Israeli vice premiere Haim Ramon gets to Clinton's left and admits the obvious point that the Arab parts of Jerusalem are going to need to be part of an independent Palestine.
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Don't Tell Hillary
21 Sep 2007 10:19 am
Comments (30)
Tick..tick..tick..tick..
Kadima members disagree over how J'lem should be divided By Nadav Shragai, Haaretz Correspondent
Serious differences of opinion have erupted in Kadima over the possibility that the agreement of principles Israel is now negotiating with the Palestinians will determine the final-status deal on Jerusalem.Seven years after the Camp David summit in 2000 and the cabinet's subsequent decision to adopt, with reservations, then U.S. president Bill Clinton's plan to divide the capital, no one in Kadima is asking whether Jerusalem will be re-divided. The only question is how it will be re-divided.
Vice Premier Haim Ramon is promoting a plan to Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayad in which almost all Palestinian neighborhoods of East Jerusalem would be subtracted from the Israeli city and become part of a Palestinian capital in East Jerusalem. The areas inhabited by Jews, including the new neighborhoods south, north and east of the Green Line that divided the city until 1967, will remain under Israel's jurisdiction.
The plan would also divide the Old City between Israeli and Palestinian sovereignty, with the Muslim and Christian Quarters under Palestinian rule, and the Armenian and Jewish Quarters under Israeli rule. Sovereignty over the Temple Mount would be divided between Palestinians and Jews as well.
From the Israeli daily newspaper Ha'aretz.
An antidote to the commentary in the left wing appeasement rag Haaretz.
http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/12075.htm
Well this week you had an Iranian general saying if Israel attacks Iran, Iran will bomb Israel.
In Lebanon, the main division in the country is between the American/Saudi-backed side and the Iranian/Syrian/Hezbollah side. This week the Iranian side assassinated another opposing politician.
On NPR there was interesting story about a film being shown on Iranian prime time TV:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14574945
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/866562.html
"It tells the story of a young Iranian named Habib Parsan, played by a well-known Iranian actor, Shihab Hassini, who goes to Paris to study at university before the war. He befriends a young Jewish woman by the name of Sarah Struk, who fears the growing strength of the Nazis in Germany."
The interesting thing is that according to Iranian propaganda, it is the European imperial powers who put European Jews in Israel, it wasn't really the Zionists idea.
Yeah, linked to that here the other day. But note that "undivided Jerusalem" is a term of art - here's Jimmy Carter referencing it as an essential peace plank - it means that both sides will get access to the whole city. Pretty crazy idea, but whatever.
The only part of Jerusalem that needs to remain undivided is the Old City. The idea of Palestinian militia policing Damascus gate is a non-starter however. Whatever creative solution will need to implemented at the conclusion of any peace process, given the threat of violence in the holy sites to derail the whole thing.
Ultimately, Israel will need to cede the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem, which already are cut off from the rest of the city. When I lived there, a couple of Egged lines connected the Old City, downtown East Jerusalem and Hebrew U., but that was it. Otherwise East Jerusalem has its own bus station and totally seperate infrastructure.
Its an act of political kabuki to proclaim the indivisibility of Jerusalem while knowing that it is already divided. We're still waiting for a Palestinian leader, any Palestinian leader to propose a realistic plan on refugee resettlement and compensation. Until then, there is no reason to think that Palestinian maximalist position on the refugees is theater.
"We're still waiting for a Palestinian leader, any Palestinian leader to propose a realistic plan on refugee resettlement and compensation."
How could a Palestinian leader cede such an important point outside the context of a deal securing sovereignty and achieving other important aims while remaining at all credible to his constituents?
"An antidote to the commentary in the left wing appeasement rag Haaretz."
There we have the completely crazed, completely vicious, completely hateful and hate-filled vile beyond any sense SLC. Hi, crazed hate-mongering SLC.
How could a Palestinian leader cede such an important point outside the context of a deal securing sovereignty and achieving other important aims while remaining at all credible to his constituents?
How could an Israeli leader cede the indivisibility of Jerusalem outside the context of a deal securing Israel's security needs?
