Mideast peace has long way to go

By Oei Eng Goan

The United Nations held a two-day international seminar for journalists on the question of Palestine, one of the longest- lasting and most complicated political problems of this century, in Madrid last month. Indonesia was represented by The Jakarta Post.

MADRID (JP): There seems to be just a glimmer of light at the end of the Israeli-Palestinian tunnel after half a century of Israel's occupation of Palestinians' homeland and numerous agreements signed.

Diplomats and political analysts attending a two-day inter national seminar in the Spanish capital two weeks ago came out with different opinions regarding the Palestinian question. Some said the peace accord reached between the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel at the White House in September 1993 -- known as the Oslo Agreement and sealed by a historic handshake between then Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat -- was a watershed in Palestinian- Israeli ties, while others said the peace process was dead and a new deal was needed to reinvigorate true peace in the region.

Still more others said that a fair share of ancestral lands for both the Israelis and the Palestinians was an important factor for the peace process and that regional acceptance of Palestine statehood was far more important than territorial aggrandizement.

Pros and cons in the current process were discussed candidly, and sometimes emotionally, in the seminar. Held on March 23 and March 24 and attended by dozens of analysts from the Palestinian National Authority, Israel, the United States and a number of European and Arab countries as well as by 30 journalists from Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America, the summit focused on "Prospects for Peace" in Palestine.

The seminar was considered important as two important events are to take place in the region next month: a possible Palestinian declaration of statehood on May 4, the deadline of the Oslo agreement, and a May 17 Israeli general election.

Sulaiman Al-Najjab, a member of the Executive Committee of the PLO, told participants that as the Palestinians were dedicated to peace and to abiding by the Oslo Agreement, they were committed to implementing the plan for declaration of a Palestinian state.

"The Israelis do not have the right to state whether the Palestinians can have the state or not," Al-Najjab said, refer ring to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's threat that he would annex parts of the West Bank under Israeli rule if Arafat unilaterally declared a Palestinian state.

The Palestinian General Delegate (ambassador) to Britain and the Vatican, Afif Safieh, noting that "a sovereign independent state is undeniably a Palestinian right", said the establishment of a Palestinian state was also a moral obligation of Israel which expropriated the land from the Palestinians 50 years ago.

Safieh called for a third party, other than the United States, to support the existence of a Palestinian state and help create peace in the region.

"Peace is too important to be left to the Israelis to decide upon," he added.

Israeli Ambassador Colette Avital, admitting that the process of peace had been slowed down under the Netanyahu government, refuted the idea that the process was dead.

"Oslo (Agreement) was a breakthrough for the Palestinians and the Israelis. It was the only framework. Whatever the government in Israel -- left, right, or center -- it has to accept the Oslo Agreement," said Avital, who is competing for a seat to represent the Labor Party at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament.

Responding to Al-Najjab's remarks that "peace means full normalization of ties between Israel and the Palestinian Authori ty and (the absence of) Israel's repeated violations of the peace agreements by using security issue as a pretext," Avital said that both sides had to straighten out the issue as there could never be peace without security, and vice versa.

"As the Israeli population has been traumatized and feels a deep sense of insecurity, one should neither overstate nor understate the security issue for the Israelis," she added, obviously referring to the fact that many of its neighboring Arab countries still oppose the existence of the Jewish state as well as to persistent terrorist actions by Hamas, a group of radical Palestinians who oppose the peace process.

On the question of the declaration of a Palestinian state, panelists at the seminar were also divided in their opinions. U.S. analyst Henry Siegman, who is the director of the Middle East Project and Council on Foreign Relations, said there was a likelihood that the international community would not recognize unilateral action by the Palestinians.

Safieh, stressing that "statehood is the absolute right of the Palestinian people" and that Palestinians should not be treated as "children of a lesser God", pointed out that should Arafat postpone the declaration, it could be exploited by Netanyahu for political gain for his right-wing Likud government during the coming election by claiming to the Israelis that "he is the one who can lower the Palestinians' expectations".

He said the announcement of statehood should go on as scheduled with "East Jerusalem for Palestine and West Jerusalem for Israel".

Avital, however, said that even with the postponement, there was already a de facto recognition of the existence of a Palestinian state by the world community, including Israel. "Eighty percent of Israelis accept the idea of a Palestinian state," she said, adding that as a strong nation Israel was not afraid of giving territorial concessions to the Palestinians.

Other thorny issues discussed at the meeting -- which some times turned into a heated debate that had to be silenced by Mian Qadrud-Din, a UN official chairing the seminar -- were the expansion of Jewish settlement in the West Bank, the question of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and the Palestinian economy, which relies largely on foreign aid and transfers of funds from Israel. It was revealed that Israeli funds to the Palestinian Authority reached US$535 million last year compared to $488 million the year before and $430 million in 1996, not including the income of the large Palestinian labor force employed in the Jewish state.

Many agreed that Jerusalem could become a dangerous bone of contention because it involves the interests of Christian, Muslim and Jewish communities, while continued expansion of the Jewish settlement could jeopardize the current peace process.

Participants also agreed that both the Palestinians and the Israelis had to boost their confidence building measures under the auspices of an international organization, such as the United Nations, through enhanced cultural and economic cooperation to achieve lasting peace in the region.

Prospects for a comprehensive peace in the Middle East will certainly become greater if Israel returns unconditionally the remaining lands it seized from the Arab nations in 1967. If this happens, the younger generation of the Arabs, Palestinians and Israelis will feel secure to work together toward a better and prosperous future in the coming century.

Window: Jerusalem could become a dangerous bone of contention because it involves the interests of Christian, Muslim and Jewish communities, while continued expansion of the Jewish settlement could jeopardize the current peace process.