Israel Matzav

The Saudis threaten war and try to cut off Jewish immigration

There has been lots of activity over the 'Saudi plan' over the past three days.

On Monday, US Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice canceled a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud K. Olmert because he wasn't docile enough yet. Instead, she held a second round of talks with Olmert to 'overcome his objections.' (Hat Tip: Menachem in the Ramat Shlomo section of Jerusalem). As a result, Rice announced yesterday that Olmert and 'moderate' 'Palestinian President' Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen would meet once every two weeks, which Rice termed a 'positive development.' But what will the 'meetings' discuss?

"The meetings between the Israelis and Palestinians will focus on two sets of issues. First, they will discuss immediate concerns like movement and access, management of the passages and preventing arms smuggling and rocket fire by terrorists in Gaza. On issues like these, the United States is already deeply involved in helping them. On this trip, however, it became clear to all of us that establishing clear benchmarks to measure progress will help us move forward. So this is one immediate task that the parties will undertake with the assistance of General Keith Dayton.

"In their discussions together, the parties will also begin to discuss the development of a political horizon consistent with the establishment of a Palestinian state in accordance with the road map. As I've noted before, we're not yet at final status negotiations. These are initial discussions to build confidence between the parties.

"Palestinians must know that their state will be viable. Israelis must know that a future state of Palestine will be a source of security, not a threat to it. Both sides must have confidence that economic and trade relations between them will promote the welfare of their populations.

"The efforts in which they engage will help to build confidence and therefore ease the path to negotiations to establish two states living side by side in peace and security.

It would be interesting to hear what Rice calls 'viable.' I'm not quite sure how a state that is split into two completely separate parts will ever be 'viable.' Especially when one part is land-locked.

The intrigue behind Rice's announcement is more interesting than the announcement itself:

Olmert and foreign minister Tzipi Livni, whom Rice met earlier in the day, spent hours hammering the phrasing for presenting their concession to the US secretary, without being seen to have abandoned the Middle East roadmap, which is the central plank of this Israeli government’s foreign and peace policy.

They agreed that this was not the time for final-status talks, and that Rice would term the Israel-Arab diplomatic track a preface to the roadmap’s implementation. The US secretary argued that Israel has nothing to lose by engaging Arab representatives and would only improve its image. Olmert asked for the encounters to take place at the senior level of foreign ministers, in order to convince the public that his government had not been browbeaten into a concession contrary to national interests. But Rice could not make this promise. US-Israeli discussion on the framework for Israeli and Arab delegates to meet will continue.

But in Riyadh, meanwhile, the preliminary conference of Arab foreign ministers has already determined the mechanism and forum for the talks with Israel. They have opted for the UN Security Council and Middle East Quartet as sponsors, convinced that both bodies are powerful enough to impose a settlement on Israel. The US Secretary informed Olmert that she does not support this demand.

In the meantime, the Arab League summit has opened in Riyadh, and the Saudis had a very ominous statement regarding their plan - which the Arab League plans to adopt without ANY of the changes demanded by Israel and the United States (Hat Tip: J O S H U A P U N D I T):

"If Israel refuses {the Saudi/Arab League plan}, that means it doesn't want peace and it places everything back into the hands of fate. They will be putting their future not in the hands of the peacemakers but in the hands of the lords of war," he said.

Prince Saud also dismissed any further diplomatic overtures towards Israel. "It has never been proven that reaching out to Israel achieves anything," he said.

In other words, Jews, take what we're offering or face jihad.

Contrary to the noises Condi Rice was making, the Arab league unanimously accepted the Saudi plan in its entirety, without the slightest modification or room for compromise.

But wait, it gets even worse:

Our Arab sources reveal that the two conditions will be incorporated in the final resolutions approved by the Arab League summit in Riyadh on Thursday.

1. Israel must halt Jewish immigration so that the Israelis leaving the country or revoking their citizenship are not replaced by newcomers.

2. The international community must condemn Israel’s High Court of Justice for authorizing targeted assassination of Palestinians in cases of security threats. Arab justice ministers will lobby international judicial bodies to elicit this condemnation.

And don't hold your breath waiting for the Israeli government to respond to this latest threat either.

Update 10:55 PM

As expected, the Arab League has unanimously adopted the 'Saudi Plan' without any of the changes demanded by Israel or the United States.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:59 PM