It's now time for the West to recognise Palestinian statehood

[Violet_Crumble]

Malcolm Fraser
October 4, 2011
OPINION
The current negative approach is damaging and can't be justified.

The arguments against recognition of a Palestinian state seem to rest on the simple proposition that agreement must be reached through negotiation and that a resolution granting statehood would set that process back.

If that argument was valid it would have been true in 1948 when the United Nations recognised Israel as an independent state. People should then have argued the Israelis must negotiate with the Palestinians, the people who were being pushed out, and once they had come to an agreement, we could recognise Israel.

If the argument is so thin, why are some Western powers so strongly against recognition of a Palestinian state? I suggest it is because of the lock that Israel has over the policies of too many Western countries. There is an Israeli lobby that governments are not prepared to offend.

There have been two major stumbling blocks to peace. The first is the expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank, the daily diminution of what might become Palestine. US President Barack Obama, to his credit, tried to get Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop the expansions. He did not succeed. If other Western countries had supported Obama at the time, that result may have been better.

The second problem concerns the divisions between Fatah and Hamas, and here both Israel and the West have played their part in perpetuating that division. Hamas won a legitimate election. Nobody claimed it was fraudulent. Indeed, people working in Palestine had predicted a Hamas victory because, in small communities across the territory, if people had needed help it was Hamas that would provide it and not Fatah, which was seen as self-serving and corrupt.

<snip>

The lack of progress over 18 years is due not so much to Palestinian division or to the ineffective rocketry of Hamas, but to the determination of Israel and its closest friends to make sure that nothing is done that Israel does not support. The changes in the Middle East, not only in Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia but across North Africa, will end in greater support for the Palestinian cause. These important relationships for the West may be irretrievably damaged if the West persists in its negative approach to the question of Palestinian statehood.

Malcolm Fraser was prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1982.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/its-now-time-for-the-west-to-recognise-palestinian-statehood-20111003-1l55q.html#ixzz1ZnrhEl5r

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Violet_Crumble]

2. Yeah, bullcookies sums up yr post perfectly....

A great example of Let's Talk About Anything Else But What This Forum Is About.

And why should the Palestinians have to 'get in line behind every other minority'? I didn't realise there was a line for anything...

Huh? Give Australia back to the Aborigines? You don't seem to realise that the West Bank and Gaza aren't part of Israel for anyone to give back to the Palestinians, and yr knowledge of indigenous issues here is pretty piss poor if you think they're similar situations...

[Cirque du So-What]

5. nevermind

Thanks :hi:

[kickysnana]

3. +1000

[Violet_Crumble]

4. Some background on Malcolm Fraser...

Malcolm Fraser was a Liberal (that's our main RW party) Prime Minister, and as opposition leader blocked supply and helped bring about the constitutional crisis and the downfall of the Whitlam Government. Since he retired, he became a vocal critic of the foreign policy of the Bush sychophant John Howard, opposed the invasion of Iraq, champions civil liberties and is an all round good guy. So much so that he resigned from the Liberal party in the end because of his disgust at what they'd become...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Fraser

[oberliner]

6. Weaknesses in his argument

He writes:

"After Hamas's election victory, much of the West, led by Israel and the US, said: ''Well, you are going to have to change your policy before we will talk to you. You must now accept the existence of the Israeli state.'' That stand forced Hamas back to the weapons it had known for too long, most of which were psychological"

That stand didn't "force Hamas" back to any weapons (psychological or otherwise). They could have simply accepted the existence of the Israeli state. Is that really so much to have asked? Hamas could have just as easily taken that route and that would have been the end of this particular "stumbling block"

I also find his minimization of the rocket attacks quite insulting. I do not agree that the "main effect" of them was propaganda for Israel. I am quite confident that rockets landing on Israel is one piece of "propaganda" that Israel would be very happy not to have.

He asks the question:

"Why should Palestinians recognise Israel when Israel refuses to talk substantively about realistic boundaries to a Palestinian state...?"

However, Palestinians have, as you know, recognized Israel - it is only Hamas that has refused to do so. If Arafat and Abbas have been able to grant that recognition, there is no reason why other Palestinian leaders would be unable to do so.

I think, for all the legitimate points raised in this article, the author's perception of Hamas is misguided - and I think it substantially weakens the argument he is making.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

7. No, it's 65 years too late.

Arguably a lot more than that. Still, better late than never.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. Your ignorance of the history of the region is showing

The Arab nations have treated the Palestinians quite shabbily while they occupied land taken from Israel and the UN partition.

[oberliner]

9. The West did recognize Palestinian statehood 65 years ago

It was the "non-West" that rejected the idea.

Look at how each country voted on the UN Partition Plan which would have established a Palestinian state.