Sharon's Phony War

[Saudade]

Sharon's Phony War
By Henry Siegman

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/16831

In recent weeks, cracks have appeared in a three-year-old Israeli consensus that there is no Palestinian partner for a peace process, that the Palestinians' real goal is the liquidation of Israel, and that to negotiate with Palestinians before terrorism is ended is to "reward terrorism."

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The inescapable answer to this question is that the war that Sharon is waging is not aimed at the defeat of Palestinian terrorism but at the defeat of the Palestinian people and their aspirations for national self-determination. In this war, Palestinian terrorism has been not an enemy but an indispensable ally, providing Sharon with the pretext that has enabled him to proceed relentlessly with the implantation of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. Over the years, Sharon has made no secret of his conviction that these settlements must be built so extensively as to create facts on the ground that no future Israeli government will be able to undo. Sharon's assurances that he is committed to the launching of a peace process once Palestinian terrorism is vanquished is a lie intended to gain time for securing the irreversibility of the settlement enterprise.

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Sharon and those closest to him have often expressed their surprise over how easy it has been, in the name of fighting terrorism, to "push the envelope" of what the international community finds acceptable Israeli behavior. During Israel's last presidential election, Sharon's son Omri explained to a group of Likud faithful how cleverly his father has handled the US and other nations:

"Today...we are located in the Palestinian areas, we are violating international agreements, and no one is saying anything. So we talk Palestinian state, Palestinian state, but in the meantime not even Area A exists any longer.<*> And there is no Orient House, no Palestinian representation in Jerusalem, and Palestinians are afraid to walk around with weapons in their own cities. Obviously we all want peace, who doesn't want peace. But statement about a Palestinian state is a very remote statement."

What Omri Sharon was describing is an incremental approach by which his father has managed to obtain US acquiescence in Israel's gradual obliteration of Palestinian self-government in the Occupied Territories, and even in targeted assassinations. At first these assassinations were supposedly limited to "ticking bombs," but they were gradually extended to political leaders of Hamas and Jihad as well. They inevitably and consistently kill large numbers of Palestinian civilians.


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Comment: The phony "war on terrorism" is the unraveling veil behind which an old-fashioned colonialist war for territory is being pursued. The current American "war on terrorism" utilizes the same model with slight variations.