Abir Dandis, the mother of the two girls who were murdered in the Negev town of Al-Fura’a last week, couldn't find a police officer to listen to her warnings, neither in Arad nor in Ma’ale Adumim. Both police stations operate in areas where Israel wants to gather the Bedouin into permanent communities, against their will, in order to clear more land for Jewish communities. The dismissive treatment Dandis received shows how the Bedouin are considered simply to be lawbreakers by their very nature. But as a resident of the West Bank asking for help for her daughters, whose father was Israeli, Dandis faced the legal-bureaucratic maze created by the Oslo Accords.

The Palestinian police is not allowed to arrest Israeli civilians. It must hand suspects over to the Israel Police. The Palestinian police complain that in cases of Israelis suspected of committing crimes against Palestinian residents, the Israel Police tend not to investigate or prosecute them.

In addition, the town of Al-Azaria, where Dandis lives, is in Area B, under Palestinian civilian authority and Israeli security authority. According to the testimony of Palestinian residents, neither the IDF nor the Israel Police has any interest in internal Palestinian crime even though they have both the authority and the obligation to act in Area B.

The Palestinian police are limited in what it can do in Area B. Bringing in reinforcements or carrying weapons in emergency situations requires coordination with, and obtaining permission from, the IDF. If Dandis fears that the man who murdered her daughters is going to attack her as well, she has plenty of reason to fear that she will not receive appropriate, immediate police protection from either the Israelis or the Palestinians.

Dandis told Jack Khoury of Haaretz that the Ma’ale Adumim police referred her to the Palestinian Civil Affairs Coordination and Liaison Committee. Theoretically, this committee (which is subordinate to the Civil Affairs Ministry) is the logical place to go for such matters. Its parallel agency in Israel is the Civilian Liaison Committee (which is part of the Coordination and Liaison Administration - a part of the Civil Administration under the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories).

In their meetings, they are supposed to discuss matters such as settlers’ complaints about the high volume of the loudspeakers at mosques or Palestinians’ complaints about attacks by settlers. But the Palestinians see the Liaison Committee as a place to submit requests for permission to travel to Israel, and get the impression that its clerks do not have much power when faced with their Israeli counterparts. In any case, the coordination process is cumbersome and long.

The Palestinian police has a family welfare unit, and activists in Palestinian women’s organizations say that in recent years, its performance has improved. But, as stated, it has no authority over Israeli civilians and residents. Several non-governmental women’s groups also operate in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and women in similar situations approach them for help. The manager of one such organization told Haaretz that Dandis also fell victim to this confusing duplication of procedures and laws. Had Dandis approached her, she said, she would have referred her to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which has expertise in navigating Israel’s laws and authorities.

John Kerry revealed his long-awaited plan for peace in the Middle East on Sunday, hinging on a $4bn (£2.6bn) investment in the Palestinian private sector.

The US secretary of state, speaking at the World Economic Forum on the Jordanian shores of the Dead Sea, told an audience including Israeli president Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas that an independent Palestinian economy is essential to achieving a sustainable peace.

Speaking under the conference banner "Breaking the Impasse", Kerry announced a plan that he promised would be "bigger, bolder and more ambitious" than anything since the Oslo accords, more than 20 years ago.

Tony Blair is to lead a group of private sector leaders in devising a plan to release the Palestinian economy from its dependence on international donors. The initial findings of Blair's taskforce, Kerry boasted, were "stunning", predicting a 50% increase in Palestinian GDP over three years, a cut of two-thirds in unemployment rates and almost double the Palestinian median wage. Currently, 40% of the Palestinian economy is supplied by donor aid.

Kerry assured Abbas that the economic plan was not a substitute for a political solution, which remains the US's "top priority".

Peres, who had taken the stage just minutes before, also issued a personal plea to his Palestinian counterpart to return to the negotiations.

"Let me say to my dear friend President Abbas," Peres said, "Should we really dance around the table? Lets sit together. You'll be surprised how much can be achieved in open, direct and organised meetings."

