WI Arafat accepted Ehud Barak's terms in the 2000 Camp David Summit?

Barak offered 93% of the territories and Arafat rejected it. Arafat accept any terms that are not including giving Tel-Aviv and Haifa to the Palestinians ASB

The 9 percent the West Bank that was filled with Israeli settlements that Barak wanted to annex to Israel would have divided the independent Palestinian State and have made it difficult to make it viable. Many important Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem would have remained under Israeli control.
 
Or ten minutes to LIVE! Just imagine yourself in such a situation? Being warned JUST 10 minutes before your permanent evacuation. OR should I say, indefinite death sentence!!

Lets get realistic guys, invading is one issue and ending one's life is totally another. But the world just observes and comments, as we're doing right now. Always comfortable in our comfort zones, so to speak.

If I was given 10 minutes warning I'd be damn sure I am a LONG way away from any building they are bombing!
 
If I was given 10 minutes warning I'd be damn sure I am a LONG way away from any building they are bombing!

10 minutes is also quite a bit longer than most people think. I currently live on the sixth floor of an apartment building and when I have to I can have a suitcase ready and be cleared out in less than five minutes. In Palestine alot of people rarely live above the second floor. They have a good ammount of time to get away from the blast.
 
10 minutes is also quite a bit longer than most people think. I currently live on the sixth floor of an apartment building and when I have to I can have a suitcase ready and be cleared out in less than five minutes. In Palestine alot of people rarely live above the second floor. They have a good ammount of time to get away from the blast.

What's even more important I think is that 10 minutes are 10 minutes more than many Afghan or Iraqi civilians received from NATO or the US if these had secret service information about valuable aims (not to mention that I'd value Israeli secret service information much higher than CIA information - but that's another story).

And considering the ratio of deaths - can you remind me about the death ratios of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan against western forces?

Point is, even if we in the West say that Israel is completely wrong in its doings, we're in no way better if our interests are (vaguely) concerned. And Israel is in a far worse situation.

Just to give an example: Assume that a Mexican drug cartel shoots 10 Kassam into LA over the weekend, killing 3 US citizens, among them a small girl. What do you think would the US response be? And now imagine the proposals of the Republican presidential candidates to this...
 

BlondieBC

Banned
The 9 percent the West Bank that was filled with Israeli settlements that Barak wanted to annex to Israel would have divided the independent Palestinian State and have made it difficult to make it viable. Many important Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem would have remained under Israeli control.

Based on all the restrictions on the Palestinians, it is more like an autonomous region than a state. i.e no military, foreign military in your country, Israel controls border crossings to Jordan, etc. Or perhaps a fairer comparison is an Indian Reservation in the USA. If the American media used more precise terms, it would be clearer to the average American the difficulties in Israel. Palestine is not getting a "state" like Federated States of Micronesia.

Israel/Palestine real issue is that it is the "Twice Promised Land".

As to the posters question. Arafat is assassinated. The majority of the Palestinians reject the deal, and at some point in the future, the violence resumes. There are but three potentially stable long-term solutions.

1) Arabs win. Jews expelled/killed.
2) Jews win. Arabs expelled/killed.
3) Palestine/Israel divided. All Jews on one side of big wall, All Arabs on other side. No interaction. After many generations, interaction can be allowed.

Unfortunately, the conflict has too many elements of a Holy War, and Holy wars can go on for centuries as the crusades and European history shows. I am not advocating the solutions, just pointing out that once you are in a holy war with "demons", you don't make peace. And it takes two to make peace, but only one to make a war. In all probability, your grandchildren can come to a site like this and post a similar question in 50 years. If XXXX did YYY in year 20ZZ, would there have been peace.
 
Those terms were simply unacceptable to any self respecting Palestinian. There is such a misconception of what was really offered in the peace talks. No reference of splitting Jerusalem, a right of return or reparations were ever agreed to. What was offered was dozens of seperate enclaves in the West Bank divided by checkpoints, settlements, IDF, roadblocks and walls and the Gaza. Arafat would be basically agreeing to the biggest man made prison complex in the world, a modern day Bantustan.
 
As always, more heat than light, and giant dollops of delusion. 'borderline utopia?' I don't think so.

The comparison to an Indian reservation is most apt.

The problem with the proposal is that it amounts to a political and economic dead end for the Palestinians. The 'state' that is constituted is essentially non-functional. The whole thing implodes, and we're all worse off than before.

Whether Arafat lives or not is irrelevant to anyone but Arafat. Fatah basically inherits a nonfunctional series of land parcels which are dependent on Israeli goodwill. The indigenous Palestinian economy tanks. You have malnutrition, starvation, staggering unemployment. The response is Palestinian on Palestinian repression, supported by Israeli assistance to the favoured. Fatah is discredited. Hamas rises more dramatically. Israel punishes the west bank, cascading problems.

Basically, we'd get Gaza, earlier, faster, bigger, badder. Hell on Earth, brought to you by people who should have known better.

Israel's position would be better, since its has legitimized various land grabs, but it would have to elevate its security profile and costs.
 
A better question is what if USA pulls out of the peace process and let's Israel and Arabs settle it on their own with the ultimatum of pulling back USA aid to Israel and Palestine if no deal is consummated?
 
People forget the context of Barak's "deal." Barak after getting elected, proceeded to alienate most of his party and many senior figures, then spent two years trying to negotiate an agreement with the Syrians that fell apart, largely over the question of whether Israel withdrew to the 1949 Ceasefire Lines or the Mandate Palestine boundaries, which were slightly different. (The 1949 lines gave the Syrians a small shoreline along Lake Galilee/Kinneret.)

By the summer of 1999 his coalition was falling apart, his popularity was collapsing, and he decided to roll the dice with a Hail Mary summit with the Palestinians. Keep in mind Barak insisted on no preliminary talks whatsoever in order to prevent leaks. But this came after two years of ignoring the Palestinian issue and reneging on a deal to withdraw from several Palestinian towns.

The maps Barak at first presented allowed nearly a 20% annexation of the WB and would have broken the WB up into two or three different cantons. Barak moved closer to the Palestinian position over the course of the talks, but in the end his proposal would still have annexed 9% of the WB, would have put an East-West Israeli road (with checkpoints) under Israeli control, and put severe limitations on Palestinian sovereignty.

I don't want to absolve Arafat of blame. He offered no counterproposal during the Camp David talks, for example. But Barak's handling of the talks was atrocious.

LATER, in January 2001 at Taba the two sides came genuinely close to an agreement. By that point, the Israeli parameters had narrowed to a 6% annexation plus a land swap and more equitable terms. The two sides could have reached an agreement given a few more weeks, but these were last-ditch talks held just prior to the Israeli election. They were called off because of Sharon's win.

Had Barak begun to hold talks with the Palestinians from the start of his term, a peace deal could have been achieved.
 
I dare anyone to tell me any self respecting arab who could have accepted that deal? Even the weak, spineless, vasilating, corrupt murderer Arafat did the one good thing for his people and said NO. Barak basically held a gun to the arabs head in a take it or leave it you get no better deal offer and any rejection would lead to war and immediate destruction of palestinian government and society which was exactly what happened.
 
In all probability, your grandchildren can come to a site like this and post a similar question in 50 years. If XXXX did YYY in year 20ZZ, would there have been peace.

Some say 'history repeats itself.' Others say 'history is a good indicator for the future.' Yet, there are those who say 'history should NOT be a determining factor for the future.' And the list goes on and on and on.

I say, you are absolutely right!!! :D
 
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