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02/27/2006:

"Henry Kissinger: What's Needed From Hamas"

aka Mr. Stench of Brimstone

The image of Ariel Sharon lying comatose in an Israeli hospital has a haunting quality. There is the poignancy of the warrior who fought -- occasionally ruthlessly -- in all of Israel's wars, incapacitated when he was on the verge of proclaiming a dramatic reappraisal of Israel's approach to peace. And, there is the prospect that this combative general has transcended his implacable past to show both sides the sacrifice needed for a serious peace process.

Well Henry should know about 'haunting' being a ghoul himself. Ask the massacred people of Sabra and Shatila, his and Sharon's little project, about "poignancy."

...The Palestinians have yet to make a comparable adjustment. Even relatively conciliatory Arab statements, such as the Beirut summit declaration of 2003, reject Israel's legitimacy as inherent in its sovereignty; they require the fulfillment of certain prior conditions. Almost all official and semi-official Arab and Palestinian media and schoolbooks present Israel as an illegitimate, imperialist interloper in the region.

Fancy that! "Fulfillment of certain prior conditions," which, if not met, render a Palestinian state in name only.

...To the Palestinians, "fair and just" signifies a return of refugees to all parts of former Palestine, including the current territory of Israel, thereby swamping it. To the Israelis, the phrase implies that returning refugees should settle on Palestinian territory only.

Territory agreed upon by whom? It's really an unreasonable demand to shut down those refugee camps in Lebanon, right Henry? Israel was established to gather a scattered people. Why should Palestinian attempts to do the same be condemned?

...A return to the 1967 lines and the abandonment of the settlements near Jerusalem would be such a psychological trauma for Israel as to endanger its survival.

The most logical outcome would be to trade Israeli settlement blocs around Jerusalem -- a demand President Bush has all but endorsed -- for some equivalent territories in present-day Israel with significant Arab populations. The rejection of such an approach, or alternative available concepts, which would contribute greatly to stability and to demographic balance, reflects a determination to keep incendiary issues permanently open.

Well we all know how irrational the Arab nature is...

...A serious, comprehensive negotiation is therefore impossible unless Hamas crosses the same conceptual Rubicon Sharon did.

Yes Sharon the mostly-dead visionary leads the way. He would have crossed the Rubicon and slaughtered man, woman, child, and dog.

...Hamas may in time accept institutionalized coexistence because Israel is in a position to bring about unilaterally much of the outcome described here.

Yes, with brute force.

...A diplomatic framework is needed within which Israel can carry out those parts of the road map capable of unilateral implementation, and the world community can strive for an international status that ends violence while leaving open the prospect of further progress toward permanent peace.

In other words, the world should turn a blind eye to the bloodbath that 'unilateral implementation' will mean on the ground, and for all the phony striving for permanent peace, there will be permanent war. Nothing like that scary, oh-so-reasonable Harvard rhetoric.

Think one-state solution: that is the only way, and at any cost these guys will resist it.

One mostly-dead irredeemably evil war criminal idealizes another.
washingtonpost.com