Let's see - first, by conditioning the division of Jerusalem on a full peace agreement, and second, by having subordinates like Ramon float trial baloons to prepare the Israeli public for what a realistic deal would look like. This works both ways.
When we reach the point where a Palestinian leader can bluntly tell his own people that giving up the pipe dream of settling the refugees in Israel is the price for statehood and ending the occupation and live to tell about it, then we know that peace is attainable.
We can only hope that the diplomatic dance being conducted by Olmert, Abbas and Rice is getting us closer to that point.
"An antidote to the commentary in the left wing appeasement rag Haaretz."
SLC, crazed and vicious beyond all redemption, even in such a time of redemption. What is wrong with you, you vile person?
Even if Haim Ramon had been a woman. she wouldn't have been a Premiere, any more than Hillary Clinton is running for Presidente.
mhp, the cases aren't at all parallel. Israel has a vibrant democracy with a PM elected on a let's-return-most-of-the-WB platform; the Palestinians have a political civil war underway and the elected party has a platform which doesn't recognize the other side.
It'd be nice if there was more speaking-truth-to-unpower on the Palestinian side, but I'm not willing to wait, esp. since the basic final status parameters are clear to everybody.
James Wimberley stirred,
Stared on a post of Yglesias, and heard
How the gods of spelling and grammar cried;
And fought with the invulnerable tide.
(w/apologies to Yeats)
Re jennifer
Hey, save some of that venom for Don Williams and Richard Steven Hack.
An antidote to the commentary in the left wing appeasement rag Haaretz."
There we have the completely crazed, completely vicious, completely hateful and hate-filled vile beyond any sense SLC. Hi, crazed hate-mongering SLC.
What Jennifer said. I don't have any problem with SLC arguing his position on Israel and the Palestinians. But Haaretz is an Israeli newspaper with a large circulation. Presumably, like all large circulation newspapers, it reflects the views of many of its Israeli newpapers.
In other words, Haaretz's popularity is evidence that there are many Israelis who reject SLC's position on the Palestinian issues.
This is important because SLC is quick to imply that people who advocate a more conciliatory position vis-a-vis the Palestinians have anti-semitic leanings. Of course, he can't call Haaretz anti-semitic; so he calls them left-wing appeasers instead.
Look, SLC, why don't you just argue your position without smearing the motives of everyone who disagree with you, who include a significant number of people who are living in the crossfire in Israel and who think a belligerent stance is counterproductive? You'll find that it is a lot easier to have productive discussions on these issues when one side is not accusing everyone who disagrees of bad faith and bigotry.
Well, at least it's finally clarified that this is not about being pro- versus anti-Israel.
According to the resident nut squad, if you're Israeli and Jewish and you rage in your pages every single day that Israel must stop the Qassams and must defend the North, you're still an "appeasement rag".
So, according to the hard-core nut squad, it's not enough to be Israeli, to be Jewish, and to live in Israel.
The only thing which counts is if you're 100% committed to lunatic right wing war hawkery, then, and only then, does your opinion count.
The real, the only real legitimate view is for the extreme right wingers of Israel and any cheap promoter of idiotic hawkish policies outside Israel.
F*** off, loser.
I don't understand why SLC seems so emotionally invested in the Israel/Palestine issue, when by his/her own admission s/he has never visited there. Seriously, I'm curious!
Not that it's particularly hard to get to Clinton's left on Palestine-Israel matters.
"Not that it's particularly hard to get to Clinton's left on Palestine-Israel matters."
On this issue, you just have to be left of Carter and advocate for a wall dividing the quarters.
Re El Cid
Any newspaper that prints articles by Amira Hess is an appeasement rag.
Re nbt
I have not visited Israel because I don't like the people who live there.
Independent Palestine, what's that?
Oh, Hamas palestine, al_asqua martyrs brigade palestine
That's right, give them part of Jersalem
IT IS YOM KIPPUR, PERHAPS HAIM RAMON CAN REPENT
Re El CidAny newspaper that prints articles by Amira Hess is an appeasement rag.
