Palestine And Obama - Ego Trip Or Meaningful Journey?

[Published December 2008]

Hillary Clinton’s appointment as Secretary of State will afford many future opportunities to compare her performance with her predecessor Condoleezza Rice in bringing finality to the allocation of sovereignty in the West Bank and Gaza - where no internationally recognised sovereign ruler has reigned supreme since Britain left in haste in 1948 with its lion’s tail firmly planted between its legs.

To be fair to Ms Rice her failure to resolve the status of the West Bank and Gaza was due to the flawed objectives of President Bush’s 2003 Roadmap - popularly termed the “two state solution”.

President Bush misguidedly envisioned the Palestinian Arabs accepting a democratic, contiguous, viable - - and 22nd Arab Moslem - state in the major part of the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan, Egypt and Israel - living in peace and harmony alongside an expanded Jewish State whose boundaries would incorporate a substantial majority of the 200000 Jews then living in the West Bank and Gaza.

President Bush also believed the Arabs would abandon their 70 years old demand for millions of Arabs to be granted permission to emigrate to Israel - opting instead to engage in the business of nation building in their own newly created state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Not only he genuinely believed this laudable and idealistic goal was achievable. The President was able to convince the European Union, Russia and the United Nations to join him in negotiating such an outcome.

He - and they - have been proved sorely wrong on all counts.

Ms Rice became the most frequent - and frustrated - foreign emissary to the region since the Roadmap’s formulation yet failed to achieve even the slightest change in the Arabs’ negotiating stance - first formulated in 1967 - which totally rejected the President’s vision and its desired result.

Israel had been prepared to make concessions in settling its claims in the West Bank and Gaza in accordance with the rights accruing to the Jewish people under Article 80 of the United Nations Charter. However in the face of entrenched Arab opposition to recognising any Jewish claims of any sort whatsoever in the West Bank and Gaza those concessions were always bound to be rejected.

President Bush’s belief that he could solve the Arab - Jewish conflict has come crashing to the ground joining the failed attempts of President Carter and President Clinton - who also thought they too had the power prestige and standing to do exactly the same.

Now President-elect Obama stands ready to follow their footsteps. He needs to be very careful in believing he has the answers to finally end the Arab -Jewish conflict where distinguished former Presidents - and even the League of Nations and United Nations before them - have failed so abysmally.

Unverified reports that President-elect Obama intends to pursue the two-state solution or perhaps even embrace the 2002 Arab League Peace Initiative will inevitably land him in the same cavernous potholes that President Bush - and those who resolutely accompanied him - encountered in their six year trip to nowhere.

The Arab League Initiative is a sugar coated pill that merely repeats the 40 years old Arab demands that have caused the Roadmap to be taken off the best seller list. Put to the Jewish people as a “take it or leave it” proposal the Initiative will be rejected - as no major political party in Israel could possibly embrace its terms unconditionally and hope to gain Government when the next elections are held in February 2009.

Peace between Jews and Arabs will not be achieved in one trip. There will need to be frequent garage stops to refuel the vehicle and even a few oil and grease changes. It is a very long journey that will require patient and very careful navigation around all kinds of obstacles and pot holes.

The overly-ambitious objective of totally solving the conflict should now give way to genuine attempts to manage and moderate the conflict - rather than bring it to a triumphant and permanent end - since Jews and Arabs remain as far apart as they were when the division of Palestine was first proposed between them by the Peel Commission in 1937.

President-elect Obama needs to prepare for his journey armed with the Congressional Resolution dated 21 September 1922 (42 Stat. 1012 PART 1, 1922) signed by the 29th President Warren G. Harding which stated:

“Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled THAT the United States of America favours the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of Christian and all other non-Jewish communities in Palestine, and that the holy places and religious buildings and sites in Palestine shall be adequately protected.”

The President-elect should unequivocally affirm his support for this resolution and its clear intent.

He needs to understand where the territorial boundaries of “Palestine” were located in 1922 and what has since happened to the allocation of sovereignty between Arabs and Jews in the length and breadth of that territory.

He has to recognise that the Jews now exercise sovereignty in 17% of Palestine, the Arabs exercise sovereignty in 77% of Palestine and that sovereignty remains unallocated between either Jews or Arabs in the remaining 6% now called the West Bank and Gaza.

