Writing with Forked Tongue

The Jerusalem Post has decided to employ the word "convergence" as the English translation of the Hebrew "hit'knasut", the new term bandied about by the media and politicians to describe Ehud Olmert's regurgitated disengagement plan.

Another word, employed by the Jerusalme Center for Public Affairs, is "consolidation".

This, however, is a bit incomprehensible.

The act of converging is defined as moving toward union or uniformity; coming together to unite in a common interest or focus and tending to merge. Now, if Israel and Jordan were to reunite territorially as they were prior to the September 1923 British decision to partition the original mandate area, I could understand the word's use.

Consolidation is defined as the act or instance of unification; solidification; strengthening.

However, what is being done is yielding up further areas of the Jewish national home and aiding in the creation of yet a third political entity in what was once but one geopolitical unit.

What Mr. Olmert is actually suggesting is that Israel turn in to itself by reducing the land mass it controls and surrendering it to a foreign power.

Perhaps, then, 'self-reduction' or even 'diminution' would be a better choice?

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UPDATE

The above was published by the Jerusalem Post as a "letter to the editor" on April 2, which is a nice thing for them to do.