Any Wikipedia Editors Available?

You can find in this entry this statement:

Palestinian police are forbidden from reacting to acts of violence by Israeli settlers, a fact which diminishes their credibility among Palestinians.

The confirming footnote directs you to page 292 of a book by Daniel Byman, A High Price: The Triumphs and Failures of Israeli Counterterrorism, Oxford University Press/Saban Center, Brookings Institution, published in 2011. Byman at the time was pro­fes­sor at the School of For­eign Ser­vice at George­town Uni­ver­si­ty and senior fel­low at the Saban Cen­ter for Mid­dle East Pol­i­cy at the Brook­ings Insti­tu­tion.

I do not know if Byman notes it but if one reviews the Oslo Accords, signed and agreed upon by the PLO, specifically Article XIV - The Palestinian Police, and others, you can learn a few additional things.

For example, at 3 there it reads

Except for the Palestinian Police and the Israeli military forces, no other armed forces shall be established or operate in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip

and in the previous Article X Redeployment of Israeli Military Forces, 4 it reads

Israel shall continue to carry the responsibility for external security, as well as the responsibility for overall security of Israelis for the purpose of safeguarding their internal security and public order

In the Security Annex, it is quite apparent that the Authoritys police force is restricted to areas A and B as in Article V Security Arrangements in the West Bank, at sub-paragraph 
3. Areas B and C,  (2), where it reads

The Palestinian Police shall be responsible for handling public order incidents in which only Palestinians are involved.

At 6. Movement of Palestinian Policemen, it reads

Movement of uniformed policemen, whether armed or unarmed, as well as armed on duty plainclothes policemen, in Area C, will be confirmed and coordinated by the relevant DCO

In other words, the Wikipedia entry is worded to present a false impression, as if something is wrong with a situation the Palestinian Authority is committed to by its own agreement. It is not clear that it is the Osleo Accords which govern such actions. Violence is not mentioned except for the matter of safeguarding, by Israel, of the security of Israelis. 

Are there any Wikipedia editors available to correct this entry?

^

Avi Gil and the Failure of the Oslo Accords

Avi Gil, long-time Shimon Peres confidant, was asked on the occasion of the publication of his memoir:

Today the Oslo Accords are perceived as a failure by large parts of the Israeli public. Do you still believe in it?

and replied: 

“I will not deny that significant mistakes were made by both sides. On the Palestinian side, they did not control and did not stifle the terrorism effectively. That was a terrible wrong, flaw or sin – all those words are correct. Both because of the victims who died and also because it sabotaged the possibility of progressing from there. And on our side, especially, because of the settlements. Because according to the Palestinian narrative – and I don’t have a good answer when they thrust it in my face – they say: ‘In Oslo we made a tremendous concession from our point of view, of 75 percent of our dream, of what in our opinion is ours, of the territory between the sea and the river, and what has been left to us are the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, which constitute about 25 percent. We agreed to recognize you on the basis of our understanding that Gaza and the West Bank are ours, it doesn’t matter in what form [not necessarily as a state, but as long as they could see the land as theirs], and since then you have been eating away at that territory. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a right-wing or left-wing government, since we signed on the White House lawn, the number of settlements has done something between doubling and tripling.’”

Two comments.

One, the assumption that 'settlements' equals 'terror' is a huge failing by those who, like Gil, seek to understand, as it were, why did Oslo fail. The terror preceded political Zionism, Balfour, the Mandate and the state and the "occupation".

Second, the accords specifically applied an exclusion category to the issue of Jewish residency locations in Judea and Samaria.  As explained here:

Neither the Oslo Accords, nor any subsequent signed Israel-Palestinian agreement put any restriction on settlement growth in Area C, the Israeli-controlled area of the West Bank.

Article 5, Section 3 of the Oslo Accords, which deals with what will be discussed during permanent status negotiations, makes it clear that the future of the settlements would be resolved only through direct negotiations between the two parties. No other article limits construction of or in settlements.