He must appreciate that the history of Palestine did not start in 1948, that it was part of the territorial division of the Ottoman Empire after the defeat of Turkey in World War 1 - offering the Arab nation self determination in 99.99% of that liberated land and the Jewish people self determination in just 0.01% of such land.

He must acknowledge the body of international law that exists in relation to Palestine - starting with the Treaty of Sevres in 1920 - which the Arabs now need to finally accept since continuing rejection prevents any possible prospect of a peaceful resolution of the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Armed with this body of information President-elect Obama will understand why the two state solution and the Arab League Initiative never did, never could, and never will succeed. He should be able to conclude that changes in the Arab negotiating stance are necessary since pressing for 100% of your demands can never lead to a concluded agreement with your adversary.

President-elect Obama must carefully plan for the journey that awaits him before he turns the engine on.

Palestine - Fantasy And Fiction Feature At The United Nations

[Published November 2008]

The gross ignorance displayed by current United Nations General Assembly President - Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann - highlights the difficulty in having any kind of rational discussion at the United Nations about finally resolving Jewish and Arab claims to the territory once called Palestine.

Speaking on the Question of Palestine at the 57th Plenary Meeting at UN headquarters in New York on 24 November, President Brockmann stated (apparently without anyone present attempting to correct him) :

“No amount of arm twisting and intimidation will change the Security Council resolution 181, adopted 61 years ago, calling for the creation of two states”

The President was demonstrably wrong in making this remarkable utterance.

Resolution 181 calling for the partition of western Palestine into one Jewish State and one Arab State was a resolution of the General Assembly not the Security Council. Being a General Assembly resolution it did not bind any member state of the United Nations - even those Arab States violently opposing it.

However many member states were concerned that Arab rejectionism of Resolution 181 could result in outright war and sought to qualify their support for Resolution 181 by seeking assurances that the Security Council would enforce the resolution once it was passed.

Resolution 181 therefore specifically requested

“The Security Council determine as a threat to the peace, breach of the peace or act of aggression, in accordance with Article 39 of the Charter, any attempt to alter by force the settlement envisaged by this resolution; “

The subsequent invasion of western Palestine in May 1948 by the armies of all the Arab League members (excepting Yemen) - signalled open defiance of Resolution 181 by the Arab League and exposed the Security Council as a toothless tiger unwilling to stop this clear act of aggression by the Arab League in its campaign to wipe out the nascent Jewish State.

Yet the opportunity presented by Resolution 181 could still have been translated into reality between 1948 and 1967 - after the Jews living in Gaza and the West Bank had been driven out by the invading Arab armies leaving the solely Arab population under Egyptian and Jordanian occupation.

However instead of creating a state in the West Bank and Gaza in that 19 year window of opportunity and self determination for its exclusively Arab population - the United Nations bowed to Arab League pressure and perpetuated a refugee problem instead - haunting its thought processes on Palestine to this very day.

Yet worse was to come as President Brockmann continued his journey into Fantasyland by declaring:

“Shamefully there is no Palestinian state to celebrate today and the prospects are as distant as ever”

Really?

The President of the General Assembly had obviously not read the debates of the General Assembly on 26 November 1947 when the Question of Palestine was being discussed. Had he done so he would have come across Uruguay’s representative - Rodriguez Fabregal - reminding those present on that day:

“But this word “partition” is not new; it has not been suddenly introduced into the present debate on the question. It goes back further than that. The territory of the old League of Nations Mandate [ for Palestine] has already been divided; and an independent State has already been established in its territory. That new State, Transjordan, has already been considered as a candidate for admission by the competent organs of the United Nations”

Not one of the hostile Arab delegations then present disputed Mr Fabregal’s statement of fact - namely that in 1946 Transjordan - with its exclusively Arab population - had been the first sovereign and fully independent state to be created in Palestine on territory that comprised 77% of Palestine.

Transjordan still exists today - having been renamed Jordan in 1950. Israel - established in 1948 comprises 17% of the former territory of Palestine. The West Bank and Gaza - in which sovereignty still remains undetermined - makes up the remaining 6% of what was once known as Palestine.

This historic truth makes a mockery of Arab propagandists and sympathisers who claim today that Israel comprises 78% of Palestine whilst Gaza and the West Bank comprise the remaining 22% of Palestine.

