Tipping Point? Palestinians and the Search for a New Strategy

[Rex Brynen]

Whatever benefits derived from a complete withdrawl and independence would not off set the international contributions.

You may not think so, but the Palestinians certainly do, as do the IFIs. I've seen the PA's internal economic projections and planning, post-(hypothetical) agreement. Have you?

Yes, Israel anticipated what would happen because they know who they are dealing with. All or nothing is not a bargaining tactic, its an intimidation tactic. Again, there is NOTHING that Israel could offer that the arabs won't claim, "It isn't enough JIHAD!" Gaza proved that.

Gaza proved if you withdraw from part of an occupied territory while continue to occupy and settle the rest of it, some of the locals don't suddenly come to like you. Big surprise there!

As I said before, and having worked on planning for disengagement with both the Israelis and Palestinians, they did not plan on the withdrawal ending periodic rocket fire, and undertook it for quite different strategic reasons.

As for "the Arabs," it is about as useful referring to them generically, as if they all had the same views and interests, as it is talking about "the Jews."

Even without the money, Israel would have given the Sinai up.

Yes, this was my point. And even without money, Egypt would have accepted it. After all, they had dangled the same offer as early 1972, but weren't taken seriously until after the 1973 War.

A true palistinian state would be a huge threat to the Hashemites.

This claim drives the Hashemite security establishment crazy--it really does. I've seen senior GID officials, foreign ministry officials, and even Jordanian prime ministers go on at length about why is it that others have the temerity to describe to them what their security interests are, what it is Jordan "really" wants. The speed with which King Abdullah shut down talk of Palestinian non-statehood under Jordanian or Jordanian-Israeli custodianship last year highlights how frustrated they are that this thing gets floated from time to time.

I missed the Israeli embassy my last trip to Amman.

It's on Maysaloun Street.

Arafat's wealth was pretty well established and his wife lived quite well in Paris.

Yes, his wife received payments (largely to get her out of the way), but no, the funds weren't generally diverted to private Arafat accounts for private Arafat personal reasons. Don't get me wrong, I'm not an Arafat fan--indeed, I was writing about corruption and patronage in the PLO in the late 1980s, long, long before most others. However, what happened to Arafat's money is fairly well established (used for political patronage and security force expenditures), as is how it was diverted to him (it wasn't foreign aid money, but rather Israeli excise tax collections). Moreover, the vast bulk of it was recovered and put into the PIF (http://www.pif.ps).

Their only quasi friend is the United States, coincidently the only remaining country with any sizable jewish population.
Canada's feelings on the subject can be amply summed up from WWII. None would be too many.

I'm not quite sure how Canada slipped in here, unless it is some sort of guilt-by-citizenship thing. (I could debate how friendly current Canadian government policy is to the current Israeli government, but it really doesn't have anything to do with anything).

I'm starting to think Wilf's policy of generally avoiding comment on the Arab-Israeli conflict is the smart one