http://www.orlandosentinel.com/automagic/columnists/2000-04-04/OPEDreese04a040400.html
When it comes to crafting a peace plan, Clinton plays the dummy
By Charley Reese, Published in The Orlando Sentinel on April 04, 2000
Did you see President Clinton playing Charlie McCarthy to
Ehud Barak's Edgar Bergen?
For you young ones, Charlie McCarthy was a dummy
created by ventriloquist Bergen. Barak, of course, is the
prime minister of Israel. The pathetic little act was played
after the peace talks with Syria adjourned.
Barak and his guys say to Israelis that they have done all
they can to bring about peace and that the ball is now in
Syria's court.
Clinton says to Americans that the ball is now in Syria's
court. I started to say Clinton should be embarrassed to be
such an obvious shill for a foreign power, but I remembered
that nothing can embarrass Clinton.
The ball, of course, is not in Syria's court. Syria's position
remains the same it as it has been for years: Withdraw
from Syrian territory and you can have peace. Syria wants
a commitment that Israel will withdraw before negotiations
start on other matters, such as water and security. You
have to admit that there is not much point in negotiating
with someone who refuses to say he will withdraw from
land he illegally occupies. Oh, yes, United Nations
resolutions have for years called on the Israelis to pull
back from territory they captured in the 1967 war and held
on to in the 1973 war.
So what was Israel's offer?
No commitment for a complete withdrawal. Syria must
agree that Israel can keep some area to control the water
as well as a military post on Mount Hermon. And there
must be a peace treaty and exchange of ambassadors first
before withdrawal is complete.
Syrian President Hafez Assad is too smart to fall into that
trap. Peace talks started in 1991 in Madrid, Spain. Nine
years later, Yasser Arafat is still waiting for the Israelis to
withdraw from the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.
Assad knows that if he signed a peace treaty first, Israeli
"withdrawal" could be dragged out for decades.
Clinton called Israel's offer generous and admonished the
Syrians to make a counteroffer. This is absurd. Imagine if,
before the Gulf War, Iraq had offered to withdraw from
part of Kuwait. Would an American president say, "That's
a generous offer, and now, Kuwait, you make a
counteroffer."
When your land is taken by force and occupied by a foreign
army, you don't make counteroffers, allowing it to keep
part of its conquest. You do what the Syrians are doing:
Complete withdrawal means peace; anything less, no deal.
Bear in mind, as Clinton refuses to, that Syria's claim to 100
percent of its territory is 100 percent legitimate. Israel has
no legal claim to one square inch of Syrian territory.
Apparently the Israeli government has decided that it
would rather have the Golan Heights than peace with
Syria. And Clinton is providing the Israelis political cover
by pretending it's the Syrians who are stopping the talks.
But that's consistent with Clinton's Middle East policy,
which has, from day one, given Palestinians and Lebanese
and everybody else the same advice: Do what the Israelis
want you to do. Unfortunately, what the Israelis want the
Palestinians and Syrians to do is be content to lose a hunk
of their territory to Israeli control.
No doubt Israel, secure with its high-tech air force and its
nuclear weapons, feels that there is nothing the Syrians or
the Palestinians can do about it. And that's true. But only
for now. It is a foolish man who believes that the status quo
can be maintained indefinitely.
Clinton had a chance, created by others, to craft a Middle
East peace. Instead he preferred to play the dummy for
Israel and its lobby. And, in doing that, he has sewn the
seeds for another war sometime in the future. One day
Americans will realize what a bad president he has been.