President Brockmann - revelling in his fictitious world - then appealed to member states :

“All explanations notwithstanding, this central fact[no Palestinian state] makes a mockery of the United Nations and gravely hurts its image and prestige. How can we continue like this?”

President Brockmann’s blatant attempt to bury any explanation for this “central fact” indicates the extent to which he has become a victim of his own rhetoric and a guarantor for the continued mockery of the UN.

Resolution 181 was adopted on 29 November 1947 by a vote of 33 nations in favour , 13 against and 10 abstentions. Those against the resolution included Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Yemen - the then entire membership of the Arab League with the exception of Transjordan.

Arab outrage at the proposed Resolution clearly failed to win the day in the General Assembly. The Arabs were simply not prepared to accept this overwhelming international support for Resolution 181. Their failure to do so has been the root cause for everything that has occurred since then in relation to Palestine.

Even today Articles 19 and 20 of the PLO Covenant proclaim that the partition of Palestine in 1947 was illegal and the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based on them are deemed null and void.

Respect for this body of international law still has no place in the Arab lexicon.

This is the explanation President Brockmann did not have the moral courage to identify, face up to or address.

No amount of crocodile tears by President Brockmann - or those who have pushed proposals such as Oslo and the Road Map - can ever hope to succeed in bringing about a 22nd Arab State in all of the West Bank and Gaza.

This is the clear message to be understood on the 41st Anniversary of Resolution 181.

Redrawing the boundary lines between Israel, Egypt and Jordan to allocate sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between them represents the last - and now the only - hope for peace between Jews and Arabs.

Until the United Nations abandons the notion of three states in former Palestine its image and prestige will continue to remain at rock bottom. It has become the victim of its own gutlessness.

It is indeed time for fact to replace fantasy and fiction at the United Nations.
Starting at the top with the President of the General Assembly would be a welcome first step in the right direction

Palestine - Lame Ducks, Dead Ducks, And Revived Ducks

[Published November 2008]

President George Bush became a lame duck on 20 November 2008 - giving up his unfettered executive authority to begin working closely with President-elect Barack Obama on important policy matters of significant national importance until his retirement from office at noon on 20 January 2009.

President Bush’s Roadmap became a dead duck on the very same day - after the Palestinian Authority placed full page advertisements in a number of Israeli and Palestinian newspapers urging Israelis to embrace the Arab League Initiative first proposed in 2002.

That Initiative was rejected by Israel on 25 May 2003 as having any role in the Roadmap negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority to create a new Arab State between Israel, Jordan and Egypt.

The placement of these advertisements amounted to a total - and highly public - repudiation of the Roadmap by the Palestinian Authority after almost six years of totally fruitless negotiations.

Such repudiation should be immediately accepted by Israel so that there is no possible misunderstanding that the Bush Roadmap and the negotiating farce it represented is effectively ended once and for all.

The timing of the advertisements was exquisite - even if perhaps a little irreverent - in burying President Bush’s vision on the very same day he surrendered his absolute power to make any decisions on the future progress of the Roadmap proposals he personally instigated.

Dead ducks or mortally wounded ducks need to be buried or the stench soon becomes unbearable. They indeed abound aplenty and many people, countries and organizations will feature in the obituary notices.

The Quartet - America, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations - has been mortally wounded. It has now seen its collective prestige in jointly endorsing and promoting the Roadmap finally come crashing to the ground without achieving one iota of movement in achieving the Roadmap’s objectives.

Yet the end of the Quartet’s negotiating role must be seen as a merciful release in finally terminating its public humiliation and embarrassing impotency at failing to have had the slightest effect whatsoever on influencing the course or outcome of the Roadmap negotiations.

Those countries who have paid up on their pledges totalling US$7.7 billion dollars to the Palestinian Authority just 11 months ago must be gagging on their duck pancakes - as must those other countries who have contributed billions of more dollars in the last 15 years to a totally implacable and unyielding Palestinian Authority.

Rejecting 90% of what you want and holding out for 100% - and being supported in that rejection by a host of fawning nations eager to throw money at you - has been brought to an end by a few full page ads.

The Roadmap - like the Oslo negotiations conducted between 1993 - 2000 - are now curiosity pieces to be picked over by future historians and conflict resolution centres as they ponder how 15 years of negotiations could have foundered in resolving sovereignty over a piece of land the size of Delaware.

