The problem is not in the Palestinian leadership, nor is it about the details of who is in power in Israel. It's a basic disagreement over land and power. No matter who was leading the Palestinians the issue would be the same. This is not some unique historical event, this is the kind of fight that has already been fought many times over every square foot of arable land on this planet.
Carl, while the fight is over land and power, reducing it to these terms exclusively omits all power of choice from either side. It also omits the consequences of those choices from the debate.
I do believe that if King Abdullah had been in Arafat's shoes and Barak offered him 90% of what he wanted, he would have tried to bargain hard and do a deal. I also believe that King Abdullah would have been smart enough to make moral arguments to the Israelis, who are swayed by them. Arafat has only figured out how to make moral arguments to the West (self-determination as a cause goes over much better than attempted destruction of Israel) while favoring indiscriminate killing of Israelis as a tactic.
Remember, the whole settlements issue is of recent date; the PLO was founded before Israel was even in the territories for the purpose of destroying Israel. Arafat passed on real chances to get the territories (he could have joined Sadat in 1979) because he was intent on destroying Israel. He only said yes in 1993 because he was broke and friendless in Tunis.
For that matter, if things were reversed, the Israelis would be executing terror tactics against the Palestinians (just like they did against the British).
If things were reversed, you might have a minority movement favoring terrorism among the Israelis, as the Irgun was a minority during the Mandate. The Israelis majority, who would be better organized and more in control than their Paleistinian equivalents (based on history), would try to use diplomatic options if they were open -- and unlike the case of the Zionists in the Mandate, the Palestinians had real diplomatic options open to them. Arafat just reverts easily to terrorism because he's a terrorist from his youth, he's comfortable with it. Again, we're dealing with the consequences of his choice. |
