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Some Israeli Labour opposition politicians and a number
of former Palestinian ministers have published a new “peace plan”, the fruit
of over two years of secret negotiations sponsored by the Swiss government
and released in draft form this week.
This plan provides for an Israeli withdrawal from most of the West Bank
and the Gaza Strip that would comprise the territory of a new Palestinian
state. Israel would retain key positions around Jerusalem in exchange for
some land in the Negev desert. The Palestinians would give up the refugees’
right of return but a small number would be allowed home while others would
receive financial compensation.
Why this should have taken two and a half years to draft is puzzling. It
all looks suspiciously like the “Barak Plan” that the last Israeli Labour
government tabled at the Camp David talks with President Arafat and Bill Clinton
in 2000, apart from a minor further concession to put Jerusalem’s Haram al
Sharif shrine under Palestinian administration.
The Barak plan fell because it did not address the problem of the Palestinian
refugees. This one, dubbed the “Geneva Accord”, is likely to fare no better,
though some say it has the blessing of President Arafat himself. Except, of
course, that this plan has no official standing in Israel and it has already
been dismissed out of hand by General Sharon’s ruling Likud coalition in Tel
Aviv.
Though it may provide a focus for Israel’s Labour Party in its campaign
against the disastrous policies of the Sharon administration it still shows
how little they are prepared to go on the central issue of the Palestinian
refugees – in fact little more than what was proposed in the 1950s when Israel
offered to accept the return of 100,000 refugees on the basis of re-uniting
families in exchange for a peace treaty.
The American “road map” was a plan without a map that offered the Palestinians
nothing. This one has a map but lacks a plan to deal with the fundamental
demand of the Palestinian people.