In a few days time, President George W. Bush will arrive in the Holy Land. In West Jerusalem he will meet with Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and in Ramallah, Bush will meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Notwithstanding Israel’s violation of its recently made commitment at the Annapolis peace conference to stop Jewish settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territory, Olmert, in an interview with the right-wing Israeli newspaper, the Jerusalem Post, spoke of Maale Adumim (a large Jewish settlement choking Arab East Jerusalem, and stretching eastward in the central West Bank, over looking the Dead Sea, forming a physical barrier cutting the southern West Bank from its center) as an inseparable part of Jerusalem to remain in Israel’s hands. This is not all. Last Wednesday, Olmert convened a meeting with his Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak to coordinate Israel’s strategy demands that will be submitted to the Bush while in West Jerusalem. These Israeli demands include: (1) Allowing the Israeli occupation forces a free hand to conduct any military action in the occupied Palestinian territory while negotiations are going on. Essentially this means unlimited repeat of bloody raids conducted against Palestinian population centers whenever the Israeli military establishment sees fit. Considering the alleged inability of the Israeli political establishment to control the Israeli military, as was reported in the Israeli press recently, this will effectively give the Israeli security and occupation establishment a veto on the peace process. (2) The complete demilitarization of the future state of Palestine. (3) Israel to maintain effective military superiority, and the complete freedom for its air force to fly over Palestinian airspace. (4) Israel will maintain permanent presence of its armed forces in the Jordan Valley, and the ability to deploy large troops in other parts of the West Bank whenever Israel feels any danger coming from the east. (5) Israel will demand monitoring Palestinian border crossings to know who is coming or going.
All these demands are utterly unacceptable and show the downright cheek and arrogance on the part of Israel that would preclude any possibility of concluding a peaceful settlement.
Olmert will demand to receive an OK from Bush on the above Israeli demands. According to an Israeli government source “Israel is seeking Bush’s support for its security demands so that such understandings can serve as a basis for the work of the American Special Security Envoy Gen. James Jones.”
Guided by past and recent history, the fear is that Bush will succumb to Israeli demands, and will try to force them on the Palestinian side. In their book entitled “the Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy,” John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt produce a long list of old and recent historical events in which the US administration and the American President bowed to Israel’s demands. Mearsheimer and Walt cite in their book a statement made by US Secretary of State George. P. Shultz under President Reagan in which he recalled:
“In December 1982... I got word that a supplement was moving through the Congress to provide a $250 million increase in the amount of US military assistance granted to Israel: This in the face of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, its use of cluster bombs, and its complicity in the Sabra and Shatila massacres...The supplement sailed right by us and was approved by the congress as though Reagan and I had not even been there. This brought home to me vividly Israel’s leverage on our Congress. I saw that I must work carefully with the Israelis if I was to have any handle on congressional action that might affect Israel Middle East.” It is no secret that Olmert is under heavy pressure from the Israeli military and from the opposition, but Olmert can convince no one of his intentions, namely whether he is sincere in his peace efforts or not. Olmert cannot claim to want peace while insisting on “Maale Adumim settlement” as part of Israel. This cannot be for the simple reason that Maale Adumim and its extensions leading to Jerusalem are built in the occupied Palestinian territory on occupied Palestinian land, under international law, all settlements are illegal. Also, Maale Adumim constitutes a long physical barrier that divides the center of the West Bank from its south. The same applies to the Jewish settlement of Ariel, which lies deep in West Bank territory close to Nablus. As Walt and Mearsheimer write in their book: “Yitzhak Rabin was right, America’s generosity toward Israel is beyond compare in modern history. The authors forgot to mention the impact of this on the Palestinians. This can be summarized in three words: perpetual misery and destitution. Despite deep wounds, and in anticipation of a better future for all in the Middle East, I say: President Bush, Welcome to Palestine.
— Walid M. Awad is a member of the Central Media Commission in Ramallah.
