Sharon's New Offer: A Compromise, a Threat or Both?

[Gimel]

JERUSALEM, Dec. 19 The cottage industry that is Ariel Sharon-watching in Israel and elsewhere was very busy on Friday parsing Mr. Sharon's instantly famous speech of Thursday night and trying to answer the basic question: was Mr. Sharon's declaration an offer, a sort of olive branch, or was it a threat?

The speech had two essential elements. One was a pledge to work hard to carry out the American-supported peace plan known as the road map, which if successful would lead to a Palestinian state by 2005.

That much was not new for Mr. Sharon, who has pledged himself to the peace plan, with reservations, in the past, but it was a reassuring affirmation at a time when peace negotiations had been stalled for several months.

What was new, and subject to different interpretations, was his second point. If there is no progress toward a negotiated peace in the next few months, Mr. Sharon said, Israel will move unilaterally to separate the Jewish and Arab populations in the West Bank and, as he put it, reduce "friction" between them.

The speech, which aroused intense interest in Israel, certainly seems to portend something new in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It came at a time of an almost palpable desire among Israelis for some new direction, and widespread criticism that the old formulas were not working.

So from that point of view, Mr. Sharon's ....
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/20/international/middleeast/20ASSE.html
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Most interesting analysis yet. More in depth and perceptive.

[Resistance]

1. Is he going to stop murdering civilians and peace activists?

[Martin Eden]

2. It's a poltical manuever, and a retrenchment

Removing a few exposed settlements is a smart political move in the international arena. It makes it look like he's implementing the road map and working for peace, while he's only giving up a small fraction of the settlements -- ones that were difficult to defend.

This provides cover for the unilaterally-imposed boundaries he alluded to -- boundaries that cross the '67 green line -- and that would not likely be agreed to in negotiations with the Palestians.

I've always believed that Ariel Sharon never wanted a Palestian state, that his long-term goal was a Greater Israel, and that he agreed to the Road Map out of political necessity with the realization that it would never be implemented.

Just look at the howls of protest over the removal of a few isolated settlements. I cannot imagine Sharon would ever voluntarily remove all settlements from the West Bank and Gaza -- he is a chief architect of the settlements.

This latest move, in my opinion, is Sharon doing in the short term what he thinks is necessary to achieve his long term goals. He's retrenching amid the current political and logistical realities, but I sincerely doubt he's laying the groundwork for a Palestinian state, especially one that would be currently acceptable to the Palestinians.

He may be acknowledging the reality that a separation is necessary and that the Palestinians will have authority on the other side of the fence, but I think another reality is there will not be peace with the boundaries he draws. Peace, ultimately, rests with the establishment of recognized and accepted boundaries, and I don't believe Sharon and the other proponents of a Greater Israel will, in the long term, limit Israel to any boundary that cedes so much of the Promised Land. They would rather sacrifice peace, and endure the Intifada, then give up their dream.