Opinions of Peter Belmont
Speaking Truth to Power
| After Reading Two Articles: “Two State Illusion” and “Oslo at 20 a Failed Process” |
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by Peter A. Belmont / 2013-09-19
A tide is turning in America: it is becoming possible, if not quite fashionable, to criticize—if not the Israeli occupation—the now 23-year-old “peace process”. Even the New York Times has provided elegant space to such criticism, Pressure on Israel Alone Can Bring Peace In my view, the so-called “peace process” is, at best, like what in school we once called “busy work”, something useless to make people do when they might instead have been employed doing something useful. At worst, and in fact, it has also served as an argument for dissuading the EU and others from taking any action (“pressure”) to, for instance, end the settlements—the USA’s and Israel’s argument being that nothing should be done which would interfere with the ever on-going (but, as all knew, ever useless) “peace process”. The “peace process” thus not only failed to get anything useful going between the parties but kept the rest of the world at bay. It served as an analogy for the sign my then 5-year-old son once put on the door of his room: “Do not tutch”. Could the “peace process” have produced a “just and lasting peace”? In principle it might, but in fact, the parties were never close to a mutually agreeable solution, even in 1967, even in 1990, and Israel’s determined regime of illegal settlement building (and settlement populating) has, over the many years of “peace processing”, moved the parties farther and farther from the possibility of a just and lasting peace arrived at purely between themselves—that is, without outside pressure on Israel. In my view, a view I’d imagine was quietly shared by 100% of people who actually want a peace treaty that is fair to (or acceptable to) Palestinians, there can be no peace unless and until severe pressure is exerted upon Israel to move Israel away from its settlement project and toward an acceptable peace treaty. Where would international pressure on Israel come from? Who can say? It has not happened yet and is as purely conjectural today as are “solutions” most commonly suggested as a possible resolution of the conflict, the ever-distant Two States, and the even-more-unlikely (in my opinion) One Single Non-Discriminatory Democratic State. The only very, very slight pressure on Israel that I am aware of is the EU’s current tentative steps to suspend contact with organizations connected to the settlements in the Occupied Territories—a very oddly tentative and illogical step since, of course, European contact with the government of Israel is not proposed to be banned even though the government of Israel is itself author and prime mover of the occupation and the illegal settlements. See: Former European leaders call on EU to enforce ban on Israeli settlements.[1] What would international pressure on Israel seek to accomplish? This too is pure conjecture since no such pressure has eventuated. I’d like the pressure to aim at forcing Israel to remove the settlers and remove/demolish the settlement buildings and the wall. My reason for choosing that “goal” is that it SEEKS TO ENFORCE EVIDENT INTERNATIONAL LAW, whereas making “peace” is not required by law, and making Israel become a “democratic” state and especially a “non-discriminatory” state is not required by law, and not very well defined as a goal, either. But those are my own “druthers”. Choose your own. But—after you’ve chosen what you consider a desireable outcome OTHER than the current status quo apartheid regime, the current undemocratic fully-discriminatory multi-ethnic, multi-confessional Single State—ask yourself how it could possibly come to pass without the exertion of extreme pressure on Israel (or, of course, on the much beleagured Palestinians). My prediction is that no sensible person will see a likely path within a shortish time period (e.g., “his or her lifetime”) to a goal differing from status quo without the exertion of extreme pressure, presumably upon Israel.[2] That said, I wonder that people are not saying so out loud. ----------- [1] Israel condemns this proposed EU banning action, saying that it runs contrary to the Oslo accords or Quartet agreements which, Israel insists, allows settlement activity. But of course, most nations are also signatories of the Fourth Geneva Convention which banns settlement and in which each nation agrees to “ensure” Israeli compliance with the convention “in all circumstances”—which would seem to include the circumstance of the Oslo and Quartet agreements. ----------- [2] And never forget the “Not in God’s Lifetime” jokes once popular. They expressed an important truth. |
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