Bush's Mideast Plan Full of Doubtful Points: Commentary

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, July 05, 2002

Bush's Mideast Plan Full of Doubtful Points: Commentary

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Under the expectations and concern of the international community and various parties of the Middle East, and at the critical moment when conflicts between Palestine and Israel are becoming increasingly fierce, the Mid-East peace plan of the Bush administration was finally published on June 24.

Although the United States has tried its utmost to hawk this ware, the plan has only won the acclamation of the Israeli authorities, while censures from Palestine and the Arab countries have arisen in swarms, even the Western allies of the United States have expressed their suspicion about and mistrust in the feasibility of the plan.

US Mid-East peace plan involves three sides: Palestine, Israel and Arab countries and raises demand and conditions on the three sides respectively. Worthy of noting is that the main points of the plan suggest for the first time establishment of a Palestine state three years later and propose that in line with the UN resolutions Nos. 242 and 338, Israel withdraw its troops to the international boundary existing before the 1967 war.

Superficially, the US peace plan and the "land-for-peace" principle are identical, but the prerequisites for the two key links-the establishment of a Palestine state and Israel's withdrawal of troops-are entirely different. And there is no synchronous timetable for the closely related two.

As regards other main points of Mid-East peace, the plan does not express its clear-cut intention in regard to the major issues such as: How should the United States perform its responsibility as a mediator, when should Israel carry out its phased troops pull-out and how to determine the final status of East Jerusalem. Public opinion of the Mid-East region generally holds that the US Mid-East peace plan is a plan "hardly practicable and disappointing".

On the Palestine issue, the plan set up many harsh terms on the establishment of a Palestine state, including a complete halt to violence activities by the Palestinian side, the election within the year, reform of the leading body and establishment of an interim state after half a year.

The United State even flagrantly tries to get rid of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, demanding the Palestinian side to "elect a new leader". US act of gross interference in internal affairs has met with the resistance from Palestine and the Arab countries, many European countries also advocate that the leader of Palestine should be selected by the Palestinian people themselves. The plan also demands that the Palestine National Authority (PNA) must carry out reform, but to what extent can reform satisfy the United States and Israel?

On the other hand, the plan also sets a variety of demands on the Arab countries, which include: eradication of the base of terrorist organizations, obstruction of assistance to terrorist organizations and establishment of close relations with Israel, it also calls by name those countries which support such organizations. No wonder local media hold that from Palestine-Israel conflicts and the US plan it can be seen that "America has said what Israel wants to say, and Israel has done what America wants to do".

Compared to US demands on Palestine and the Arab countries, Israel almost has no peace obligation to speak of, which it "must" perform. The United States only expresses the "hope" that Israel would agree to pull out its troops.

As regards the major issues, such as when Israel should withdraw from Palestinian territory including East Jerusalem, and how many Palestinian refugees are allowed to return to their homeland, they are just like "chaotic accounts", because they are not clearly defined in the US plan. It must be pointed out that the Palestine issue and the crux of Palestine-Israel conflicts lie in Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory.

After the "September 11" incident, a series of new evolutions took place in the Mid-East situation. The United States supports Israel energetically playing the "counter-terror card", its act of shelving "land-for-peace", one-sided stress on "security-for-peace", "power-for-peace" and "counter-terror-for-peace".

On the strength of America's persistent bias toward it, Israel is the only country in the world, which refuses to implement dozens of UN resolutions but is free from any sanctions. In this sense, due to the rife of US unilateralism and the "marginalization" of the UN role, the Mid-East peace process is going farther and farther down the wrong path. .

In order to avoid the overturn of the Mid-East peace process, it is necessary to stabilize the two pivotal points: one is the hope of the Palestinian people, the other is the security of Israel; the sole foundation of these two pivotal points is Israel's return of the occupied lands and restoration of Palestinian people's legal rights to independence, self-determination and establishment of their state.

At present, the serious situation of crisis in the Middle East calls for fair mediation and just peace. However, US Mid-East peace plan of world concern has brought up the old question: why does the United States invariably fails to solve the Mid-East issue impartially, or figuratively speaking, why can't it "hold the bowl of water level"?

By People's Daily Online

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