The Bill Clinton proposals for an Israeli-Palestinian peace pact before he leaves office are simply mind-boggling.
The New York Times describes them as "wrenching concessions by both sides." Mr. Clinton actually wants Israel to cede sovereignty of the Temple Mount -- including the holiest of all Jewish shrines, the Western Wall -- to Yasser Arafat's Palestinian organization -- if Arafat & Company will only give up the Right to Return. That refers to three and a half million Palestinians who once lived (or rather their ancestors lived) inside Israel.
I am one of the few reporters left in Washington who saw the Western Wall when it was in the hands of the Arabs in 1956. And Jerusalem's mayor is so appalled by this Clinton idea that he has moved his office to the Western Wall.
How on earth did Clinton come up with such utterly zany proposals?
How would these kinds of proposals have been formulated if France's King Louis XVI, instead of sending desperately-needed troops and money to the financially exhausted Continental Congress, had sent it the following proposal:
"I am willing to send the soldiers of France so needed by your valiant (but oft-defeated) General Washington; and to send credible financial aid to your national treasury, which, we learn is virtually destitute.
"However, since you are not royalty, and I must try to bring a lasting peace between you and my fellow sovereign George III of England, I must insist upon the following:
"1) All Tory residents of your country who have fled to Canada, the Bahamas, or England, must be al- lowed the Right of Return, with lands restored and funds paid for property destroyed. This includes General Benedict Arnold.
"2) The colony of New Hampshire, along with the territories of Vermont and Maine, must be evacuated by all except Indians -- to whom these territories, plus the territory of Florida and one half of Georgia and the Carolinas, must be given and preserved as Indian territory. And you must agree never to expand your territories beyond the lands of the present 13 colonies.
"3) One half of your city of New York, plus the Bunker Hill sector of the city of Boston, and one half of Charleston, South Carolina, will remain under the British Crown, as will all such battlefields as Saratoga, Princeton and Trenton; lest any reminder of these revolutionary victories should encourage any idea of revolution against royalty.
"I feel sure that with the agreement of the Continental Congress to these reasonable compromises, we shall have peace in our time and the United States will be recognized throughout the civilized world as free, sovereign and independent states.
(Signed) Louis XVI of France."
Can we imagine either General Washington's army, or the Continental Congress accepting such extortion?
No, I cannot imagine any reasonable American countenancing such a surrender. What I do hope, however, is that the President-elect of the United States, as soon as he is sworn in, will enunciate so strong a support of Israel -- and so firm a resistance to Arafat's unelected terrorist organization -- that there will be no confusion at all about where the United States stands: in full support of our only real ally and only functioning democracy in the Middle East.
Lester Kinsolving is host of The Les Kinsolving Show: Uninhibited Radio, which airs on WCBM in Baltimore.
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