topic by
watcher
4/12/2002 (7:32) |
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There is no chance of peace in the world until the power of the fith column Israel lobby is broken beyond repair.
Bush strategy in shambles
Posted: April 12, 2002
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
President Bush's war on terror is close to being derailed, and his
Middle East policy is starting to look like downtown Jenin.
What happened? Not long ago, President Bush, victorious in the
Afghan war, seemed everywhere invincible. But this last month
has left him looking almost impotent in the Middle East.
What happened was predicted here six months ago. When Phase
I of the war on terror ends, I wrote, the president will face a
tough choice: Follow the War Party and invade Iraq, which will
shatter his Arab and allied coalition, or try to force a peace in the
Palestinian conflict, which will shatter his domestic coalition.
President Bush decided to pursue both courses. He is now on the
verge of shattering both coalitions. How did it happen?
Just weeks ago, Vice President Cheney was sent to the Mideast
to line up Arab recruits for the march on Baghdad. But in every
capital, he found zero Arab support for a U.S. invasion and
angry Arab insistence that America get the Middle East 'peace
process' back on track. That is the message a chastened Cheney
brought home.
Then events took charge. A Hamas suicide bomber carried out
the Passover massacre, and Ariel Sharon decided to settle the
hash of the man he believes to be the godfather of all anti-Jewish
terror: Yasser Arafat.
When the president, in a rambling Easter weekend interview,
said that his sympathy lay with Sharon, a firestorm swept the
Arab world. The president was warned that his Arab allies, such
as the king of Jordan, might be in mortal peril of violent
overthrow.
So the president did a stunning about-face. Calling on Sharon to
get his troops out of Palestinian cities, he sent Secretary Powell
to the region to effect a cease-fire. But when the president
moved off the Baghdad war track and onto the Oslo peace track,
he scheduled a confrontation with Sharon and his U.S. allies. For
Sharon rejects Oslo's land-for-peace formula as an Arab scheme
to shrink Israel and enlarge the Arafat enclave for a final assault
on the Jewish state.
Today, the president's Mideast policy collides with Sharon's on
almost every point. The president demands a cease-fire, an end
to Israeli incursions in the West Bank, negotiations now between
Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the dismantling of Israeli
settlements and Israel's withdrawal to something like its 1967
borders.
How far apart are he and Sharon?
Colin Powell was quoted in Madrid as saying, '(Arafat) is the
partner that Israel will have to deal with,' even as Sharon was
calling the Powell decision to meet Arafat 'a tragic mistake.'
Sharon's envoy to the U.S. media, Benjamin Netanyahu, says:
'The Oslo agreements are dead. Arafat killed them.' He says
Arafat should be deported. 'You cannot uproot terror without
uprooting (the Palestinian Authority).'
'I do not accept the word 'Palestinian state,'' Netanyahu told The
Washington Times, which added, '(Netanyahu) would apportion
an autonomous Palestinian area, overseen by Israel.' This is the
Bantustan solution no Palestinian leader could accept without
meeting the fate of Anwar Sadat. Where, then, do we stand?
Sharon considers Arafat a terrorist and is resolved to smash his
Palestinian Authority as a nest of terrorists. He has never shaken
hands with Arafat and has no intention of negotiating with him
or of going back to the Oslo process or of accepting the Barak
Plan, let alone the Saudi Plan.
The ball is in the president's court. If Sharon refuses to pull out
of the West Bank or negotiate with Arafat, how does the
president compel him? And if he cannot bring Sharon around,
what does he tell an Arab world, enraged by Israel's re-invasion
of the West Bank and appalled at the killing and carnage?
By December 2001, President Bush had overthrown the Taliban,
smashed al-Qaida, stood at 90 percent approval, and had behind
him a united country and international coalition. Today, he is
under attack from his former media allies, Congress is rising in
support of Sharon, his international coalition is history, Arafat
refuses to renounce the suicide bombers, and the Arabs are
celebrating Palestinian resistance.
Ronald Reagan was never in this situation, but Richard Nixon
was. In November 1969, his presidency at break-point, Nixon
went to the nation and asked the Silent Majority to stand behind
his Vietnam policy, then under siege. President Bush may have
to go the same route or abandon his Mideast policy.
But he has a huge reservoir of goodwill, and if he will tell
America what must be done in the Middle East and the war on
terror, he may yet prevail. But does the president know what he
wants to do? Does he see how this Middle East war ends or how
this war on terror plays out? Has he thought it all through?
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