Moreover, this was confirmed in 1997 by then-US Secretary of State Madeline Albright who told NBC that while she disagreed with an Israeli decision to build new dwellings in the West Bank settlement of Efrat, “it’s legal”. Asked by Reuters if Albright was changing US policy of ambiguity regarding the legal status of Israeli settlements, her spokesperson James Rubin clarified that “All she meant by that was that as a technical matter, Oslo does not prohibit the settlements” or “[the construction of additional] housing in [the West Bank settlement of] Efrat.”

So typical of the Oslo proponents.

And Peres admirers.

^ 

GraphicZionism: Burying Oslo

^

A Very Negative Oslo/Pro-Eretz Yisrael 53%

There's a new poll, conducted by Maagor Mochot and commissioned by Ma'ariv and the results are, after finding out that but 73% of the public knows what are the "Oslo Accords", that

57% believe that the Oslo agreements were injurious to Israel from a political, security and economic viewpoint and that 53% would not vote today in favor of an agreement that includes a withdrawal from Judea and Samaria, even if the Palestinians would recognize Israel as a Jewish state and give up the right of return.

The graphics:

which indicate further that 40% were pro-Oslo at the time while 33% claimed to be against and that 62% haven't changed their minds, with 3% saying they are now for and 11% admitting they are now against.


Remember all, first 20th anniversary marking, in another week.


_____________________________

UPDATE

IMRA adds another poll's results:

New Wave Poll: 79.7%:6.25 Permanent agreement will not be reached


The survey was conducted by New Wave for Yisrael Hayom 15 August 2013 and published on 16 August.

Are you for or against release of prisoners are a gesture for the start of negotiations with the Palestinians?

For 14.2% 
Against 77.5% 
Don't know 8.3%

Will a final agreement be reached this time that will end the conflict between the sides?

Yes 6.2% 
No 79.7% 
Don't know 14.1%

More on that:

Israel Hayom poll: 80% of Jewish Israelis skeptical on peace talks

A new Israel Hayom poll shows that the vast majority of Israeli Jews believe the newly launched talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority are a futile endeavor...Some 79.7% of respondents said the talks would not end with a permanent peace accord that would resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Just 6.2% said such an agreement would be reached, and 14.1% said they had no opinion.

In a similar poll in July, 73.1% said negotiations would not lead to a peace agreement, while only 5.3% said the talks would conclude with a deal, and 21.6% had no opinion.

On the question of whether Israel should have agreed to release prisoners as a goodwill gesture alongside the talks, 77.5% said they opposed the move, while 14.2% said they supported the gesture and 8.3% had no opinion.

The poll was conducted a day after Israel released 26 prisoners as part of its phased release of 104 prisoners.

^

A 20th Anniversary Approaching

May I remind you that

On the night between August 18th and 19th, Norwegian Foreign Minister Johan Jorgen Holst served as a mediator between Peres, who was located at the time in Stockholm, Sweden, and Arafat and Abu Alaa from PLO headquarters in Tunisia. The Declaration of Principles was initialed the following day. It was signed by Savir, Abu Alaa, Singer, and Hassan Asfur, in the presence of Peres.

The outline of the process:

The decision to hold direct talks with the PLO was a diplomatic revolution in Israel’s foreign policy and paved the way to the Oslo accord of 13 September 1993.  Three men were primarily responsible for this decision: Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, the foreign minister, and Yossi Beilin, the youthful deputy foreign minister.  Rabin held out against direct talks with the PLO for as long as he could.  Peres took the view that without the PLO there could be no settlement...

...The secret talks in Oslo got under way in late January 1993 with the active encouragement of Yossi Beilin who kept Shimon Peres fully informed. Altogether, fourteen sessions of talks were held over an eight-month period, all behind a thick veil of secrecy. Norwegian foreign affairs minister Johan Joergen Holst and social scientist Terge Rød Larsen acted as generous hosts and facilitators. The key players were two Israeli academics, Dr Yair Hirschfeld and Dr Ron Pundik, and PLO treasurer Ahmad Qurei, better known as Abu Ala...

