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Maybe Negotiating Isn't Such A Good Idea?

© lawhawk

Well, it would appear as though the Israelis and Palestinian governments have decided that the peace process is not worth pursuing. Each side has accused the other of being so unwilling to negotiate that they have made the negotiating climate totally incompatible to reaching any kind of agreement. Politics requires parties to make concessions in order to maintain or acquire power, yet it would appear as though the Israelis and Palestinians are both resorting to such extreme positions that they make any kind of concession appear to their constituents as though it was the end of the world.

The Israeli leadership, especially Prime Minister Netenyahu, has done an extremely poor job of looking at the long term solution to the peace process and has settled on a strategy of making extreme demands on the short term that the Palestinians will find completely unacceptable. This makes the Palestinians react to Israeli demands in the only way they know how; resorting to violence. Thus Israeli concerns are borne out when Israeli citizens are attacked by terrorists in an attempt to push Israel towards completely abandoning the peace process altogether.

Prime Minister Netenyahu continues to assert that Israel has the right to expand existing settlements on the West Bank, something that the right-wing Israeli settlers wholeheartedly agree with but completely opposed to by the Palestinians. The US has now made it clear that the Israel should stop continued work on the settlements in the West Bank or there will be serious curtailments on funding commitments. This adds to the growing discontent of other countries against Israel as the leaders of the Czech Republic and France have spoken out against the current Israeli policy.

What should Israel do considering that their leadership believes that the West Bank was properly taken as part of the Six Day War and that they have a right as a sovereign power to do with the land as they see fit? The Israelis continue to believe that they have these rights under international law although the Arab World, Western countries and even the United States believe that Israel's claims to the West Bank are rather tenuous at best. Israel needs to put forth a good faith bid to improve relationships with the Palestinians, beyond just suggesting that the peace process will continue if the Palestinian Authority cracks down on terrorism. Israel needs to give a meaningful concession to the Palestinian Authority such that the Palestinian Authority is able to make concessions and agree to terms that are acceptable to their people. However, any concession is sure to make right-wing Israelis very unhappy and could take matters into their own hands, not to mention potentially pull out of the Likud government forcing Netenyahu's hand.

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