| Talkback | |
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Title: | Quartet foolish preconditions | |||
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| Name: | Tosefta | | |||
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| City: | Tveria | State: | | ||
| First came the Roadmap (2003), a foolishness which turned into a Roadblock to peace since its inception. The first step in the Roadmap required "dismantling" terror groups. Hamas was already too strong to be dismantled without a full scale civil war. Arafat was aware, and having him under house arrest (since late 2002) did nothing to change this reality. In early 2006 Hamas won the elections and became the governing party. The Quartet then imposed milder preconditions to allow financial aid. The Quartet must have learned something from the failure of the Roadmap and did not insist on its acceptance. The new preconditions: 1. "Renounce violence". Too bad that national liberation movements do NOT renounce violence. They suspend it during peace talks, but threaten to use it if the peace talks fail; otherwise they have little influence on the outcome. 2. "Recognize Israel". This can be demanded in principle from the partner to the peace talks. But why demand it of the new government as a precondition? The PLO is the partner, not the PA government? An unnecessary requirement serving as a roadblock. 3. Accept all earlier deals with the PLO. One of these is to renounce terrorism. Again, forget it. The Palestinians today can survive without financial aid from the West, as long as Saudi Arabia and Iran are willing to offer support. Pushing them into Iranian hands will be bad, but then giving Israel an easy excuse to reject peace talks will be the real damage the unnecessary conditions will cause. |
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