Former Israeli diplomat calls on Obama to present a plan
For a guy who's calling for thinking outside the box, former Israeli diplomat Alon Pinkas is sure thinking inside it. Pinkas is calling on the United States - or the 'quartet' - to present a plan for peace. This is why Washington needs to present a comprehensive, detailed and viable peace plan for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — if not a plan, then a bold vision with concrete principles and parameters. And yes, the sides are encouraged to make changes. But there should be a timetable.No, of course you cannot impose peace, and there's no point to peace if it's not going to be sustainable and durable - which it won't be if it's imposed. But having President Obama or the 'quartet' present a 'peace plan' is still inside the same box as letting the parties try to resolve it themselves. It's called the Clinton parameters, and we've been in that movie before too (Israel accepted them with reservations, the 'Palestinians' rejected them) in late 2000 and early 2001.
President Barack Obama, who lucidly defined the resolution of the conflict as a vital U.S. national security interest, should not be too cautious or overly sensitive to the intricacies of Israeli and Palestinian politics.
We have seen this movie several times — and the ending does not change.
The conflicting narratives are all too familiar. The contours of an agreement are known. The issues have been dissected and reassembled numerous times. The two sides’ versions of what went wrong are presented ad nauseam. Their real or perceived anxieties about each other are visibly out there.
A U.S.-sponsored plan — whether written by the Obama administration or presented by the “Quartet” (the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia) — is not an imposed peace.
You cannot impose peace, and you cannot enforce sustainability or guarantee durability.
Really thinking outside the box would be leaving the parties alone until they have tired enough of the status quo to want to change it by making peace. Unfortunately, that's not likely to happen in your lifetime or mine. As Pinkas admits, the 'Palestinians' exist for the sole purpose of trying to destroy the Jewish state. But at least if the World left the Israeli - 'Palestinian' dispute alone, we could find more gainful employment for all the diplomats and bureaucrats who have lived on the 'peace process' for the last 17 years.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:19 AM
5 Comments:
The Palestinians will reject ANY settlement along the lines of the Clinton Parameters. And the only way to get them to go along with it at all would be to impose it upon them by force - not just upon Israel as many people mistakenly assume. That's never going to happen.
And Alon Pinkas strikes me as the stupidest person in the room.
What could go wrong indeed
A rare historical phenomenon: Israel's Independence was declared on the eve of Shabbat, the 14th of May 1948. The Palestinians since then of course, have celebrated it as Nakba Day.
Little has changed since that Friday 62 years ago.
And to think some people wanted to make this guy Israel's UN ambassador...
yes, we can´t
Funny that I was googling Alon Pinkas the other day trying to figure out what ever happened to him and why we don't hear from him anymore. Commenter criticisms aside (and un-understood by myself!), Alon did a fabulous job making Israel's case during the bus and restaurant bombings. He would be a major reason for the ongoing support that the barrier has among the U.S. public.
My question on this proposal is: Didn't the "Quartet" already institute a peace plan (roadmap)? And isn't item one on that the bottom line, which is the Palestinian govt accepting Israel as a Jewish state and stopping the attacks? So maybe Alon could take up the task of making the case against the warcrime rockets the way he made the case against the suicide bombers. He would be very good at this. His suggestion for yet another plan is a tangent and distracts from the bottom line action that will result in peace (albeit with Israel intact), which is for the neighbors to stop attacking Israel.
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