Just as the senseless slaughter of World War I showed the old
European regimes were inept, the slaughter taking place in the
Middle East today is showing the current political leaders of
Israel and Palestine are also deficient. The most recent evidence
of this is Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s denouncement
of the best hope for peace in a long time ““ the Geneva
Accord.
The Geneva Accord, to be officially announced at a signing
ceremony on Nov. 20, is the result of unofficial negotiations
between prominent Israeli and Palestinian citizens, including
former ministers and negotiators. The 50-page document hammers out
every detail that must be decided before the establishment of a
Palestinian state: control of Jerusalem, Palestinian right of
return, and Jewish settlements in the occupied territories. The
accord gives concessions to both sides and solves one of the main
problems that caused the breakdown of the previous peace process in
2000: control of Jerusalem. Under the accord, Jerusalem would be
divided and become the capital of both states, and both sides would
be given control over their respective holy sites. In most cases,
the Israeli settlements in the occupied territories that anger
Palestinians so much would be handed over to Palestinian
control.
The accord has initial backing from many countries such as
England and Switzerland. It is also gathering grassroots support
from the Israeli and Palestinian populations. According to The
Guardian, “Public meetings (in Israel) to explain the accord
have been standing room only. Among the Palestinians, the
indications are similarly positive: When Al-Ayyam printed the
Geneva text in Arabic for the first time at the weekend, the paper
sold out; a reprint is on the way.” Additionally, over
100,000 Israelis and 60,000 Palestinians have already signed on as
supporters of a plan very similar to the Geneva Accord.
The Geneva Accord represents a revolution in contemporary
thinking about how to create peace in the Middle East. The ability
of the plan to create peace is demonstrated by the derision it
received from Prime Minister Sharon, the conservative Likud leader
who has little interest in compromise because it would invalidate
everything his administration has been built around. Uncompromising
nationalism is strengthened during times of suffering ““ a
fact we Americans rediscovered following the World Trade Center
attacks as public support for President Bush swelled to
unprecedented levels. Sharon’s government gains support from
each terrorist attack on Israel. But this same fact works in the
opposite direction, as each Israeli military strike that takes
place and each wall that goes up creates more Islamic extremism and
terrorism than it stops.
Some conservatives like Jerusalem Post columnist Saul Singer
even go so far as to make the outrageous claim that peace is
impossible. According to Singer, “Real peace between the
United States and the Soviet Union did not depend on any agreement
between them, but on the collapse of the latter. The same goes for
the Arab world; peace depends on its transformation, not on
agreements with it in its current dictatorial state.” This
couldn’t be further from the truth.
I could cite countless examples of real peace being established
without the complete collapse or annihilation of one side, but I
would run out of room for my column. A pertinent example is the
system of power-sharing established in the Good Friday Agreement of
1998, which finally created peace between the long warring
“terrorist” factions of the Irish Republican Army and
the Ulster Unionists in Northern Ireland. Instead of one side
completely annihilating the other, both have agreed to share power
in the greater interest of peace.
The people of Israel will realize while the liberals may not
have a figurehead like Sharon, they have something far more
important: a plan for peace ““ something the conservative
Likud party has shown time and again it will never be able to
deliver. The people of Israel will realize the current strategy of
hard-line military strikes is contributing to an endless cycle of
violence and extremism on both sides. The main reason Likud party
members have given for opposing the accord has been that it would
be capitulating to terrorist demands. But the Palestinian people
are not terrorists. Neither are the Israelis who negotiated with
them. And neither are the Israeli people.
But Likud continues to operate the Israeli government under the
assumption that the other side is a big bunch of terrorists. For
example, Likud Agricultural Minister Yossi Katz compared the Geneva
Accord to the Democrats signing a treaty with Osama bin Laden and
the Taliban. Sharon’s argument is a schoolboy excuse for not
shaking hands with a classmate he got into a scuffle with. He seems
to have forgotten one of the most important lessons we all learned
in grade school: sharing.
Sharon has shot down the Geneva Accord as being “more
dangerous than the Oslo Accords.” Well, if Palestinian
demands are comprised of sharing the territory equally and living
with secure borders, then I say give it to them. Besides,
Sharon’s statement couldn’t be further from the truth.
The Palestinians have their own share of pills to swallow in the
accord, including no right of return and allowing Israel to keep
control of some of its settlements in the occupied territories. The
bottom line is that the accord seems fair for both sides.
The unwillingness of the Likud party to negotiate for peace
demonstrates that the party is useless and bankrupt. The
opportunity for peace is at hand. Both sides would be foolish to
waste it.
Bitondo is a third-year political science and history
student. E-mail him at mbitondo@media.ucla.edu.