Thick locks hug the front gates of shuttered shops, now covered in graffiti and dust from lack of use. Only a handful of customers pass along the dimly lit road, sometimes stopping to check the ripeness of fruits and vegetables, or ordering meat in near-empty butcher shops.

“All the shops are closed. I’m the only one open. This used to be the best place,” said 64-year-old Mustafa Sunocret, selling vegetables out of a small storefront in the marketplace near his family’s home in the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City.

Amidst the brightly coloured scarves, clothes and carpets, ceramic pottery and religious souvenirs filling the shops of Jerusalem’s historic Old City, Palestinian merchants are struggling to keep their businesses alive.

Faced with worsening health problems, Sunocret told IPS that he cannot work outside of the Old City, even as the cost of maintaining his shop, with high electricity, water and municipal tax bills to pay, weighs on him.

“I only have this shop,” he said. “There is no other work. I’m tired.”

Abed Ajloni, the owner of an antiques shop in the Old City, owes the Jerusalem municipality 250,000 Israeli shekels (68,300 U.S. dollars) in taxes. He told IPS that almost every day, the city’s tax collectors come into the Old City, accompanied by Israeli police and soldiers, to pressure people there to pay.

“It feels like they’re coming again to occupy the city, with the soldiers and police,” Ajloni, who has owned the same shop for 35 years, told IPS. “But where can I go? What can I do? All my life I was in this place.”

He added, “Does Jerusalem belong to us, or to someone else? Who’s responsible for Jerusalem? Who?”

Illegal annexation

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, including the Old City, in 1967. In July 1980, it passed a law stating that “Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel”. But Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem and subsequent application of Israeli laws over the entire city remain unrecognised by the international community.

Under international law, East Jerusalem is considered occupied territory – along with the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Syrian Golan Heights – and Palestinian residents of the city are protected under the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Jerusalem has historically been the economic, political and cultural centre of life for the entire Palestinian population. But after decades languishing under destructive Israeli policies meant to isolate the city from the rest of the Occupied Territories and a lack of municipal services and investment, East Jerusalem has slipped into a state of poverty and neglect.

“After some 45 years of occupation, Arab Jerusalemites suffer from political and cultural schizophrenia, simultaneously connected with and isolated from their two hinterlands: Ramallah and the West Bank to their east, West Jerusalem and Israel to the west,” the International Crisis Group recently wrote.

Israeli restrictions on planning and building, home demolitions, lack of investment in education and jobs, construction of an eight-foot-high separation barrier between and around Palestinian neighbourhoods and the creation of a permit system to enter Jerusalem have all contributed to the city’s isolation.

Formal Palestinian political groups have also been banned from the city, and between 2001-2009, Israel closed an estimated 26 organisations, including the former Palestinian Liberation Organisation headquarters in Jerusalem, the Orient House and the Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce.

Extreme poverty

Israel’s policies have also led to higher prices for basic goods and services and forced many Palestinian business owners to close shop and move to Ramallah or other Palestinian neighbourhoods on the other side of the wall. Many Palestinian Jerusalemites also prefer to do their shopping in the West Bank, or in West Jerusalem, where prices are lower.

While Palestinians constitute 39 percent of the city’s population today, almost 80 percent of East Jerusalem residents, including 85 percent of children, live below the poverty line.

“How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t control your resources? How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t have any control of your borders?” said Zakaria Odeh, director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, of “this kind of fragmentation, checkpoints, closure”.

“Without freedom of movement of goods and human beings, how could you develop an economy?” he asked.

“You can’t talk about independent economy in Jerusalem or the West Bank or in all of Palestine without a political solution. We don’t have a Palestinian economy; we have economic activities. That’s all we have,” Odeh told IPS.

Israel’s separation barrier alone, according to a new report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTD), has caused a direct loss of over one billion dollars to Palestinians in Jerusalem, and continues to incur 200 million dollars per year in lost opportunities.

