Posted on 06/10/2002 1:36:36 PM PDT by kezekiel
resident Bush will try to persuade Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon today that a return to 1967 borders is a starting point for resuming peace talks, officials said.
After weekend meetings with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and top U.S. aides just back from the Mideast, Bush's White House sitdown with Sharon is a last hurdle to creating a U.S. peace plan.
"He [Bush] won't draw a map and we're not going to start proposing borders. ... The 1967 borders are seen more as a beginning," said a U.S. official familiar with the plan.
'Committed to Peace'
Bush has embraced a Saudi peace proposal that uses the 1967 borders as the framework for reaching a settlement. Sharon opposes the idea and has said talks can't start until Palestinian violence ends. "Israel will not return to the vulnerable 1967 armistice lines," Sharon wrote in an Op-Ed piece in yesterday's New York Times.
Bush might have a trump card to play in the form of taking off the table a demand that millions of Palestinians forced from their homes by the creation of Israel be granted the right of return.
"Everything is on the table," the official told the Daily News.
Sharon, for his part, will try to dissuade Bush from speeding up the peace process by proposing his own plan.
But Bush is firm on creating a U.S. plan — and has said he plans to give a speech to the American people in the coming weeks to try to sell the idea.
"I've never seen the President more committed to peace," the top official said after Bush met with Mubarak.
While pushing his plan, Bush said over the weekend the time is not right to set a deadline for creating a Palestinian state.
Bush's carefully worded statement left open the possibility of setting that date down the road — and the possibility that Israel still might have to deal with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Another hot-button issue on the table is the question of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
World's 'Stability' at Stake
Mubarak told "Fox News Sunday" the settlements are a "time bomb" under efforts to settle the Middle East conflict. Sharon has said he will not dismantle any settlements.
Arafat also pressed yesterday for the removal of Jewish settlements in Gaza and the West Bank.
If not, he said in a speech, there will be "a disastrous explosion that will impact the stability of the whole world."
Palestinian terrorists have targeted Jewish settlers for attack throughout the 20-month-old Palestinian uprising.
Three Israelis, including a pregnant woman and her husband, were killed in an attack on a West Bank settlement Saturday.
Of course, there could have been a "Palestinian" state in 1948. The UN plan called for two states in "Palestine", one Jewish, the other Arab. The Jews said, "Fine by us." The Arabs said, "Um, no, we'd rather exterminate all the Jews in 'Palestine.'"
Guess what, towel-heads: Sucks to be you.
Those borders were between Israel and Jordan. Jordan didn't give the Palis a state on the West Bank, so why should Israel?
And I hope Sharon was gracious enough not to laugh in the President's face when he brought up the 1967 borders. That'd mean it'd be quite easy to slice Israel in half when the Palies and their pals attack Israel once again.
To which W should reply: "about that aid money, go ...yourself"
Unless Israel wants to be majority Arab/Palestinian in another 15-20 years, they have to abandon the West Bank and Gaza. That leaves the Golan Heights, Jerusalem, and the settlements as the sticking points. The settlements will be untenable in a Palestinian state, so we're really down to Golan and Jerusalem.
Aside from mass expulsions of the Palestinians from the West Bank, there's no other way out. I am as strong a supporter of Israel as anyone, but I don't see a way to beat the demographics.
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