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Mr. Sharon–Don’t Miss This Opportunity for Peace
Today’s New York Times contains a cogent editorial calling on Ariel Sharon to grasp firmly the chance for peace offered by Yasir Arafat’s death (
Over the years, there have miraculously been a few moments of possibility that have punctured the gloom that is the peace process in the Middle East: the talks at Oslo and at Camp David come to mind. Now we seem to have stumbled, through the death of Mr. Arafat, into another moment of opportunity. It would be criminally negligent if any of the principal leaders involved didn’t step up to the plate. Mr. Sharon, we await you, and we beg that you swing for the fences. Sharon’s certainly a slugger, if only by weight. But I have strong doubts about whether he has the will or inclination to do as the Times asks. I haven’t yet read Henry Siegman’s essay, Sharon & the Future of Palestine, in the current New York Review of Books. But I understand it provides a largely negative prognosis for peace as long as Sharon remains in power.