Resurrection is not an unknown phenomenon in the Middle East and so the re-emergence of the Arab League Initiative from the dustbin will no doubt be trumpeted and discussed for quite a while.

There are even reports that President-elect Barack Obama will announce his support for the Initiative heralding a new and important foreign policy move by the new US administration. Mr Obama would be well advised to duck the issue and move very cautiously before taking to the air on such a flight of fancy.

Israel’s rejection of the Arab League Initiative in 2003 was unequivocal and for very good reason.

The Initiative called for the removal of about 300,000 Jews then living in the West Bank and Gaza, complete withdrawal from the West Bank, Gaza, the Golan Heights and Lebanon and the emigration of millions of Arabs into Israel to turn the Jews into a minority population in their own State.

Some things have changed since Israel’s outright rejection of these proposals. Israel has evacuated all 8,000 Jews from Gaza. It has withdrawn its military forces and ended its occupation in Gaza and part of the West Bank. 500,000 Jews now live in the West Bank.

What hasn’t changed is the Arab League’s refusal to agree to any amendments to its six years old Initiative - which itself mirrors the Arab League’s unchanged position for the last 41 years.

Jordanian Foreign Minister Abdelelah al Khatib confirmed this position telling Reuters on 27 March 2007

“The Arabs have agreed to reactivate the Arab initiative without changes. We reiterated that all Arab nations will adhere to the initiative as it is,”

Notwithstanding this “take it or leave it” approach both Israel’s President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert have recently expressed interest in the Arab League Initiative. Both are lame ducks without any political power to translate their views into political action.

One duck still in full flight and prepared to throw her hat into the ring to seek election as Israel’s next Prime Minister is current Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni who told the Jerusalem Post on 20 November:

“Israel has interests that are incompatible with the Arab peace initiative, including the issues of borders, east Jerusalem and refugees. These [issues] are presented in the plan in a way that I find unacceptable.”

Any Israeli political party espousing acceptance of the unexpurgated version of the Arab League Initiative would face annihilation at the upcoming elections next February. Ms. Livni - the leader of the Kadimah Party - presently Israel’s largest Parliamentary party - clearly does not intend to be such a sitting duck

She now understands that embarking on protracted negotiations over proposals that do not have the remotest chance of succeeding is a recipe for disaster.

The Israeli media are winners from this novel Arab foray into the Israeli press. They would certainly welcome the boost to their flagging advertising revenues at this time of global economic downturn. They no doubt hope that this process will continue and that shuttle diplomacy and furtive backroom meetings will be replaced by full page ads on a weekly basis to inform the public about matters that impact on their very lives and on which they have not had any input.

The reality is that in the absence of substantial amendments to the Arab League Initiative there will be many more dead ducks and lame ducks on the hit list as the Initiative sinks to its inevitable denouement.

Sweet and sour duck might then be a good idea to serve on the menu as we all flock to hear ex-politicians on the speaker circuit telling us why Oslo, the Roadmap and the Arab League Initiative became fatally flawed exercises in peace making efforts between Arabs and Jews.

Palestine,President Peres And Poppycock

[Published November 2008]


“The President seems to extend executive privilege way out past the atmosphere. What he says is executive privilege is nothing but executive poppycock.” - Sam Ervin


Israel’s President -Shimon Peres - has seriously undermined Israel’s national interest in his endorsement of the 2002 Arab League Initiative proposing a comprehensive peace with Israel and the 22 members of the Arab League.

Addressing the United Nations General Assembly Meeting on Inter-Faith Dialogue in New York on November 12 President Peres called the Arab League expressions of establishing normal relations with Israel in the Initiative as:

“inspirational and promising, a serious opening for real progress”.

He was moved by the Initiative’s call

“to stop the further shedding of blood enabling the Arab countries and Israel to live in peace and good neighbourliness and provide future generations with security, stability and prosperity”

Fine sounding words indeed but the devil is in the detail of how this vision is to be realised.

Israel’s Government has made no bones of the fact that it does not consider the Arab League initiative as having any effective role to play in the current negotiations being conducted under the Roadmap adopted by America, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations - dubbed the Quartet.

