Israel
Accept the Saudi Initiative
JERUSALEM - Four years after it was first presented, the Arab Peace Initiative is finally coming to centre stage. Rumours of behind the scenes meetings and negotiations on the Initiative between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Saudi national security advisor Prince Bandar bin Sultan have been strengthened by reports that the Saudi prince is trying to modify the Initiative so that it will be more acceptable to Israel.
by Gershon Baskin
Palestinians as partners
 Ziad Asali writes, "A historic negotiated compromise that results in a viable state of Palestine on land occupied in 1967, with mutually agreed borders and with Arab Jerusalem as its capital, is an Israeli imperative as it is a Palestinian need. It is Israel's best guarantee to survive the new existential strategic threats and the ultimate guarantee for security and peace for both nations. And for Palestinians to achieve their freedom and viable state, they must repudiate Hamas' regression to the olden days of rejection of Israel's pre-1967 borders." |
Israel and Hamas' Truce Offer
 One of the most common themes heard in discussions of U.S. policy in the Middle East these days is that Washington should be speaking to the key players in the region -- like Syria, Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah -- instead of boycotting them. Yet when it comes to Israel speaking with Hamas in Palestine, the same rational suggestions are not heard. Israel remains a state that enjoys unique standards of behavior in the world, both in terms of what it should and should not do. |
No negotiations, no peace
| "It is true that with the current chaos and almost complete breakdown of law and order on the Palestinian side, it seems almost absurd to renew the peace process. However, it is also absurd not to understand that the developing alternative to Hamas, if the situation there continues to deteriorate, is not a return of Fatah but the rise of al-Qaida and similar groups," says Gershon Baskin. |
Toward a comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict
| "With the recent Lebanese-Israeli and Palestinian-Israeli crises, a new global Middle East peace initiative is urgently needed to generate a final and comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict," writes Gareth Evans. "So long as that conflict continues, everyone will be losers except the extremists throughout the world who prosper on the rage it continues to provoke." by Garth Evans |
U.S. - key to solving Palestinian-Israeli conflict
 "Bush has everything to gain by championing Palestinian-Israeli peace," writes Saliba Sarsar. "Palestinian statehood will remove the greatest single source of anti-American sentiment throughout the Arab and Muslim worlds, enhance the security of all states in the Middle East by establishing defined borders for Israel, establish a democratic model for the rest of the Arab world to emulate, and open up substantial markets in the Middle East and North Africa to greater opportunities for economic cooperation." |
Interfaith Vigil to End Occupation Calls on U.S. to Impose Cease-Fire
 By Pat and Samir Twair
On July 16th, five days into Israel's blitz on Lebanon, the Interfaith Community United for Justice and Peace convened a meeting of Jews, Christians and Muslims in the Islamic Center of Southern California. Speakers were Rev. Dr. George Regas, Rabbi Leonard Beerman and Dr. Maher Hathout. "We must speak out against violence," Rev. Regas, retired rector of All Saints Episcopal Church of Pasadena, told the audience of 250 concerned citizens. While denouncing the capture of Israeli soldiers by Hamas and Hezbollah, the cleric called on Israel to cease its greatly overproportional actions in Lebanon and Gaza. |
