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Cover Stories
Special> World in Retrospect 2009> Cover Stories
UPDATED: December 18, 2009 NO. 51 DECEMBER 24, 2009
Middle East Solution
The Obama administration takes a star turn toward peace in the Middle East
By WANG JINGLIE
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AN EYE FOR AN EYE: Palestinians search the rubble of a factory building damaged in an Israeli air raid on May 20. Israel bombed a Hamas stronghold in Gaza the day before in retaliation for rocket attacks from Gaza (XINHUA)

Netanyahu has long held the two-state solution as an international arrangement. Everything, he said, should be negotiated based on the real conditions. In fact, it means he does not accept the two-state solution. He merely regards Palestine as an "entity" rather than a state.

Israel's tough stance has consistently won the support of its domestic right-wing forces. Still, far-right members of the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, have sardonically said that Netanyahu lost his qualifications to lead as soon as he brought forward the idea that the Palestinians could establish a state without an army.

This kind of compromise, they said, is actually the victory of Palestinian terrorism.

Palestinian variables

The Palestinian National Authority believes Obama's two-state solution, as well as his policy of supporting the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, is an active stance in promoting peace in the Middle East. The Palestinians emphasize that the key to the peace process lies in whether Israel can really accept the two-state solution, stop the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, withdraw the checkpoints and roadblocks in the West Bank and lift the blockade on Gaza.

For long, the frictions between Palestinian groups have overshadowed peace in the occupied territories. Hostilities between Hamas and Fatah show no sign of abatement.

The Palestinians have kept making efforts to eliminate its internal disputes, but the result has yet to be satisfactory. A new Palestinian Government was established in May. Then, in August, Fatah held its Sixth General Conference and elected a new Central Committee and Revolutionary Council.

Later the Palestinian National Council, the legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), elected six new members to its Executive Committee at the end of August to ensure the improvement of leadership. Nevertheless, all these have failed to eliminate the Palestinians' internal disputes.

It is noteworthy that Hamas has accepted the two-state solution—establishing a Palestinian state of full sovereignty with the lines of June 4, 1967, as its border and East Jerusalem as its capital.

However, discouraged by the repeated failures of a peace deal, Abbas, who was at an advanced age, declared at the beginning of November not to participate in the January 2010 elections. This further increases uncertainties for the future Palestinian political situation.

Abbas is a moderate who has been overwhelmingly trusted by Israel, the United States and Europe. In 2006, Hamas' big victory in the Palestinian legislative elections dealt a heavy blow to Fatah. But now, if the moderates led by Abbas were defeated once more, the political situation in the Palestinian territories will very likely be filled with new variables.

No pending agreement

Currently, the international community, including the UN and major big countries, are actively pushing for the solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Obama has made a lot of good efforts. The attention he paid and the measures he took have surpassed any other one of his predecessors. But the Americans cannot play the end role in resolving the Palestinian-Israeli dispute, which must ultimately be addressed mainly by the Israelis.

It is safe to say that the conservative Israeli Government has allowed this conflict to fester. It will, thus, be difficult for the two sides to restart peace talks in the near future.

There are a number of reasons for Israel's intractability. Inside Israel, for example, the right-wing elements maintain a huge influence, thus the Israeli Government can hardly change its hard-line stance.

What's more, after the Cold War, a large number of immigrants flowed into Israel, which created stress on infrastructure and housing availability and thus intensified its social problems. Both the hardliners' stance and the expansion of settlements are due to the Israeli domestic political needs to certain extent.

The PLO, which has fought for national rights for decades, is not powerful enough to play a bigger role. Internal disputes and the existence of armed, independent regimes have severely undermined its strength and status. The Israeli Government, which is in a stronger position, is reluctant to reach a peace agreement with a divided opponent.

The author is director of the Division of Middle East Studies at the Institute of West Asian and African Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

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