MORE WALL, LESS ISRAELI DEATHS.
Posted on 10/24/2003 1:40:51 PM PDT by Pubbie
The US has dropped its opposition to Israel's construction of security barriers through the West Bank and is involved in detailed negotiations over project that has divided communities and disrupted the lives of thousands of Palestinians.
The US administration, which had called the wall "a problem", says it wants to minimise the impact on Palestinians of Israel's efforts to protect its settlers on occupied land and stop infiltration by militants into Israel itself. Officials insist the Bush administration is seeking to keep the barrier close to the pre-1967 border.
Commentators close to both sides said yesterday that negotiations over the wall, which may eventually cover several hundred miles at a cost of $1.5bn, had become the central element of US policy in the region following the collapse of the "road map" peace process.
"The fence is now the name of the game," said Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
Privately, US officials concede that with a US election one year away, the administration is unlikely to confront Israel over the issue and alienate the powerful Jewish lobby.
But diplomats warn that the change in US policy is breaking apart the "quartet" - the US, European Union, Russia and the United Nations - that launched the road map.
This week the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly approved a non-binding, EU-backed resolution calling on Israel to halt construction. Only four countries voted against - the US, Israel, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands.
The Bush administration's threat to reduce $9bn in loan guarantees to Israel in response to the building of the barrier has had a limited impact on Israeli decisions. But plans for the most controversial sections cutting through East Jerusalem and down the Jordan Valley have not been finalised.
US aviation security experts are in Israel discussing a proposed section that is intended to protect Ben Gurion airport from attack but will cut through Palestinian neighbourhoods.
Israeli officials said the US had specifically approved parts of the fence and wall built on the northwest fringes of the West Bank that have left 13 Palestinian villages and nearly 12,000 people virtually marooned on the Israeli-occupied side. The US State Department denied this, but sources close to the administration said opposition had been abandoned.
B'tselem, an Israeli human rights group, estimates that the first stage of the construction, running for about 130km and in most places 60 to 100 metres wide, has consumed 2,850 acres of Palestinian land and will give only limited access for 72,000 people to their farmland. Most sections do not follow the pre-1967 border.
In July, President George W. Bush pronounced the barrier a "problem".
With Mahmoud Abbas, then Palestinian prime minister, by his side in the White House, he told reporters: "It is very difficult to develop confidence between the Palestinians and Israel with a wall snaking through the West Bank."
But diplomats warn that the change in US policy is breaking apart the "quartet" - the US, European Union, Russia and the United Nations - that launched the road map.
A. Who cares what diplomats think?
B. US out of the UN. UN out of the US.
But look at the positive side. Fewer Jews will die at the hands of Islamofascists. I am sure the "diplomats" appreciate that fact. Right???
We need a wall around the state department.
GOOD!
How many inocent Israelis have been murdered since this road map was put in place anyway. Since we're dealing with terrorists who don't want peace in the first place anyway, this road map, although well intentioned, never had half of a chance. It's best we face the terrorists' true intentions now, before they acquire WMD, rather than later.
If these diplomats are supposed to be so smart, why don't they realize this simple truth. Oh I know, they too want the destruction of Israel. Sorry but that just isn't going to happen, Israel will survive.
Could we make it watertight?
In this case, good fences make for living neighbors.
They should threaten to move it a kilometer east every time a terrorist attack occurs.
It would be interesting to see if the terror would stop before the fence fronted on Mecca.
They should be sowing a minefield about a kilometer deep.
L
Bwahahahhaaha!
Confidence between Palestinians and Israel....please...ohhhh please...you're killin' me!!
(good fences make good neighbors.)
MORE WALL, LESS ISRAELI DEATHS.
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