Thats right, the Palestinians said no, they wanted to go for broke, and indeed they lost. Instead of having 94% of the west bank, no control over the water, no control over their borders, no own immigration process, what did they get? Thats right, the secret prize they got for turning the offer down was NOTHING. Now they have absolutely zip.
There is no point accepting an unworkable deal.
Read this from Ha'aretz
There may be nothing new about that, but the operation in the territories brought about the collapse of the Palestinian governmental structure and put an end to the concept of "Rajoubization," the security model - the epithet is based on the name of Jibril Rajoub, the head of Palestinian preventive security in the West Bank - that placed the battle against terrorism in the hands of Palestinian subcontractors in return for personal and economic advancement and vague political promises
How long could such a situation last?
The deal offered to Arafat would have meant selling out the Palestinians, accepting the permament status of the occupation and settlements.
It would have meant the Palestinians having to live with less water than they needed, every year having to reduce the amount of irrigated land, whilst Israeli settlers built ever more swining pools and orchards. It would have bred more resentment.
In return, Arafat would have had to crack down on the Islamic extremists who would have been strengthened by the sell-out.
In effect, Israel offered to turn the Palestinian authority into Kapos. (I'm not comparing the West Bank to concentration camps, but the Kapo principle is the same.)
That wouldn't work in the long term.
It was a stupid and short-sighted attempt by the Israelis, but one that Arafat was sucked into with the Oslo accords. Perhaps Arafat genuinely believed it was going to lead to a Palestinian state, more likely he was too stupid to see it couldn't last, and that he wouldn't be able to exercise his new-found power for long.
The end result was, Arafat couldn't sign, because one of the extremist groups would have killed him. Anybody who tried to keep to the same bargain with the Israelis would have suffered the same fate sooner or later.
As it is, Arafat didn't sign, the Israelis too continued to play hardball, and both sides are suffering the consequences.
On water rights:
That water has to come from somewhere. If the Israelis would have given up the water rights and handed them to the palestinians Israel would have been forced to import water from Turkey. Now how would the water get from Turkey to Israel I hear you ask? A pipeline THROUGH SYRIA. Yeah…I wonder why the Israelis turned that one down.
Or cut back consumption. Currently Israelis are using 5 times as much water per head as the Palestinians. Cut back Israeli consumption, and they could survive on the sources located within Israel.
Or they could set up desalination plants. One or the other option will have to be used sooner or later anyway, Israel is drawing more water than is being replenished in the underground aquifers.
Do you apply such logic in your judgements, Hortlund?
Criminal: I needed a car, my neighbour had a car, I stole his
Hortlund: Oh, that's allright then
No? Didn't think so. Perhaps if the theft victim was an Arab?
On Palestinian control over external borders:
Take a look at a map over Israel. Take a look at the west bank. If you would let the Palestinians have control over the external borders you would effectively open up the entire country. 95% of the populated areas of Israel are within artillery range from the West bank and Lebanon. You would effectively take the IAF out of the equation too, since most of the Israeli military airfields would be within arty range. IT AINT GONNA HAPPEN.
None of the Arab armies can challenge Israel, even combined together they couldn't.
However, safeguards were offered by the Palestinians. Borders could be monitored and policed by international observers, possibly with Israeli observers included. What they refused was allowing borders to be controlled by the Israeli military.
The Palestinians also agreed to Palestine having a limited military, with international observers to monitor their weapons procurement and deployment.
The Palestinians also agreed to Israeli requests for three Israeli military early warning stations to be set up in the West Bank.
On breaking up Palestinian territory with roads:
Look at a map again. Consider where the Palestinian and Israeli settlements are located. Try to form a continuous Palestine territory AND a continuous Israeli territory. Good luck.
You can't. That's why some settlements will have to go.
Interesting to note your beliefs:
3 million Arabs can be uprooted from their ancestral homes, a few thousand Jewish settlers must be maintained in their new built tax haven settlements at any cost.
LOL "all but settled" Where do you get these ideas? Where are the refugees supposed to return? You are aware of the fact that the pals want the refugees to be able to return to their previous homes inside Israel right? The demand is as ridiculous as if some German family who used to live in East-Prussia before the war wanted to return to their old estates, throw out the current owners, and be given the same rights as a Russian citizens. It aint gonna happen.
This week 12 Arab families were evicted from a houses their families had been living in for years, because a Jewish organization managed to unearth deeds to the land dating from before 1948.
So it's okay to force Arab out, but not Jews?
In fact, it isn't much of a problem in Israel.
All the land siezed from Arabs is held by the Israeli government and it's agencies, it is only leased out to individuals. Over80% of land in Israel is owned by the state.
As I said, the right of return has been all but settled, with numbers strictly limited. The Palestinians aren't asking for millions of people to be let back in.
Of course, it' worth pointing out that anyone in the world who converts to Judaism has the right to go and settle in Israel, but people who were born there who aren't Jews haven't got the right to return.
The status of Jerusalem was also agreed upon, with East Jerusalem being the Palestinian capital, West Jerusalem the Israeli capital.
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Hmm...yes...that would be the agreement that the Palestinians refused to sign then
The Palestinian negotiating position was the East Jerusalem must be their capital. At no point did they make any claims on West Jerusalem.
THe same was said of the Sinai. It was vital to the defense of Israel. The Egyptians would just take it back and use it to launch more attacks on Israel.
Irael gave it back, and have had peace with Egypt ever since.
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Perhaps indicating that land is not as holy for Israel as you might want to imply? Israel is more than willing to change land for peace. Problem with the west bank and the Golan heights is that Israel would be changing land for more terrorist attacks instead.
Exactly what was said of the Sinai.
It's interesting to note, that despite your "terminator" view of the Arabs, Israel has borders with 4 Arab states. It has resolved it's land disputes with two, Jordan and Egypt, and has good relations with both, with neither country allowing themselves to be a base for terrorist operations against Israel.
It still has land disputes with two, Syria and the Palestinians, and both are a constant source of terrorism.
The Sinai was never regarded by Israel in the same way as the West Bank. It's largely a desert, not suitable for settlements, and the numbers of settlers there were small.
Besides, when the peace deal with Egypt was made, there were no terrorist activity funded and led by Egypt against Israel. Perhaps that might have something to do with things too?
We can't make peace becaue we're at war?
There are options you know. One would be to allow the Pals some self governing in some cities and areas. Then you surround these areas with Berlin-wall -like defenses. Easier than just emptying the west bank of palestinians
I think the word you are looking for is ghetto
It wouldn't work. If you create some walled ghettos, but don't put everyone in them, the ones outside are still capable of mounting attacks.
You can't move everyone into a few small ghettos, they wouldn't be able to feed themselves, and whilst seeing them all die of hunger might please you, most of the rest of the world wouldn't accept it.
The biggest problem with a fence/wall situation is it's length. A sensible coherent border might be workable, but if you draw a border including the Israeli settlements it will be far too long. The IDF says it takes an entire battalion to provide security for each settlement.
There are no cross border attacks from Jordan into Israel.
But surely you can't stop the Arabs? They just keep on and on until Israel is destroyed. Don't you know they're like the terminator?