Posted by SLC
No one gives the slightest sh*t what you think of Amira Hass (not the poet Hess) nor of Ha'aretz nor of the free Israeli media nor of Israel in general.
By the way, here's an interesting recent article by Hass, who's a real journalist on the ground in the Occupied Territories, in a real newspaper, which doesn't just regurgitate right wing state propaganda on command all the time.
It depends who is doing the torturing by Amira Hass
"But look what Hamas is doing in Gaza." That is the standard response in the West Bank to reports about the offensive being waged by the Palestinian Authority (PA) against Hamas activists. And from Hamas men in Gaza one can still hear that the beating of detainees and the forcible repression of demonstrations and meetings are the result of errors of some individuals, not orders from above, despite the fact that the "errors" are continuing. "The error of individual, in contradiction to policy" is how a senior official in a PA security force characterized, in speaking to Haaretz, reports of the torture of Hamas detainees.Information cannot be obtained through torture, the official said. According to him, Palestinian intelligence has succeeded, in the last few months, in uncovering - without torture - many details about the activities of the illegal Hamas Executive Force in the West bank and about plans to attack PA officials. In the wake of the organization's takeover in the Gaza Strip, the denials by Hamas are unconvincing. Hamas is known for its ability to compartmentalize its military plans and those behind them. But just as in the wave of arrests in 1996, the PA is attacking where the streetlight shines, namely civilian activists. In these mirror images, one large difference stands out: the acts of repression by Hamas in Gaza and the violation of basic civil rights there are given relatively wide media coverage in Israel and abroad. Similar actions by the PA in the West Bank, however, are hushed up.
According to the findings of Palestinian human rights organizations, hundreds of Hamas activists have been arrested, and are still being arrested, in blatant violation of Palestinian law, and by some security forces who do not have the authority to make arrests. Reports from Nablus speak of security personnel who are waiting, with the advent of Ramadan, outside the mosques in order to arrest Hamas activists after evening prayers. Disturbing testimony is piling up that speaks of the severe torture of some detainees - a few of whom required hospitalization. Revenge and intimidation are the name of the game. Some of those released testified that they had been forced to sign a promise to keep completely silent about their experiences during their detention. The arrests are part of a whole complex of offensive tactics: shootings of Hamas activists; attacks, including arson, on Hamas offices; threats to Hamas representatives on local councils, to journalists and members of parliament; and infringement of freedom of the press (including blocking the distribution in the West Bank of the two Hamas newspapers).
Most of these claims have not been checked, nor have they been reported except in the Hamas media. They have not received the same public relations in Israel and abroad as have similar actions by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.The reason for this oversight is basically political. The negating of freedom, arrests and intimidations fit the definition of Hamas as an Islamic terror organization, but not the respectable, Western, appearance of the Ramallah leadership under PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayad. According to the current Israeli and American interpretation, Abbas and Fayad are capable of reaching a "compromise" (more correctly, a surrender) with Israel. That is to say, an arrangement of a state of enclaves, intersected by settlements (or, alternatively, "a state with temporary borders"). In order to promote this impression, the Abbas-Fayad leadership must be presented as deriving its legitimacy from authentic Palestinian frameworks - either the Basic Law of the PA or the historical legitimacy of the Palestine Liberation Organization, which today is completely devoid of any content as a liberation movement.
In reality, however, the legitimacy of the PA leadership stems from its compliance with the U.S. standard for an acceptable Arab regime. Ignoring the PA's campaigns of repression is a repetition of past mistakes. It means a denial of the fact that Hamas has won its popularity not because of its religious-political vision, and that the dual reason for its victory at the polls has not disappeared: The PLO failed in the negotiations to achieve political independence; at the same time, its internal administration is tainted by a lack of caring for its people and by seeing mainly to the interests of a limited stratum of society. This stratum owes its comfortable status to the adherence to a tactic of failed negotiations with Israel, over a non-solution.
Am I supposed to be disturbed by the beating or "torture" of Hamas members?
They should simply be shot whenever one has a clear shot, as should al-quaidi and the like. There is no compromise with a scorpion
Am I supposed to be disturbed by the beating or "torture" of Hamas members?
No one knows why you are disturbed.
