War, Peace and Secret Polls
By URI AVNERY
CounterPunch
".......ANYWAY, in order to accommodate President Bush's request, Olmert is now ready to cooperate with Abbas in writing something like a "framework agreement" that will lay down the principles of an agreement that may be achieved later on - but without details or a time-table.
According to the leaks, the agreement will repeat more or less Ehud Barak's proposals at Camp David, including some of the bizarre ones, such as Israeli sovereignty "beneath" the Temple Mount. The Palestinian state will have "temporary" borders, with the "permanent" borders to be fixed some time in the future. Olmert demands that the Separation Wall will serve as the "temporary" border. This, by the way, confirms what we have been saying from the very first moment, and what was violently denied even before the Supreme Court: that the path of the Wall does not reflect security considerations, but was designed to annex 8% of the West Bank to Israel. In this area, the "settlement blocs" were set up, those that President Bush has generously promised to attach to Israel.
The whole exercise is very dangerous for the Palestinians. True, if such a document is indeed completed, it will officially fix the minimum that the Israeli government is ready to give, but it can be interpreted as setting down the maximum that the Palestinians will be allowed to demand. In political life, not much is more permanent than the "temporary".
It is also dangerous for the Israelis. It may encourage the illusion that such a "solution" would put an end to the conflict. In fact, no Palestinian will see this as a real solution, and the conflict will go on......"
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