| Stillborn, Not Dead |
25 August 2003
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"Roadmap to Peace" Led Nowhere
On Tuesday of last week, 22 or so people died in a Jerusalem bus explosion, the most lethal suicide bombing in a long time. In response, the Israeli military killed a Hamas leader. The rioting that ensued included a Palestinian mob, or crowd if one prefers, chanting "The road map is dead." They were wrong. The roadmap to peace was stillborn.
Months ago, when all was bright optimism in the Middle East, when the roadmap was announced, the Kensington Review pointed out that peace is only possible when both sides want it enough to sacrifice, and that neither side in the dreary conflict had that amount of commitment. Last week merely proved the point.
Most troubling now is the disrepute into which the violence has cast the "peace process" as the negotiations have been misnamed. When Colin Powell, the thoroughly undermined American Secretary of State, made his limp appeal to Yasser Arafat, the capo de tutti capiin Palestinian refugee camps, a new low was set. This was the same Mr. Arafat with whom the US administration refused to negotiate. Perhaps the lesson has been learned in Washington that one does not get to choose the other side's representatives.
There is now no hope of peace in thge Middle East so long as Mr. Bush is president. His credibility on both sides has evaporated. He now only damages future chances by continuing any attempts at discussion. So he should stop. He must refuse to get any further involved because he doesn't believe either side wants peace and that they will have to prove otherwise before he acts.
Will that stop the murder? No. Will it lead to talks? No. Will it clear the decks for whomever is president in 2008? Yes. Until then, the killing will go on, and there is nothing the world's only superpower can do about it because the policy has been bungled.
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