...Rabin’s conversion to the idea of a deal with the PLO was clinched by four evaluations which reached him between the end of May and July. First was the advice of Itamar Rabinovich, the head of the Israeli delegation to the talks with Syria, that a settlement with Syria was attainable but only at the cost of complete Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Second were the reports from various quarters that the local Palestinian leadership had been finally neutralized. Third was the assessment of the IDF director of military intelligence that Arafat’s dire situation, and possibly imminent collapse, made him the most convenient interlocutor for Israel at that particular juncture. Fourth were the reports of the impressive progress achieved through the Oslo channel...the army chiefs and the internal security chiefs repeatedly stressed to him the urgency of finding a political solution to the crisis in the relations between Israel and the inhabitants of the occupied territories.  Rabin therefore gave the green light to the Israeli team and the secret diplomacy in Oslo moved into higher gear.

...On 23 August, Rabin stated publicly for the first time that ‘there would be no escape from recognizing the PLO.’...On Monday, 13 September 1993, the Declaration was signed on the South Lawn of the White House and sealed with the historic hand-shake between prime minister Rabin and chairman Arafat.

Oslo, when the 'peace' went out into the cold.

^

More Arab Anti-Semitism

When the Arabs claim they are not ant-Semitic and that they have nothing against Jew but Zionism mis the problem, tell them about this little item:


Hundreds of settlers break into Yussef’s Tomb performing Talmudic rituals

NABLUS Shchem, (PIC)– Hundreds of Jewish settlers broke into Yussef’s Tomb to the east of Nablus in West bank last night to perform Talmudic rituals under IOF protection.

Eyewitnesses said that 15 military vehicles stormed the eastern part of Nablus, and headed towards Yussef’s tomb to secure the entry of buses and cars carrying hundreds of Jewish settlers who came to perform religious Talmudic rituals.

The sources affirmed that the occupation forces fired stun grenades and tear gas against Palestinian houses in the area. They continued in their rituals till the morning hours, using loudspeakers and loud music during their prayers, caused great nuisance to the residents who threw stones and empty bottles as a response to their provocation.

It should be noted that the Israeli settlers have repeatedly stormed the Tomb which was an Islamic mosque built over a tomb of an Islamic Sheikh named Youssef Dweikat from the town of Balata. It was seized by Israeli settlers just after the occupation of the West Bank in 1967 under the pretext that it contains Tomb of Prophet Youssef.

Remember,

a) "Talmudic rituals" is an anti-Semitic buzz phrase.  Jewish ritual practices stem from the Bible.

b) that Joseph's tomb is in Shchem predates Arab arrival in the country.

c) the Oslo Accords recognized Jewish holy site status of the building in detailing arrangements regarding the Tomb in Article V(2b) of Annex I, which were designed “to ensure free, unimpeded and secure access” to the site.

^

Problems with Pal. Propagandists

In response to this article, Palestinians can't bypass Israel, Oslo accords, I found this comment:

It is not unexpected to find distortions and half-truths in the above piece written by a fellow for Middle Eastern affairs at The Heritage Foundation. Let me just give two examples:

About the Oslo Accords, he wrote: "Mahmoud Abbas essentially turned his back on the 1993 Oslo peace accord with Israel." The truth is that the Oslo Accords, specifically Oslo II, explicitly prohibited any change in the status of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Instead, in violation of the accords, the building of settlements continued and Jewish settlers continued to move to the West Bank. Furthermore, bypass roads were built to connect these settlements.

He also wrote: "Israel agreed to an unprecedented 10-month halt on building settlements in the West Bank." The writer failed to mention that the 10-month housing freeze did not include East Jerusalem, which under international law is part of the West Bank. Of course, "international law and Israel" are an oxymoron.

Medhat Credi
Elmsford

Dear Medhat:

a) the Oslo Accords expressly excluded any reference to "settlements".

