere, director of the ICG's Arab-Israeli Project, focussing on the peace process.

 

"Our report argues that Annapolis has been through a number of lives; it started as an institution-building conference, developed into a political conference that was supposed to [and eventually did] endorse an Israeli-Palestinian document, and then became a launching pad for permanent status negotiations between Israel and the [Palestinians]," said Choukri-Fischere.

 

"Now that we have Annapolis shaped as a launching pad for peace talks, we think it is important that a number of things happen in Annapolis and immediately after." According to Choukri-Fischere, the first requirement for a successful post- Annapolis process is to design a negotiation process that maximises the chances of success, ensuring "active involvement by the international community and the Arab world, and thinking of a fall- back strategy in case parties get stuck in bilateral talks."

 

Second, Choukri-Fischere argued that it is "of vital importance that Palestinian national dialogue starts without further delay". "It is unthinkable that we push for peace between Israel and only a part of the Palestinian political landscape, or -- as some would say -- between Israel and the Palestinians against other Palestinians," he argued. According to Choukri-Fischere, if Annapolis is perceived as an attempt to undermine Hamas the latter will have an interest in fighting it. "We want the opposite to happen. We want Hamas to have a stake in the success of peace talks after Annapolis," he said.

 

Finally, the ICG is calling for the substantive engagement of Syria on the basis that the ultimate objective is an Arab-Israeli peace, not merely an Israeli-Palestinian peace. "I am glad that the US administration has recently made changes in order to make room for Syrian participation. This is a good beginning and I hope both Syria and the US build on it," Choukri-Fischere said.

 

Choukri-Fischere added that post-Annapolis also requires inward Arab coordination: "The ICG is recommending to Arab states that they lay down a vision for the future: What will they do if Israel and the [Palestinians] make serious progress towards an agreement? What steps would they take towards Israel if the latter signed a permanent peace agreement? When and how would Arab states decide that their 'conditions' for normalisation are met?"

 

According to the ICG report, despite the many obstacles ahead, there remains at least some hope. "I think [we must] follow closely Palestinian-Israeli negotiations in the coming few months, and see what the dynamic is," Choukri-Fischere said. "In three or four months from now we will be able to detect how serious the parties are and how involved the partners are," he added.

 

DOWN TO REALITY: Judging by statements made at the opening ceremony in Annapolis, and by the language of letters of invitation forwarded by the US to Arab participants, including Palestinian participants, none of the criteria that the ICG suggested is necessary for progress is likely to be met. US involvement will not go beyond that of "facilitator", with an obvious bias towards Israel. Pressure on Olmert will be minimal, both from the US and the international community. Hamas will continue to be marginalised according to the wishes of Abbas and Olmert, each for different reasons.

 

Syria may emerge as the only possible progress out of Annapolis, as predicted by the ICG. "It is somewhat ironic, but at the end of the day it might be Syria, who was reluctant about taking part in the meeting, that would come out as the real winner of Annapolis," commented one Arab diplomat on condition of anonymity. According to this diplomat, if the Israelis feel they can make progress on the Syrian track -- which is embraced by the Israeli cabinet -- the Palestinian track may be put again on the backburner for an indefinite period.

 

Speaking to the Weekly as the Annapolis meetings were drawing to a close, Choukri-Fischere argued that the US-hosted peace conference offered "positive signs but an incomplete work". "We heard talk about the international intervention and about the follow-up mechanism. We saw Syria present and we heard that a meeting to be hosted by Russia [by the spring of] next year would follow up on the Palestinian-Israeli track and address more attention to the Syrian-Israeli track. These are good signs," he said. However, he hastened to add, "what matters now is to see that there is sufficient substance to these [gestures] which should not be [reduced to mere political] ornaments." Moreover, the director of the ICG peace project expressed worry over the continued marginalisation of Hamas, but added that this concern could be addressed through an endeavour to induce national Palestinian reconciliation.

 

Meanwhile, Arab peace process diplomats say that while the Americans are not blind to the many difficulties embedded in the Arab-Israeli struggle, they still want some progress, if only to cover up for miserable US failure in Afghanistan and Iraq. "When Bush went for his war on Iraq against the advice of those who called for a settlement of the Middle East situation first, he argued that the road to Jerusalem is through Baghdad. Today, it seems that he is taking the reverse road," commented one diplomat.

 

Indeed, for the Bush administration, a semblance of movement on the Palestinian-Israeli front could help gear up support for a potential military strike against Iran. "The most worrisome part is that it is not just Iran that qualifies for the US's 'extremists' list. Hamas and Hizbullah are also there, and this could mean an open confrontation between Hamas, which rejects Annapolis, and Abbas, who is very keen on Annapolis," commented one diplomat.

 

In this sense, commented the same diplomat, "the day after" Annapolis could be a day of Palestinian bloodshed, "and may even end the legitimacy of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, chaired by Abbas," and witness the rise of the resistance approach, as epitomised by "both Hamas and the Islamic Jihad". Were this to happen, the "difficulties" Bush predicted in his speech to lie ahead, may be of a wholly new order.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly 

Paint by Numbers

In its latest trick, Israel is using the idea of a Palestinian state to ethnically cleanse itself and to keep its illegal settlements, marvels Saleh Al-Naami

 

The Israeli vice premier and minister of strategic threats (officially strategic affairs) Avigdor Lieberman doesn't let any opportunity pass without mentioning that the positions of the extreme right Israel Beituna Party that he heads have come to form a central "national" consensus in Israel. Lieberman does not conceal his relief that more parties and political movements in Israel have begun to adopt his party's position calling for the implementation of a land swap between Israel and a Palestinian state. In such a swap, the Palestinian leadership is supposed to agree to Israel annexing the major settlement conglomerations in the West Bank in return for annexing to a Palestinian state some of the residential areas in Israel in which the Palestinians live.

 

Lieberman has stressed that through this proposal Israel would achieve two strategic goals -- ridding itself of the Palestinian demographic burden within Israel, and at the same time wrenching agreement from the Palestinian leadership to annex settlement conglomerations in the West Bank to Israel. As Lieberman has clarified, the proposal is not a peace plan but rather a security plan, for he is concerned with the establishment of a Palestinian state on the condition that it contribute to solving Israel's demographic "problem". He fears Israel turning into a "bi-national" state if the natural growth of Palestinians within Israel continues as its current high rate.

 

More parties and political forces, both on the right and left, have become enthused over this idea of swapping land. Ephraim Sneh, a leader in the Labour Party and former Israeli deputy defence minister, holds that swapping land is the best solution to guaranteeing that "Israel remains a Jewish and democratic state". Even Minister of Foreign Affairs Tzipi Livni has noted on more than one occasion that she is enthusiastic about the idea.

 

The idea of swapping land was first introduced during the Camp David II meeting in late 1999, when former US President Bill Clinton suggested that the Jewish settlement conglomerations remain under Israeli sovereignty while part of the resident-free Israeli area Halwasa be annexed to the Gaza Strip. This proposal was rejected by late Palestinian president Yasser Arafat.

 

On the eve of the Annapolis conference, talk of land swapping increased, becoming a primary component of all the proposals put forth by Israeli officials. Yet no one in Israel is now proposing that Palestinians receive the Halwasa area; they are only offering some of the areas within Israel in which Palestinians reside to be exchanged for settlement conglomerations. The idea is fervently supported among researchers and the military elite in Tel Aviv. Gideon Begher, a professor of geography at Tel Aviv University, says that the idea of swapping land is alone capable of guaranteeing a Jewish majority while at the same time increasing the area of Jewish settlement. Begher says that swapping land between Israel and the Palestinian state would mean that Israel would rid itself of 200,000 Palestinians living within it.

