Ron's Note: Obama is headed to Cairo in June '09 to detail a hard-sell peace program which is merely a take off on other peace plans that have failed. This one is spiced with Obama's new rude muscle. Do it or else is the message. No more fooling around, Obama wants a Noble Peace Prize and he means it! I have interjected comments in italics.
Abraham Rabinovich, Jerusalem | May 22, 2009
Article from: The Australian
US President Barack Obama is expected to outline a far-reaching proposal for a Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement in Cairo next month that will flesh out the Saudi-initiated Arab Peace Plan proposed in 2002 in a way that makes it more palatable to Jerusalem but also requires the Jewish state to make major concessions.
Under the Obama proposal, Palestinian refugees would not be permitted to return to Israel, but they would be permitted to return to the Palestinian state that would arise on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Those who continue to reside in Arab countries where they have been largely confined to refugee camps for 60 years would be given citizenship of those countries, ending their refugee status.
What will the 900,000 Jews who were driven from Islamic nations, having to leave their belongings behind between 1948 and 1953, be offered? Any remuneration? I doubt it will even be mentioned. That number is contrasted with the 400,000 claimed by Arafat to have fled Israel at the command of Jordan, Egypt, and Syria so they could obliterate Israel.
On the critical question of Jerusalem, Mr Obama will support the Arab demand that Palestinians be permitted to establish their capital in East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel in the Six Day War in 1967. However, the walled Old City at the heart of Jerusalem, where the principal holy sites of Christianity, Judaism and Islam are located, would become an international enclave and fly the UN flag.
Can we talk about the U.N.'s terrifying history in the Middle East: gunrunning using diplomatic immunity from Jordan and Lebanon; Arafat using the basement of the UN building in Southern Lebanon in 1982 as a terrorist training center and explosives repository; UN involvement in kidnapping IDF soldiers in both Lebanon and Gaza. What a great choice Obama!
The Palestinian state would be demilitarised, maintaining a significant police force to keep order but not an army that might pose a security threat to Israel.
Tell that to Hamas. However, this is good news because Hamas will tell Obama where to take his peace plan.
The pre-Six Day War borders between Israel and the Palestinian territories would be modified, but only by mutually agreed territorial exchanges, not unilateral annexation.
Condi Rice has been to Israel half a dozen times to bang the pulpit shouting "Contigious Palestinian State." That means the West Bank would be connected to Gaza by a land bridge, dividing Israel into north and south for the first time since Solomon's sons. What could we possibly be thinking?
The proposal was reported by the prestigious Arab-language newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi, which is published in London. The paper said the plan would be unveiled by Mr Obama when he gives his much-touted address to the Muslim world in Cairo next month.
According to the newspaper, Mr Obama's plan was drawn up in consultation with Jordan's King Abdullah, who was the first Arab leader to be invited by the President to Washington. The two had first met in Amman last year during Mr Obama's tour of the Middle East as part of his presidential campaign.
After returning from Washington three weeks ago, the king spoke to other Arab leaders in the region, including Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in a rapid shuttle.
Abbas, just this week told Palestinian Youth that he rejects the idea of recognizing Israel. He will never recognize Israel!
He then gave an interview to The Times of London in which he said Israel was in a position to win recognition from all 57 Muslim countries if it came to terms with the Palestinians.
He said that a peace deal to be brokered by the Americans would be the most comprehensive since the Madrid peace conference in 1991. To sweeten the deal, Israel would be offered immediate benefits such as entry visas to all Arab countries and the right of El Al, Israel's national carrier, to overfly Arab territory.
Oh my, Israelis have just been frothing to enter enemy territory, be spat upon, decapitated, tarred and feathered, and subjected to horrors not unlike Jewish treatment in the dark ages of Europe. Such a great gift.
Acceptance of Israel by all Arab states would, the thinking goes, give Israel the confidence to make concessions to the Palestinians, something more difficult to do when it faces a sea of hostile faces around it.
If Obama can pull this off, let's go ahead and give him his Noble Peace Prize. This tops all other overtures that could gain him his historical limelight.
Should Israel choose, however, to procrastinate instead of accepting a two-state solution, it would be likely to find itself at war within 12 to 18 months, the king said.
There you have it. The noose. If you should choose not to accept this deal, we have cooked up for you a little war. And, since I've (Abdullah of Jordan) warned Obama about this, how could he protest when we do it?
Israeli officials said yesterday that the details of the Obama plan outlined in Al Quds Al Arabi had not been given to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he met Mr Obama on Monday.
Hey, I thought we were dedicated to the safety of Israel? I guess not.
But they did not deny the report's plausibility. It is a measure of the new relationship between Washington and Jerusalem since Mr Obama assumed office that such a far-reaching plan would be run by an Arab leader before it was shared with an Israeli leader.
No less noteworthy is Mr Obama's decision to visit Cairo on his first presidential trip to the Middle East, without visiting adjacent Israel.
Mr Obama has put more distance between himself and Israel than previous US leaders. But his moves are perceived in Israel as understandable - many would even say praiseworthy - attempts to restore US credibility in the Arab world.
Let the praises begin. He has already been deified by numerous photographers and artists.
A US administration acceptable to the Arab world has a far greater chance of using its good offices to bring about peace in the region.
Mr Obama's speech in Cairo on June 4 will be a major address to the entire Muslim world, and will not focus exclusively on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. It will aim to rebuild US relations with the Muslim world that were knocked askew following the attacks on September 11, 2001.
Mr. Obama, we can't wait. You've jumped in over your head and may have added the straw that broke the camel's back.
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