Is the tide turning?
Mahmoud Abbas has ordered all government operated Palestinian media outlets to terminate programming which incites hatred towards Israel., the head of Hamas has offered a 10 year truce, and the US government shoots down an Israeli request to fund separate roads for Palestinians.
Wow. There is hope after all…
[Update] Or not, depending who you ask.
Charlie Brown and the football. Don’t get too excited just yet. Any truly positive change will take years to unfold.
Who enforces Abbas’ order? The Fatah? Hamas? or the ‘evil’ Israeli Army tearing through Palestinian homes and offices restricting their “free speech”?
Just had to throw a little water on your fire…it is good to hear some good news. Just, when it is backed up by a bunch of anti-Israeli ‘occupation’ it means a lot less.
Mobius,
I appreciate your optimism except on the hudna thing we know to be a ceasefire that Hamas reserves the right to break whenever it’s convenient for them.
As for the ‘sustaining of the apartheid regime’ through building alternative roads, why doesn’t anyone ask why getting rid of all Jews from Judea, Samaria, and Gaza doesn’t make ‘Palestine’ an apartheid regime?
hey josh,
getting rid of all jews from gaza and WB wouldn’t make it an appartheid regime as much as an area ethnically cleansed of jews (for apartheid, you would need jews living there to be given limited rights, but there would be no jews living there).
the agency of that cleansing would probably be israel itself in demanding the dismantling and evactuation of settlements. however, you need to look at the bigger picture. most arab states are effectively judenrein (jew free) and its sad and the jews are owed compensation, but i would rather have quiet in our country than tenuous minority rights in theirs (that is a big part of modern zionism). i’m not saying that there will be peace anytime soon, but if there can be, i would give up our presence in WB/Gaza for our lives in Israel proper. that’s just me though. land means less to me than a peaceful life.
also, i would think that if there is an eventual peace treaty, within 100-200 years you will have jews moving back to Judea and Samaria, and living as minorities under Palestinian rule. this is a far off day and will require quite a bit of hate to be overcome. if there were a palestinian state in the NEAR future, i’m sure jewish immigration would be restricted (but after some palestinian refugees being allowed back in israel under a compromise on the Right of Return, i’m sure Israel will similarly restrict Palestinian immigration).
An unfair thing is that the palestinians not allowed to return to Israel proper after a peace treaty will be financially compensated while Jews whose families have been in the WB for generations (ie-Avraham Burg) will probably never see their compensation (just like all those jews previously chased from arab countries). HOWEVER, again I emphasize that this unfairness is something I am willing to deal with and sacrifice if it means quiet within Israel Proper. (Though who knows, maybe the world bank, us, eu, un, etc.. will shell out compensation money for the jews who lost their homes also, would be a nice gesture).
In regards to the hudna, yes hamas could break it anytime and is not trustworthy, but i think this is still positive. AT LEAST it shows that israel’s policy of targetted assasinations has been successful and may have changed some of hamas’ tactics. they usually would not get on israel radio (owned and run by israeli government) and say they are contemplating a truce. to me, it seems they r running and maybe starting to realize that they are in trouble politically and physically.
So Hell has finally frozen. That explains all the snow in the midwest.
Robbie:
Hamas isn’t changing tactics, they are only retrenching for the ‘next phase.’
Abu Mazen is a terrorist thug and a holocaust denier. The biggest problem with him, is that he may be a lot more clever than Arafat, and actually may realize Faisal Hussain’s “trojan horse” vision. The arabs are realizing that their current tactics are not working, and therefore they will attempt more subtle means to destroy Israel. Only a fool could trust them at this point of history, and unfortunately there are hundreds of thousands, and many of them are in a position of power. There is probably going to be another Oslo, and then another more vicious terrorist war against Israel. The Jewish peace camp people have their underpants wet because of this alleged possibility of peace with the arab enemy. But this time, this dangerous gamble will cost even more Jewish blood.
Maybe the palestinian leadership are up to no good. Hamas almost definetely is (i dont believe they are changing so much, just that they are scared shitless). And I dont know much about Abbas except I like many of his public statements that the Western and Israeli media pick up, while others, like the recent one about not abandoning the Right of Return, really bother me. However, I don’t think the left or even Sharon are as stupid as you like to make them out to be. No one is going to turn around and trust a fractured, militant-filled society to change overnight. I think it will take the Palestinians many years to develop a true civil discourse and society , but I also think that I don’t want to be in the middle of that (and apparently neither does Sharon). We don’t have to “gamble” like you write because we will have a completed separation fence. That’s the beauty of disengagement, we are not at all dependent on a society that hasn’t exactly proved itself trustworthy.
Why are you so excited about a strain in US-Israel ties? I’m not saying the roads are necessarily the best idea, but the fact that the US is turning Israel down isn’t exactly a cause for optimism in my opinion.
Robbie,
I wish you knew half the truth about ‘disengagement’;
-increase of Arab workers given work visas,
-allowing for increased traffic on ‘safe passage’ routes,
-continued, uninterrupted supply of water, electricity, and fuel,
-retraining of armed forces, by foreign military and intelligence services,
-compensation to rehabilitate PA economy,
-continued monthly transfer of sales taxes,
-precedent set of Israel retreating while under fire,
-Jews creating judenrhein,
-Jews confirming that judenrhein works!
all this and much more, so that we can adopt the image-apprehensive liberal-left’s wish to be able to say, ‘ we did our part’, while at the same time gambling with the lives of Israelis living on the new border and elsewhere of course.
http://www.weaponsurvey.com
As someone once said if they have been trying to kill you for the last 50 years what makes you think they wouldn’t lie to you.