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>From http://www.startribune.com/stories/561/815518.html
>>>Do the Israelis dislike "Oslo" because of its WW2 predelictions?
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}}}>Begin
Editorial: The occupation / It's time for Israel to end it
Published Nov 12 2001
In June 1967, facing the threat of attack by three Arab neighbors,
Israel launched a preemptive strike and sent tanks rolling across its
borders into land that had been in Arab hands for years. Thus began
Israel's occupation of two zones known as the West Bank and the Gaza
Strip -- and the modern chapter of friction between Israelis and the
Palestinian residents of those territories.
It is time for that occupation to end. It humiliates and punishes the
3 million Palestinians who live under watch of Israeli tanks and
troops. It places young Israeli soldiers in constant peril. It puts
Palestinian and Israeli civilians in frequent and volatile contact,
with the result that magnificent biblical cities have turned into
bomb targets and shooting galleries. And, because of tight security
measures in recent years, it is slowly strangling the Palestinian
economy.
Under a peace framework negotiated at Oslo, Norway, in the early
1990s, Israel was to withdraw gradually from the West Bank and Gaza
Strip, at each step granting new autonomy to the Palestinians and
receiving new guarantees of order and security. That phased approach
is not working. Life for Palestinians has grown worse, not better,
leading them to believe that the Oslo process was a trick.
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has not delivered the security that
Israelis expected. Israel has continued to build new housing
settlements in occupied land to which it has no right, doubling the
Israeli population in Arab territory. The trust-building steps
envisioned in Oslo have instead turned into new rounds of suspicion
and recrimination.
Israel's withdrawal can't happen all at once; neither side is
prepared for the economic or security arrangements. But the United
States should insist that Israel stop expansion of the housing
settlements and begin dismantling them. The first Bush administration
did exactly that 10 years ago, using measured financial and political
pressure, and it was the right approach. A full Israeli withdrawal to
something like the 1967 borders is now under discussion among Israeli
and Palestinian intellectuals, and the United States should help that
happen safely and fairly.
Many Israelis insist on continuing the occupation so that their
troops can hunt down terrorists and their government can hold a
bargaining chip for future negotiations. But the military chokehold
on Palestinian cities is an ineffective way to stop terrorism.
Instead, it imposes collective punishment on innocent Palestinians
while fueling new extremist rage. As for future negotiations, the
ultimate goal should be a peace treaty between Israelis and
Palestinians, but Israel will still hold many, many cards when that
time comes.
Palestinians, too, are skeptical of unilateral Israeli withdrawal.
They want it to occur in the framework of negotiations over borders,
refugees and other issues. But the Palestinian Authority has very
little negotiating leverage at this point, and a lifting of the
Israeli occupation would be a great relief for average Palestinians
under almost any circumstances.
The Bush administration can't force Israel to end the occupation.
Israel is, after all, a democracy, and just this year it elected a
hawkish prime minister, Ariel Sharon, who is ill-disposed to
compromise with the Palestinians. But withdrawal should be the Bush
administration's message. The United States cannot continue being a
party to an occupation that is illegal under international law, that
brutalizes the Palestinian people and that stimulates further
terrorism against Israeli civilians. Continued military occupation
only spills more blood, deepens old wounds and prolongs a terrible
conflict.
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� Copyright 2001 Star Tribune. All rights reserved.
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