Quote:
Originally Posted by aceventura3
I would like to see how people posting here answer:
Does Israel have a right to exist?
My answer is - yes.
My gut tells me that there is nothing Israel could do, nothing they could concede, nothing they could compromise would be good enough. I would love to see evidence or something that would contradict my gut feeling.
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Ace - though I think the question is usually a red herring, my answer is yes, Israel has a right to exist.
But I have to disagree in the strongest terms with your gut feeling about the amenability of Palestinians to compromise.
Exhibit A is the excellent work of OneVoice, an Israeli/Palestinian/International organization that aims to dispel myths on both sides that the other side's population is 'not a partner for peace'.
OneVoice has conducted extensive grassroots work and hammered out a set of proposals (starting from the Clinton Parameters of 2000) that have 74% support among Palestinians and 78% support among Israelis. This is not just a simple "do you support a two-state solution?" poll, but a concrete set of ideas about what should happen with respect to Jerusalem, refugees, borders, etc. There are a lot of thorny issues, but the idea that there is no plausible middle ground acceptable to both populations is patently false.
OneVoice - Programs: Public Polling Results
Exhibit B is the current prime minister, Salam Fayyad.
Op-Ed Columnist - Fayyad's Road to Palestine - NYTimes.com
Quote:
Fayyad, 58, is a small, precise, U.S.-educated man with a very ordered mind. He builds long, intricate sentences with an academic bent and is given to words like “axiomatic” or “purview.” For almost a decade his home was the World Bank; he’s hardly a political firebrand. Armed struggle has never been his thing. But right now he is a man with a mission.
That mission is a two-year program, begun last August, to ready Palestine for statehood by the second half of 2011. It represents a break with past Palestinian failure in that it espouses nonviolence — “an ironclad commitment, not a seasonal thing,” he said — and is focused on prosaic stuff like building institutions (police, schools, a justice system, roads and an economy) rather than exalted proclamations.
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Unknown to most casual observers, there is a quiet revolution going on in the West Bank right now. GDP growth is in double-digits and there is a real chance - maybe the last chance - to transform the West Bank into a viable economic entity. But the life-shattering blockade of Gaza poses a long-term threat both to Israeli security and to the future of a Palestinian state - this aside from the sheer human cost.