The Observer, November 30, 2007
Volume XL, Issue 12
Unpopular Reason: Peace conference will endanger Israel
A lot is riding on the upcoming peace conference in Annapolis – for one thing, the very existence of the state of Israel. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in defiance of the will of Israel's legislature, the Knesset, and much of the nation's population, has opted to go forth as planned and partake in this suicidal sham of a summit being put together by President Bush. In what seems like a half-baked effort to garner greater support for America within the Muslim world, the United States government is now pressuring one of its most loyal allies to continue pursuing a course that history has shown cannot work.
The two primary political parties of the Palestinian inhabitants of the Israeli West Bank and Gaza are Hamas and Fatah. A quick reading of their two charters leaves it crystal clear that they are opposed to any Jewish presence in the region, and seek to completely destroy all things Israeli. Both function primarily as militant organizations, and each is responsible for several terrorist attacks that killed innocent women and children. Negotiations, as Hamas' own charter says, can be used only as a temporary means of lulling the enemy into a false sense of security before wiping them out. And as far as they are concerned, every Israeli – man, woman, or child – falls into the enemy category.
The fact is, Israel has bent over backward to accommodate the terrorists that threaten its very existence. Not once in its history has Israel been the military aggressor. Rather, it has always sought peace, even at great cost to itself as measured in land and economic loss. For a decade and a half, every leader of Israel has worked to create a Palestinian state. It started with Oslo and continued onward. Even as Arafat and his embezzling cohorts failed to live up to their end of the agreement, the leadership of Israel let them off the hook, and kept coming back to the table. Eventually, the Palestinians were offered essentially all of Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem by then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak. But they rejected it, because the goal of the Palestinian Authority is not Palestinian statehood, but the destruction of Israel.
And this desire to spill civilian blood continues to this day. With the Gaza withdrawal, an action that expelled Jews from their homes so that land could be turned over to an uncooperative, terrorist-supporting government, a great gesture was made, and a foundation was laid for peace. How was this act of kindness and good faith returned? Hamas and other terrorist groups have since used Gaza to smuggle in weapons from Egypt, and began rocketing Israeli towns on a regular basis. The attacks are nowhere close to suicide bombings in terms of effectiveness, but they are easier to pull off, and
are thus a part of daily life in Israel. Inhabitants of the city of Sderot risk being blown up as they sleep or sit down to breakfast. In other words, when given autonomy and the chance to prove their worthiness for statehood, the Palestinians did nothing other than utilize their increased power to elevate the level of violence and terror.
What good comes from giving terrorists more land? Appeasing terrorists has yet to work, as modern Israeli history shows quite clearly. Yet the whole purpose of Annapolis is to pressure Israel, once and for all, into conceding to every last demand of the Palestinian Authority, without consideration for the logic behind doing so. Meeting the unreasonable requests of bloodthirsty butchers would be Israel's deadliest error. The
sheer fact that Olmert insists on participating in the summit sends up a red flag. And if he does walk away from the table with an agreement, there is no doubt that Israel will be less secure, and at greater risk of genocidal obliteration than ever before.
Caleb Posner is a freshman political science major.
