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The Clinton Ultimatum By: Take it or leave it, this is contagious, used to be the Israeli way of dealing with Palestinians, now adopted as an American policy style. Palestinians are not in a state of war with the United States. The US administration is supposed to act as an honest broker and perform a high level of tolerance to the fears and concerns of the negotiating partners. They functioned accordingly when Israel failed to meet their requests but showed no tolerance towards the Palestinian request for clarifications. The whole American idea of rapping up all of the final status issues in a month period was not only a major mistake but represented a major failure from the side of the American middle east peace team. The current crisis in the Middle East is a direct result of the Clinton attempt to establish his legacy as the Middle East peacemaker. Firstly, finalizing an agreement in the heat of Israeli early elections is a recipe for failure. It will evidently place the whole peace process hostage to the heated election campaign. Even if he wants, and this is doubted, the Israeli Prime-Minster will posses no tolerance towards the essential needs for a final settlement of the middle east crisis. This move to replace quite, behind the scene diplomacy by a heated public discussions about extremely sensitive issues such as Jerusalem, settlements, refugees, and borders can only do good if done within an environment of cooperation and peace. It might be a necessary stage to educate the public and create better bases for ending the conflict and accommodating for the needs and concerns of each other. As the current initiative (ultimatum) came in the middle of a sever crisis, it only minimized the ability of both parties to concede. Secondly, with the current crisis, a new factor strongly entered into the seen. A factor that was artificially absent through the whole peace process, the Palestinian public opinion. The failure to address Palestinian concerns and fears towards issues like Jerusalem, refugee rights, and the integrity of the newly proposed Palestine, is a fatal mistake inherited from the history of the peace process. Arafat, is the elect president yet, in such sensitive issues he has to stand the test of peoples acceptance of the proposed deal. Clinton missed up the chance to bring about a truce in the Sharam Alsheik summit. Not being firm enough he managed to dilute all the necessary steps to do so. To avoid international proctoring, an inquiry committee, almost with no authority, was proposed. Instead of using his influence to force Israel to remove their tanks from the Palestinian areas and the Palestinian authority to take counter steps in controlling the angry masses and militant groups, he forced an artificial, non-monitored, easily reversible show ups that could not stand the test of reality. So far ambiguity, some like to call it positive ambiguity, is the name of the game. The recent crisis have proven to all that it is a fatal game that should be replaced with a firm work for establishing a truce and bring the parties to serious negotiations to define all the tiny little details of any proposed agreement. The crisis has to be replaced by a truce and ambiguity has to be replaced by clarity. The following principles can be the bases for a legitimate and practical solution to the crisis. Israeli withdrawal from all the areas occupied in 1967 war combined with swap of territories to address the concerns of both sides. East Jerusalem is an integral part of the areas occupied in 1967 war. Shared sovereignty over all of Jerusalem should be established to insure the interests of both parties and for the city to be open to all. Freedom of worship should be guaranteed to all with practical steps to insure the safety and accessibility of all holy shrines. Israel should admit moral and historical responsibility for the Palestinian refugee problem and declare readiness to share in solving this problem based on the principle of "the free choice for refugees" combined with an open Palestinian commitment that will assure Israel that this solution of this problem will be conducted in harmony with the existence of Israel as the state for the Jewish people. The United Nation should be allowed to play an active role in the negotiations. To be able to conclude an agreement based on the above-mentioned principles, both parties should be ready to resume negotiations based on those principles. Prior to that a conductive environment should replace hostilities. | ||||||||||||||||
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