In agreeing to enter into negotiations under the Roadmap Israel made it abundantly clear to the Quartet on 25 May 2003 that its acceptance of the Roadmap was subject to the removal of all references to the Arab League Initiative from its terms whilst further stating succinctly that :

“A settlement based upon the Roadmap will be an autonomous settlement that derives its validity therefrom.”

Israel’s reasons for rejecting the Initiative were based on the following Arab League demands that were clearly expressed as the price Israel was required to pay for Arab League recognition:

1. Full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, Gaza, the Golan Heights and Lebanon which would have involved the uprooting of about 300000 Jews then living in those areas at the time and their resettlement inside the armistice line between Israel and Jordan on June 4, 1967 .

2. Achievement of a just resolution to the Palestinian refugee problem to be agreed on in accordance with UN General Assembly Resolution 194 that would have involved the resettlement of millions of Arabs within Israel making the Jews a minority in their own country.

3. The establishment of a sovereign, independent and exclusively Jew free Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza - between Israel, Jordan and Egypt - with East Jerusalem as its capital.

President Bush accepted the strength of Israel’s rejection of the Arab League Initiative when he advised Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on 14 April 2004 that Israel could not be expected to withdraw from all of the West Bank and Gaza and remove every single Jew living there nor could the resettlement of millions of Arabs into Israel be expected outcomes of any negotiations under the Roadmap.

Indeed it appears that the Roadmap has come to an end precisely because the Palestinian Authority has refused to budge on these identical demands in its negotiations with Israel under the Roadmap.

What we then have at the present time are tenuous ongoing negotiations, meetings and press conferences which Israel, the Palestinian Authority and the Quartet continue to attend for fear of being blamed for bringing the Roadmap negotiations to a crashing end if they don’t.

President Peres would have done well to take the opportunity to remind the Inter-Faith attendees that the belated Arab League Initiative and the Roadmap would never have been necessary had the Arab League:

1. Accepted the United Nations Partition Plan in 1947

2. Not attempted to wipe Israel off the face of the earth in 1967.

3. Not refused to negotiate with Israel for 25 years after the loss of the West Bank, Gaza and the Golan Heights

4. Accepted the provisions of Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 which recognised that Israel’s return to the June 4, 1967 armistice lines was not going to happen.

President Peres is not the Government of Israel. He is entitled to dream of peace. In that he is no different to all Israelis - indeed the whole world - who pray and yearn for peace between the Jews and the Arabs.

However if in doing do so he hangs the Government of Israel out to dry by adopting a stance that is completely contradictory to its stated policy, then he forfeits the respect of large sections of the Israeli population all of whom he is sworn to represent as their Head of State - as well as the continuing support of all Jews and persons of goodwill world wide who regard Israel as the national homeland for all Jews not only for this but for all future generations.

The Roadmap is doomed to failure. When that inevitability is finally recognised, the way forward will certainly not be realised by negotiating on the Arab League Initiative. The Arab League has not changed its negotiating stance on the demands embodied in the Initiative for the last 41 years. Expecting it to do so now is pie in the sky thinking.

If however the Israeli Government were to nevertheless decide to try and change the Arab League’s intransigent stance by entering into negotiations based on the Initiative then it would be right and appropriate to do so only after receiving approval of the electorate. It is extremely doubtful that any political party in Israel could win a mandate to negotiate with the Arab League on its Initiative.

President Peres’ disastrous foray into peacemaking with the Arabs whilst a politician is matter of historical record. It is totally inappropriate for him to once again try do so from outside politics in opposition to the stated policy of the Government whilst holding the office of President

President Peres should stick to inspecting honour guards and giving cocktail parties for visiting dignitaries and leave the conduct of foreign policy to the democratically elected Government of Israel.

Remembering Rabin's Roadmap For Palestine

[Published November 2008]

“Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.” - Tolstoy

Israel’s current President - Shimon Peres - and Prime Minister - Ehud Olmert - have used the 13th anniversary of the assassination of former Israeli Prime Minister - Yitzchak Rabin - to misrepresent the pursuit of their own failed and discredited political agendas as being somehow aligned with - and a continuation of - Mr Rabin’s vision.

Nothing could be further from the truth and needs to be vigorously rejected.
Speaking at the memorial service for Mr Rabin held this week- Mr Olmert told those gathered there:

” The bullets that killed Rabin could not stop the historic path that he led. Even after his death, Rabin will be victorious.”

