How serious is Sharm?

Much ado has been made about the recent meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh between Abu Mazen and Ariel Sharon. It is worth taking a look at the past to see if the context for attempts at peace has changed.

In Madrid in 1991 the first official, direct talks between the PLO and the Israeli government were held. Madrid led to the 1993 letter from PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Among other points in the letter, the PLO renounced its claim to 78% of historical Palestine by accepting UN Resolution 242. (1) It was at this point that Israel was forced to face the fact that some type of Palestinian state was going to come into being; what kind of state and what it would encompass were the only remaining questions pertaining to statehood.

According to The Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement signed in September, 1995, "The two sides view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a single territorial unit, the integrity and status of which will be preserved during the interim period." (2) Yet between 1991 and 1995, the number of settlers grew from 112,000 to 147,000. (3) The settlers now in the Occupied Territories number almost 400,000, with about 6,500 to be removed from the Gaza Strip in the near future. (4) It should be obvious that Israel was not serious in the negotiations it made with the PLO. If the status of the West Bank and Gaza was to be preserved, then one would expect that the settlements would have not been allowed to grow, and certainly no new settlements would have been established.

The settlement of Giv'at HaMatos was established in 1992 as a series of mobile homes to house new Ethiopian immigrants and more importantly, to solidify a wall of Jewish settlements around the southern edge of East Jerusalem. This is part of Israel's attempt to make East Jerusalem a permanent piece of Israel. (5) Recently, a new plan has been unveiled for Giv'at HaMatos. The settlement is to be expanded eastward to include much of the population of the Palestinian village of Beit Safafa and add some 7,500 settlers to the area. (6) This will cut off Beit Safafa from the rest of the Arab areas of Jerusalem. Even more importantly though, is that Beit Safafa will not survive the expansion of Giv'at HaMatos as a political entity. It will become an Arab neighborhood of an Israeli settlement. According to Peace Now, there are 128 settlements and 99 outposts in the West Bank. If Peace Now included East Jerusalem, the number would be even higher. 15 of the 99 outposts have construction going on to make them into more permanent fixtures. (7)

With the establishment of new settlements, and less new ones being expanded, the answer to the titular question is fairly straightforward. Israel is clearly not serious about the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. As long as they're talking it seems that Israel feels free to solidify its hold over the West Bank and East Jerusalem. It seems to be much ado about nothing, again.



(1) www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Peace+Process/Guide+to+the+Peace+Process/Israel-PLO+Recognition+-+Exchange+of+Letters+betwe.htm
(2) Article XI of The Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement, www.israel.org/MFA/Peace%20Process/Guide%20to%20the%20Peace%20Process/THE%20ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN%20INTERIM%20AGREEMENT
(3) Palestine Report, "Peace Now accuses Israel of encouraging settlement", 19 April 1996, available at www.la.utexas.edu/course-materials/government/mena/AIC/PR/AIC_prc041996.html )
(4) www.afsc.org/israel-palestine/learn/factsheet.htm
(5) www.arij.org/paleye/jerusal/
(6) stopthewall.org/latestnews/851.shtml The 7,500 settlers that could be accommodated would be 1,000 higher than the number of settlers to be removed from the Gaza Strip under the "Disengagement Plan".
(7) peacenow.org.il/site/en/peace.asp & peacenow.org.il/site/en/peace.asp Peace Now does not count many settlements in East Jerusalem as it recognizes Israeli sovereignty over most of the area.

To help act against for a just peace in Palestine one can contact many groups working there. Exceptional groups I find include the Palestinian Environmental NGO Network (www.pengon.org), the Palestinian Center for Human Rights in Gaza (www.pchrgaza.org), the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (http:www.icahd.org) and the Alternative Information Center (http:www.alternativenews.org). Locally in Chicago there are several groups working for versions of a just peace including Not in My Name, the International Solidarity Movement-Chicago, and the Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago.

Another way to help change policy is to contact your representatives in government. Most of them do not seem to be overly concerned about, or perhaps they're just ignorant of, Israeli crimes in the Occupied Territories. It's possible though, that enough pressure can be applied from below to make them feel less elect-able if they don't modify their positions. If nothing else, it takes very little time, especially since I've written a form letter for you :>)


Dear fuckwit (note, you should change "fuckwit" to the name of your rep. although the terms may well be synonymous),

Recently Israel has agreed to resume talks with the Palestinian Authority after having brushed off offers from the PA over the last few years. While that may be a good sign, a more ominous one looms away from the headlines.

The settlement of Giv'at HaMatos was established in 1992 as a series of mobile homes to house new Ethiopian immigrants and more importantly, to solidify a wall of Jewish settlements around the southern edge of municipal East Jerusalem. This is part of Israel's attempt to make East Jerusalem a permanent piece of Israel. Recently, a new plan has been unveiled for Giv'at HaMatos. The settlement is to be expanded eastward to include much of the population of the Palestinian village of Beit Safafa and add some 7,500 settlers to the area. This will cut off Beit Safafa from the rest of the Arab areas of Jerusalem. Even more importantly though, is that Beit Safafa will not survive the expansion of Giv'at HaMatos as a political entity. It will become an Arab neighborhood of an Israeli settlement. According to the Israeli organization Peace Now, there are 128 settlements and 99 outposts in the West Bank (not including East Jerusalem). 15 of the 99 outposts have construction going on to make them into more permanent fixtures.

Is it a declared aspiration of the Palestinian people to have their capital in East Jerusalem. Additionally, it's part of UN Resolution 242 that Israel should withdraw from the territories occupied during the 1967 war which includes East Jerusalem. The Fourth Geneva Convention explicitly prohibits Israel from moving "parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies." I ask that you consider what it means for the United States to be supporting Israel while it carries out war crimes in the Occupied Territories and that you take actions to help the Palestinians in their quest for self-determination and a just peace.

regards, the brilliant (and remarkably good-looking) person who took the time to copy and email/fax/post this