Palestinians, U.S. working on joint statement; Sharon signals end of incursions

Palestinians, U.S. working on joint statement; Sharon signals end of incursions
Mon Apr 15,11:28 PM ET

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian and U.S. negotiators are working on a joint statement condemning suicide bombings and endorsing creation of a Palestinian state, officials said, while Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites) said his troops would leave two of the four West Bank towns they are occupying within a week.

Also, the military said forces were searching for suspects and weapons in the Askar refugee camp next to Nablus as well as the West Bank villages of Hirbet Beit Hassan, Fara, Luba Sharkiyeh, A-Ram and Anata.

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) postponed a meeting with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat (news - web sites), Palestinian officials said, hoping that the joint statement could be worked out before the session in Arafat's besieged Ramallah headquarters, now set for Wednesday. Powell is to meet Sharon on Tuesday.

In Ramallah Monday, Israeli forces arrested a top Palestinian militant linked to Arafat and also detained two Hamas leaders.

Marwan Barghouti, accused by Israel of leading the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which has claimed responsibility for dozens of shooting attacks and, lately, suicide bombings in Israel, was captured by Israeli forces not far from Arafat's office.

Barghouti, 41, is Arafat's man on the ground in the West Bank, leading his Fatah (news - web sites) movement and Tanzim militia. Barghouti has never admitted commanding the Al Aqsa group.

Sharon said that Barghouti "is responsible for horrible murders of hundreds of Israelis. He will be brought to trial in the state of Israel." Asked in an Israel Radio interview about the view that Barghouti could be a partner for peace talks, Sharon replied, "I suggest to Israel not to search out murderers as partners," saying that Israel had done that once before and reaped negative results — a reference to Arafat.

Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said Barghouti turned Tanzim into "the most murderous of the terrorist organizations committing most of the recent attacks against Israel, attacks of all types, but principally suicide attacks including female bombers, shootings and bombings." On Friday, a woman bomber from the Al Aqsa group killed herself and six other people in Jerusalem.

Also, Israeli forces in Ramallah arrested two leaders of the militant Hamas, Jamal Tawil and Fayez Abu Wardeh, Palestinians and the military said.

Sharon told CNN that Israel would pull out of the West Bank towns of Jenin and Nablus within a week. "Altogether, we are on our way out," he said, but added that Israeli forces would remain in Ramallah and Bethlehem until suspected militants there surrender.

Later, in a phone conversation with U.S. President George W. Bush (news - web sites), Sharon repeated his commitment to pull back from Jenin and Nablus within a week, the White House said. Bush has been pressing Israel to end its offensive in the West Bank, begun March 29 after a series of bloody Palestinian suicide bomb attacks in Israel. Bush welcomed Sharon's pledge as "a positive development."

In the interview, Sharon said the assassins of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi, gunned down in a Jerusalem hotel on Oct. 17, are in Arafat's Ramallah compound, and a standoff at the Church of the Nativity continued between Israeli forces outside and about 200 Palestinian gunmen inside.

Pope John Paul (news - web sites) II telephoned the priests in the ancient church on Monday, thanking the faithful for their "Christian testimony," the Vatican (news - web sites) said. The oldest part of the church complex, a massive stone basilica built in the fourth century, marks the traditional birthplace of Jesus.

Sharon also said that Powell's meeting with Arafat Sunday was a mistake. "The problem with Yasser Arafat is that you cannot reach peace with him," Sharon said. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat retorted, "Sharon has shown that he is beyond rehabilitation. He will never change." Erekat charged that Sharon "is turning our towns into big prisons."

Palestinian and U.S. officials were to meet Tuesday to continue work on a joint statement, Palestinian officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The first draft of the statement, obtained by The Associated Press, declares that the Palestinian goal of a state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip (news - web sites) and east Jerusalem must be attained "through negotiations, not terror and violence."

The statement, meant to be signed by Arafat, condemns "all terror against Israelis and Palestinians," and says the Palestinians are "ready to do our part against those who continue terror activities and suicide bombings." The Palestinians add the phrase "in accordance with our abilities," a reference to their charge that Israel's large-scale offensive has wrecked Palestinian security forces.

In the Jenin refugee camp at the northern edge of the West Bank, Israeli soldiers and Red Cross teams began gathering the bodies of Palestinians killed during the weeklong battle. Palestinians charge that Israel committed a massacre there; Sharon called that a "lie."

Foul smells rose from beneath buildings wrecked in the fighting, and some residents have tried digging with their hands to check for people or animals. Most reporters were still banned from the area, though the Israeli military guided small groups of journalists through parts of the devastated camp.

You probably know most of this, but it is always good to be reminded of the truth, is it not?

I'm sure you know that there has never been a country called Palestine or a race of people called Palestinians. The idea that the West Bank and Gaza are occupied Palestinian land, and that the Palestinian people are fighting for their land, has been accepted by most media and governments in the world.

But if you look at a map of the Middle East you will see that Palestine is a region, not a country. We can locate the Mojave Desert on the map, but we still do not recognize it as the 51st state. Similarly, the region of Siberia is a region not a state. Or the Sahara is a region not a state, etc. Neither is Palestine a state. It never was a country, just a region.