Possibly your disturbance precedes the rise and possibly even the existence of Hamas. Consult your therapist for further information.
Here's an interesting message from Gush Shalom.
Not yet enough hell in Gaza? 19/09/07
The starving of the Gaza inhabitants is a crime and a folly. Mistreating a million and a half people will make them the most bitter of enemies. Instead of a cruel policy of naked force, we should negotiate with all Palestinians – including Hamas.“With our own hands we are uniting a million and half people against us, in bitterness and hatred" says Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc). “The inhabitants of the Gaza Strip are completely dependent on Israel for their most basic livelihood. This complete dependence was created, consciously and deliberately, by all governments of Israel since 1967. The state of Israel cannot now just shrug off its responsibility for the fate of the inhabitants of Gaza. The people of the Gaza Strip have already been living for a long time in terrible squalor, on the very edge of starvation. Now we push them even much deeper into hell. The state of Israel is today roughly trampling International Law, in indiscriminate collective punishments of a whole civilian population. We, too, will eventually pay the price.
This policy of force and oppression is also emptying of content the negotiations supposedly taking place with Abu Mazen and the leadership he heads, presenting him and his followers as accomplices in the terrible suffering caused to their people. There can be no peace without talking to and negotiating with the entire Palestinian people, with all its parts including the Hamas leadership, which has explicitly expressed its willingness to discuss a cease-fire and a mutual end to attacks on both sides of the Gaza border. This is the alternative to the policy of trampling force whose main proponent is Defence Minister Barak, formally leader of the Labour Party - effectively leader of the Extreme Right in Israel”.
Starving Gaza?
I thought you apologists for Hamas (or are you actually a Hamas?) are proclaiming that corruption has disappeared and now "aid" money is getting through to The People
How can Gaza be starving? Surely not with all the Irani,and other islamofascist money pouring in
If Israelis listened to you they might as well just shoot themselves and their childern in the head and get it over with
Israel is Case 1 of what the islamists have in mind for all of us, including the fools in Washington DC
Re El Cid
Mr. El Cid is basically complaining that the Israeli authorities are being beastly towards the Palestinians. It seems to me that the Palestinians are being beastly toward Israelis, what with multiple Quassem attacks every day and attempted homicide bombings. When the Palestinians sow the wind, they may expect to reap the whirlwind.
Re. SLC
Mr. El Cid is basically complaining that the Israeli authorities are being beastly towards the Palestinians. It seems to me that the Palestinians are being beastly toward Israelis, what with multiple Quassem attacks every day and attempted homicide bombings. When the Palestinians sow the wind, they may expect to reap the whirlwind.
Actually, moron, I've made no particular arguments about the situation of the Palestinians on this page. But since you and your nitwit friends are dumb as boxes of rocks, it was easy to simply keep posting articles from the Israeli sources which seem to activate your public derangement.
Of course, Mr. Macho Tough Guy Savior of Israel, you'll note that on this particular blog page, I've argued only the obvious, that no one cares about your ludicrous statements about which Israeli news sources you trust.
Instead I've simply quoted articles by or quoting Israeli Jews on the situation which was brought up in the original post.
So take your act back to your bed where you can relive your fantasies of those tough Israeli army guys whispering into your ears about how harsh they were on those bad ol' Palestinians.
It'd be nice if there was more speaking-truth-to-unpower on the Palestinian side, but I'm not willing to wait, esp. since the basic final status parameters are clear to everybody.
Define "everybody." It certainly doesn't include the current government of the Gaza strip or the settler who just parked a trailer on a hillside outside Shilo.
The Palestinians are too weak behave rationally argument is ultimately self-defeating. I'm not sure why progressives have convinced themselves that treating Palestinians as moral infants is a path to peace.
But to be generous, let's expand the field. How about an Arab leader..let's say the King of the richest and most influential country in the Arab world..speak the hard truth that peace requires the Palestinian refugees and their descendants to be permanently settled outside of Israel.
Comments closed October 05, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
I think you meant "Israeli vice premiere and *well-known anti-semite* Haim Ramon."
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | September 21, 2007 10:23 AM