Here's an Arab source:

Oslo made no mention of a settlement freeze—formal or otherwise—and, in fact, deferred the settlement issue altogether until so-called “permanent status” negotiations to be held in five years...Notably, the Oslo Accords, including the 1993 Declaration of Principles (“DOP”) and the 1995 Interim Agreement as well as subsequent agreements and protocols, did not deal directly with the issue of Israeli settlements, either with regard to their legal status (i.e., under international humanitarian law) or in terms of limiting their continued expansion.

b) as for Bibi's non-inclusion of "East Jerusalem", well, again, with the Pals. demanding all-or-nothing, despite they being the aggressors since 1920, the practicers of terror since 1920 and those who sought the thwart international agreements as regards the "reconstitution of the Jewish national home" since 1922, when that right was recognized and formalized by the League of Nations, they will get nothing.

The problem with Arab propagandists is:

- they lie

- they prevaricate

- they tell only a part of the story

- they hide what is unpleasant

- they subvert language

- they cannot produce substantiated claims

and more.

^
^

So, the Oslo Process Was An Echo of Munich

That's the way it appears to me.

So similar:

Chamberlain's secret bid to reach a deal with Hitler, revealed in newly released documents

British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain held secret talks with Hitler's henchmen to work out ways of making the Nazis look more sympathetic to ordinary Britons, classified documents released last week reveal. The cloak-and-dagger meetings in London came shortly after Chamberlain signed his disastrous appeasement deal with Hitler in Munich in September 1938, declaring 'peace for our time' on his return to Britain. The meetings were held without the knowledge of the Cabinet and Foreign Office. Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax only learned of them later because of an MI5 mole in the German embassy.

Two newly-declassified documents show Chamberlain was ready to make more deals with Hitler after Munich, which would have the ‘happiest and most far-reaching effects for the relationship between the two countries’.  The papers reveal Chamberlain told Hitler that it would have ‘the greatest effect on public opinion in England’ if, in the event of war, they had a pact in place not to use poison gas, not to bomb each other’s civilians and to spare cities with cultural treasures.

...In his subsequent memo, Cadogan agonises over whether he should tell Lord Halifax about the clandestine meeting. He fears it might make Halifax resign and cause the Government to collapse, forcing a General Election at a time when the Nazis are poised to wage war across Europe...In the smuggled MI5 memo, Hesse tells von Ribbentrop that Chamberlain wants to finalise a deal personally with Hitler which could ensure ‘complete secrecy on the English side’ until the agreement is signed.

This also sounds familiar from the 1990s here in Israel:

...said historian Richard Cockett, author of a book on Chamberlain’s media manipulation...the just-released documents reveal that Steward had been authorised by Chamberlain to hold such meetings.  ‘If Steward was not acting under orders from Chamberlain, he was probably guilty of treason,’ he said.  ‘If he was acting under orders, then he was just a dupe.’ He said Halifax was also an appeaser but was eventually ‘changed’ by the Foreign Office and became sceptical about the policy.

Fellow historian Andrew Roberts said: ‘It is not surprising Steward was having these meetings. He was always very loyal to Chamberlain and did his bidding. Also, Steward himself was an appeaser. It is not surprising in the least bit that Chamberlain was going behind the Foreign Office’s back and holding such talks. They were sceptical of appeasement all along.’

Steward is credited as being No 10’s first spin doctor, spending a large part of his time trying to influence newspapers into writing stories that suited the Chamberlain Government...

The Israeli appeasers and behind-the-back dealers:

Shimon Peres.
Yossi Beilin.
Yair Hirschfeld.
Nimrod Novick.
Ron Pundak.
Yossi Ginnosar.

(k/t+CK)

^

"Contiguity"? No, "Integrity" - From Oslo to Obama

A good many good people are disturbed about President Obama's use of "contiguity".
Here on Thursday:

The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

And again at AIPAC:

The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps -- (applause) -- so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state...

