WORLD NEWS TRUST: Life after Bush -- Forecasting Peace in Palestine (Ramzy Baroud)

[Tace]

Ramzy Baroud -- World News Trust

Oct. 8, 2008 -- President Bush sounded much less uncertain of his peace "vision" when he received Palestinian Authority's Mahmoud Abbas in Washington Sept. 25. Certainly much has changed since the Nov. 2007 conference in Annapolis, Maryland, where Bush and his secretary of state Condoleezza Rice exhorted that a Palestinian state can only be created through moderate forces, thus designated Hamas and other Palestinian groups as enemies of peace. They marked the end of 2008 as the deadline for an agreement to create that state.

If the last 10 months were a lesson, it was that neither the Bush administration is ready to abandon its pro-Israel position -- which has jeopardized any real chance at true peacemaking -- nor is the Israeli government under Ehud Olmert ready or willing to advance the cause of peace. It also became obvious that Abbas is hopelessly ineffectual in exercising any pressure, or holding any leverage to determine the speed or direction of peace negotiations with Israel. This, once again, reinforces the belief that the re-launch of peace talks under American auspices was a strategic choice pertinent to isolating Hamas following its election victory in Jan. 2006, and its clash with Fateh in the summer of last year.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat reportedly conveyed Bush's pledge to Abbas, made "behind closed doors," according to AFP, "that if a Palestinian state does not come about during his presidency, it will happen in the near future, not more than a year."

If true, this would be the first indication that the end of the 2008 deadline is being abandoned as unrealistic and unfeasible. But can a truly viable and just peace agreement be achieved "not more than a year" following Bush's departure?

more

http://www.worldnewstrust.com/wnt-reports/commentary/life-after-bush-forecasting-peace-in-palestine-ramzy-baroud.html