President Peres was as equally effusive declaring:

“The bullets that were fired into Yitzhak’s back didn’t kill his way, because ideas and visions cannot be killed.”

Mr Rabin’s historic path and his ideas and visions are set out in the speech he delivered to the Knesset on October 5, 1995 - just days before his assassination - when presenting the 300 page “Israeli - Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip”.

That speech identified the following signposts that Mr Rabin’s historic path and vision sought to take :

1. First and foremost the State of Israel would be a Jewish State, at least 80% of whose citizens would be Jews

2. The State of Israel would include most of the area of the Land of Israel as it was under the rule of the British Mandate, and alongside it a Palestinian entity which would be home to most of the Palestinian residents living in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank

3. The Palestinian entity would be less than a State and would independently run the lives of the Palestinians under its authority.

4. The borders of the State of Israel would be beyond the lines which existed before the Six Day War. Israel would not return to the 4 June 1967 lines.

5. The main changes Mr Rabin envisaged as a result were:
(a) Jerusalem would be united and would include both Maale Adumim and Givat Zeev as the capital of Israel under Israeli sovereignty
(b) The security border of Israel would be located in the Jordan Valley in the broadest meaning of that term
(c) Gush Etzion, Efrat, Beitar and other communities in the area east of what was the “Green Line” prior to the Six Day War would be included in the State of Israel
(d) Blocs of settlements would be established in Judea and Samaria like the one in Gush Katif
(e) No single settlement would be uprooted in the framework of the Interim Agreement nor building hindered for natural growth
(f) The responsibility for the external security along the borders with Egypt and Jordan, as well as control over the airspace above all of the territories and the Gaza Strip maritime zone would remain in Israeli hands
(g) Murderers of Jews or those who had been wounded seriously would not be released
Mr Olmert and President Peres have totally rejected Mr Rabin’s Roadmap in favour of President Bush’s Roadmap which calls for a 22nd independent Arab State to be created between Israel and Jordan.

Releasing murderers of Jews and granting them pardons have now become accepted policies under Mr Olmert and President Peres.

Division of Jerusalem is now part of Mr Olmert’s vision. He struggles to retain places like Maale Adumin, Efrat and Beitar within the new borders of the State of Israel as the Palestinian Authority demand Israel returns to the 4 June 1967 lines and forcibly remove 500000 Jews now living beyond it. He seeks to do so by swapping parts of the State of Israel with the pieces of Judea and Samaria he wishes to retain.

Gush Khatif and other settlements in Gaza no longer exist because of Mr Olmert’s idea to abandon Gaza and expel the 8000 Jews who lived there.

Israel no longer controls the border with Egypt and allows flagrant breaches of the Gaza Strip maritime zone for fear of creating a public relations backlash.

Israel’s President and its Prime Minister need to stop engaging in telling fairy stories by suggesting that Mr Rabin has become victorious in death. They need to truthfully acknowledge that his ideas and vision are not alive nor continue today as they both pursue a path that is fraught with much greater danger for the continued existence of Israel than Mr Rabin’s proposals ever contemplated.

It was not bullets that killed Mr Rabin’s historic path, ideas and vision.

It was the abandonment of his policies by those who succeeded him in the corridors of power that has been the real cause.

Palestine Exits Centre Stage - Enter Jordan

[Published September 2008]

The first Presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama remarkably failed to raise or even mention their future involvement in President Bush’s proposal to create a new Arab State between Israel and Jordan.

Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Kosovo and eliminating America’s reliance on oil from the Middle East were all raised during a wide ranging discussion on American foreign policy. Israel was fleetingly mentioned by the contestants as they jointly pledged their determination to ensure that Iran’s threat to eliminate the Jewish State would never be allowed to happen.

Palestine and President Bush’s Roadmap were left out in the political wilderness.

This apparent lack of enthusiasm by both McCain and Obama indicates the sobering reality that President Bush’s Roadmap has reached a dead end so far as America’s future involvement in trying to bring it to fruition is concerned. No doubt there will be occasions during the remainder of the Presidential campaign when efforts are made to engage McCain and Obama but their responses will be half hearted at the best.

This position has certainly not come about for want of trying.