There was this:

"The president didn't say that Israel has to go back to the '67 lines. He said with agreed swaps," Mitchell told Amanpour in the interview.  "Swaps means an exchange of land intended to accommodate major Israeli population centers to be incorporated into Israel and Israel's security needs. Agreed means through negotiations. Both parties must agree...That's not going to be a border unless Israel agrees to it and we know they won't agree unless their security needs are satisfied, as it should be," Mitchell said of the 1967 borders.

And someone thought out loud:

242 says the parties will negotiate borders (P's have replaced Jordan as a party). This was always US position. '1967 lines plus swaps' implies a presumption that anything east of the lines is 'Palestinian' by default, because Israel has to compensate them for anything that it keeps. That's a significant shift.

'Contiguity' of Palestine is new. Bush called for 'contiguity' only of the W. Bank.

Jackson Diehl of the Washington Post explained:

The basic question is this: By saying that a division of territory between Israel and Palestine should be “based on” the “1967 lines” between Israel and the West Bank, with agreed “swaps” of land, did Obama move beyond the previous U.S. position on the subject?

The short, technical answer to this question is: no. The longer, political response is that by stating the principle, Obama gave a boost to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has tried to make Israeli acceptance of it a condition for peace talks, and a slap to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who has resisted it.

That Obama would do this on the eve of Netanyahu’s arrival in Washington for a White House meeting — and apparently without warning the Israeli leader — is a gaffe that has understandably angered Netanyahu and many of his U.S. supporters... Apparently at the last minute, Obama chose to include the 1967-lines idea in his speech. The result has been the draining of attention from the speech’s central discussion of Arab democracy, a cheap talking point for GOP opponents — and yet another pointless quarrel with Bibi Netanyahu

.


But they have forgotten that we all knew, or should know, - the language of the Oslo Accords on "integrity":-

ARTICLE IV
JURISDICTION

Jurisdiction of the Council will cover West Bank and Gaza Strip territory, except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations. The two sides view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a single territorial unit, whose integrity will be preserved during the interim period.

That's one reason that agreement was so deadly - it let the Pals. presume they had all the ground they wanted from the beginning. Thank you Rabin, Perers, Beilin, et al.

^

An Astute Observation

...Palestinians, he said, must act, because Israeli settlement construction means “the longer the waiting period, the lesser the space” for the Palestinian state-to-be.

In reality, as both Abbas and Western leaders know, refusing to make a deal has proven a surefire way for Palestinians to increase the amount of land on offer. Four decades ago, Israel’s left proposed the Allon Plan, under which Israel would cede 70 percent of the territories. By 2000, Ehud Barak was offering 88 percent. The Clinton plan upped the figure to about 94 percent, and in 2008, Ehud Olmert offered almost 100 percent (after territorial swaps). Each time the Palestinians refused an offer, either Jerusalem or Washington sweetened the deal in the hopes of finally getting them to say yes.

From Evelyn Gordon

But I will make my own observation - that the Pals. claim for 100% is pretty strong in any case:

In ARTICLE IV of the Oslo Accords' Declaration of Principles on JURISDICTION we read:-

Jurisdiction of the Council will cover West Bank and Gaza Strip territory, except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations. The two sides view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a single territorial unit, whose integrity will be preserved during the interim period.

That's one reason I opposed Oslo.

Even that qualifier, "except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations", which could exclude the Jewish communities and the territory they're on, is not enough to cancel the clear implication that all of Judea and Samaria was what the Arab side inserted as the geographical delineation of the PA territory.

^

Clinton on Rabin; Dalia Rabin on Rabin

In a New York Times op-ed, Bill Clinton praises Yitzhak Rabin and the Oslo process.

A decade and a half since his death, I continue to believe that, had he lived, within three years we would have had a comprehensive agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians.

