News, Views, and Analysis Governments, Lobbies,  and the Corporate Media Don't Want You To Know

MERMER Forum To Receive MER Regularly •  www. MiddleEast.Org 

  (202) 362-5266  • 16 December 2003


IF you don't get MER, you just don't get IT!
Expert Exclusive Truly Important Insights, Information, and Analysis Available Nowhere Else



                      READER'S COMMENT
"Reading your response to  the capture of Saddam shows once again
that the  most honest, the most comprehensive and most mobilizing
news and analysis on the Middle East always comes  from MER. 
It is indispensable.  Keep up the great work."
       Robert Silverman  
       Salamanca, Spain - 12/14/2003



SHARON - MORE BIG TRICKS COMING THIS WEEK

"SHARON MAY NOW ATTEMPT TO DO TO ARAFAT AND YASSIN WHAT HAS BEEN DONE TO SADDAM"

 
" 'Unilateral steps': There will be no peace agreement with the Palestinians.
They will be imprisoned behind the walls and the fences, a
continuation of the
occupation by other means.
The peace plan of Sharon and Olmert proclaims the
continuation of the
war against the Palestinian people. It is a provocation to
the United States
and world public opinion."


 

                                  Balloons
                                      By Uri Avnery

Tel Aviv - 12-13-03:
     He is at it again, and again it is working. He is launching colorful
balloons, and the whole world is looking on with rapture and wonderment.
     Ariel Sharon needs to divert attention. His popularity has dropped in
recent opinion polls. The Geneva initiative has captured the national and
international agenda. The police investigations into his corruption affairs
have reappeared in the headlines. Army and Security Services officers
have criticized him publicly. He has been accused of immobility, foot-
dragging, the lack of a plan.
     So he is launching balloons: "Unilateral steps". Sensation! "In the
future we shall not be in all the places we are now". Shock! "We shall be
moving settlements". Uproar!
     He has sent Ehud Olmert to exercise his jaw on every talk-show,
warning against the terrible danger of a "bi-national state". His plan,
Olmert declares, will ensure the existence of a "Jewish state", 80% of
whose population will be Jewish. Since already more than 78% of Israel's
citizens are Jewish, this must mean that densely populated Palestinian
territories would not be annexed. Sharon's office has leaked reports that
Olmert is echoing Sharon's own view, and that Sharon himself will make a
sensational statement to this effect next week in Herzlia.
     General turmoil! The Geneva Initiative is almost forgotten. All the
pundits are busy with wild speculation: What is Sharon up to? What does
he mean? What is he going to do? Is Bush compelling him to change his
spots?
     Olmert's conversion from screeching hawk to cooing dove has been all
the more convincing because at the same time, quite by accident, he has
been forced to accede to an European demand to mark the "place of
origin" on all Israeli exports to Europe. This is meant to block preferential
customs treatment for the products of the settlements. The settlers have
started a furious campaign against him. They have plastered the walls of
Jerusalem with posters showing Olmert stamping settlement products with
a Nazi-style yellow star of David, with the word "Jude" on it. (For good
measure, they have put my picture on the poster as well, just to show who
is pulling the strings.)
     So now it is clear: Olmert is a dove, a reincarnation of the Prophet Elijah,
announcing (according to Jewish tradition) the coming of Sharon, the
Messiah.
     The leaders of the Labor Party are already taking the nylon covers off
their ministerial suits. Any moment now, they believe, Sharon will call on
them to take the places of the extreme right-wing ministers in his
government. Shimon Peres is about to fulfil his dream and become a
minister again.
     Who would have believed it! Sharon is the Israeli de Gaulle, after all!
Peace is on the way!
     All this confirms the old American adage: A sucker is born every
minute.
     I have already warned a dozen times: Don't pay attention to what
Sharon says, pay attention to what Sharon does. His pronouncements can
be ignored, they serve only to fulfil the tactical requirements of the
moment. But his actions are very, very important.
     And his actions are quite clear: The Wall is being extended at a frenzied
pace. In the Sharon tradition, it is creating "Facts on the Ground." The
