We laughed when Baghdad announced — on the day it launched its border war with Iran — that the road to Jerusalem passed through Tehran. Later, when he marched his troops south, Saddam said the road to Jerusalem passed through Kuwait.
Today the American administration has borrowed that same idea, confirming that the road to Jerusalem is through Baghdad and vowing that it will return to the Palestinian issue after the war. Washington is very capable of keeping its promise if it wants to end the conflict and impose the creation of a Palestinian state. We hope the war won’t last long, and we hope America stands by its promise.
We know that the Americans are the only ones in the world able to impose peace on the Middle East, end the Israeli occupation of the land of three Arab States and announce an independent Palestinian State. They hold the trump cards.
Yes, the road to Jerusalem may indeed lie through Baghdad.
Americans have witnessed a series of events, among them the abortive peace process, Israel’s inability to continue the occupation without exacting a high price, and the awakening of the world — similar to its awakening to apartheid in South Africa — to the necessity of righting evident wrongs. All these may push Washington toward a peaceful resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and, more specifically, the creation of a Palestinian state.
Palestinians are wrong to think the American promises are worthless. They have a real chance that they must not let slip away.
The Palestinian stand today is as strong as that of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Turkey and Iran. All these countries can today raise the stakes in their financial demands, as Turkey did, or in political demands, like Iran. Palestinians are the main players in moving the region by virtue of their case and its overlap with the region’s other issues, including Iraq.
If the Palestinians do wish for this, they must not be sluggish — If they do, they alone will be to blame. The road map is another chance to bargain. All the Palestinians need to do is test the new American resolve and demand that the promises be implemented.
While the Palestinian issue will not change the course of war or its aftermath, the war may yet change the Palestinian situation.
Arab News Features 22 March 2003
