18 thoughts on “Bibi Demands Palestinian Confidence Building Measure, Approving Israeli Impunity – Tikun Olam תיקון עולם إصلاح العالم
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  1. It’s all window dressing anyway, Richard. It doesn’t matter who concedes what – the Israelis will lie and as always, the talks will lead to nowhere simply because Israel wants land, not peace. Netanyahu proved it again and again. The settlement freeze was the latest in a long history of farcical “agreements” Israel violated again and again.

    1. Mary, your blank condemnation of what Israel is and does and wants takes little into account regarding the diversity of views, opinions, assent and dissent within what is called Israel. Of course Netanyahu and the government have to reign in their fringe and elected constituency, and so must also the moderate “peace camp” within Israel, the diaspora and general public refrain from inflaming their own radical fringe from the same mongering in the name of pursuing social justice; or is it the point here, in this blog, to not do that. Perhaps I err in my reading of the benevolent dictators’ comment rules, for I got from it that this was a forum for seeking solutions by reaching out, and that this article today was about confidence building as a cloak to evade responsibility,…or is the protestation in demonizing Israel behind the skirts of international bodies with other vested interests not without some nefarious intent also. I suspect confidence is built by candour and realistic expectations.

      1. Mary speaks of reality. From Likud to Labor, Israel is behind the settlement movement. The minute peace camp within Israel has always been powerless to stop the colonization, and it will go on as long as US veto power over the UNSC is exploited to facilitate it.

        1. History speaks for itself. I’m not “mongering” anything that can’t be easily confirmed as fact. The annexation of territory and the illegal settlements are a reality that can’t be refuted. The refusal of Israel to dismantle settlements, and on continuing to build them, is a hard reality, as is the separation wall which neatly slices Palestinian land into israeli hands.

          1. I think history speaks for its authors, who write regarding events relevant to their communities, nations, tribes and epochs. A common saying has it that history is written by the victors; the inference being that the truly vanquished have no voice, because they are no more. Still, the ‘peace’ camp has a huge voice and following perpetuated greedily by the popular media in every corner of the globe, ‘warring’ against globalism, democracy, western liberalism, global warming and the young phenomena of the worlds’ largest ethnic minority struggling to survive and define its existence, in part, with statehood, which in itself is a fairly recent political concept and identity well delineated in the international best seller and common university reference text, EUROPE: A History by Norman Davies. If the tome leaves us with anything, it is that our institutions of governance are fleeting and fragile at best, and no ethereal notion of international law will ever raise it above its origins as a vessel of diplomacy. Walls go up and down all the time for reasons immemorial such as in China, Britain, Germany, Texas and Israel. There are no mans lands and to my grief even the two closest countries culturally in the world today, Canada and the USA, now have a bristling militarized border which until recently we could cross casually. We are not a threat to each other, but those who lurk in our midst seek to exploit that friendship to commit terrorist acts, however one may characterize them, on behalf of grievances, most not even occurring on our continent. The consequences are huge, and not clearly from a matter of a ‘land grab’ in the Middle East. So the Israeli Palestinian conflict is anything but cut and dried international law and evident historical fact. It is one of a legion in world crisis zones that needs be resolved. Heck, we can’t even reign in the tobacco industry which saps our economies and families. Some ‘peace train’!

          2. It’s wild how those of the conflict camp can rattle on so much without really saying anything.

    2. RE: “the talks will lead to nowhere simply because Israel wants land, not peace…” – mary

      FROM THE EARLY ’80s:
      …If every sign that I see is to complete
      Then I’m a fool in your game
      And all you want to do
      Is tell me your lies
      Won’t you show the other side
      You’re just wasting my time

      All you do to me is talk talk

      When every choice that I make is yours
      Keep telling me what’s right and what’s wrong
      Don’t you ever stop to think about me
      I’m not that blind to see
      That you’ve been cheating on me…

      Talk Talk – Talk Talk (Version 1) [VIDEO, 03:21] – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuTYOB53xE0

  2. Please check your email and consider if you would like to respond or request that I expand my argument regarding confidence building measures toward a two state solution based on an approximation of pre 1967 “borders”, which you advocate; as I loosely do too. Or are we all ‘gonna’ get pie in our face?

  3. Abbas’s son was leading the bid for a cellphone network in what’s left of Palestine. The Israelis, having fucked about with the contract, used it to strong-arm Abbas.
    Abbas showed his nepotism by crumbling in the face of Israeli demands.

    1. That’s not nepotism. Nepotism is defined as a preference in hiring or promoting someone because they’re your relative.

      What Abbas was showing was subservience.

      1. RE: What Abbas was showing was subservience. – mary

        MY REPLY: I believe richard01 was referring to Abbas’ nepotism in regards to his nephew’s involvement with the cellphone network. Perhaps Abbas would not have so easily “crumbled in the face of Israeli demands” (been subservient to Israel) if his nephew had not had an interest in the cellphone network.

  4. Getting back to the issue, there is overwhelming evidence that Israel knows that negotiations are a game that mollifies the U.S. government while Israel continues to steal Palestinian land with very little resistence from the U.S. The Palestinian “state” that is envisioned is a tiny, demilitarized protectorate: If you can’t raise an army you don’t have full sovereignty which mens you are not a real state. Israel would never permit the Palestinians to have a real state. Stealng land while pretending to negotiate peace has for decades been a perfectly successful Israeli strategy. Sharon pretended he believed in a 2-state solution & Bibi loses nothing by a similar pretense.

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