Word: arabize
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Bill Clinton's final Mideast peace plan is dead in the water. And, surprising to some, the fatal blow was delivered by Washington's closest allies in the Arab world...
...Palestinian leader now heads for Cairo where he'll huddle with Arab heads of state, in a meeting observers expect will underline his refusal to compromise on Jerusalem and the refugees. After all, three months of bloodletting in the West Bank and Gaza have left the moderate Arab regimes on which Washington traditionally relies to cajole Arafat into concessions facing mounting pressure from their own people to take a tougher stance. Nobody in the region is particularly bullish about the prospects of a peace deal concluded with a lame-duck U.S. president and an Israeli prime minister who, according...
...Palestinian Reservations: Besides Palestinians' historic territorial claims on Jerusalem's Old City - it was under Jordanian control until the 1967 war - the presence there of the Islamic holy sites make the issue a red line not only for Palestinians, but for the entire Arab world. Arafat was unable to compromise at Camp David on his demand for sovereignty over the sites and the eastern portion of the city, and he's unlikely to be more accommodating after three months of an uprising explicitly dedicated to reclaiming Jerusalem...
...issue on the backburner over the past decade, the current intifada makes that more difficult. The issue cuts to the core of Palestinian national identity - the displacement of Palestinians that was integral to the creation of a Jewish state. Many of those refugees currently reside in Arab states who have no interest in bearing the burden of their absorption, which creates additional pressure on Arafat not to compromise on this issue. The growing challenge to the Palestinian leader's authority in the West Bank and Gaza also militates against compromise; Arafat is well aware that signing away the refugees' claims...
...Egypt's leading newspaper, chief editor and Mubarak confidant Samir Ragab wrote that Arabs "unanimously rejected" the nature of the U.S. proposals. "This offer does not meet Arab and Palestinian interests and there is nothing which will force us to accept it." In Lebanon, a Foreign Ministry official renewed his country's objections to "any agreement between Palestinians and Israelis that may be related to the issue of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon without Lebanon being party to the agreement." Of course that means Syria has to come too - and Thursday the mouthpiece Syria Times nixed the proposals too. The plan...