Rabin's daughter, Dalia, was less sure:

Interviewed in the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot on October 8, Dalia Rabin said, “Many people who were close to father told me that on the eve of the murder he considered stopping the Oslo process because of the terror that was running rampant in the streets and that Arafat wasn't delivering the goods. Father after all wasn't a blind man running forward without thought. I don't rule out the possibility that he considered also doing a reverse on our side. After all he was someone for whom the security of the state was sacrosanct. So they say that Oslo brought Arafat and gave them rifles and caused the intifada. But historical processes develop, change and flow. It is impossible to take a person murdered in ‘95 and judge him according to what happened in 2000” (‘Dalia Rabin: My father might have stopped Oslo,’ translation from Hebrew provided by Independent media Review analysis, October 8, 2010).

UPDATE

Letter to the Editor of the NYTimes:

To the Editor:

In his Op-Ed article, as he did throughout his presidency, Bill Clinton wrongly focuses his pressure on Israel to finish Yitzhak Rabin’s work, instead of focusing on the Palestinians, who, after all, are the ones responsible for destroying what Mr. Rabin started.

Yasir Arafat was present for the signing of the Oslo agreement, along with Mr. Rabin and Mr. Clinton — and he then proceeded to violate it wantonly, by sponsoring terrorists who murdered hundreds of Israelis and several dozen Americans, including my daughter Alisa.

I deeply appreciated Mr. Clinton’s condolence call to me, in April 1995, after Alisa’s death. I would have appreciated it even more if he had pressed the Palestinian leaders to extradite the killers. Sadly, pressuring the Palestinians never seems to be on Mr. Clinton’s agenda.

Stephen M. Flatow
West Orange, N.J.

^

Wrong Documents

Rick Richman has a post over at Contentions, "Re: The Value of an International Guarantee" and in it, he writes:

Let me add a note to Evelyn Gordon’s important posts yesterday and today regarding Mahmoud Abbas’s weekend assertion that the UN should endorse a two-state solution “based on the June 4, 1967 borders” – a solution he contends is reflected in the relevant UN Security Council resolution and the Roadmap...it would be a breach of a longstanding international guarantee to Israel for the UN to endorse the June 4, 1967, lines as the basis of a Palestinian state. It would also violate repeated assurances made to Israel by the United States.

Would it be so simple.

I hate to break it to everyone but the Pals. base themselves on another document.

Yes, the Oslo Accords.

Allow me:

Declaration of Principles
On Interim Self-Government Arrangements
(September 13, 1993)

The Government of the State of Israel and the P.L.O. team (in the Jordanian-Palestinian delegation to the Middle East Peace Conference) (the "Palestinian Delegation"), representing the Palestinian people, agree that it is time to put an end to decades of confrontation and conflict, recognize their mutual legitimate and political rights, and strive to live in peaceful coexistence and mutual dignity and security and achieve a just, lasting and comprehensive peace settlement and historic reconciliation through the agreed political process. Accordingly, the, two sides agree to the following principles:

ARTICLE I
AIM OF THE NEGOTIATIONS

The aim of the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations within the current Middle East peace process is, among other things, to establish a Palestinian Interim Self-Government Authority, the elected Council (the "Council"), for the Palestinian people in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, for a transitional period not exceeding five years, leading to a permanent settlement based on Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338...

...ARTICLE IV
JURISDICTION

Jurisdiction of the Council will cover West Bank and Gaza Strip territory, except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations. The two sides view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a single territorial unit, whose integrity will be preserved during the interim period.

Now, I will be the first to point out, similar to what the Arabs have done to us Zionists regarding the Balfour Declaration, that a Jewish National Home will be reconstituted "in Palestine" but not all of it will be the future Jewish state (see: The initial draft of the declaration, contained in a letter sent by Rothschild to Balfour, referred to the principle "that Palestine should be reconstituted as the National Home of the Jewish people." In the final text, the word that was replaced with in to avoid committing the entirety of Palestine to this purpose), that the wording is not 100% solid in supporting the Pal. assertion.

For example, in this phrase:

to establish a Palestinian Interim Self-Government Authority...for the Palestinian people in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip

but, nevertheless, basing themselves on that last phrase, that "the West Bank and the Gaza Strip [is] a single territorial unit", the situation is nebulous.

