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Friday, October 26, 2001 Cheshvan 9, 5762				
PM plans to offer Arafat a state - if he stops the violence  
By Aluf Benn 
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is working on a plan to offer the Palestinians a
state even before a final agreement - provided Palestinian Authority
Chairman Yasser Arafat puts a halt to the violence. 
The Sharon plan includes using a meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush
on November 11 - when the prime minister is due in Washington for a meeting
with Jewish leaders - to discuss what to do if Arafat fails to crack down on
the militias operating in the territories and cannot, therefore, be
considered a partner for a political deal between Israel and the
Palestinians. 
Sharon is offering an interim agreement, which includes a Palestinian state,
even before the determination of final borders or the resolution of the
Jerusalem and refugee issues. 
The prime minister believes that at present, there is no Israeli majority
for a final agreement and that Arafat is also unable to reach an
end-to-the-conflict deal. The question troubling Sharon is whether Arafat is
able or wants to change his current strategy of using terror and violence to
achieve his goals. Sharon conditions any political progress on an end to the
violence and incitement by the Palestinians. 
The Israelis believe that by the end of November, the U.S. will wind down
its operation in Afghanistan, as harsh winter conditions will prevent air
campaigns or the involvement of ground forces. Under such circumstances, the
U.S. administration's agenda could change and Washington could be open to
new ideas for dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. 
Sharon has promised the United States that he does not intend to topple the
PA, nor harm Arafat personally. But it appears that the prime minister wants
to reach an understanding with Bush that would allow Israel to step up the
pressure on the Palestinians. 
According to government sources in Jerusalem: "If Arafat is not the partner,
we'll have to exact an ever-increasing price, both militarily and
politically. It's important for the United States and the international
community to reach this conclusion and remove his legitimate base. That way,
we'll have more freedom of action - militarily, as well," the source said. 
Behind closed doors, Sharon is skeptical of Foreign Minister Shimon Peres'
claims that Arafat is the only partner for a political process and that if
the PA leader were to fall, he would be replaced by Hamas, Hezbollah and
Islamic Jihad. Sharon believes that Arafat made a historic mistake when he
refused to cease the hostilities and engage in political negotiations,
knowing that Sharon could push a deal through with the support of the
Israeli public. 
Political sources said that the assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam
Ze'evi had interrupted a political move that the prime minister had begun.
They noted that the night before the assassination, Sharon had decided to
make a speech about a Palestinian state to a gathering of Likud central
committee members in Kiryat Motzkin. 
The following are the main points of the Sharon plan: 
l A long-term interim agreement, with no timetable, and the postponement of
the Jerusalem and refugee issues 
l The Palestinian state will be established before a solution to the other
issues 
l The Palestinian state will be demilitarized, with the Israel Defense
Forces controling its borders with Egypt and Jordan and the Israel Air Force
having freedom of movement in the skies above it.
****************************************************************
New peace initiatives suggested by Labor Party members
By Ellis Shuman October 31, 2001
http://www.israelinsider.com/channels/diplomacy/articles/dip_0112.htm
After a long period of relative quiet on the diplomatic front, Labor
Party  members are promoting a number of new
initiatives. Foreign Affairs Minister Shimon Peres  is
reportedly finalizing a proposal that would call for a total Israeli
withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and recognition of a demilitarized
Palestinian State. Knesset members Haim Ramon <javascript:;> and
Shlomo Ben-Ami <javascript:;> have launched their own plan for
unilateral separation. Peres told reporters yesterday that he is
likely to meet with Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat when
the two attend an economic conference on the Spanish island of Majorca
at the end of the week. Peres said, "We shall probably meet, but we
are not going to negotiate because I think that negotiations should be
prepared very carefully, otherwise it will create a disappointment
instead of a hope." The last time the two met was at the end of
September, when they agreed to a cease-fire plan that was never
implemented. Peres also repeated what he had told Labor party 
 Our plan is "to create a temporary border between us and them."  - MK
Haim Ramon	
members at a meeting last Thursday -- that he was working on a new
diplomatic initiative that he planned to bring to the party for
approval in the near future. The Peres plan would call for a total
withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the dismantlement of all Jewish
settlements there, Maariv reported yesterday. Israel would reportedly
agree to the creation of a demilitarized Palestinian state. In
addition, an international committee would be created, with the
participation of the United Nations, European Union, the United States
and Russia, that would deal with the subject of refugees and
compensation for their suffering and property loss. Each side would be
responsible for its own holy sites, but the question of sovereignty
over Jerusalem would be postponed to a later stage, Maariv said. The
Peres plan would reportedly also call for a mutual defense pact
between Israel and the United States, and the creation of joint
Israeli-Palestinian teams to monitor and ensure security. Maariv
reported that the Peres plan has already been written and was now in
final stages of editing. Peres refused to confirm the details of the
plan, only admitting to Channel One television that he "wrote a draft"
which he planned to discuss with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Sources
in the Prime Minister's Office suggested that Sharon would probably
not allow Peres to meet with Arafat because "there is no point to such
a meeting," Maariv reported today. The Jerusalem Post cited unnamed
sources who said that if Peres had a new diplomatic plan, it would
have to be presented to the cabinet before it could be discussed with
the Palestinians. Labor Party sources suggested that the presentation
of Peres's diplomatic initiative, which certainly would be rejected by
Sharon and the rest of the cabinet, would be the first step towards
the party's departure from the national unity government, Maariv
reported. Others suggested that Peres was merely presenting an
alternative to the recently presented unilateral separation plan
suggested by party Knesset members Haim Ramon and Shlomo Ben-Ami.