Israel’s severing and control over the Jerusalem-Jericho road – the historical trade route that connected Jerusalem to the rest of the West Bank and Middle East – has also contributed to the city’s economic downturn.

Separation of Jerusalem from West Bank

Before the First Intifada (Arabic for “uprising”) began in the late 1980s, East Jerusalem contributed approximately 14 to 15 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the Occupied Palestinian territories (OPT). By 2000, that number had dropped to less than eight percent; in 2010, the East Jerusalem economy, compared to the rest of the OPT, was estimated at only seven percent.

“Economic separation resulted in the contraction in the relative size of the East Jerusalem economy, its detachment from the remaining OPT and the gradual redirection of East Jerusalem employment towards the Israeli labour market,” the U.N. report found.

Decades ago, Israel adopted a policy to maintain a so-called “demographic balance” in Jerusalem and attempt to limit Palestinian residents of the city to 26.5 percent or less of the total population.

To maintain this composition, Israel built numerous Jewish-Israeli settlements inside and in a ring around Jerusalem and changed the municipal boundaries to encompass Jewish neighbourhoods while excluding Palestinian ones.

It is now estimated that 90,000 Palestinians holding Jerusalem residency rights live on the other side of the separation barrier and must cross through Israeli checkpoints in order to reach Jerusalem for school, medical treatment, work, and other services.

“Israel is using all kinds of tools to push the Palestinians to leave; sometimes they are visible, and sometimes invisible tools,” explained Ziad al-Hammouri, director of the Jerusalem Centre for Social and Economic Rights (JCSER).

Al-Hammouri told IPS that at least 25 percent of the 1,000 Palestinian shops in the Old City were closed in recent years as a result of high municipal taxes and a lack of customers. “Taxation is an invisible tool…as dangerous as revoking ID cards and demolishing houses,” he said. “Israel will use this as pressure and as a tool in the future to confiscate these shops and properties.”

In 1974 I had a meeting with Aaron Yariv, then Minister of Information in Israel. As expected we discussed the Arab Israeli conflict and how to promote a peace process. Two points were highlighted. First, negotiation is the only viable way because neither side would be able to annihilate the other. Second, each party to the conflict would be wise to put itself in the position of the other and imagine how they see the issues and how they would decide in the given circumstances. To illustrate this point, Yariv said that he had followed the development of Yasser Arafat's political career since the 1950s and he has admired his dedication to the Palestinian cause. If he were in Arafat's position, he would have acted the same way that Arafat had acted, except for Arafat's failure to see the issues from Israel's standpoint. In other words, Arafat was not realistic enough for his own cause.

These two highlighted points are relevant to the impending Annapolis Conference between Israel and the Palestinians, sponsored by the United States. However, many questions have been raised to express skepticism, hope, and hopelessness. For example, should a conference be convened without assurances of some success? Who should be invited to participate? Should basic issues be discussed or should the emphasis be on principles and general confidence building procedures? Should the conveners expect resolutions or consider this conference as the start of negotiations? Many other questions are raised, especially by the media, with comments and predictions that might influence the expectations and results. However, experienced negotiators would try to remain immune to influence by others, especially by those who are much less informed than they themselves are.

The main principles of an agreement are well known. 1) Two states, Israel and Palestine, will coexist peacefully side by side in the pre-1948 territory known as Palestine, within boundaries established by the United Nations 242 and 338 Resolutions, which have been generally agreed to by both Israelis and Palestinians. Deviation from the designated boundaries would be negotiated, with land swapping and compensation as helpful instruments to stay within the framework of the UN resolutions.

2) The same principle applies to Jerusalem, which, according to the United Nations, should be international, demilitarized, and open to both Israelis and Palestinians to use as their political capital. Thus, the Israelis and Palestinians will each get their wish to have Jerusalem as their capital, the holy and historical places will be secure, and the city will be open to all visitors, regardless of nationality, belief, or denomination.