Palestinian territory is being cut into ribbons. Before our eyes, isolated
Palestinian enclaves are appearing, each of them an open air prison. And
while the army is removing one uninhabited mobile home in one "illegal"
hilltop outpost, the government is pushing the enlargement of the
settlements by all available means.
     This is a vigorous campaign, employing all arms of the government.
Only a person completely cut off from what's happening in the occupied
territories can claim that things are "frozen". Only a person living in the
virtual world of the media could believe that Sharon has no plan.
     He does have a plan, the same one that he has been following for
decades. His and Olmert's statements do not contradict it, quite the
contrary. Here are its basic principles:
     - "Unilateral steps": There will be no peace agreement with the
Palestinians. They will be imprisoned behind the walls and the fences, a
continuation of the occupation by other means.
     - "A state with an 80% Jewish majority": All sparsely populated
Palestinian territories will be annexed. That will include half the West Bank
(the former Area C), all the major highways, the entire Jordan valley, many
of the olive groves and fields of the Palestinian villages (but not the
villages themselves.)
     - "Painful concessions": Israel will give up the Palestinian population
centers, towns and blocs of Palestinian villages (the former Areas A and
B) and most of the Gaza Strip.  All the enclaves together will amount to
some 45% of the West Bank. Together with the Gaza Strip, they will
constitute only some 10-12% of the original territory of Palestine before
1948.
     - "A Palestinian state": Sharon is ready - indeed, keen - to have  these
enclaves called "a Palestinian state". This will free Israel from taking any
responsibility for the population. If they starve or decide to move
elsewhere - so much the better.
     - "Moving settlements": The dozens of small settlements built in the
Palestinian population centers will be transferred to the areas that will be
annexed to Israel, enlarging the Jewish component.
     - "The terrorism will continue": This will not end the war. Indeed,
Sharon and his people have no interest in ending it. As far as they are
concerned, it can go on forever.  The Palestinians will always be blamed.
The redeployment will make life much easier for the army, since there will
no longer be a need to devote substantial forces to the defense of isolated
settlements.
     This is the opposite of the Geneva Initiative, which is based on the
belief that an agreement with the Palestinians can be achieved. It is also
the opposite of the Road Map, to which both sides still pay lip service,
while treating it as a whim of President Bush that has been forsaken by
Bush himself. Sharon "accepted" it at the time - with 14 reservations that
emptied it of all meaning. In practice, he did not take even the first step
along this road (any more than the Palestinians did).
     The peace plan of Sharon and Olmert proclaims the continuation of the
war against the Palestinian people. It is a provocation to the United States
and world public opinion.
     How will it affect opinion in Israel? Perhaps it will divert into another
channel the growing longing for peace, which found some expression in
the Geneva Initiative. Sharon and Olmert play upon two powerful
tendencies in the Israeli subconscious: (a) racist attitudes towards Arabs,
which undermine belief in the possibility of peace with them, and (b) the
desire for a Jewish state, without Goyim (non-Jews) in general and Arabs
in particular.
     Some say that the Sharon initiative is nothing but media spin. Just
another of Sharon's utterances that have little to do with reality. But
anyone who sees the walls and fences that are now going up, will
recognize the new reality that is being created.



[MER - Of course the semi-oficial presentation of all this in the pages of the Jerusalem Post -- with considerable propaganda preparations no doubt underway to follow the speech and to impose the 'plan' -- is far more benign...and far less on target]

Sharon plan aims to minimize
confrontation with Palestinians

By GIL HOFFMAN

[Jerusalem Post - Dec. 12, 2003]  The goal of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's new diplomatic plan will be to give the Palestinian Authority a contiguous state that would minimize the points of confrontation with Israel, Sharon's ally Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin said on Thursday.

