Replies

Oslo was nothing more than a self-inflicted wound. It put Israel in an impossible situation since the whole thrust was that Israel could bring peace to the region by giving land. It puts the whole peace process squarely on Israel's shoulder. Yet, Israel doesn't have control of the peace process. Only the Arabs, who started the war, can make peace. There is nothing in their rhetoric, their actions, or their past that should have made Rabin or Peres believe they meant they would recognize Israel and settle quietly on the West Bank.

Oslo also failed because Israel capitulated their stand on Resolution 242. Resolution 242 left the final disposition of the land to Israel. Even though the Arabs have been shouting "illegally occupied" since 1967, the Resolution clearly shows that the UN said that Israel did not have to withdraw back to the 1967 lines, that Israel could set up borders that guaranteed secure borders, and in the end, Israel could trade land for peace as she did with Egypt with the Camp David Accords.

Yet, Israel, in principal, gave the land back to the Palestinians without asking the Palestinians anything in return. And even today, after 10 years of failure, after 10 years of lies, after a 2 year intifada that has claimed 611 Jewish lives, Israel still works to return to the Palestinians the land.

If I was a Palestinian, why would I need to change my behavior. I am getting everything I want through PR, Terror, and Fear.

Israel's inability to bring peace to a region plays right into Europe's anti-semitism. Europe does not hold the Palestinians guilty of any breech of contract/treaty. It is Israel's fault because Israel has the means to bring peace. Just give them what they want. It takes a severe case of self-imposed deception for Europe to believe that the Palestinians are the victims and not the instigators, yet Europe and our own State Department has developed such a case of blindness.

The other thing Oslo did was allow the Arabs to see how any other democracy might behave when faced with terror. They will back-down, guarantee, pay, do anything for the terror to stop. As Great Britain showed us in the 1940's, France in the 1960's, and Reagan in Lebanon... when faced with terror, the West will run away. Why should Arafat ever back down?