3) The Palestinian refugees and the Right of Return have been subject to rhetorical declarations and pronouncements since 1949, though little has been done to agree on a solution. To the Palestinians, the Right of Return has become like a religion, and so has its denial by Israel. Realism in this case would be a good first step in the direction of an agreement. Would the Palestinians, if they were to put themselves in Israel's position, agree to welcome 4 million Jews as future citizens of their state? Would the Israelis, if they were to put themselves in the Palestinian's position, forget the land they had departed or forced out from only half a century ago, especially if the United Nations had resolved they have a right of return to it? Actually the Jews claim a right of return to a land they departed or were forced out from two thousand years ago. However, realism and cooperation between the Palestinians and Israelis would smooth the way out of this stalemate in the direction of a solution. For instance, a symbolic acceptance of the right of return of each party by the other would be a first step; offering compensation for land and assets left behind would help; opening the way for Palestinian settlement elsewhere would be a viable alternative for many; a fourth argument for realism is the fact that many Jews departed or were forced out of the Arab countries since 1948 and were absorbed within Israel. One could argue that population exchange has been applied, although the Palestinian and the Jewish refugees were not consulted. The hope is that the negotiators will be realistic enough to see the issues from the adversary's side as well and be courageous enough to recognize the solution and express it strongly and precisely.

4) The other resources, including water, minerals, air and sea space would be shared according to a negotiated formula, and guided by the United Nations and international law. Good will and cooperation would be great facilitators in this case.

Now Israel is presenting a new condition for peace: Recognition of Israel by the Arabs, including the Palestinians, as state of the Jewish people. This condition has attracted many groans from around the Arab and Islamic countries. Again realism may be helpful. All the Arab countries belong to the Organization of the Islamic Conference, thus declaring their Islamic identity. Pakistan calls itself the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Egypt, Libya, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates identify themselves as Arab states. Israel's condition does not imply any more than either of these ways of identification imply. In fact some of the Islamic and Arab countries have more restrictions against other religions and nationalities than Israel does.

The Fall Conference at Annapolis would have more chance of success if the number of participants is limited to those directly involved in the negotiations, and to international institutions with experience in conflict resolution. Another criterion for participation would be the ability and experience to apply rational and secular principles to the negotiations and to the expectations from the conference, pressures and predictions by others notwithstanding.

This is a great opportunity to negotiate an agreement and finalize a solution. President Abbas and Prime Minister Olmert are both ready and willing. President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice are anxious to bring about peace in the Middle East. The peace process has been outlined in the Road Map adopted by the Quartet (The US, Russia, The EU, and the UN), and has been given general acceptance by Israel and Palestine. In the meantime, the Palestinians are suffering from the Israeli occupation, unemployment, poverty, and violence. The Israelis are also suffering from violence, anxiety, and uncertainty regarding the future. Even though the Conference may not offer final solutions to all the issues, it would be invaluable to try to resolve some if not all issues. It would be equally invaluable if the negotiators stay in session until a peace agreement has been concluded. Of course, it would be a great loss if the Conference fails, but it would a greater loss if an attempt is not made.

Professor emeritus of economics, University of California, Davis, CA.

Yasser Arafat has been eulogized as founder of Palestinian nationalism, unifier of the various liberation and resistance movements, trouble maker in neighboring Arab countries, compromiser with Israel for peace, and the obstacle to peace during the last five years of his life. Arafat was a complex man, a consensus seeker, and an autocrat in the Arab rulers' fashion. Above all he was a symbol of the Palestinian struggle for statehood and independence of Palestine. Now that he is gone there is a chorus heralding new opportunities for peace, especially in the American media and in Israel.

President George W. Bush and Premier Ariel Sharon were first among those who saw new opportunities for peace in the absence of Arafat, even though they had pursued the misguided policy of deeming him irrelevant and confined him to his largely demolished headquarters. Both leaders have urged the Palestinians to replace Arafat with leaders with whom they could negotiate. The transition of power after Arafat, to the surprise of many, has been smooth and in accordance with the Palestine National Council's charter.