 

Yet a close look at the map of the regions Israel is prepared to concede to the Palestinian Authority (PA) in exchange for settlement conglomerations shows that they include the city of Um Al-Faham and a group of towns and villages around it. This city is considered the stronghold of the Islamist movement in Israel under the leadership of Sheikh Raed Salah. The Israeli security agencies have concurred that this movement forms a "strategic threat" to Israel because it is an overtly religious movement and the one most extreme in its rejection of the "Jewish state". It calls for the boycott of Israel's "political institutions", defence of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and support of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in their struggle against the occupation.

 

From another perspective, the idea of swapping land is completely in keeping with Israel's demand that the PA acknowledge it as a Jewish state. As the Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak has said, this acknowledgement would mean that the PA agreed that settlement of the conflict must ensure a continued Jewish majority in Israel, and would oblige the PA to give up implementation of the right of return for Palestinian refugees to the areas they migrated from. It would also necessarily decrease the Palestinian presence within Israel.

 

Yet beyond the enthusiasm of officials and the elite in Israel for the idea of a land swap, what is the position of the PA? The Palestinian stance on this issue is hazy and sometimes contradictory. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and head of the Palestinian negotiations delegation Ahmed Qurei have announced that they reject the idea of swapping land. Yet the Israeli officials who have communicated with PA representatives affirm that the PA has indicated preliminary agreement to the idea. On 22 November, Israeli television Channel 2 revealed that in the discussions held between the Palestinian and Israeli delegations on the eve of travelling to the Annapolis conference, it had been agreed that the idea of a land swap between the two parties should be a part of the permanent solution to the conflict. The station added that the understanding between the two sides regarding a Palestinian state included a paragraph stating the "establishment of an unarmed Palestinian state whose borders are those determined by 1967 maps, with agreement on the borders' details based on security needs, demographic developments, and humanitarian requirements, which will open the door to a swapping of land at a 1:1 ratio, with preservation of the settlement blocs within Israel".

 

But what about the opinion of the Palestinians within Israel, who will be the primary victims of this idea of a land swap? Israeli Knesset member Jamal Zehalqa holds that the insistence of Israeli officials in proposing this idea aims to weaken the Palestinian minority within Israel and do away with its political role, marginalising its effect on decision-making circles in Tel Aviv. "We absolutely cannot accept this deal," he told Al-Ahram Weekly. "Can we accept exchanging Jerusalem for Um Al-Faham?" Zehalqa added that if they were insistent on the idea, then its basis should be a return to the 1947 borders, which would mean that Israel would withdraw from expansive areas in the Galilee and Triangle regions, which would be annexed to a Palestinian state.

 

Wadi Al-Awaadeh, editor-in-chief of the website arabs48.com that covers developments among the Palestinian minority within Israel, says that he rejects the principle of equating himself as a Palestinian citizen living within Israel with settlers. "We are the landowners; we were born and raised on our land," he told the Weekly. "Merely proposing this idea is an indication of Israel's racism, for it is prepared to divest citizenship from us as Arabs merely to grant legitimacy to the annexations of angry settlers." Al-Awaadeh pointed out an extremely important point, that Israel only proposes transferring land that Palestinian citizens live on, without transferring the agricultural land they own or other land the occupation authorities previously confiscated. "What about the social connections between people here?" he asked. "When they want to annex Um Al-Faham city to a Palestinian state, how can communications continue between the residents of this city and their relatives in other cities and residential areas that remain within Israel?"

 

Abdul-Hakm Mufid, a Palestinian academic who lives in Um Al-Faham, says that with regard to the principle he has no objection to living under the rule of a Palestinian state or any other Arab rule, but that he notes that the Israelis wanted to get rid of the demographic "burden" that the Palestinian minority creates. "Since the Zionist movement began to implement its settlement endeavour, it has stuck to the rule that control must be taken of the largest area of land with the smallest number of Arabs," he told the Weekly. "This rule has driven the Israeli leadership to propose the idea of swapping land."

 

There is no dispute between Mufid, Al-Awaadeh, and Zehalqa that the PA is responsible to a large degree for Israel daring to propose this idea they describe as "racist". "Despite the reassurances of Abu Mazen that the idea will be rejected, I hear other voices within the PA supporting the idea," said Zehalqa. Al-Awaadeh and Mufid hold that the PA is considered the "full partner" of Israel in its attempts to deny the Palestinians their rights.

 

Shalom Dichter, general director of the Sikway organisation, one concerned with dialogue between Jews and Palestinians within Israel, holds that the idea of swapping land and including it within the settlement to the conflict between the Palestinian people and Israel will destroy relations between Israel and the Palestinian minority living within it. "This will lead to transforming the dream of political peace into a civil nightmare," he says. "The insistence of Israeli officials in proposing such ideas to get rid of Palestinian citizens because of their ethnic affiliation casts doubt on the extent to which officials and the drafters of political plans in Israel understand the essence of the concept of citizenship as the basic humanitarian building block of a state," he continues.

 

In sum, Israel wants to employ a potential Palestinian state to implement a "demographic and geographic transfer" through which it could rid itself of the greatest number possible of the Palestinians and their descendants who remained on territory claimed by Israel in 1948.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly 

Madrid Redux

Bush's peace meeting is nothing but an empty orgy of rhetoric, writes Azmi Bishara

 

Bush's brilliant brainstorm to hold a meaningless, lustreless peace conference is like dry lightning, which brings not the prayed for rain. The US administration needed something to prove that its policy towards the Arab region was not a drastic failure. It came up with nothing better than to restage the Madrid peace conference that was engineered by James Baker, secretary of state under Bush's father. For some reason, Republicans regard the Bush Sr-Baker policy following the war in Kuwait a success story worthy of commemoration and emulation. So we have a conference, today, that has brought the Arabs to Washington, flushed with gratitude to the imperial grace for bestowing its attention again upon the Palestinian cause.

 

Over the years, Arab officialdom and its entourage has adopted such terms and concepts as "the peace process," "the process," "the priority [high or low] that the US administration has accorded to the Palestinian cause," "giving impetus to diplomatic efforts," and even "the Bush vision". What all these terms and concepts have in common is that they are disseminated as positive values, in their own right, for their purported ability to inspire hope and budge stagnant waters. Another common virtue is their ability to sideline substance and to promote the veneration of form (the "process" and "priority on the agenda"). They also presume the public's recurrent and total amnesia with respect to the very history of these terms, which their proponents never tire of repeating. As for people who venture to ask "But why?" and "To what end?" they are scoffed at as naïve and babbling children.

 

True, international conferences are historic events. But as Karl Marx observed with respect to Napoleon III, some historical events are repeated twice, once as tragedy and the second time as farce. Madrid set the scene for the formulation of negotiating tracks and the tragedy of Oslo, to which the Palestinian cause is still held hostage. With Annapolis, the curtains opened to farce. At first people thought that it was to be a conference, only to learn that it was to be an assembly. Then it was billed as a "meeting" and, finally, as an inauguration of a peace process, which is to say a negotiating process. But Madrid, too, turned out to be the inauguration of a negotiating process. How many negotiating process inaugurations can there be? How many times must pompous speeches, embellished with quotes from the Torah, inlaid with Quranic verses, bespangled with references to "our common father Abraham" and to the step- siblings Isaac and Ishmael, be delivered to specially prepared over air-conditioned halls crammed with delegations and journalists, all anticipating nothing, dying of boredom and passing their time pondering how they're going to recast the dullest, most innocuous ramblings into speeches that were "profound," "cohesive," "eloquent" or otherwise? What have the Arabs done from Madrid to the present day? They've negotiated. Why do we need another rhetoric orgy to introduce more of the same? Your guess is as good as mine. Of course, some say, or maintain (for those who think that the subject requires a soberer tongue that is not pressed into the cheek), that this time negotiations will be serious about creating a Palestinian state, that we are inaugurating a serious phase in the negotiations, that what we'll be seeing in the next eight months will make all the negotiations that have taken place up to now look like child's play. At least so the Palestinian negotiators promise themselves, even as Olmert counters this promise with the promise that he will not be bound to any timetable or deadline for concluding negotiations over a permanent solution.

