Get real, Hamas

[Behind the Aegis]

WHETHER THE impetus was a shaky cease-fire in the Gaza Strip or President Bush's visit to the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday unexpectedly extended an olive branch to the Palestinians. If the Palestinian Authority — including the Islamic party Hamas — doesn't respond in kind, it will be yet another golden opportunity for Mideast peace squandered.

Speaking against the backdrop of a truce designed to end months of violence in Gaza, Olmert offered to engage Palestinians in new talks to create something even many liberal Israelis once considered unthinkable: an independent Palestinian state.

Declaring that "I hold out my hand in peace to our Palestinian neighbors in the hope that it won't be returned empty," Olmert offered to uproot Jewish settlements in the West Bank, reduce the number of checkpoints, unfreeze funds withheld from the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority and release "numerous Palestinian prisoners, including ones who are sentenced to lengthy prison terms."

In exchange, the nascent state of Palestine, and its Hamas-led Cabinet, would have to recognize Israel's right to exist, and Hamas would have to return Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was captured in June. The stage would then be set for negotiations toward the two-state solution envisioned in the "road map" for peace endorsed in 2002 by the United States, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union.

more...

[leveymg]

1. It's an empty offer from a hand that's already turning cold and white

Check out LBN - al-Sadr just pulled the Shi'a out of the Maliki government. Some idiot at the Saudi Embassy in DC said the Saudis will intervene to save the Sunni.

The lid just blew off the pot.:nuke: Classic too little, too late from Olmert.

[Behind the Aegis]

2. Then why bother?

[leveymg]

3. Either there'll be some sort of comprehensive regional settlement --

which the Israeli Right and Dubya are likely to reject -- or things are going to spin out of control, quite soon.

The next phase of the game is a Turkish-Kurdish war, with Turkey working with Iran. That more or less dashes efforts to cement Turkey into the EEU and NATO. It also puts the U.S. on a crash course with the Europeans.

Then, there's the growing Shi'a minority in Saudi Arabia, and the potential for an insurgency there. Do you think 6000 Saudi Princes are going to put that one down? What will be the result of a civil war on Saudi oil exports, and then happens to world markets?

You have to admit that the GOP and Likud-Kadima have managed to paint the U.S. and Isreal into a corner. There are no easy answers left. The last-minute offer to Hamas was a Hail-Mary pass, as was Baker's confab with Abdullah. It's become clear, either there's a Grand Deal struck with Iran, or shit hits the fan.

That prospect doesn't fill me with glee.

[Behind the Aegis]

4. Sounds like the terrorists on both sides have won.

On one side you have the right-wing fringe in the US and Israel making demands, then, on the other you have those who have no more interest in a lasting peace than the other side. However, what I find most disillusioning is the failure to understand that it takes at least two to tango, yet, more often than not, one tango partner is given a pass.

There will never be an easy answer, especially in regards to the Middle East. At this point, I feel all we may ever see is a stalemate.

[leveymg]

5. The Grand Entente of 1913 was a stalemate.

All it took to break it was a couple lost wars by the Czar in the Balkins and an agent provocateur to arm some crazy Serbs, and -- :nuke:-- it all blew up. Fin d' epoch.

I'm afraid the situation today is even more unstable, and far more dangerous. I think only the oil companies are going to win this one.

The Bushes are our Romanovs, and even Nicholas II was more capable than W.

[pelsar]

6. regional settlement?...are you nuts?

any kind of "regional settlement" that involves hizballa, hamas, al aska, etc etc etc...is simply looking for some kind of temporary "fragile" peace accord.....lebanon would be a good example of that. (civil war anyone?)

the only what peace will break out is when the palestenians and israelis start with small steps...with the greater responsability lying with the palestenains.

they have to create some kind of stable govt that can keep their own terrorists from shooting missles...that would be their first step. Step two would be to recognize israel....simple words.

at that point, gaza would be have enough freedom (assuming egypt agrees) to start developing a real society...after that its easy....

all local, keep out al quida, hizballa, syria and their guests etc

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[sabbat hunter]

9. Turkey is unlikely to side with Iran

Turkey is a fairly modern secular nation, and is also Sunni. it will fight against an independent Kurdistan, but will not side with Iran.

[leveymg]

11. Turkish and Iranian units already are coordinating bombardment

of Kurdish PKK bases on their shared borders.

There's a received and a real mutual interest to put down the separatist movement. See, www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=36445

Turkey, Iran agree on active cooperation against terror
Thursday, February 23, 2006

ANKARA - Turkish Daily News


Turkish and Iranian officials have decided to enter into active bilateral cooperation in the fight against terrorism and signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) late on Tuesday in Tehran. The decision came at the end of a three-day meeting of Turkish and Iranian officials who had gathered in the Iranian capital for the 11th round of Turkey-Iran High Security Commission meetings. Head of the Turkish delegation Interior Ministry Undersecretary Şahabettin Harput and his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad-Baqer Zolqadr, signed the MoU on the two countries' active cooperation against terrorism.

Delivering speeches at a ceremony held for the signing of the MoU, both Harput and Zolqadr described talks as “positive and constructive,” the Anatolia news agency reported. The substance of the MoU in brief is “the region becoming a peaceful land which is purified from all kinds of terror,” according to Harput.

Ankara has similar concerns as Tehran in regards to mutual neighbor Iraq and the threat posed by members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is carrying out attacks on Turkish soil. The group is also believed to be behind ongoing ethnic unrest in Iran's northwest.

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