Importantly, the Jews did not displace anyone, because no one permanently resided there. It was a land inhabited by nomadic, Bedouin tribes. The whole region was nothing but deserts and swamps. Only about 120,000 Arabs resided in an area that covered the territories, the state of Israel and Jordan. When Mark Twain visited the area, he wrote he found nothing but a wasteland.

During the 19 years that the territories - including Jerusalem and Gaza - were occupied by the kingdoms of Jordan and Egypt, no one talked about a Palestinian state … not the Arab countries, not the United Nations. Nobody asked Jordan or Egypt to abdicate their ownership and give it to the Palestinians. Not even the Palestinians themselves said anything about a Palestinian state or a Palestinian people, because they hadn't thought up the idea yet.

The fact simply is that there are no Palestinians. These people are Arabs like all other Arabs, and they happen to live in a region called Palestine. They are not a separate people.

What makes a separate people? Religion, language, culture, garb, cuisine, etc. The Arabs in Palestine speak the same language, practice the same religion, have the same culture, etc., as all the other Arabs. The few minor differences that exist between them are like the minor differences that exist between the Welsh, the Scots, and the Londoners. They are still all Britons. Yankees and Southerners have the same minor differences, but they are still all Americans. People in the south of France are quite different from the people in the north, but they are still all French. These inconsequential differences do not make a people.

The Arabs living in Syria or Jordan, etc., are also the same Arabs, but they are each a separate nation because they each have a separate country. The so-called Palestinians want a separate country because they claim to be a separate nation. They are not. They were never a separate people before the new state of Israel. How did they suddenly become one now?

But if you can "invent" a country and "invent" a people, you can somehow try to justify that it is okay to send in suicide bombers to kill women, children, babies, old men, old women and noncombatant citizens, because these people have taken away your land. And the United Nations and the European Union can somehow rationalize their condemnation of Israel as the correct response against a country who has stolen land from it's rightful owners.

Let me ask you, what is the United States doing in Afghanistan? Routing out terrorists. Why? Because they attacked the United States on September 11. I understand this. But what I do not understand is how the world can critisize Israel for doing exactly the same thing, only on a much smaller scale.

Ask yourself this: Should the use of terror ever be rewarded? When is the use of terrorism justified as a military or political tactic? And if Israel gives into the terrorists, what implications does this hold for the future?

Let us examine the truths here:

1) There never was a Palestinian state or a Palestinian nation. There are no Palestinian people, per se. Rather, these are Arabs living in a region that historically has been called many things, including "Palestine."

2) Israel did not go to war against a Palestinian state and occupy its land. Rather, Israel was attacked by six Arab countries at once. She defended herself, defeated her attackers, and won the so-called territories, not from the Palestinians, but from Jordan and Egypt.

3) Jerusalem was never the capital of any state but Israel. It was certainly never the capital of a country that didn't exist. Why should the Palestinians get any part of it? Because they want it? Because they have terrorists?

4) Jerusalem, under the current Israeli control, is a free and open city. Israel, as a democracy, guarantees freedom of religion within its borders. Contrast this fact with areas that have come under Palestinian occupation. How many millions of Christians have fled the harassment and persecution that exists in these countries?

5) Most Arabs living in Palestine today are not indigenous to the region. It was not until after the Jews had changed deserts and swamps into a productive and thriving land that the Arabs started migrating there. Arafat himself was born and raised in Cairo, Egypt. Did you know that?

The belief that giving the Palestinians a state will bring peace is a delusion. The truth is that they want it all. The short-term goal is a state consisting of the West Bank and Gaza. The long-term goal is a state which includes all of "historical Palestine," including Jordan. How do I know this?

The late Faisal Husseini, Arafat's Jerusalem representative, a man who was cultured, sophisticated and considered the most moderate of all the Palestinians, shortly before his death on May 31, 2001, expressed his true feelings in an interview with the popular Egyptian newspaper el Arav. Husseini said: "We must distinguish the strategies and long-term goals from the political-phased goals which we are compelled to accept due to international pressures." But the "ultimate goal is the liberation of all of historical Palestine." Explicitly he said: "Oslo has to be viewed as a Trojan Horse."

He even added and clarified that it is the obligation of all the Palestinian forces and factions to see the Oslo Accords as "temporary" steps, as "gradual" goals, because in this way, "We are setting an ambush for the Israelis and cheating them." He also differentiated between "strategic," long-term, "higher"goals, and "political" short-term goals dependent on "the current international establishment, balance of power" etc.

All of historical Palestine! Does not this include all of Israel and all of Jordan? What does this say to you?

The bottom line is that even if the Arabs are given a state of their own, they will always feel wronged, cheated, and forced into giving up what they have been brainwashed to believe is theirs. They will continue to plot and look for an opportunity to destroy Israel in order to take back what they claim is theirs, especially the younger generation that has been brainwashed to hate the "occupying enemy." Whether there is a Palestinian state or not, there will be no peace.

Only a massive and ongoing re-education of the Arab people to these truths will enable meaningful negotiations to begin, followed by a lasting peace between Arabs and Jews. It is therefore critical that everyone who has an audience, whether in print or other media, use the forum they have available to repeat these truths again and again until they reach the consciousness of those waging war in the Middle East. Written by Gloria Lawrenson

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