 

The Palestinians and Israelis have reached no understanding with regard to the status of Jerusalem, borders or dismantling Israeli settlements. On the Palestinian right to return, on the other hand, they've made no small amount of headway -- towards the Palestinian and Arab official abnegation of the exercise of that right. This was done by turning a non-subject -- the Jewishness of the state of Israel -- into a negotiating issue on par with all the others, such as Jerusalem, the refugees, borders and settlements.

 

There is also a quasi consensus over Bush's "vision". Essentially the same as the earlier "Sharon vision", it is a formula for bartering away all once "non-negotiable" Palestinian rights in exchange for a Palestinian political entity to be governed after an age or two by a Palestinian elite after it does its part of fighting "terrorism". That political entity, to be termed a state, will not be territorially defined by pre-June 1967 boundaries. Its creation will not be accompanied by the return of Palestinian refugees to their homes and by the dismantlement of major Israeli settlements. It will not exercise sovereignty over Arab Jerusalem although it may possibly be able to extend citizenship to Arabs in Jerusalem who may possibly be able to retain their residence there. There may also possibly be some provision for easy access to key holy sites. It is a rosy dream for those who dream of ruling a state, a nightmare for anyone who still clings to the justice of the Palestinian cause.

 

In all events, before this dream comes to pass, negotiators will have to gather and hammer it together. But first, America needs some fanfare: a Bush-Rice-Blair-Republican Party fete to celebrate their stunning success, at last, in getting a peace conference off the ground, while the Palestinians in Gaza, the Lebanese and the Iraqis are living a very real nightmare.

 

But the Annapolis meeting was not just borne of American yearning for a PR coup but also of the need to cater to the position of Arab moderates. These have toed the American line on all issues and on every occasion and have not once quibbled with Washington since the neo- conservatives stopped meddling in their domestic affairs. Now is the time for the US to reward them by offering something on the "peace process". But once again, they are going to Washington instead of making Washington come to them. Olmert offered no good-faith initiatives and he was supported in this by Israeli public opinion, the majority of which refuses to discuss final status issues, even if a 65 to 75 per cent majority supported Israeli attendance at Annapolis and negotiations with Syria and the Palestinians. Washington made no attempt to call Olmert on his lack of cooperativeness and eventually it became very awkward for "moderate" Arabs to even consider attending a conference that was supposedly being held, in part, to help them. Sure, the Palestinian Authority (PA) president could be heard, in Cairo, talking about the historic opportunity that should not be missed. But everyone knows that he is hostage to the negotiating process and to Israeli handouts, and that he would rather flee forward further into Israeli clutches than entertain the idea of returning to a Palestinian national unity government.

 

The foregoing leads to what had been accomplished in advance of the conference. This conference was built upon internal Palestinian discord and strife. Before the Fatah-Hamas rift, there was a freeze in the so-called peace process and Israel told the PA and its president that they had to stop even speaking with Hamas in order for Israel to agree to so much as talk with them. Israel has an inexhaustible font of conditions, not just for reaching an agreement with the PA but merely to deign to speak with it. The latest was that the PA had to cease any form of cooperation and parleying with Hamas, which is to say with the representatives of a huge portion of the Palestinian people.

 

This was the first accomplishment. And so well did the PA perform it that it received hundreds of pats on the back for its resolute stance against Hamas, the whole world summoned to Annapolis to bear false witness to negotiations that haven't begun and that offer no guarantees for success if and when they do. All this display just to bolster (or "empower" in political science jargon) the position of Palestinian moderates who must be so proud of themselves for having seized the "historic opportunity" that they can already hear the wings of history fluttering over Annapolis. How important a person can feel when he accepts Israeli conditions! How good the US and Israel (and Europe, which just wants to get it all over with) are at making the people they want feel important!

 

The second accomplishment is on the tip of everyone's tongue. Israel had announced on several occasions and through various spokespersons that the condition for talking with the Palestinians had been met. Now, for talks to make any progress, the Palestinians had to honour their commitments under the roadmap, which were to fight "terrorism" and dismantle the "terrorist infrastructure". By this Israel meant crushing the Palestinian resistance, beginning in the West Bank. This commitment under the roadmap had always been a bone of contention between Israel and Arafat, in large part because the Israeli style is to force the Palestinians to prove themselves and then tell them, "Let's wait and see." But Israel succeeded in prevailing upon the post-Arafat PA to accept this condition.

 

With these accomplishments harvested by Israel even before negotiations began, the Palestinian negotiator is weaker than ever. He's even weak in the eyes of Israeli public opinion as a consequence of the Palestinian rift and as a consequence of how dependent the PA leadership has become on Israel's good faith and the success of negotiations. When the Palestinians were more or less united, Israel required an internal Palestinian rift in order to talk. After the rift it claimed that the PA was too weak to control its field and could not be taken seriously enough to merit concessions of good faith.

 

But there was a third accomplishment: Arab disengagement from the Palestinian cause. The Arabs can see how weak the PA is and in whose hands the PA's decision-making powers reside. They share its weakness and so can understand it very well, which is why they grasp at any "pragmatic" solution that this weakness has made possible. They are not about to be "more Palestinian than the Palestinians," which is to say the Palestinian negotiator. True, they take advantage of every rut and bump in the negotiating process to proclaim how steadfast is the Palestinian side, and how it will not cave in easily. But ultimately, whether or not it came to them easily and whether or not they suffered pangs of conscience, they agreed to sell the cause down the river.

 

That this is the foundation that has been set for the Annapolis meeting is not to say that merely to sit around the table is to tacitly normalise relations with Israel. All the delegations that reported to Annapolis had attended Madrid in the past. Their participation did not necessarily lead to normalisation. It led to separate negotiating tracks, some of which have stalled. The only party that signed a peace agreement with Israel since Madrid was Jordan. The only party to have normalised its relations with Israel without a peace agreement was the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

 

Apparently Syria decided to take part in Annapolis for fear that it would be left totally isolated in the Arab world if it did not. That it chose to participate offers no guarantee that the Golan Heights will be restored to it, even if that issue was listed on the Annapolis agenda. It had to be affixed to the agenda, because otherwise Syria could not accept to go. In the not so distant past, it would have taken only a quick assessment of how detrimental this inaugural ceremony will be to the Palestinian cause for Damascus to decide not to attend, whether Golan was mentioned on the agenda or not.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly 

Flexibility Versus Escalation

Participating Arabs are walking into another trap in Annapolis, writes Nicola Nasser

 

Israel doesn't need bombs to abort the Annapolis meeting. The incendiary rhetoric with which Israeli officials and media are arming Arab and Palestinian opponents to Annapolis should do the trick.

 

Take, for example, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni's statement on Sunday that the future Palestinian state would provide a solution to the demands of Palestinians worldwide, including "Israeli Arabs", whose national demands would end the moment a Palestinian state is established. Livni's statement triggered a daily mounting protest movement among Palestinians in Israel who saw in her remarks signs of an impending official endorsement of Minister of Strategic Affairs Avegdor Lieberman's call for "transfer" -- the expulsion of 1.5 million Israeli Arabs under the guise of a "population swap" with the future Palestinian state.

