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musaamadupembo
175 Posts |
 Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 14:43:45
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Stop the Band-Aid Treatment
We Need Policies for a Real, Lasting Middle East Peace
By Jimmy Carter
Tuesday, August 1, 2006; Page A17
The Middle East is a tinderbox, with some key players on all sides waiting for every opportunity to destroy their enemies with bullets, bombs and missiles. One of the special vulnerabilities of Israel, and a repetitive cause of violence, is the holding of prisoners. Militant Palestinians and Lebanese know that a captured Israeli soldier or civilian is either a cause of conflict or a valuable bargaining chip for prisoner exchange. This assumption is based on a number of such trades, including 1,150 Arabs, mostly Palestinians, for three Israeli soldiers in 1985; 123 Lebanese for the remains of two Israeli soldiers in 1996; and 433 Palestinians and others for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three soldiers in 2004.
This stratagem precipitated the renewed violence that erupted in June when Palestinians dug a tunnel under the barrier that surrounds Gaza and assaulted some Israeli soldiers, killing two and capturing one. They offered to exchange the soldier for the release of 95 women and 313 children who are among almost 10,000 Arabs in Israeli prisons, but this time Israel rejected a swap and attacked Gaza in an attempt to free the soldier and stop rocket fire into Israel. The resulting destruction brought reconciliation between warring Palestinian factions and support for them throughout the Arab world.
Hezbollah militants then killed three Israeli soldiers and captured two others, and insisted on Israel's withdrawal from disputed territory and an exchange for some of the several thousand incarcerated Lebanese.
With American backing, Israeli bombs and missiles rained down on Lebanon. Hezbollah rockets from Syria and Iran struck northern Israel.
It is inarguable that Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks on its citizens, but it is inhumane and counterproductive to punish civilian populations in the illogical hope that somehow they will blame Hamas and Hezbollah for provoking the devastating response. The result instead has been that broad Arab and worldwide support has been rallied for these groups, while condemnation of both Israel and the United States has intensified.
Israel belatedly announced, but did not carry out, a two-day cessation in bombing Lebanon, responding to the global condemnation of an air attack on the Lebanese village of Qana, where 57 civilians were killed this past weekend and where 106 died from the same cause 10 years ago. As before there were expressions of "deep regret," a promise of "immediate investigation" and the explanation that dropped leaflets had warned families in the region to leave their homes. The urgent need in Lebanon is that Israeli attacks stop, the nation's regular military forces control the southern region, Hezbollah cease as a separate fighting force, and future attacks against Israel be prevented. Israel should withdraw from all Lebanese territory, including Shebaa Farms, and release the Lebanese prisoners. Yet yesterday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert rejected a cease-fire.
These are ambitious hopes, but even if the U.N. Security Council adopts and implements a resolution that would lead to such an eventual solution, it will provide just another band-aid and temporary relief. Tragically, the current conflict is part of the inevitably repetitive cycle of violence that results from the absence of a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East, exacerbated by the almost unprecedented six-year absence of any real effort to achieve such a goal.
Leaders on both sides ignore strong majorities that crave peace, allowing extremist-led violence to preempt all opportunities for building a political consensus. Traumatized Israelis cling to the false hope that their lives will be made safer by incremental unilateral withdrawals from occupied areas, while Palestinians see their remnant territories reduced to little more than human dumping grounds surrounded by a provocative "security barrier" that embarrasses Israel's friends and that fails to bring safety or stability.
The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key U.N. resolutions, official American policy and the international "road map" for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since the founding of Israel, U.S. government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal.
A major impediment to progress is Washington's strange policy that dialogue on controversial issues will be extended only as a reward for subservient behavior and will be withheld from those who reject U.S. assertions. Direct engagement with the Palestine Liberation Organization or the Palestinian Authority and the government in Damascus will be necessary if secure negotiated settlements are to be achieved. Failure to address the issues and leaders involved risks the creation of an arc of even greater instability running from Jerusalem through Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and Tehran.