Ramon and Ben-Ami present unilateral separation plan Last Thursday,
Ramon and Ben-Ami announced their plan for a unilateral Israeli
separation from the Palestinians. At a press conference held in Tel
Aviv, they suggested that the separation plan, backed by multinational
support, would be an intermediate stage before achieving a final
comprehensive agreement, acceptable to the international community.
According to the two, the chances of reaching an agreement with Arafat
in the near future are minimal, due to the fact that he refuses to
fight terror. Therefore, they suggest, Israel should call for support
from the international community for a separation initiative.
According to the plan, Israel would announce its intention to withdraw
from the vast majority of Palestinian territory. Administration of the
territory would be handed over to "international management" led by
the United States. The border would be determined with Israeli
territory encompassing a minimal part of the Palestinian population,
but ensuring that 80% of the settlers remain under Israeli
sovereignty. The proposed arrangement would remain in place until
Israel and the Palestinians reached a permanent agreement, which would
be achieved with international sponsorship. Ramon said the plan was
intended "to create a temporary border between us and them" and that
opportunities for violence and terrorism would be minimized by
international involvement. Ramon and Ben-Ami announced that they hoped
the Labor Party would adopt their plan, as it presented a "real
alternative" to Sharon's policies of "reconquering the territories,
destroying the Palestinian Authority, and then hoping for the best."
Ramon said, "To the best of my knowledge, Shimon Peres opposes any
unilateral action. He believes that we can come to an agreement with
Arafat in which Arafat will fight terror." Ramon and Ben-Ami
challenged Peres's stand by stating, "Arafat can't and won't fight
terror or prevent attacks carried out by extremist groups or even
groups that he is associated with." The two declared that continued
negotiation on the Oslo model was futile, and that the only viable
alternative to guarantee security for Israelis was unilateral action.
World Jewish Congress President Edgar Bronfman appeared to express
support for elements of both the Peres initiative and the
Ramon-Ben-Ami plan of unilateral separation. In an address last night
at the opening of the Congress's 11th Plenary Assembly, Bronfman
stated, "Settlements on the West Bank which cannot be defended should
be dismantled." He termed the Israeli presence in Gaza "a mistake" and
called for a new boundary to be determined separating Israelis and
Palestinians by a fence. Beilin presents joint Israeli-Palestinian
declaration Left-wing members of the Labor Party argue that an
immediate cessation of violence and a return to negotiations are still
possible. At a meeting of the Peace Coalition of leftist parties and
organizations, former Justice Minister Yossi Beilin <javascript:;>
presented a joint Israeli-Palestinian declaration calling for an
immediate Israeli withdrawal from Area A, an end to violence and
terrorism, a return to negotiations and the end of the occupation. The
declaration, which was short on details, stated that the Mitchell
Report should serve as the basis for the return to permanent status
negotiations, and that all violence, assassinations and settlement
activity should be halted in order to ease tensions in the "current
climate of mistrust and mutual hostility." The goals of the
declaration could only be achieved "with the support of the
international community and through international monitoring."
Signatories to the declaration included Palestinian Minister of
Culture and Information Yasser Abed Rabbo, Minister of Parliamentary
Affairs Nabil Amr and others. Israeli signatories included Peace Now
activists, Meretz Knesset members Yossi Sarid, Naomi Chazan, Ran
Cohen, Zahava Gal-on, Mossi Raz, Avshalom Vilan and Anat Maor, and
Colette Avital, Yael Dayan, Eitan Cabel and Nawaf Mazalha of the Labor
Party.