President Bush - like Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush Senior and Clinton before him - invested a large amount of his authority, prestige, personal time and active involvement in attempting to bring peace between Jews and Arabs. All of them have ended up being humiliated and getting egg on their face for their efforts.

The stumbling block this time - according to the Arabs - is the Jewish cities towns and villages established in the West Bank since 1967 mainly on State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes - collectively called “the settlements”.

President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority once again repeated his mantra in front of the United Nations Security Council this week when declaring:

"Settlement activity is not only an obstacle but it risks undermining the peace process,”

Abbas stubbornly continues to reject Israel’s offer to resettle 70000 Jews and to cede an area of land from within its own sovereign state boundaries to compensate for the retention of those remaining settlements that house 400000 Jews and businesses in the West Bank. Abbas wants all the Jews tossed out and is apparently prepared to throw away the opportunity to get his State if he does not get his way.

The stumbling block this time - according to Israel - is the Arab insistence that millions of Arab refugees and their descendants be resettled in Israel - rather than in the new West Bank State.

President Bush has come down heavily in support of Israel’s stance on both issues recognising that the removal of all Jews from the West Bank and the resettlement of millions of Arabs in Israel is simply not going to be agreed to - and can never be agreed to - by Israel.

A last ditch stand by America to try and modify both of these Arab demands over the past ten months has met with embarrassing failure. Both of these contentious issues have been pressed by the Arabs for the last 40 years and nothing has occurred in Arab thinking to change or moderate them over that period.

It is therefore completely understandable that neither McCain nor Obama was really interested in flogging a dead horse. The Bush proposal was simply not worth discussing any longer.

In taking this stance, McCain and Obama were probably mindful of the sentiments expressed in two polls conducted among Arab residents of the West Bank and Gaza this week.

Only 27.5% of the 1270 adults interviewed by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research believed the chances for the creation of the new state between Israel and Jordan were medium to high whilst 69.2% rated the chances as low to non-existent.

Encouragingly however 28% of the 1380 adults interviewed by the A-Najah University in the West Bank city of Nablus supported the idea of the establishment of a joint Palestinian - Jordanian state.

Perhaps these surveys herald the starting point of a new approach - involving the active participation of Jordan - in resolving the territorial dispute in the West Bank and Gaza, the humanitarian issues involving the Arab residents living there and the refugees who continue to languish in the refugee camps situated in the surrounding Arab states.

Opposition to Jordan’s involvement was expressed at a conference held by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy last weekend when former Jordanian foreign minister Marwan Muasher declared:

“Good luck finding Jordanians who will accept this idea. This is a non-starter.” (Jerusalem Post 23 September)

Former Head of Israel’s National Security Council Giora Eiland however was reported as saying in the same article that “tacit support for this idea has been expressed in private talks.”

Hopefully the international community - and America especially - will not be phased by this apparent case of stage fright from a player destined to once again share the spotlight with Israel as the two central characters in the continuing effort to end the conflict that has bedevilled the region for 130 years.

Jordan’s return to centre stage would cap a remarkable comeback. Jordan was the last Arab occupier of the West Bank between 1948-1967 and continued as the prime Arab interlocutor until 1974 when replaced by the PLO with Arab League approval. Having ceded all claims to the West Bank in 1988, Jordan once again could now find itself cast in the role of preserving at least some part of the West Bank and its Arab population under Arab sovereignty.

The alternative to Jordanian involvement is the renewal of terrorism and possibly war. Such outcomes will not only involve Israel, the West Bank and Gaza - but will surely spread to Jordan.

The time for Jordan to quit its delicate tightrope act is fast approaching.

There is nothing so dangerous as being left suspended in mid-air with no one to break your fall.

Paulson's Prognosis Pinpoints Palestine's Panacea

[Published September 2008]

“This needs to be big enough to make a real difference and get at the heart of the problem” US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson [Times Online 20 September 2008] - The Paulson Prognosis

The threat of a world economic meltdown does wonders in helping concentrate the mind on how to resolve the intractable 130 years old conflict between Arabs and Jews over a piece of land once called Palestine that today comprises two sovereign States - Jordan and Israel - and two tiny slivers of land that currently belong to no one - the West Bank and Gaza.

It has taken a roller coaster week of unprecedented turmoil, crises and upheaval for Governments, their central banks and stock exchanges to realise that unquantified wads of money - not just pocket money - had to be thrown at resolving - and thereby avoiding - a world financial crisis that threatened outcomes last experienced in the Great Depression 80 years ago.

