Word: rabins
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Sharon's objective clearly isn't to get hundreds of thousands of Israelis filling the streets of Tel Aviv singing songs of peace and hope. Indeed, he makes clear in the interview that he sees the Oslo peace process started by Yitzhak Rabin as dangerously deluded - and that he, Sharon, has no intention whatsoever of pursuing it. Withdrawing from the Golan Heights or the Jordan Valley or removing the Israeli settlements dotted throughout the West Bank and Gaza deprives Israel of the "strategic depth" to defend herself, Sharon insists. Returning those lands to Arab control - as his predecessors had considered...
...other words, the kind of comprehensive peace Rabin and Barak had sought is off the agenda, for at least another generation. In the meantime, Sharon says, Israel will continue to live, as it always has, with a sword in one hand, hammering out clear-eyed interim agreements where possible along the way, while rekindling Zionist education of Israel's youth and attracting another 1 million Jewish immigrants to bolster its defenses...
...When the Oslo peace process began in 1993, a cautious Yitzchak Rabin insisted that any exchange of territory for intangible promises of peace must include a provision calling for Palestinian leaders to cease from engaging in "hostile propaganda" against Jews and Israel. Toning down the rhetoric of hate was a necessary prelude to resolving all other issues. Unfortunately, Rabin's core request has never been addressed...
...needs to watch his back. Mikhail Gorbachev won in 1990 and was tossed into oblivion in 1991. Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho were honored in 1973 for negotiating to end the Vietnam War - which didn't end until 1975, on terms hardly flattering to Kissinger. Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat were the winners in 1994; Rabin was assassinated, Arafat is embattled, and peace in the Middle East is becoming even more remote...
...Oslo, the greatest trophy of Arafat's career, is history. The gap in expectations turned out to be too wide for Israelis and Palestinians to close, the peace process itself too flawed to produce a magic solution. Even if Sharon comes and goes, as Barak, Netanyahu, Peres and Rabin did before him, Arafat must discover a new way of dealing with the Israelis. Otherwise, he will never persuade them to give the Palestinians what they want. Many Palestinians believe their fortunes will improve only when Arafat's domination of their affairs ends. "Democracy is needed," says Haider Abdel Shafi...