*************************************************************
October 18, 2001
Arafat as political welfare queen
by Cal Thomas
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat may be the world's biggest recipient
of political welfare. He refuses to work toward peaceful relations
with Israel. He honors none of his agreements. He continues to promote
terror. And the world pays him anyway, at Israel's expense. British
Prime Minister Tony Blair is the latest to offer political payments to
Arafat. During a meeting with Arafat in London, Blair called for the
creation "of a viable Palestinian state as part of a negotiated and
agreed settlement which guarantees peace and security for Israel,"
according to the New York Times. Ah, but there's the rub, as Blair's
fellow Englishman, William Shakespeare, said. Arafat and his many
brothers - from Osama bin Laden to Saddam Hussein (whom he praised
during the Iraqi shelling of Israel in the Gulf War) - don't want to
guarantee Israel anything, except its extermination. Apparently that
isn't clear to Blair, who also said, "Islam as a religion prevents
anyone, forbids anyone to harm any civilians, any innocent people
around the world." He said this after shaking hands with Arafat, who
is a Muslim, but is responsible for the deaths of many, many
civilians, from schoolchildren to tourists. Arafat has praised as
"martyrs" the suicide bombers whose targets are exclusively civilians.
If Blair and the Bush administration pressure Israel into making
additional concessions to its sworn enemies, with no requirement that
they live up to any of their previous promises, Arafat will again get
the message that terrorism pays. When President Bush said he favors a
Palestinian state, with the usual caveat about a safe and secure
Israel, the reaction was instructive. The London Telegraph reported
that thousands of marchers in the West Bank town of Ramallah emerged
from Friday prayers Oct. 12 with cries of support for Osama bin Laden.
"Osama, hit more skyscrapers," they shouted. Arafat knows he needs to
give nothing, except violence, to get land. Why should he bargain when
Israel is the only nation pressured to give and Arafat needs only to
take? No gesture, no turning over of land to Arafat by Israel, has
diminished Palestinian violence. According to an Israel Defense Forces
spokesperson, there have been hundreds of attacks on Israel and its
civilians since Arafat's claimed cease-fire June 1. When Israel and
the Palestinians "accepted" the cease-fire plan negotiated by CIA
director George Tenent on June 15, violence continued unabated. On
June 26, when President Bush said there had been "much progress" in
ending the violence, it continued. When Arafat declared seven "quiet
days" on July 2, there were 27 violent incidents that day and 110 for
the remainder of the seven-day period. On July 9, Foreign Minister
Shimon Peres said that Arafat told him he was serious about stopping
the violence. It continued. On July 26, when the State Department said
there had been a decline in violent incidents, those incidents
persisted at the same or at greater levels than before the
announcement. Last week, Israeli forces shot and killed a man believed
responsible for the death of 22 Israelis, mostly teen-age girls, at a
Tel Aviv disco on June 2. Asked about it, a U.S. State Department
spokesman said, "We are against targeted killings." But isn't the U.S.
targeting Osama bin Laden, whom the president says he wants "dead or
alive"? And what about the targeted assassination of Israel's minister
of tourism last week? Why do Arafat and his cronies and the United
States get to target people for death, but not Israel, whose territory
and population are smaller than that of the Arab world and the United
States? Nothing that Israel or the United States does will deter
Arafat and his friends from their objectives. They're after Israel
first and then they're coming after us. Sept. 11 was just the
beginning. When Tony Blair claims that Islam forbids the harming of
any civilians, he must be into severe denial. Either these terrorists
and others who hate America, Israel and all things Western are not
Muslims, or they are conducting a major disinformation campaign that
would be the envy of Joseph Goebbels and Tokyo Rose. Meanwhile, Yasser
Arafat plays the role of welfare queen, taking all he can get and
giving nothing in return. What's worse, no one expects anything more
of him. 
c2001 Tribune Media Services
****************************************************************
Ross Mackenzie 
October 18, 2001
Ok, Yasser, Here's your Palestinian state
Osama's latest outrage has irrevocably altered the picture here and in
the Middle East. For the Palestinians, the jig may be up. As President
Bush seeks to form a coalition of countries against terrorism, he
encounters his biggest obstacles in the Arab/Muslim world.