Finding the vast amount required - estimated to eventually exceed US$ 1 trillion - was not seen as being an option or even negotiable but as an absolute essential to ending the crisis for one simple reason - the alternative of risking a world recession and global shutdown could simply not be countenanced.

United States Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson was the one to successfully deliver this unpleasant - but totally necessary - prognosis.

The unresolved Arab-Jewish conflict with its sinister overtones of possible nuclear war and surging oil prices threatens the health of the very world economies and societies that today only continue to survive because of the Paulson Prognosis.

Billions of dollars have already been spent over the last 60 years - as a consequence of the war in 1948 between Israel and six invading Arab armies - in perpetuating the only refugee crisis in the world that apparently appears incapable of resolution by resettlement and rehabilitation.

The cash budget for 2008 approved by the General Assembly of the United Nations for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is a staggering US$ 541.8 million. Preservation of refugee status - not its elimination - remains a cardinal tenet of its continued and privileged existence.

Since October 2000, UNRWA has launched Emergency Appeals to the donor community to fund the Agency’s Emergency Programmes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. From October 2000 until December 2007, the Agency received a total of US$826.6 million in pledges, which was less than two-thirds of the amount requested. In December 2007, UNRWA launched an appeal for US$ 237.7 million to cover the cost of its emergency activities in 2008. In May 2008 the requirement was revised and increased to US$ 263.4 million. Against 2008 Appeal UNRWA received US$ 128.3 million in pledges as of 31 May 2008. [http://www.un.org/unrwa/finances/index.html]

Additionally billions of dollars - US$7 billion pledged in Paris alone in December 2007 - have been spent by the international community since 1993 in a concerted effort to create conditions for a new Arab state to be established between Israel and Jordan, to resettle and rehabilitate there those Arabs made refugees in 1948 and their descendants and to end the state of war between Israel and its Arab adversaries.

This money has been misappropriated, badly spent, poorly directed, irresponsibly controlled and has not had the slightest impact in achieving any of these objectives - which remain as unattainable now as they have for the last 60 years.

The uncertain nature of Iran’s current nuclear program, its threats to eliminate Israel and Israel’s refusal to become a sacrificial lamb constitute a potent cocktail that could well risk a world nuclear meltdown on a scale that would make this past week’s threatened economic meltdown pale into insignificance.

Can the international community continue to stand by and take the risk that this will not happen - possibly as early as within the next six months?

As we have seen this past week, events can take a very sudden turn for the worse after a slow period of gestation - which in hindsight probably justified action being taken far earlier, with less fallout and at possibly much less cost than had to be found this week to ensure the world’s economic survival.

President Bush’s Road Map was a sincere and well intended attempt to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict. Its failure to get to first base after six years of trying has proved it to be totally ineffective as a cure. The writing has been on the wall for at least four years but the international community has closed its eyes, allowed the conflict to deteriorate and the rhetoric to increase.

It is abundantly clear that a huge amount of money needs to be strategically targeted and urgently spent to make a real difference by getting at the heart of the problem before it once again suddenly degenerates into outright war with possible nuclear as well as economic consequences world wide as its legacies.

The Security Council of the United Nations needs to unanimously resolve taking the following steps to resolve the conflict as a matter of grave urgency:

1. Setting up an international claims tribunal with sufficient funds to process and pay all claims made by

(a) Arabs from Palestine and Jews from Arab countries who became refugees as a result of the Arab - Israeli War in 1948 - and their descendants.

(b) Current host countries in resettling and rehabilitating those refugees now living within their national boundaries and closing down and demolishing any existing refugee camps.

2. Declaring that any claimed right of return by any refugee or his descendants to his original country of origin is deemed abandoned on settlement of his claim.

3. Immediately dissolving UNWRA and transferring its budget and responsibilities to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

4. Establishing an International Boundaries Commission to redraw the international boundaries between Jordan, Israel and Egypt with the participation and joint consent and approval of all three countries to such new boundaries.

The old saying - “when life gives you lemons - make lemonade” - is surely one that the international community should heed at this point of time. It is going to be a very expensive drink indeed but its cost pales into insignificance compared to the medicine that awaits us if we don’t.