 

If Livni not so subtly hinted at one Israeli aim that would be accomplished by the creation of a Palestinian state, the now comatose Ariel Sharon made no bones about another when he first announced his approval of the two-state solution. It would solve the problem of the Palestinian "right to return", which has long posed the greatest obstacle to a peace settlement. Palestinians would be able to "return" to the newly created Palestinian state.

 

The Palestinian refugee problem and the problem of the Arab minority in Israel have long constituted the occupying power's foremost strategic concerns. Together they form the "demographic" nightmare that stands in the way of the fulfilment of the Zionist movement's drive to create a purely Jewish state in Palestine. It is in this context that Israel launched another ploy to derail the Annapolis conference in the form of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's statement insisting that there could be no such talks unless the Palestine Liberation Organisation, which recognised Israel's right to exist in 1993, now recognise Israel as "a Jewish state".

 

The statements by Livni, Olmert and, before them, Sharon, essentially form the contours of the Israeli project for a Palestinian state. Far from the Arab vision of a sovereign entity for Palestinian national expression, the Israeli version is a strategic vision for ridding the occupying power of two demographic burdens, a vehicle for absorbing Palestinian refugees abroad and Palestinians inside Israel who possess Israeli passports but are otherwise doomed to second-class citizenship. Israel sees in the Annapolis conference, which, whether by design or not, will coincide with the 60th anniversary of the United Nations' partition resolution of 29 November 1948, an opportunity to strike two birds with one stone.

 

That, however, is the long shot. By setting demands that it knows no Arab, let alone Palestinian, could accept, it hopes to drive the Arabs to boycott Annapolis or to bring the talks to a standstill if they do take place. With the Arabs to blame, it will have publicly washed its hands of its commitment to Washington to help the conference succeed. It will have played along with the Bush administration's game in which the real goal of Annapolis is not success in substance but success in form, in exchange for the support of "moderate Arabs" for the US's floundering occupation of Iraq and for its plans of aggression against Iran and Syria, the two remaining obstacles to complete American hegemony over the Middle East.

 

Arab opponents to Annapolis have not only received ammunition from the provocative statements of Israeli extremists but also from the comments of Israelis whom Arab supporters of a political settlement with Israel class as Israeli "peace advocates" and "moderates". Yossi Beilin (the Israeli partner in the Geneva Initiative) is one. In Haaretz of 19 November, he cautions against going to Annapolis without both sides first having agreed on certain essential issues. Otherwise, he writes, the people in Annapolis will be left standing in the middle of the road exposed to extremists on both sides.

 

Palestinian negotiators see Annapolis as the avenue to turn the Palestinian "declaration of independence" from a dream to a reality. Clearly they are so blind to the attrition Israel is inflicting on this hope by the day that not even the failure of Annapolis would snap them out of their delusion. While the Palestinian negotiator is so intent on making the Annapolis conference succeed that he is demonstrating a flexibility that appears almost ready to compromise on fixed national principles, his Israeli counterpart is just as determinedly upping the stakes, to the extent of threatening to derail the conference before it begins, with the aim of wresting so many concessions out of the Palestinians that the conference would be meaningless. As Yossi Verter observed in Haaretz last Thursday, while Palestinians were on holiday commemorating the "declaration of independence", Israel has turned Annapolis into such a PR campaign that it is "killing" the meeting in advance.

 

There was a striking contradiction between a headline and the text below it in a Palestinian news agency article published in English on 15 November. The headline quoted President Mahmoud Abbas as saying, "Only a peace based on justice will bring peace to Palestine and Israel." In the body of the article, the quote was rendered as, "Only a peace based on injustice ..." An inadvertent typo, perhaps, but pithy nevertheless. It sums up perfectly the state of confusion in which the Palestinian negotiator is mired, caught as he is in a no-man's land between "optimism" and "pessimism" and between hope and delusion. Fortunately, such confusion has not been transmitted to the Palestinian people who have learned through the cauldron of experience how to discriminate between realistic national aspirations and political pragmatism steeped in self-deception.

 

President Abbas, himself, epitomises the pitiful disorientation of Palestinian officialdom. On Friday, he confided in Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul-Aziz his doubts about the chances of success at Annapolis. Only four day earlier, while in Ankara, he hailed the forthcoming Annapolis meeting as a "historic opportunity", parroting Israeli President Shimon Peres and others who are pinning hopes for the meeting's success on upbeat rhetoric. Interestingly, in this regard, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown struck a somewhat discordant note when he referred to the meeting as a "unique opportunity". But King Abdullah II was undoubtedly closer to the truth when he described it as "a last chance."

 

Whether this "opportunity" is "historic", "unique" or "final", observers cannot fail to notice all the steps Israel is taking to nip it in the bud. In the face of the tactical and strategic concessions Palestinian negotiators are making in order to pave the way for success at Annapolis, Israel has escalated tactically, through its ongoing assassinations and assaults; strategically, through its undisguised preparations to mount a full-scale incursion into Gaza in the wake of the conference; and politically by upping its demands on Palestinians in advance of the conference, the most salient being Palestinian recognition of the Jewish character of Israel as a precondition for talks. The most recent is the Knesset's ratification of an amendment to the law regarding the status of Jerusalem. Whereas the old law required a majority of 61 votes to alter the status of the Holy City, under the new one a majority of 80 will be needed.

 

The Israeli drive to kill Annapolis or void of it any substance will not stop short of blackmail, as was the case last month when the American Zionist lobby drummed up a campaign calling upon Fatah, headed by Abbas, to amend certain passages of its charter, effectively defunct for 30 years, as a precondition for Israel to go to Annapolis. But Israel's arm-twisting techniques assume their crudest and most hypocritical from in its treatment of its Palestinian "peace partner." For example, last Friday's Jerusalem Post reported that the Israeli military establishment had urged Olmert not to offer any "good faith initiatives" to the Palestinians in advance of Annapolis. Such "initiatives" would have been nothing less than taking steps to meet Israel's obligations under the first phase of the roadmap, such as freezing settlement construction, releasing Palestinian detainees and easing restrictions on the freedom of movement of Palestinians and goods. At the same time, the Israelis insisted that the Palestinian side had to implement its obligations under the roadmap before going to Annapolis, which, in fact, it is doing in coordination with the occupation security apparatus.

 

The Palestinian people looked on with a mixture of anger and pain as the third annual commemoration of the death of Yasser Arafat turned into an occasion to deepen the national divide. Instead of further internecine violence, the commemoration should have afforded an opportunity to unite ranks around the direct cause for the siege on Arafat's compound that ultimately drove him to his death: the negotiating chicanery of the Camp David summit. Instead of learning from that mistake, Palestinian negotiators are determined to let themselves get stung a second time by plunging headlong into another US-Israeli negotiating trap in Annapolis. The only sense that can be made of the flare-up in internal Palestinian tensions is that it was fuelled precisely in order to divert the public's attention from the impending fiasco into which the Palestinian negotiators are being lured, or are letting themselves be lured.

 

That there was no rift in Palestinian ranks seven years ago did not spare Arafat from the Israel-US trap in Camp David. Given the deep rift that now exists, the Palestinian leadership will most likely bring upon themselves and the entire Palestinian cause even more dire consequences if they insist on stepping into the latest trap that is being laid for them in Annapolis. Surely this leadership must be acute to the dangers in view of its considerable experience with the way Israel exploits Palestinian divisions in order to accuse the Palestinian leadership of weakness and then charge it with failure to fulfil its obligations, a tactic that Israel is certain to bring into play again after Annapolis in order to wriggle out of whatever commitments it might have made there.