Congressional Democrats, echoing leftists everywhere, worry that
military action will inflame radical wrath against moderate Arab
regimes - and never mind that moderate Arab regime, with none readily
coming to mind, may be an oxymoron. So as not to create unrest in
countries overseen by those regimes, all of them autocratic and
undemocratic, the administration insistently includes zero Arab/Muslim
troops in the allied force. And what do even tentatively pro-Western
Arab regimes perceive as the paramount problem with the United States?
Ah, yes. The United States abides tolerance of Israeli violence
against Palestinians. In short, the United States backs Israel. During
the past three decades, through conventional military conflicts and
urban guerrilla wars called intifadas, American efforts have sought to
settle things in Palestine - for instance: the Rogers Plan (1969),
Camp David I (1979), the Reagan Plan (1982), the Oslo Accords (1993),
Camp David II and the Mitchell Plan (2000). The aim of each has been
the trading of Israeli land for Palestinian promises of recognition
and peace. And of course each has failed. The current intifada, now a
year old, has cost 800 Palestinian and Israeli lives (the first, in
the late 1980s, cost 300). Last year Ehud Barak, Israel's Jimmy
Carter, proposed giving away half of Israel plus the Golan Heights.
Yasser Arafat, whom Israel's Abba Eban has described as one who never
misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity, said Barak's offer was
insufficient and so launched Intifada II, complete with precursors of
the suicide bombings Osama has brought to the United States. These
suicide bombings, supported in polls by 75 percent of Palestinians,
have congealed the fear of Israelis and united them as rarely before -
just as Osama has united Americans as no one else since Hitler.
Israeli voters have replaced their Jimmy Carter with their Ronald
Reagan (Ariel Sharon), who regards boss Yasser as the terrorist goon
that he is. When Osama struck, Bush II forced Sharon to agree to a
cease-fire with the Palestinians, a cease-fire that so far has seen
about 30 dead and 300 wounded - just as, in 1991, Bush I compelled the
Israelis not to retaliate against Saddam Hussein's 39 Scuds dispatched
to Israel. Neither time has the Israeli military been allowed to join
the U.S.-led coalition out of fear of offending sensitive Arabs. This
time, though, it is OK for the United States to seek the support of
terror sponsors Iran and Syria. And this time, the ever-moderate
Saudis have warned the United States to instruct the Israelis not to
go after Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, or the Popular Front for the
Liberation of Palestine - all of them anti-Israeli terrorist groups -
if the United States wants the Saudis to play ball against Osama,
which they have not yet said publicly they will do. Bush has complied,
and has tried to confirm himself in the Saudis' good graces by
becoming the first president to declare his support for an eventual
Palestinian state "so long as the right of Israel to exist is
respected." Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair, the voice of the
anti-terror coalition, echoed President Bush regarding a Palestinian
state last week. The gritty Sharon said something similar several days
prior to Bush's statement: "Israel wants to give the Palestinians what
no one else gave them before, the possibility of forming a state." Yet
following Bush's statement, Sharon issued Bush a haunting warning of
his own: "Do not try to appease the Arabs at our expense. ... Don't
repeat the terrible mistakes of 1938, when the enlightened democracies
in Europe decided [at Munich] to sacrifice Czechoslovakia for a
comfortable, temporary solution. [Israel] will not be Czechoslovakia."
The Israelis have been fighting the terror war certainly since the
1967 conventional war in which - attacked by the Arabs yet again -
they won again convincingly. Yasser is not incompetent but malign. He
and his fanatics are principal functionaries in the terror network.
Suicide bombings in Israel originated in the territory he controls.
His PLO participated with (for instance) Spain's murderous ETA at the
annual conference of Northern Ireland's deadly Sinn Fein, which itself
has been "advising" anti-government rebels in Colombia. Syria, Libya
and Iran fund Islamist terror groups Yasser says he cannot control.
Yasser directs the Palestinian Authority, which prints anti-Israeli
hatred in school texts, trains Palestinian youths in guerrilla
tactics, encourages the spewing of hate in mosques, coordinates the
bombing of pizzerias, and organizes joyous celebrations of the murder
of 6,000 in the reduction of the World Trade Center to smithereens.
It's a genuine question how much more of this terror war even the
resolute Israelis can take - or how much more they should be asked to.
Violence, sniping and atrocities persist, with Israelis and
Palestinians in virtual urban guerrilla war. Yet maybe the hour is
approaching, maybe the signs are there in the statements by Bush and
Sharon, when Sharon declares in effect: "OK, Yasser. Time's up. Game's
over. Here's your Palestinian state. It's all yours. Indeed, we're the
first country to recognize it, and President Bush says America gladly
will be the second. The state will consist of a consolidated version
of certain lands occupied by Palestinians following the conclusion of
the 1967 war. We will move Israelis out and we will move into the new
Palestinian state Palestinians living elsewhere on Israeli lands.
