Won't apologize for using the 'M' word

[oberliner]

Excerpt:

We must support two-states, I said, because two-states is the only solution. One-state, as more and more Palestinians are advocating out of anger and six decades of failure, would be the Palestinians' "Final Solution." We can't afford to let the extremists hold us hostage by causing so much violence that it gives Israel more excuses to back away from compromise and make Palestinians suffer even more.

Let's face it, Hamas spent the entire 90s opposing peace and using suicide bombings not to kill Israelis as a primary goal but to kill the peace process and if they took some innocent Israeli lives with then so be it, they felt. In my mind, fighting while Palestinian leaders were negotiating with Israelis at the peace table was an unforgivable act of terrorism by Hamas.

Another Palestinian panelist on the program decided to attack me. What a shock. Like I have never been attacked by an uncompromising Palestinian before. She said the "only solution" is the "one-state solution." She said that using terms like "moderates" and "extremists" was disrespectful to "the cause of peace."

What "peace" is she talking about when you embrace the one-state final solution of the Palestinian problem? It's not a peace plan but a declaration of continued conflict. But then the lifers in the activist movement have always been willing to sacrifice the rest of our lives so they can make a point of principle at a podium in front of a large audience. I think if there ever was to be peace, the activists would be out of jobs and that must scare them more than admitting their failure to defeat Israel and having to compromise for half of Palestine.

http://palestinenote.com/cs/blogs/blogs/archive/2009/10/28/won-t-apologize-for-using-the-m-word.aspx

[pelsar]

1. very very interesting site....

..it seems to have quite an interesting bit of info......

and i do like the:

But then the lifers in the activist movement have always been willing to sacrifice the rest of our lives

as i've recently have come to the very same conclusion. gaza and its egyptian border was the eye opener for that.



Israel has exploited our failure to accept reality and refusal to fight for a reasoned goal rather than an unreasoned dream. We cannot go back to 1922. With all the recent failures and violence, I am worried that we can't go back to 1967, either.

[xc8mip]

2. weird

must be so called "stockholm syndrome"

[pelsar]

3. no...its called reality....

look at a map......

[azurnoir]

4. which map Pelsar?

there are many, can it be Israeli ones that call the west bank "Judea and Samaria? the Palestinian ones that show Israel as Palestine or others that show the West Bank Occupied?

[pelsar]

5. the shrinking Palestinian area since 1948......

it keeps getting smaller and smaller.......which relates to the blog, about the failure of going for the fantasy and not the reality.....

[azurnoir]

6. So what is reality?

that Israel will keep what it already has?

[LeftishBrit]

7. Hopefully not; but that a realistic solution will involve two states,

and need compromise on both sides.

The old fable about 'grasping at the shadow and losing the substance' applies here, as in so many conflicts.

It's a very interesting article, IMO.

[pelsar]

8. depends upon time.......

my guess.....is that the settlement blocs/cities/universities/factories/shopping centers/schools will remain....the reality of uprooting so many people who have jobs, infrastructure etc to basically live in caravans/hotels and be unemployed wont work....the gaza experience shows what happens.

the smaller outlying settlements will go....and the PA will pick up some land from israel pre 67.

this is assuming that nothing changes drastically in the future, such as hamas taking over the westbank.
______

one of the things never talked about it is the social and economic aspects of "clearing out the settlements".....like the Right of Return..its not going to happen...its not a matter of justice, it a matter of reality.

[aranthus]

10. Could this be why the Palestinians want a settlement freeze?

So that there won't be any more matters of reality? You may be right that the settlements won't be moved, but doesn't that mean that the Palestinians are right to see continued building as a sign of bad faith and creeping encroachment on whatever they are likely to get out of a peace deal?

[azurnoir]

11. yes it does depend on time

the Palestinians have waited 60 years for a state and IMO have the patience to wait a few more now as to the settlements I could possibly see the settlement blocks immediately adjacent to Israel in areas surrounding Jerusalem remaining in exchange for major concessions from Israel concerning the status of East Jerusalem it self and perhaps a "Palestinian only" road connecting the West Bank and Gaza, no settlements beyond that point as the settlements will of course have their own personnel IDF guards conversely I could also see the settlements remaining as part of the Palestinian State minus IDF and the settlers themselves offered full Palestinian citizenship of course the settlements IMO would become integrated in time and that too would have to understood

[excess_3]

9. Palestine declared independence in 1988

Israel, in 1948.


one state, looks rather unlikely