And yes, one could say that the single-unit integrity is only for the length of the interim period and that there are those final status issues that could evolve into an alteration of geographical configurations. But to presume that the Pals. will willingly yield on territory is wishful thinking.

It doesn't preclude, of course, that Israel will also demand that a strict literal interpretation be held to by all concerned. Something that should happen.

However, in basing themselves on what they do, both Evelyn and Rick have to rethink their arguments.

How Netanyahu Has Fallen, Or Stumbled At Least

On the eve of the festive ceremony at which the Oslo Accords - or, as the document is officially called, the "Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements" - were signed, MK Benjamin Netanyahu took the podium in the Knesset and railed at Rabin that he was worse than Neville Chamberlain.

"We will work with all the legitimate means at the disposal of the opposition in a democracy to put a stop to this foolish process, which is endangering the state's very future," he asserted.

Thirteen years before declaring his support for the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, Netanyahu wrote in his book "Fighting Terrorism": "At Oslo, Israel in effect accepted the first stage of the PLO's Phased Plan: a gradual withdrawal to the pre-1967 border and the creation of the conditions for the establishment of a PLO state on its borders." Netanyahu also described Yair Hirschfeld and Ron Pundak, who created the Oslo back channel, as "disconnected academics."

This week, when we met in the office of Yossi Beilin, the behind-the-scenes string-puller in the Oslo process, Hirschfeld allowed himself a gracious smile. "Netanyahu, just like all the other politicians who promised to annul Oslo, honors the principles of the agreement,"

Source

Beilin, Savir and Hirschfield:

...admit that although they were able to shatter the collective dream of Greater Israel, they lost the battle for public opinion. The opponents' campaign, which employed such slogans as "Oslo criminals" and "Why did you give them guns?" - culminating in Rabin's assassination, returned Likud to power the first time. The farce of Camp David II returned the right to power a second time, while the second intifada wiped out the peace camp.

Missing?

Postscript to Oslo: The Mystery of Norway's Missing Files

Hilde Henriksen Waage

Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 38, no. 1 (Autumn 2008), p. 54

Report


In Norway, the secret negotiations culminating in the 1993 Oslo agreement are still seen as a shining moment in the nation’s history, so when the files of the entire process were discovered to be missing from government archives, a minor public scandal erupted. After laying out the Oslo “myth” and its cast of characters, the author recounts the story of the disappearance of the files, new revelations concerning their scope, and the (thus far unsuccessful) quest to recover them. The author concludes by exploring the implications of the backchannel negotiations for the entire Oslo process and its lessons for conflict resolution, particularly third-party mediation in highly asymmetrical conflicts.

Amazing.

Malley Perverts History

The 1947 UN partition plan gave the Palestinians much more than any current proposal. Yet they rejected it because at the time they formed a majority in and controlled most of Mandatory Palestine.

The above, from a new article by the Pal. sympathizer Robert Malley and his sidekick, Hussein Agha, is true but misleading and actually, a perversion of history.

The partition was meant, as it had been back in 1937 when first promoted by the British as they slid into a reneging on their obligations as outlined in the Balfour Declaration and the League of Nations decision of 1923, to separate territorially the Arab and Jewish communities. It was intended to resolve the violence that the Arabs initiated.

The Arabs rejected it because they did not want the Jews to live as a sovereign and politically independent entity anywhere in the area they called "Palestine", a Latin name for a supposedly Arab country which never existed and was envisioned by Christian Arabs.

They launched terror and murderous riots in 1920, 1921, 1929, 1936-39 and then began their war of agression in violation of the United Nations.

This statement, though, is quite correct:-

The 1993 Oslo Accords, most Palestinians will concede...never mentioned statehood or independence. It did not define boundaries or the fate of Jerusalem. And it did nothing to halt the settlement enterprise.

And another Malley error:-

Hamas may not be willing to recognize Israel, but it could accept coexistence with it.

This is not what the so-called intellectuals should be reading.