Except for perhaps a corridor or two in and out, around this state we
will build on Israeli territory - and patrol - a mile-wide
no-man's-land buffer, the better for Israelis and Palestinians to live
side by side in the peace we all want. Two peoples, two states - one
Israeli, one Palestinian. This is ours. You fought, you lost. What's
left is yours, essentially a benevolent refashioning of the lands
remaining to you at the end of all the losing wars you have launched
against us - wars responsible for so much misery, maiming, and death.
Congratulations. Peace, brother. Make love, not war. And have a nice
day." Would such an entity mark a capitulation to terror? On the
contrary, it would recognize the reality that neither side can prevail
under the operative rules. Indeed, it would remove the ostensible
cause of Yasser's war (the lack of a Palestinian state), and might
well mark the first victory in the worldwide war against terror that
President Bush has declared. And then perhaps the moderate Arab
regimes would rejoice in the enlistment of the Israelis in the war to
nail Osama et al. 
c2001 Tribune Media Services
*********************************************************
jpost.com
Syrian defense minister blames WTC, Pentagon attacks on Israel
By Arieh O'Sullivan
TEL AVIV (October 19) - Syrian Defense Minister Mustafa Tlass has
blamed the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center on Israel.
At a meeting in Damascus last week with a delegation from the British
Royal College of Defense Studies, Tlass said the Mossad planned the
ramming of two hijacked airliners into the WTC's towers as part of a
Jewish conspiracy.
He also told the British visitors that the Mossad had given thousands
of Jewish employees of the WTC advance warning not to go to work that
day.
The Jewish-conspiracy theory started circulating in the Middle East
shortly after the terrorist outrages in New York, Washington, and
Pennsylvania. The "rationale" was that Israel wanted to provoke US
retaliation against the Arab world.
In Israel and in Jewish circles abroad, the theory has been dismissed
as a "gross lie." It had been dismissed by Arabists as "wishful
thinking" by frustrated Arabs who badly wanted to believe that Muslims
were not responsible for the atrocities.
But Tlass's comments last week indicate that it has been commuted to
fact among senior Arab officialdom. Experts believe the false rumor
has taken root in the Middle East, thanks to the deep anti-Semitism
propagated by Arab governments as well as the myth of the "awesome
power" of the Jews.
American Jewish leaders this week urged the Bush administration to
debunk the rumor.
"Nobody is challenging this gross lie. Nobody is getting on Arab TV
stations and saying it is a lie, it's absurd, and it's a libel," said
Abraham Foxman, executive director of the Anti-Defamation League.
David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee,
agreed.
"Perhaps the Bush administration doesn't want to confer legitimacy on
these canards by even acknowledging their existence. Sadly, this story
has taken on a life of its own. It has even reached non-Muslim
countries like Greece and South Africa, where Jewish communities have
frantically contacted us, asking for help in refuting these charges,"
Harris said.
"At this point it would be very helpful for the Bush administration
and other countries not only to condemn this canard, but to call it by
its real name, which is raw, unadulterated anti-Semitism," he said.
In Iran, the hard-line Resalat newspaper last week quoted "experts" as
saying the attacks were so complicated they had to have been carried
out by the Israeli government and the Mossad.
In Kuwait, where some speakers on television have ridiculed the
report, some people have even added embellishments, saying Jews were
advised by New York rabbis to sell their holdings in the stock market
the day before the attack and did so.
Public opinion data on Arab views on the September 11 attacks is
sparse. One poll conducted a week after the attacks and published in
the Lebanese newspaper An Nahar found that 31 percent of respondents
thought Israel was behind the hijackings, while only 27% thought
Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden was responsible, as the US has
charged.
Historian Richard Levy, an expert on anti-Semitism at the University
of Illinois in Chicago, said such conspiracy theories have flourished
after years during which Arab governments have encouraged crude Jewish
conspiracy theories.
"They have encouraged their peoples to explain politics and history by
means of myth, lie, and fear. This sort of demagogy will come back to
bite them," he said.
"If I were a Pakistani who has internalized what my successive
governments have been telling me for years about the awesome power of
the Jews and their Israeli pawns, I might well find bin Laden more
attractive and inspiring than my so-called leaders," Levy said.
(Reuters contributed to this report.)
************************************************************

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