Al-Ahram Weekly Online 23 - 29 August 2001 Issue No.548
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875		Current issue | Previous issue | Site map

The logic of madness

Despite reports of an imminent meeting between Arafat and Peres, expectations remain low that Sharon will really accept a compromise allowing the resumption of talks on a final settlement.

After German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer mediated a cease-fire in early June following the suicide attack in Tel Aviv, calm was restored in the occupied territories. Then Sharon ordered his army to escalate its policy of assassinating Palestinian activists whom Israel accuses of "planning" attacks. The Israeli premier still champions extrajudicial killings, denying that they constitute violations of the cease-fire. Israeli army bulldozers also continue to destroy Palestinian homes and maintain the stranglehold the army has kept on the West Bank and Gaza Strip for almost a year now. Sharon intends to spend millions of dollars further consolidating the Jewish presence in occupied East Jerusalem and has sworn he will never accept the dismantling of a single settlement built on occupied land. Faced with such insane policies, Palestinians had no option but revive the resistance, despite their extremely limited resources.

This week, Fischer is in the region again, raising hopes that a new cease-fire agreement can be reached. The multifaceted Peres also resumed his favourite hobby: coming up with "creative," but clearly ridiculous, proposals to restore calm in the occupied territories. The real danger is that all this sound and fury will amount to nothing but an even more dangerous escalation of violence.

The Bush administration, on the other hand, remains unwilling to intervene, beyond backing Sharon's statements that the Palestinians must stop the "violence." One of the main tasks facing the Arab foreign ministers who started an emergency meeting in Cairo yesterday, therefore, should be the elaboration of a clear plan of action that will induce Washington to change its policy.

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