Don't knock Annapolis - Haaretz

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Sat., November 24, 2007 Kislev 14, 5768

Israel Time: 01:51 (EST+7)

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Don't knock Annapolis

By Haaretz Editorial

Tags: Annapolis, U.S., PA, Israel

Lucky for Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill that the disparaging phrase "photo-op" had not been coined during their time. Otherwise, the wise guys of their generation would have torn into the Tehran Conference (1943) even before it could convene, causing the war to last even longer.

Even in our age of cynicism, there is room to wonder whether the dismissive attitude of the chorus ridiculing the Annapolis summit is justified. After all, even the cynics acknowledge that the broad outlines of a two state solution are known, clear and acceptable to the majority in both nations. The question, therefore, remains: if not at Annapolis - then where, and if not now - then when?

Of course, at Annapolis the Iranian issue will loom between the lines. Israel, and to a great extent its Arab neighbors too, come to the conference importuning the United States and its allies to save them - also the rest of the world, but first and foremost the explicitly threatened Jewish state and the Sunni Arab states - from the menace of the regional, fundamentalist thug and his nuclear program.

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Behind closed doors, President George Bush has hinted that Israeli-Palestinian progress will make it easier for him to rally a determined international front against Tehran. For its part, Israel is keen to see such a front take shape, and take effective action, but it objects to every attempt to link the two issues.

"Linkage" has always been a dirty world in Israel's diplomatic lexicon.

But in the past "international conference" was also unacceptable, as was the PLO and "Palestinian people," and here we are, after 40 years of such rejections, with British academic circles deliberating over "the single state solution," while Israel's friends find consolation in the fact that - for the time being the discussants are a small, fringe group.

They may be a minority in Britain, but demography in the Land of Israel is in their favor. "The single state" is taking form, not at the universities of Oxford and London, but here, in the crucible of occupation, where the two intertwined peoples are being forged into an inseparable amalgam with this contested land. As long as Israel represses the existential necessity of converging back into its cohesive self, it reduces the chance that it will ever be able to do so in the future.

There is never a want for excuses. Mahmoud Abbas is too weak (just as Yasser Arafat was, at the time, too powerful and too authoritarian), the Palestinian security organizations are not functioning, their institutions of government do not exist, their economy is faltering, and corruption is on the rise. Israel must not allow itself to be seduced by excuses and deceptive conclusions that there is nothing to do and no one to do it with.

At Annapolis, and after it, during the conference of donor nations that will meet in Paris next month, the international community will express its willingness to assist the Palestinians to establish their state, and Israel, to make peace with them. There are those who consider the two conferences, at this time, to possibly be the final chance of setting the two-state solution on the road to realization. The clear interest of the international community, and foremost of the United States, is to bring this about, as a vital precondition to blocking Iran. Israel's clear and urgent interest is to accept and indeed to encourage international assistance at all levels, including the presence on the ground of policing and training forces, that can contribute to the establishment of a Palestinian state and help it stand on its own two feet.

The police decision to reveal on Sunday whether they think there is enough evidence to indict Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the Bank Leumi affair leaves the citizen a choice of one of two conclusions. Neither one is encouraging - either our police are moronic, or they are malevolent.

It has been proved that Olmert is not immune to investigations, and his involvement in state affairs has not stopped the inquiries. But releasing such a decision on the very day he is to land in Annapolis to represent Israel vis-a-vis world leaders reflects obtuseness, at the very least.

If the police recommend indicting Olmert, they will undermine his authority at Annapolis. But should they decide to close the case, deep suspicion will remain that the announcement was timed for Olmert's convenience. Either way, the police will walk into the very trap of political influence they sought to avoid.

The Bank Leumi affair has been investigated for quite a while. Olmert is not staying overseas forever, and a regrettable announcement of an indictment, or a joyful one of removing the suspicions, could be made on his return, a mere four days later.

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