 

In the summer of 2000, Arafat yielded to enormous pressure from the US, Europe, Arab governments and a contingent of Palestinians for whom negotiating with Israel had become an addiction and set off for Camp David in order to discuss final status issues. He went to Camp David before Israel had fulfilled its obligations under the interim Oslo Accords, in accordance with which Israel should have completed the redeployment of its forces from the West Bank by July 1999. Camp David was Israel's way of evading these obligations and casting the blame on Arafat.

 

Palestinian negotiators, today, are about to commit exactly the same mistake. They have agreed to go to another international conference before Israel has fulfilled its commitments, one of these being its pledge to withdraw its occupation forces to their pre-28 September 2000 positions. Sadly, this oft-repeated Palestinian demand has gone the way of other demands Palestinian negotiators had once insisted needed to be met before agreeing to go to Annapolis, such as the timeframe for follow up of six months, the detailed memorandum of understanding, the provision of international guarantees and mechanisms for the conference, all of which have fallen by the wayside in the negotiators' eagerness to attend a conference whose aims and mechanisms appear so suspect that Palestinians from across the political spectrum have cautioned against it.

 

The prickly trees of the peace process into which the US-Israeli alliance led the Arabs and Palestinians have blinded many of them to the nature of that dark forest whose layout is defined by a balance of international and regional powers skewed heavily in favour of that alliance. This process did not even begin until after Israel's overwhelming military and strategic superiority was guaranteed, until a major Arab power (Egypt) was removed from the equation, another Arab power (Iraq) decimated and a third Arab power (Syria) isolated, and until other Arab countries were either too preoccupied with internal problems (such as Saudi Arabia and Algeria), neutralised through other means (Jordan, Mauritania and Kuwait), or so cowed by the ogres of "international terrorism" and Iran (the Gulf countries) that they threw in their lot with that alliance.

 

The more important generally overlooked truth is that the US and Israel, whose main foreign policy tool is recourse or threat of recourse to violence, are incapable of using peaceful political and diplomatic means to solve their international or regional conflicts. War-makers can only hammer together peace on the basis of their conquests through war. The invader and occupier of Iraq cannot end the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Even without its occupation of Iraq, its 60-year long record of military, financial and political support of the Israeli occupation has lost it any shred of credibility as an impartial peace broker.

 

These fundamental truths that Arab officials who have opted for peace with Israel as "a strategic option" have concealed from their publics are, at least, clear to the members of an American grassroots anti-war movement that has organised a demonstration to coincide with the "phony peace conference" in Annapolis. "It is a monumental insult to the people of the Middle East and all justice- minded people that war criminal Bush would dare to convene a 'peace meeting' while Washington continues to bring occupation, genocide and devastation to Iraq and Afghanistan, destabilisation to Palestine and Lebanon, and constant threats to Iran and Syria in its quest for oil and colonial empire," reads the statement issued by the organisers of the rally. This meeting is not about peace and justice for the Palestinians, the statement continues. "It's about attempting to force new concessions on the Palestinian people, while attempting to normalise relations between Saudi Arabia and other Arab governments with Israel, even as Tel Aviv continues its all- out assault on the Palestinian people. And it's about preparing for a new war."

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly 

Demoralisation and Absence

How conditional can support for the Palestinians be, asks Ramzy Baroud

 

A once profound and widely read commentator recently claimed he no longer writes about the Palestine/Israel conflict because "Palestinians are killing each other". Feeling his words have ceased to carry weight he simply decided not "to take sides".

 

What should be made of such a reaction? Granted, what has transpired in Palestine in recent years is disheartening, demoralising and confusing.

 

It is disheartening because a long-victimised nation, subject to an intense and ongoing colonial project should deploy all its energies in fighting its enemy's long-term goal of an ethnically cleansed Palestine, i.e. a Palestine without Palestinians. Infighting is hardly an appropriate response to colonialism.

 

It is demoralising because the Palestinians should inspire a global movement aimed at sending a clear message to Israel, that racism, colonialism and apartheid no longer have a place in a world that seeks equality, peace and harmony. Unfortunately a divided nation cannot present a unifying leadership, let alone a unified message.

 

And what is happening in Palestine is very confusing to many of those who have long sided with the Palestinian struggle for freedom. It is a struggle that has been manipulated to suit the aims of different groups, each spurred on by ideological, religious and other motives. In some places the fight in Palestine is conducted on behalf of Islam, in others it is to resist racism. For some, the Palestinian struggle is an aspect of the class war, and I once read, somewhere, the battle between Israel and the Palestinians described as a civil war.

 

Thus is the conflict between a nation denied its land and basic freedoms and a state with immense wealth and power distorted, allowing the latter to defy international law on a daily basis, thanks in part to the backing of the world's only superpower, the United States. Decontextualised, the struggle has become the vehicle for spurious meanings that lead to the misunderstanding of what is in fact transpiring. In some instances it has led to an over-romanticising of the conflict, which goes part way to explaining the bewildered response of many who long stood in solidarity with the Palestinian people.

 

But the Hamas takeover of Gaza in June 2006, and the factionalism and bloodshed associated with it should not have come as a surprise. The conflict in Palestine, like any other conflict, is rational, and can serve as a classic example of a regional conflict with international boundaries, allowing opportunity for analysis that does in fact matter to Americans (the role of their country in the conflict, and the power of the Israeli lobby in their midst), the Europeans (who wish to see a truly independent Europe playing a less injurious role in a region where they have a vested interest in stability), the United Nations (whose credibility has been damaged too often by the belligerent US-Israeli alliance), and others.

 

Many questions must be asked and debated. Should solidarity with the people of Palestine wane because the Palestinians chose a religious group to represent them in democratic elections, hurting the secular sensibilities of many of their supporters? Can the Palestinians be held collectively responsible for the few among them who choose to align their interests with those of power and capital? Is what Mahmoud Abbas did -- working with the coloniser to isolate a large segment of his people -- unprecedented? Has any nation that fought for its freedom actually managed to avoid the peril of infighting?

 

One can understand the sense of demoralisation that has struck many supporters of the Palestinian cause as events unfolded in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. However, it is also important to warn that if such demoralisation is caused by the Palestinians failing to live up to the ideological and religious expectations of others, then it is perhaps time for those others to engage in some serious introspection as to why they wished to support the Palestinian struggle in the first place.

 

I believe that there is no choice but to side with that which is just and morally upright even at the risk of creating ideological inconsistencies or, dare I say, upsetting religious dogma. The conflict in Palestine doesn't have to be a straightforward clash between haves and have-nots, blacks and whites, Muslims and Jews.

 

The responsibility of deciphering recent accretions to the seemingly mystifying conflict is the responsibility of the intellectual who is capable of research, analysis and articulation. The intellectual is not a cheerleader, nor a poet, and should, no matter where his sympathies lie, remain capable of dispassionately approaching the subject at hand.

 

Over 30 years ago, Noam Chomsky wrote in the New York Review of Books : "Intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments, to analyze actions according to their causes and motives and often hidden intentions. In the Western world, at least, they have the power that comes from political liberty, from access to information and freedom of expression."

 

No one can claim that the Palestinian question is easy to understand. It may be a classic colonial case that should not have been allowed to fester for so long but to grasp an event as recent as Palestinian infighting requires an examination of various layers of analyses, local, regional and international. One must ask questions about causes, motives and hidden intentions. If done properly, this will show that as disheartening, demoralising and confusing as they may seem from the outside, recent developments in Palestine were predictable and are consistent with the history of past national struggles. If we do not wish to shirk our moral and intellectual responsibilities we must resist the temptation to make of Palestine an exception.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly 

Pricking the Western conscience

The West needs to be constantly reminded that it is not just complicit in the persecution of Palestinians but that it bears much of the responsibility for stripping them of the most basic human rights, writes Galal Nassar

 

The West was instrumental in helping the Zionist movement create a state in Palestine. Israel was established at the expense of the Palestinians who have, as a result, lived for decades in unspeakable horror. To this day there is not a glimmer of hope for a just solution in Palestine.

