Road map unfolds unevenly

There are two big issues on the table right now between Israel and the Palestinians. Firstly, Israel has agreed to release some Palestinian prisoners, many of whom have been detained without trial indefinitely, received 'moderate physical pressure' from Israeli security, and generally locked up, as a way to remove agitators and other 'hazardous' people, along with armed fighters, from Palestinian society. The question is how many will be released, and Israel doesn't want to let those go who have harmed Israelis, including soldiers. The Palestinian militant groups are demanding a pretty broad collection of people be released, and it seems unlikely that Sharon will let many of those go. The second big issue is the settlements, where construction continues in defiance of the 'road map.' Even while road closures may hypothetically be eased, such steps can't ease the trauma of the settlement project:

Does anyone in Israel expect the Palestinians to be so grateful for having been permitted to leave their confined quarters that they won't see what is happening before their very eyes?

What is happening before their very eyes is the non-stop expansion of the settlements. Settlements are the unlawful transfer of an occupying population to occupied territory; they are the cynical theft of land reserves vital for the Palestinian cities and villages; they are the denial of territorial contiguity and the potential to develop; they are the wresting of control of irreplaceable water resources; they are control of roads. They are all that, and more.

The settlements embody all of the perceptions of Israeli lordliness that have developed over the years on both sides of the Green Line. It is an axiom now that "state lands" are only for Jews; that Palestinians need less land and water per head than Jews; that they do not deserve or require the same infrastructure or conveniences as Jews (see East Jerusalem and Galilee villages); that Palestinians live here because we allow them, not because it is their right.

Nothing as dangerous as an Israeli like Amira Hass who sympathizes with Palestinians. The venerable Edward Said reflected on the road map, and saw a document floating far from reality:

The roadmap, in other words, is not about a plan for peace so much as a plan for pacification: it is about putting an end to Palestine as a problem. Hence the repetition of the term "performance" in the document's wooden prose, -- in other words, how the Palestinians are expected to behave, almost in the social sense of the word. No violence, no protest, more democracy, better leaders and institutions, all based on the notion that the underlying problem has been the ferocity of Palestinian resistance, rather than the occupation that has given rise to it. Nothing comparable is expected of Israel except that the small settlements I spoke of earlier, known as "illegal outposts" (an entirely new classification which suggests that some Israeli implantations on Palestinian land are legal) must be given up and, yes, the major settlements "frozen" but certainly not removed or dismantled. Not a word is said about what since 1948, and then again since 1967, Palestinians have endured at the hands of Israel and the US. Nothing about the de-development of the Palestinian economy as described by the American researcher Sara Roy in a forthcoming book. House demolitions, the uprooting of trees, the 5000 prisoners or more, the policy of targeted assassinations, the closures since 1993, the wholesale ruin of the infrastructure, the incredible number of deaths and maimings -- all that and more, passes without a word.

There is also some very interesting stuff in this piece about an initiative called the National Political Initiative, which would help mobilize Palestinian society for elections seek peace, and take control of the adrift Intifada. There's an extremely interesting piece in Haaretz about how Marwan Barghouti, the arrested West Bank director of Fatah, helped orchestrate the cease-fire from within an Israeli prison. Barghouti has been linked to dozens of fatal Palestinian attacks and is on trial now. However, It's extremely likely that Barghouti will become the president or PM of Palestine someday.

"The hudna came about on three planes: There were negotiations between Abu Mazen [Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas] and the Palestinian organizations; there were negotiations between Barghouti and these organizations; and there were talks between groups of prisoners in the jails," says Haaretz Arab Affairs Editor Danny Rubinstein. "The prisoners are considered the avant-garde of the various Palestinian movements, and without their imprimatur, nothing can go forward. Thus it is that one of the central conditions of the hudna is the release of prisoners."

...Certainly Barghouti is no pacifist, nor a Ghandian proponent of passive resistance and non-violent struggle. Writing in the Washington Post in January last year, Barghouti declared that "Israel will have security only after the end of occupation, not before." He was widely seen as the West Bank leader of the Tanzim, the Fatah young guard that has functioned as the primary militia during the uprising. But Barghouti has consistently pressed for a two-state solution, in which Israel and an independent Palestine in the West Bank and Gaza Strip co-exist with fully normalized relations.

"For six years I languished as a political prisoner in an Israeli jail, where I was tortured, where I hung blindfolded as an Israeli beat my genitals with a stick," Barghouti wrote of his imprisonment, which ended only with his deportation to Jordan. "But since 1994, when I believed Israel was serious about ending its occupation, I have been a tireless advocate of a peace based on fairness and equality."

Posted by HongPong at July 6, 2003 02:14 PM
Listed under Israel-Palestine .