After three months of nonstop atrocities and the violation of every comma in the Oslo accords by the PLO, Barak continues to pursue his policy that no act of violence by Arabs must go unrewarded. With less than a quarter of the Knesset behind him, with the polls showing the vast majority of the public opposed to his policies, trailing behind every conceivable opposition candidate in the polls, the lame duck Barak has agreed in principle to accept Clinton's proposed "compromise" for a Middle East settlement.
This "compromise" is a Munich capitulation. It is based on the destruction of Jerusalem. Israel would turn over the entire Old City of Jerusalem to the PLO, who would create a situation much like the one that existed before 1967, with the walls of the Old City used to shell Western Jerusalem. Israel would be left with the Jewish Quarter of the Old City and a "safe conduct corridor" to it and the Western Wall, which will be as safe as was the safe-conduct corridor to Joseph's Tomb in Nablus. The PLO will be granted all of East Jerusalem, including the Mount of Olives, the mountain on which are buried the Prophets of Israel. The Hebrew University campus on Mount Scopus will become the new front line for gunfire.
Once inside Jerusalem, the PLO will destroy every vestige of Jewish history and religion in the Old City. They will reduce the Western Wall to gravel. They will raze the synagogues there, the same synagogues -- many centuries old -- that had been destroyed by the Jordanians after 1949 and then rebuilt by Israel after 1967. They will destroy Rachel's Tomb.
Next, the Arabs will demand removal of Jewish "settlers" from the Galilee and Negev.
In exchange for this Munich capitulation, the PLO will not agree to forego demanding the "Right of Return" of Palestinian "refugees" to Israel proper, even after Barak admits 150,000 of them. Refusing to abandon their demand for the "Right of Return" is tantamount to refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of Israel in any borders whatsoever. But Barak and the Left will not desist. The Arabs will continue to demand removal of Jewish "settlers" from the Galilee and Negev. The Western press will report daily about the inequality and mistreatment of Arabs in what is left of Israel and demand that Israel end "apartheid" by dezionization of the country and by merging rump Israel into a secular Palestinian state from the Mediterranean to the Jordan.
No doubt resolution of the conflict over the "Right of Return" will be put off by Barak. Barak will seek to get Arafat to say that the Palestinians have no further claims upon Israel and are satisfied with what they have gotten in the Munich capitulation. After all, Hitler at Munich said he was now satisfied. Arafat will refuse, or -- at most -- issue some sort of statement with duplicitous language, and Barak and Peres and Beilin and Sarid will have a peace festival in celebration of the statement. Regardless of what Arafat will say, the violence will escalate and gunfire and shells will rain down upon Israel from the Palestinian state and from the Lebanese border. Syria and Egypt will prepare to intervene militarily.
The new battle lines in the Middle East will shift from the Gilo suburb to the Old City of Jerusalem. The world will insist that Israel evacuate its settlers from the Jewish Quarter in the Old City. Jews will be murdered every day trying to reach the Western Wall. This is Barak's "legacy" to Israel.
The Jordan Valley will be turned over to the PLO and its settlements forcibly evacuated. This is so that it will be easier for the PLO to admit the Iraqi and Iranian troops crossing over the Jordan River into Palestine to prepare for the coming showdown. Iran has promised to reward Israeli generosity by shooting missiles at it, the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported on December 26.
The Hebrew University campus on Mount Scopus will become the new front line for gunfire.
Ha'aretz of December 26 also reported that Barak has already agreed that unlike the evacuation of the Sinai, the homes of settlers will not be destroyed when abandoned and will be turned over intact to the PLO. Barak has even agreed in principle that swaths of pre-1967 Israel will also be handed to the PLO. The more atrocities the PLO launches, the larger the swaths he will grant them.
When Barak was running for office, not only did he deny that he had any intention of dividing Jerusalem, but he even insisted that anyone from the opposition claiming he had such intentions should be jailed for criminal incitement.
No wonder, in the current elections, the Arab anti-Jewish political parties of Israel have decided not to run their own candidate for Prime Minister. That is because Ehud Barak is already running as their candidate.
Steven Plaut teaches at the University of Haifa.
January 2001 - 5 - Outpost