 

The assistance the West furnishes Israel grows constantly. Sixty years after the creation of the state Washington provides Tel Aviv with $3 billion every year, in addition to substantial loans and donations. Israel receives the highest per capital financial assistance in the world, although the Israelis boast of their vibrant economy.

 

Since Israel was but a twinkle in the eyes of Zionist leaders, the West has embraced its cause, helped it along and offered it steady material and moral support. As a consequence a peaceful people has been displaced and deprived of the most basic human rights, while Arab and Islamic nations now view the West with suspicion. The Arabs often speak about the duplicity of Western values. When it comes to human rights and self-determination, they have a point.

 

How can the West live with the damage its lop-sided policies have caused? The answer to this question is simple and has to do with the symbiotic relationship between Israel and the West. Several factors have helped strengthen the ties between Western society and the Zionist movement, of which two are worth mentioning here.

 

First, the Zionist movement, through its literature and its policies, presented itself as a loyal supporter of Western schemes of expansion, for which it has been rewarded with money, expertise and information. Secondly, the Zionist movement succeeded in infiltrating Western religious and political structures, invading its academic, cultural and financial institutions and influencing decision-making, legal and moral considerations notwithstanding.

 

This symbiotic relationship has limited Western freedom to act even at times when it whimpered about Israel's actions. The West, as a political, cultural and military organism, remains responsible for empowering the Zionist movement in its persecution of the Palestinians and neighbouring Arab nations. The West keeps justifying its policies through any number of arguments, most of which are blatantly racist. The West also continues to pressure the Palestinian people to give up their historical rights, including the right of return and self-determination.

 

The West knows that much of what Israel does contravenes international law and undermines the decisions of international organisations, but does nothing. The US consistently vetoes any UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel for its mistreatment of Palestinians or for its settlements, built on land expropriated from the original inhabitants.

 

The West will talk about human rights in Arab countries, including pro-Western Arab states. Yet it turns a blind eye when Israel commits human rights violations. This double- dealing is what allows Israel to pursue its racist policies against the Palestinians with impunity.

 

Look at what's happening in and around Jerusalem. Despite the Annapolis principles, Israel is determined to Judaise Jerusalem, the city it describes as its eternal capital. When quizzed about the future of Jerusalem's Palestinian inhabitants, Israeli officials say the latter can remain as long as they recognise Israel's sovereignty and abide by its laws. But something much more sinister is going on. Israel has built the apartheid running 640km around the West Bank and Jerusalem. This wall, which has turned the life of many Palestinians into hell, will force 120,000 Palestinians in Jerusalem to leave the city since their work and livelihood are on the other side of the wall.

 

When the occupation forces cut off Jerusalem from other Palestinian areas the Palestinians rightly see this as a death sentence for the holy city. The international community decided at one point to turn Jerusalem into a city with special status and place it under UN supervision, a decision all but forgotten. Western powers may dominate the UN, but they implement its resolutions selectively. Right now the West is watching as Israel remakes Jerusalem, changing its religious and cultural traits, and distorting its historic and social legacy.

 

UNESCO has more than once denounced Israeli measures in Jerusalem. So has the Vatican, some European countries, and a host of other nations and institutions. Undaunted, Israel continued building illegal settlements. Israel acts as if American support, vetoes and dollars free it from any obligation.

 

Today, Israel continues its excavations under and around Al-Aqsa Mosque, paying no heed to the protests from world capitals. Those protests, however sincere, haven't produced any action that might deter Israel, let alone punish it. Israel continues its plans to demolish Al-Aqsa and rebuild the temple on its site undeterred. Since the arson attempt at Al-Aqsa in August 1969, assaults on the holy city have been constant. In 1990, 23 people were killed and dozens were wounded by Israeli bullets at the mosque. The Dome of the Rock also came under attack in April and July 1982. Churches, Greek orthodox and Ethiopian, have been attacked.

 

The more Israel oppresses the Palestinians and defies international resolutions -- even those resolutions formulated in part by the US -- the more assistance the US offers. The US defends Israel at the UN Security Council, recognises Jerusalem as its capital, and continues to give it financial assistance. The US is giving Israel sophisticated weapons, although it knows that these weapons will be used to kill Palestinian children. US military assistance to Israel grew after the latter's defeat by the Lebanese resistance in summer 2006, leading analysts to conclude that the decision by the US administration to increase military aid to Israel after the Lebanese war constituted a tacit endorsement of Israeli military activities in the region.

 

Most of the weapons the US is giving Israel are offensive, clearly sent to help the Israelis subjugate the region and bring it under dual US-Israeli hegemony. Successive US administrations are responsible, therefore, for what happens in Jerusalem and what happens to the Palestinians. The US is giving unlimited aid to a racist state, a state that made violence a way of life, a state that boasts a long record of massacres -- from Kafr Qasem to Sabra, Shatila, Jenin, Nablus and Gaza.

 

US support began long ago. In 1952 Washington pressured west Germany into paying $3 billion to Israel over 12 years in compensation for Nazi crimes against Europe's Jews. Israel used the funds to buy weapons, seize more Palestinian land and build settlements. The German assistance continues to this day. Germany is still supplying Israel with Dolphin submarines.

 

The US has always tried to tilt the balance of power in Israel's favour. Four events come to mind: the day president Wilson gave Britain the green light to issue the Balfour Declaration; the day president Johnson threw American might behind Israel during the 1967 War; the day president Nixon -- encouraged by Henry Kissinger -- ordered the US army to help Israel during the 1973 War, and the day the US urged Arab and Lebanese officials to denounce the Lebanese resistance during the July 2006 confrontation.

 

Condoleezza Rice considered the war on Lebanon part of the birth pangs of a new Middle East. All this clearly indicates that the partnership between the West and Israel is a full and active one. Even before the US took the mantle of aiding and abetting Israel, France and Britain were engaged in similar policies.

 

France supplied the Israeli air force with Mirage fighters and built the Dimona reactor in the 1950s and 1960s. It did so in retaliation for its defeat in Algeria and Suez. Britain issued the Balfour Declaration, which paved the way to the creation of Israel. At the time, Britain and France had plans to divide the Middle East, although they promised Sharif Hussein they would recognise a united Arab state following the end of WWI.

 

Britain broke its promises to the Arabs but kept its promises to the Zionists. During its mandate in Palestine Britain gave the Jewish Agency the privileges usually accorded to a favoured nation, while repressing the Palestinians. Herbert Samuel, then high commissioner of Palestine, helped the Jewish Agency build up its political, financial and housing institutions. British officers trained and armed Zionist militia, turning them into a modern army that outnumbered Arab troops by four to one in 1948. Records show that some British officers actually led Zionist gangs in attacks on Palestinian villages.

 

During its mandate in Palestine, Britain honoured in full the first provision of the Balfour Declaration, calling for the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. But it forgot all about the second provision, the one calling for the protection of civil and religious rights of other groups. The British government, typically, failed to match its words with deeds. The encouraging remarks British officials made to the Palestinians were designed to deceive. The deception, coupled with repression of the Palestinians, paved the way for the implementation of the Zionist scheme, and to one of the worst political and humanitarian disasters of modern times.

