The Haaretz Op-Ed:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/558481.html
The interview
http://www.fmep.org/analysis/intervi...s_10-01-04.htm
A BBC-article I googled
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3720176.stm
This article or interview first struct my eys, because of the Finnish comparison, but it has much more..
The interview is in many ways quite harsh.. For me it shows that Weissglass (and Sharon) has decided a strategy, which favors the settlers. For him the Palestinian state is unacceptable in the form it has been represented. For him the political process is something undesirable because it will eventually lead to the state and all other unwanted things. The following quote summarizes quite well, why the political process is unwanted in his eye:
Quote:
From your point of view, then, your major achievement is to have frozen the political process legitimately?
"That is exactly what happened. You know, the term `political process' is a bundle of concepts and commitments. The political process is the establishment of a Palestinian state with all the security risks that entails. The political process is the evacuation of settlements, it's the return of refugees, it's the partition of Jerusalem. And all that has now been frozen."
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Because the political process is undesirable, it must be avoided:
Quote:
So you have carried out the maneuver of the century? And all of it with authority and permission?
"When you say `maneuver,' it doesn't sound nice. It sounds like you said one thing and something else came out. But that's the whole point. After all, what have I been shouting for the past year? That I found a device, in cooperation with the management of the world, to ensure that there will be no stopwatch here. That there will be no timetable to implement the settlers' nightmare. I have postponed that nightmare indefinitely. Because what I effectively agreed to with the Americans was that part of the settlements would not be dealt with at all, and the rest will not be dealt with until the Palestinians turn into Finns. That is the significance of what we did. The significance is the freezing of the political process. And when you freeze that process you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and you prevent a discussion about the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package that is called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed from our agenda indefinitely. And all this with authority and permission. All with a presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of Congress. What more could have been anticipated? What more could have been given to the settlers?"
I return to my previous question: In return for ceding Gaza, you obtained status quo in Judea and Samaria?
"You keep insisting on the wrong definition. The right definition is that we created a status quo vis-a-vis the Palestinians. There was a very difficult package of commitments that Israel was expected to accept. That package is called a political process. It included elements we will never agree to accept and elements we cannot accept at this time. But we succeeded in taking that package and sending it beyond the hills of time. With the proper management we succeeded in removing the issue of the political process from the agenda. And we educated the world to understand that there is no one to talk to. And we received a no-one-to-talk-to certificate. That certificate says: (1) There is no one to talk to. (2) As long as there is no one to talk to, the geographic status quo remains intact. (3) The certificate will be revoked only when this-and-this happens - when Palestine becomes Finland. (4) See you then, and shalom."
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It seems that the idea between the finnish comparison is the state, which Finland held during the Cold War. In practice, Finland accepted the Soviet hegemony and influence on its area, in spite of that they had fought two wars before and they represented opposite political-system..
I suppose, that the other possible interpretation for the 'Palestine becomes Finland' is in setting such conditions for the state, that Palestinians cannot either accept or realize..
Of course the article contained also a lot of other things, such as talk about the futility of negotiating with the palestinian leadership. He gives a picture, where it becomes very difficult to make demands or expect commitments from the palestinian authorities. In this way, it is uncomfortable and futile for them to negociate future actions or commitments, which would concern both them and the opposite, when only them can reasonably realize the promises and the accepted sacrifices.
- BtD
03-31-2005, 07:43 AM
If only Palestine were Finland
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