Sharon is expected to outline the plan in a major policy address at the Herzliya Conference on Thursday.

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and Industry, Trade, and Labor Minister Ehud Olmert will also address the conference.

Sharon's spokesman said that the prime minister is considering several options, and has not yet fully decided in which direction to go in the Herzliya speech.

Rivlin, who himself opposes the plan, said Sharon believes that to achieve contiguity for the Palestinian state, several isolated settlements will have to be dismantled or moved, including Ganim and Kadim in northern Samaria. Rivlin said Sharon is also under pressure from Shinui to dismantle isolated settlements in the Gaza Strip like Netzarim and Morag.

According to Rivlin, another of Sharon's goals will be to avoid a confrontation with either Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei (Abu Ala) or US President George W. Bush. To that end, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom left Rome for Washington on Thursday and meetings are continuing with Palestinian officials to arrange an eventual meeting with Qurei.

"Sharon can't afford to do anything that would embarrass Abu Ala, because he cannot afford to be blamed for another Palestinian prime minister being toppled," Rivlin said. "He also has to be very careful not to do anything that Washington wouldn't want."

The prime minister met on Thursday with cabinet ministers Tzahi Hanegbi and Dan Naveh, and Likud MKs Roni Bar-On, Majallie Whbee, as well as Labor MK Ephraim Sneh, and has met in recent days with Mofaz, opposition leader Shimon Peres, and several Likud officials. He is set to meet separately next week with Labor MKs Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, Matan Vilna'i, and Shalom Simhon.

Ma'ariv reported on Thursday that a majority of Labor MKs would agree to joining a national unity government if Sharon is ready to withdraw from settlements and take other serious diplomatic steps. The MKs who said they would be ready under those circumstances to join the coalition surprisingly even included dovish MKs Colette Avital and Yuli Tamir, who signed the Geneva Accord.

Avital said she would agree to join the coalition on the basis of an agreement with a plan of action and a timetable that would include a pullout from Gaza and a withdrawal from settlements in the West Bank.

Tamir said her conditions include a total settlement freeze and a withdrawal from settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a confidence-building measure for negotiations on a final-status agreement that would result in a Jewish majority for Israel and a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

"If that happens it would be a new reality," Tamir said. "But I think Arik is only talking. I think the chance of him meeting all those conditions is close to zero. I can't rule out sitting in a Sharon-led coalition and say nothing he does would let us join. We need to give him an incentive that if he goes far enough, he will get our support, first from outside, and upon implementation, inside the government."

Transportation Minister Avigdor Lieberman met top Likud officials at Likud Party headquarters in Tel Aviv on Thursday in an effort to unify the Right against Sharon and Olmert's plans for unilateral separation from the Palestinians. Lieberman and Tourism Minister Benny Elon have met Likud ministers in recent days to strategize.

The Likud Bureau is set to meet on Sunday to express opposition to the plans.

All of the Likud's MKs have been invited to the meeting, which will be the first forum for the MKs to criticize Olmert in full force.

A draft resolution of Sunday's bureau meeting that has already been signed by half the Likud faction calls for a rejection of any unilateral withdrawal, a delay in negotiations until the Palestinians end terror and incitement, and a new commitment to the Central Committee's controversial decision last year ruling out the creation of a Palestinian state.

A poll broadcast on Israel Radio on Thursday found that 54 percent of people who said they voted Likud oppose Olmert's plan, while 81% of Labor voters support it. Forty-five percent of those polled said they support the plan.

Fifty-two percent said they want a national unity government and 31% said they believe the current government should be maintained. The poll was of 560 people and it had a 4.5% margin of error.





To receive MER regularly and free click here

To receive MER free and easy email MERList@MiddleEast.Org with subject SUBSCRIBE
Comment on this and other MER Articles in the MER FORUM



         Copyright © 2003 Mid-East Realities, All rights reserved             To unsubscribe from MER



Comment on these article(s)