 

When Weisman was propagating the idea of Jewish settlement in Palestine, he met Arab leaders and assured them that the Jews would come as refugees, not invaders. This was the same man who, decades later, proclaimed a state dedicated to invasion and terror, a state that turned the original inhabitants of Palestine into refugees. Weisman knew full well that his colonialist plan wouldn't materialise without symbiotic ties with Western imperialist interests. His policy is still alive today. Israel is in a strategic alliance with the US. And the two countries are trying to divide the region and ultimately dominate it. This is why they are fomenting sectarian strife all over the region in an attempt to rip apart the social fabric of Arab countries.

 

With the blessing of the current US president, Israel is trying to Judaise Jerusalem by emptying it of Palestinians. This scheme can only have catastrophic repercussions for the Palestinian issue and the region. Lebanon, which is coming under immense pressure to settle Palestinians permanently on its soil, is a case in point.

 

To please the Americans, some Arab leaders are now looking into a way of skirting the Palestinians' right of return. Meanwhile Israel -- with full support from the US -- is trying to expel the Palestinians from their land, especially from Jerusalem, a city that is part and parcel of Palestinian life. Israel knows that its schemes cannot be achieved without undermining the Palestinian presence in Jerusalem. This is why it is encircling Jerusalem with settlements, hoping to isolate it from its Palestinian surroundings. This is happening not only with US knowledge, but also with Washington's financial, political and military assistance. And what is the world doing? What are the Arabs doing? Apart from paying the usual lip service, nothing.

 

Western, especially American, support of the Zionist scheme in Jerusalem is far from abating. This support has moral and political repercussions, ones that we should not let the world forget. In international forums, conferences and the media, we must point out to the responsibility of the West, especially the US, for the injustice done to the Palestinians. Somehow people find it easier to champion democracy and human rights than to help the Palestinians which is why, apart from organising international conferences, such as the one in Annapolis, little is being done to redress the injustice.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly

 

 

The Invisible Guest

 

Despite avowing "optimism" in the countdown to the opening of the International Peace Conference in Annapolis, Maryland on Tuesday, when almost everyone else was openly pessimistic, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was destined to be disappointed. The Palestinians and the Israelis failed to agree on a joint accord that would have set a time frame for "peace negotiations" yet still representatives from 50 countries crossed the Atlantic to participate in a meeting the vast majority believe will fail to achieve any progress towards peace.

 

The Arab League's secretary-general announced the "death of the peace process" when Israel launched its bloody war on Lebanon last year, a ruthless assault that targeted and killed hundreds of innocent civilians and destroyed much of Lebanon's infrastructure. Shouldn't that have been a reminder of who exactly Abbas's peace partner is? So how is it that peace has been so suddenly resurrected?

 

Is Annapolis simply an exercise in listening to harmless proposals and ideas to "revive" the "peace process"? And why are Arab officials so keen to project an Arab consensus -- a euphemism for collective defeat -- by participating in a conference they have regularly predicted can end only in failure? Or is all the noise simply a strategy to deflect from the startling decision of Saudi Arabia and Syria to openly sit and talk with Israel? Israel clearly feels it is high time that the model of "moderate" Arab countries like Egypt and Jordan -- which have full diplomatic ties with Tel Aviv -- should be embraced by other Arab states, and at absolutely no cost to itself.

 

The Annapolis conference does, of course, carry a deeper and more disturbing significance. For judging by what was heard and seen in the American city the participants who represent 50 nations are making a statement, simply by their presence. And what they are saying is that the United Nations and its many resolutions on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are now irrelevant to the entire peace process. This gives the US and Israel freedom to act outside the boundaries of international law. It also further partitions the region into moderate states and those that are not: it is the latter that, in Washington and Tel Aviv's scheme of things, remain the obstacle to US and Israeli plans for the region, while the former are being softened up to accept a possible military attack on Iran. For it is Iran -- a country pursuing its right, in accordance with International Atomic Energy Agency standards, to develop nuclear energy independently -- that is the invisible guest at a feast the purpose of which is to further isolate Tehran.

 

The media hype surrounding the Annapolis meeting has been pegged on the Middle East peace process. Statements on "a future Palestinian state" were invariably followed by the qualification "free of terror" and the importance of guaranteeing "Israeli security". Israeli occupation, land grabbing, illegal settlements, demolition of Palestinian property and houses and daily killing of Palestinian civilians were not mentioned in Annapolis. No one expected them to be.

 

Annapolis is a legacy that well suits US President George W Bush.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly

 

 

Taking the High Road

Syria bit the bullet and accepted Bush's invitation. Here's why, explains Sami Moubayed

 

There was much speculation in Syria on whether to attend the Annapolis conference or not. Reservations stemmed from an earlier no-mention of the occupied Golan Heights, tension in Syrian-US relations, US backing for the anti- Syrian regime in Beirut, and the latest Israeli air attack against Syria, which took place on 6 September 2007. The Syrians could not forget what had happened on 6 September, which apparently was done in compliance with the Americans. They also could not ignore that in December 2003, President Bush had said, "Syria is a weak country that just has to wait" until all other pending Middle East issues are solved.

 

The Syrians believe that Bush is unable to bring peace to the region, because of the problems on his hands in Iraq, and because, unlike president Bill Clinton; he is not interested in Arab-Israeli peace. President Bashar Al-Assad put forth his country's condition to attend: negotiations on the occupied Golan. The Americans said yes. If the Syrians were to attend, who would represent them in the United States? Would it be Foreign Minister Walid Al-Moualim, his deputy Faysal Miqdad, or Ambassador Emad Mustafa? Sending Al-Moualim would give the conference too much importance, and the Syrians were really going there just to tell the world, "we did our part. We attended. But Annapolis led to nothing!"

 

Some in Syria wanted a complete boycott of Annapolis. According to the London-based Al-Hayat, the decision was taken only after a series of phone calls between Foreign Minister Al-Moualim and his counterparts in Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey and Egypt. The British and French ambassadors to Damascus also visited the foreign minister. All of them reportedly wanted Syria to go to Maryland so as not to miss the chance, after four years of absence from the Washington arena, to make themselves heard in the US. On the other hand, the Iranians and Hamas wanted Syria to boycott the event, seeing it as nothing but a PR stunt for Bush. Significantly, expressing how the Syrians views the conference, the official Syria News said, 24 hours before the conference, that Al-Assad and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad view Annapolis as doomed to failure.

 

But regardless of outcomes, the Syrians scored a goal when Golan was actually put on the conference agenda. So a three-man Syrian delegation arrived in Annapolis, headed by Faysal Miqdad, his country's ambassador to the United Nations from 2003 to 2006. Ahmed Salkini, a communications officer at the Syrian Embassy in the US, said, "we participate with the understanding that the Golan will be discussed. Syria continues to be committed to the Arab peace initiative as the only way to achieve a just and comprehensive peace in the Middle East." Al-Hayat quoted an unnamed Syrian source saying, "what we asked for was granted." Reportedly, the US Chargé d'Affaires to Syria Michael Corbin contacted a senior Foreign Ministry official on 24 November, giving him the final schedule for Annapolis. In a session called "Comprehensive Peace" the Syrian-Israeli track will be discussed, as well as the Lebanese- Israeli one.

 

The Syrians head off to Annapolis convinced that solutions cannot be reached -- for different reasons -- so long as President George W Bush and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert are in power in Washington and Tel Aviv. It would have been unwise not to attend, however, for this would have given the Americans justification to say, "the Syrians are not ready or interested in peace." Recently, Ambassador Emad Mustafa was quoted in Forward, Syria's English monthly: "He [Al-Assad] has come to a realisation, however, that it is almost impossible to do business with this US administration. He concluded that with this administration, contacts would be either minimal, or non-existent." But regardless, the Syrians want to maintain ties and even improve relations with the US administration. Again, Ambassador Mustafa explains: "He is not hostile -- not at all -- towards the US. He is keen to improve relations with Washington, a basic reason being the understanding that it is very difficult for any country in the world not to have good relations with the world superpower."

