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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: paul_philp who wrote (33014)	6/24/2002 9:11:11 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Respond to of 281500

You're welcome,I'm sure -g- Steve den Beste thinks the speech was important, if it really represents a lasting change to the new policy contained in it. Admittedly that's a big If, and more than I can believe until I see followup evidence. Palestinian foreign policy, and broader Arab initiatives for the last twenty years have all been designed to try to induce the US to stomp on Israel's government hard and force Israel to give in and give things away without getting anything in return. The US is the only outside power capable of doing this, for historical reasons, and in the past the US had done so. What Bush said today is, forget it. It isn't going to happen anymore. So the key points of this speech are as follows: 1. The United States considers the Palestinians the aggressors in this struggle, and considers Israel's actions to be defensive and responsive. Irrespective of how awful the current living conditions are for the Palestinians, the US holds the Palestinians totally responsible for the current war. 2. The United States doesn't care any longer what happened in 1948. Historical grievances are moot. The only thing the US cares about anymore is what is happening now, and what the Palestinians do now. 3. The United States does not expect Israel to change its behavior and remove its forces from Palestinian territories until after the Palestinians remove the threat to Israel. 4. Arafat is history. The United States will no longer deal with him in any substantive way. The Palestinian Authority is also history. The US now considers it a terrorist organization, not a government. 5. As long as the Palestinians prosecute the war against Israel, and as long as they refuse to clean up their act and become a civilized people with an honorable government, which isn't riddled with corruption and arbitrary dictatorial rule, then the Palestinian people will continue to suffer and the US will not do anything to relieve that suffering. 6. If the Palestinians give up on the idea of the US forcing Israel to surrender, give up on the idea of reconquering Israel, boot Arafat out and create a real government which is actually worth talking to, then and only then will the US once again engage in diplomacy between the two sides. In that event, the US will be generous with aid money and technical assistance to help rebuild the Palestinian territories and give the Palestinians a better life. But before that money flows, the US will make sure the reforms are real. 7. The Palestinians must act first. They will not be given anything until after they do, and they will be judged only on the basis of concrete accomplishments. If, in fact, Bush really sticks to this then this is a major change in American foreign policy. It means that the US has become formally partisan for Israel and has abandoned any pretensions to trying to mediate between the sides in this. That's been tried and it has failed, over and over and over. From now on, improvement in the situation for Palestinians will be predicated on Palestinian good behavior, and nothing else will be accepted. This amounts to an ultimatum to the Palestinians, and it is distinctly one-sided. There was no attempt at even-handedness, no attempt to blame both sides. It also makes clear that the US expects no progress at all as long as the terrorist campaign continues. This is critically important: the situation for the Palestinians will never improve as a result of terrorism; it can only improve if the Palestinians give up armed struggle. And that is the only way it can be. I do indeed hope that Bush does stick with this. It is about time that someone cleared the air. denbeste.nu