The people of the Middle East deserve peace and justice, and we in the international community owe them our strong leadership and support.
Former president Carter is the founder of the nonprofit
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/31/AR2006073100923.html
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Cornelius
Sweden
1051 Posts |
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Cornelius
Sweden
1051 Posts |
Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 15:37:21
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Keeping it short:
When someone does not recognise you or your existence, then how is there going to be peace between you and that person who would prefer to see you dead? As Iran’s Ahmed has said they would love to wipe out Israel off the map. Their battle cry is “Israel out of Palestine. They want the whole cake called the Promised Land and WHO is it that promised it to Hamas and Hezbollah? What do Iranians do on the day instituted as Qods Day by Imam Khomeini?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Qods+Day+&btnG=Google+Search
I read quote of Dag Hammarskjöld yesterday, that you don't get to where you are going by keeping your eyes on the ground and he said/says:” Never look down to test the ground before taking your next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far horizon will find the right road”
So in addition to Omri Ceren’s critique, above all the most well known fact (and surely Jimmy Cater knows it too) is that Hamas and the axis of evil’s Hezbollah who wage war on Israel and are not interested in a two-state solution. Hamas has still not been smart enough to recognise Israel (perhaps they smell victory in the gunpowder of Iran’s Katyusha rockets and t Shahab III on which they painted “Death to (you know WHO) at the military parade at which they paraded them.
http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=Most+advanced+Iranian+missiles&prssweb=Search&ei=UTF-8&fr=slv1-adbe&x=wrt
67 borders? Faisal Husseini said EXACTLY what Benjamin Netanyahu had been saying all along. : A Palestinian three stage plan to take all of the Promised Land: with Faisal Husseini in heaven with his last interview and his last words with eyes fixed on the horizon:
http://www.aish.com/jewishissues/middleeast/Faisals_Trojan_Horse.asp
We are also keeping our eyes on the Horizon.
For many suicide leads to heaven. The Jewish State- only one there is, is not on a suicide mission and is where the Almighty‘s eternal love has destined Israel TO BE!
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musaamadupembo
175 Posts |
Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 15:37:44
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Salaam to Brother Cornelius,
You know my brother,it pays at all times to be honest and frank with our friends,otherwise,our utterances or writings would be classified as high-class hypocrisy.
The reaction of "Israpundit" should not come as a surprise to you.By the way,Israpundit is to Isreal what The Daily Telegraph is to Conservative Party of the UK!
Let us all hope and Pray for the Innocent Civilians on both sides of this "great Divide".
The Best of salaam,
Musa. |
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Cornelius
Sweden
1051 Posts |
Posted - 07 Aug 2006 : 15:55:57
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ASalamalaikum wa rahamatullahi wa barakatuhu Musa!
There are many Arab and Muslim papers on the Israpundit menu. Israel is grappling with reality and is not sweeping the problems that are and that await, under the table.
It is Lebanon has rejected the UN 's terms of offer of a cesafire.
As you can see, it is Lebanon and some of the strident voices in the Arab league that have not accepted the conditions of the ceasefire that have been attained with such difficulty, and bear in mind that France is and has always been Lebanon’s best friend.
The Arab League (and OIC voices) are less strident and less passionate and have always been less passionate about Janjaweed militia activities in Darfur where it seems to be more of a black thing.
Rasulullah salallahu alaihi wa salaam says in his last sermon “Blacks don’t think that you are better than whites and whites don’t think that you are better than blacks. Arabs don’t think that you are better than non-Arabs and non-Arabs don’t think that you are better than Arabs: The best among you is the one with the most Tarqwa!”
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=The+Last+sermon+of+the+Prophet+of+Islam
This question is not rhetorical: So why all this foot-dragging about Darfur while people of patience and people of no choice die daily and you have details of this long, sad story.
As you have details of the daily civilian deaths in Iraq , which apparently is still on the Arab League’s back burner.
Is Iran a member of the Arab league?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=The+arab+League+and+Darfur&spell=1
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