So, This Is The Process: Expectations

This is how the New York Times wants its readers to think about the upcoming new round of talks about a peace process:

Mr. Obama, administration officials said, will call on the four leaders to do all they can to settle, within a year, the final status issues: the fate of Jerusalem, the borders of a Palestinian state, the right of return for Palestinian refugees who fled their homes and the issue of Israeli security.

But on Sept. 26, Israel’s 10-month moratorium on settlement construction will expire. Mr. Netanyahu appears unlikely to extend it, Israeli and American officials said. And Mr. Abbas has said that he will withdraw from negotiations if settlement activity resumes.

“This becomes the first test of the intentions of the two sides, a test of whether they’re serious,” said Martin S. Indyk, the former American ambassador to Israel and Middle East peace negotiator.

If Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Abbas stick to hard-line positions, the peace process will be dead just after this attempt is born, Mr. Indyk and other Middle East experts said. But if they are able to come up with a way around the Sept. 26 moratorium hurdle, “they will have created a more positive environment” for tackling the big issues, Mr. Indyk said.

Or put more simply, they will have shown the world that this time, they mean business.

Well, let me phrase it this way:

Continuation of a construction moratorium means less Jews in Judea and Samaria. It is predicated on the Arab viewpoint that we shouldn't be here at all. The precedent is the peace with Egypt which left no Jew in Sinai anywhere as well as the Gaza Disengagement which arrived at the same situation: territory of the Land of Israel that is Jundenrein.

Israel does not demand the removal of any Arab settlement in the state of Israel.

Thus, the issue of "settlements" is artificial on the one hand and on the other, racial discrimination at the least. It also ignores the historic connection between the Jewish people and its homeland, internationally recognized, as well as basic security needs.

That simply will not do.

To expect Israel to yield on a Jewish presence in its homeland is poor reasoning or malicious intent.


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