 

Last summer, Olmert made an initiative towards the Syrians in a interview with the Saudi channel Al-Arabiya. Olmert said: "I am ready to sit with you and talk about peace, not war. I will be happy if I could make peace with Syria. I do not want to wage war against Syria." This proposal was echoed by President Shimon Peres in September, who added, "we are ready for dialogue with Damascus." Back in July, President Al-Assad gave a speech in parliament in which he re-emphasised his country's willingness for peace, recalling that the basis of any Syrian cooperation would be the borders of 4 June, 1967. He also asked for guarantees, saying that from experience in the 1990s, Syria does not trust the Israelis. "We did not trust them before the 1990s and distrust them further now." Al-Assad asked for something similar to the agreement reached with the late Israeli leader Yitzhak Rabin, which promised to restore the Golan Heights in full to Syria.

 

Then came the Israeli air invasion, with US support, on 6 September 2007, which put a damper on Syrian hopes and shed serious doubt on Olmert's credibility. With that in mind, the Syrians went to Annapolis, almost convinced that it will lead to nothing. The Syrians believe that Olmert is in a difficult position because of the results of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in July-August 2006. Olmert understands that none of his declared objectives were met: Hizbullah was not crushed, and the two Israeli soldiers abducted in South Lebanon are still held by the Lebanese. The Israeli public holds him and his team accountable for the ill-fated Lebanon adventure. His Kadima-Labour cabinet was on the verge of collapse, arch-foe Ehud Barak was making a thundering political comeback, and the Winograd Report on the summer war made life all the more difficult for the Israeli prime minister. Olmert needed to divert attention fast from Israeli domestic affairs and find solutions to the tension in the Israeli-Syrian-Lebanese crisis.

 

With such a defeat on his record, the Israeli prime minister cannot possibly deliver peace with the Syrians, who are viewed as the main backers of Hizbullah. Olmert needs to obtain his war medals to right the wrongs done to his image in Lebanon. Only after waging another war -- and either winning or at least not losing it -- can he project himself as a "peacemaker". That was the prevailing mood in Damascus this summer.

 

Then, something changed in Israel. Many started to say that only Syria can secure Israel's border with Lebanon. Making peace with the Syrians, the Israelis started thinking, seemed all the more logical since it automatically would mean peace with Hizbullah. And since Hizbullah cannot be crushed by force (as the results of last year's war proved) then the best solution would be to isolate and neutralise it by making peace with the Syrians. If they sign a peace pact, after all, they cannot continue supporting Hizbullah. In April 2007, US Congress Speaker Nancy Pelosi went to Damascus with a message to Al-Assad from Olmert. The Israeli press went into a frenzy revisiting the Syrian-Israeli peace track. The Syrians were, and still are, unimpressed by the Israeli conditions for peace, which included halting Syria's cooperation with Hamas, Hizbullah and Iran.

 

All of these recent events help explain why the Syrians are worried as they head off to Annapolis. Countries interested in peace don't go around flying into their neighbour's airspace without permission, especially when the two countries are in a state of war. They don't fire missiles into other countries' territory. The last time I checked, this was called war-making rather than peace-making. But despite all that, the Syrians have been committed to peace since Madrid and are willing to try Annapolis. But it's doubtful that Annapolis will lead to a breakthrough, with the likes of Bush and Olmert in power.

 

From Al-Ahram Weekly

 

Sick and Tired of Talks

Disappointed in Annapolis, the Palestinians feel deceived once again, reports Khaled Amayreh from the West Bank

 

Palestinians throughout the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip have reacted to the American-hosted conference in Annapolis, Maryland, with a heady combination of scepticism, ambivalence and anger.

 

The Palestinians used epithets like "another deception", "another lie", "another illusion" and "another Oslo" to describe the much-publicised Annapolis conference that they watched live on their television screens.

 

"Another Oslo" is a reference to the 1993 Oslo Agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), which generated high hopes, euphoria and great expectations. These upbeat feelings were soon thwarted and eventually proved to be totally misplaced as Israel continued to consolidate its occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, while pretending to seek peace.

 

In the southern West Bank town of Hebron, a Palestinian man was killed Tuesday afternoon when poorly-trained and utterly-undisciplined Palestinian police opened fire on a rally, organised by the Islamic Liberation Party, protesting against the Annapolis conference.

 

The usually non-violent group which calls for the reinstitution of the Islamic Caliphate that encompasses the entire Muslim world, is considered the second largest organised militant Islamic group in the West Bank after Hamas.

 

The group's spokesman in Hebron, Mohamed Jaabari, condemned the "cold-blooded murder" of the Palestinian man and accused the PA police of "emulating the Israeli occupation army in killing and repressing Palestinians".

 

"I don't see any difference. They are acting like the Israeli occupation army. They are traitors and quislings. This is why the Zionists and the Americans armed them and brought them here to kill us and silence our voices," said Jaabari.

 

Hebron's appointed governor, Hussein Al-Araj, blamed the organisers for the violence, saying "we told them not to organise any rally, but they chose to challenge us. They bear full responsibility for the consequences."

 

However, when asked why the police didn't use non-fatal methods to disperse the estimated 3,000 protesters, the governor sardonically said, "this is another problem."

 

Similarly, PA police, recently re-armed and equipped by the US, violently repressed protests against the Annapolis conference in Nablus, Bethlehem and Ramallah and a number of other localities in the West Bank.

 

Dozens of protesters and a number of reporters and cameramen were injured, some badly, when anti-riot police ganged up on protesters in the centre of Ramallah, beating the demonstrators with clubs and rifle-butts.

 

Earlier, the PA warned the media against covering any "anti-Annapolis protests" unless they get a permission beforehand. However, the local and international media apparently didn't heed the warning, infuriating PA security chiefs.

 

In Gaza, as many as 150,000 (organisers say a quarter of a million) people held rallies denouncing the Palestinian leadership of Mahmoud Abbas for what Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahar termed "using Jerusalem and the right of return as a bargaining chip".

 

"Let them go to a thousand conferences, we say in the name of our people that we haven't authorised anyone to sign any agreement or any document compromising or harming our inalienable rights. Anyone compromising our rights will be judged by history as a traitor."

 

Ahmed Bahr, deputy-speaker of the now virtually paralysed Palestinian Legislative Council addressed the huge multitude, saying that, "we will not let our people down, we will not compromise our national constants. We will not sell Jerusalem out, the right of return is a red line."

 

Speaker Aziz Duweik is imprisoned in Israel for running in elections under the banner of an illegal organisation --Hamas. Meanwhile, Mohamed Al-Hindi, an Islamic Jihad leader, similarly lashed out at Arab leaders and representatives for attending the conference. "I don't know why they are trooping off to Annapolis. What has changed in Israel's attitudes and positions? Or, do they want to use this occasion to normalise relations with Israel?"

 

Interestingly, Fatah, Mahmoud Abbas's faction, which controls the West Bank, failed to organise rallies supporting Annapolis. Insiders within Fatah intimated that the organisation was worried that such rallies would attract a few people compared to the anti-Annapolis rallies, and would therefore embarrass Fatah.

 

In fact, much of the indignation, disenchantment and frustration in the Palestinian street is not aimed at PA President Abbas per se as much as it is an expression of distrust of Israeli intentions.

 

"Abbas's speech is good and balanced. The problem is that he is be