Report: PA leaders discuss unilateral establishment of state

[Gimel]

The Palestinian leadership has discussed the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state unilaterally, Israel Radio reported on Saturday.

According to the radio, the issue was discussed in a meeting Friday held in Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat's Ramallah headquarters and attended by members of the PLO executive committee and the Fatah leadership.

"The Palestinians have a right to establish a democratic state in all the territories conquered in 1967, and Jerusalem would be the capital of this state," the radio quoted the Palestinian leadership as saying in a statement released Friday. The PA also blamed Israel for failing to implement the internationally-brokered road map for peace, the radio said.

An adviser to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Friday dismissed statements by Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia that raised the possibility of a single Arab-Jewish state in Israel and the Palestinian territories, in the event that no progress is made by the two sides.

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/381076.html

The only real thing to do is to make progress in the months that remain.

Edited to add a space after "real".

[Jack Rabbit]

1. The overall situation is not a good one

A unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state may not be an entirely bad thing for Israel. Such a state would be recognized and give Israel an entity with which to negotiate for the end of the occupation.

Beyond that, one may wonder whether Arafat's definition of democracy is simply a kleptocracy in which he controls the payola.

More importantly, is Arafat's unilaterally declared state going to give the Israelis what is most important to them? That would be security, meaning an end to terrorist attacks by Palestinian militias.

Otherwise, Arafat isn't the only one threatening unilateral action. Sharon has announced his own ideas. Will he be any more willing to talk to the Palestinians after they declare a state than he has been all these years that they haven't declared one? Or will he continue to be loathe to treat them as equals and impose some solution by force that does not need to be negotiated?

And then there's the militants. They, too, have a nasty habit of taking unilateral action whenever they feel their political position threatened by reasonable people trying to solve the conflict.

[forgethell]

2. It's not a bad idea,

but if Israel would withdraw from the conqured territory just because the Palestinians said they had jurisdiction, or declared a state, it would already have happened. The Arabs have no power, and will just continue to suffer until they are willing to make peace on terms that recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. At least, that is how I read the situation

[Jack Rabbit]

3. That goes without saying

No matter how unjust one believes the occupation to be, all agree that it should take more than Arafat remembering to say "please" to get the Israelis to withdraw. Everybody knows and expects that. Obviously, the Palestinians must recognize Israel and sign a non-aggression pact that includes penalties to be leveled by the government of Palestine against private parties who wage war against Israel. The Palestinians should understand that failure to live up to any agreement could be construed as an act of war.

Nevertheless, if they were to unilaterally declare a state, at least it would put an end to this haggling about when they're going to get one. They are a nation and don't need to ask anybody permission to be one. For the Israelis, it says that this is the government of Palestine and this is who negotiates in the name of the Palestinian people.

Perhaps it would be unprecedented that a state is born in order to negotiate the end of a military occupation on its land. However, both sides need to have that occupation end.

[Muddleoftheroad]

4. They DO need permission

Otherwise their state will be an aborted attempt and that will make things even worse.

[Gimel]

5. Israeli withdrawal

With Israeli troop withdrawal from the territories, something that has been initiated, a vacuum must be filled by the PA so that Hamas and IJ don't fill it. Social services have to be provided by the PA, not Hamas. Jobs have to be created, and infrastructure built. Otherwise, the new state will again collapse.

The quasi-state becoming a state in name is forgone conclusion, but to call Jerusalem the capital is like France calling Geneva it's capital. That has to be negotiated. The security fence encircles a good deal of Jerusalem, and the PA has no official building, not even the Orient House, apparently, operating in Jerusalem.

[forgethell]

6. They don't need permission to be a nation, no, but

they need permission to be a state, a totally different proposition. The Israelis do not feel any need to commit national suicide themselves. The Palestinians are Arabs, and all these problems counl have been solved long ago if their "brother" Arabs had been willing to help them instead on exploit them.

On this site we often talk about how * and the repukes exploit the simple-minded white, southern, fundie male. But nobody, even in this administration, has been as exploited by those he should be able to trust and depend on as has the poor Palestinian.