Does this mean that the peace process will resume with renewed hopes for an Arab-Israeli peace agreement? The answer is yes and no, depending on what the Israeli and American governments expect from the new Palestinian government and what they offer in return.

The fact that Arafat, the symbol of Palestinian nationalism, has died does not change the political objectives of the Palestinian people. They still want an independent state within the internationally recognized borders of pre-June 1967, as per UN resolutions 242 and 338; a shared if not divided Jerusalem; compensation if not the return of the Palestinian refugees; and control of their natural resources. Whoever the leaders are, it would be difficult for them to compromise on these objectives. If the Israelis, supported by the U.S., respect those Palestinian objectives and work with the new leaders toward realizing them, the new opportunities for peace will be real and peace may be realized in a relatively short order. On the other hand, if the Israelis and Americans focus only on their own objectives, the new opportunities for peace may prove to be figments of their own imagination.

For example, Bush has made it his doctrine to transform the Middle East, including Palestine, into democracies of the American style, on the assumption that democracies do not allow terrorism and do not fight their "democratic" neighbors. Sharon wants security for Israel and large parts of the Palestinian territory, and peace. Unfortunately these Bush/Sharon objectives are not easy to reconcile with the basic Palestinian goals.

First, the institution of an electoral democracy in Palestine does not mean Palestinians will become more flexible with regard to their objectives than they were under Arafat. On the contrary, an elected government may feel more confident in safeguarding the basic objectives than an autocratic revolutionary government in transition. Second, a democracy "imposed" by the outside, through blackmail or ensnaring, is unlikely to gain popular support for compromise on the main objectives. The pending "electoral democracy" in Palestine is bound to be too superficial to count on for mobilizing popular support and consensus if major compromises are demanded.

Thus, the death of Arafat and his replacement by elected leaders do not guarantee that peace negotiations will be more successful than they have been so far. In fact, counting on Palestinian (and Arab) democracy to open the gates to a peaceful settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict may be a big miscalculation. The Arabs, including the Palestinians, at this time have great disdain for the Bush and Sharon democracies because of the destruction and cruelty they have inflicted on the Iraqi and Palestinian people respectively. Sharon wanted Arafat out because he considered him a terrorist and an obstacle to peace, by which he means peace on his own (Sharon's) terms. If that is still his concept of an acceptable peace, there is little reason to expect a new elected, reformed, and fully accountable Palestinian government to be more conciliatory and cooperative with Sharon than was Arafat. Actually such a government may be less capable than Arafat of compromising on basic issues because it is unlikely to have as much clout in facing Israel or the Palestinian opponents of peace with Israel. In that case, the opportunities for peace perceived by Bush, Sharon, and the western media would be no more than daydreams and wishful thinking, unless, of course, both Sharon and Bush are ready to look at the Palestinian objectives and capabilities in more realistic ways.

Bush has led the "Quartet" (the UN, Russia, the EU and the US) into creating the "road map" to peace on the basis of UN resolutions 242 and 338 and two sovereign states side by side. The least Bush needs to do to make the new opportunities for peace a reality is to reaffirm his commitment to the road map, the 1967 boundaries, and the two-state solution. He would enhance the new opportunities for peace by refraining from offering blind support to Sharon's policies regarding the Palestinian people and territory. By doing so he would gain confidence of a large majority of the Palestinians as a sincere and even-handed promoter of peace in the Mideast.

However, the crux of the peace opportunities that may have been generated by Arafat's absence lies in the court of Sharon and his government.

Bush can influence but cannot decide for Israel. The new Palestinian leaders can cooperate with Sharon but they cannot decide for him either.

First and foremost, Sharon and his government must express their respect for the legitimate Palestinian objectives, including their own independent state within the pre-June1967 borders; their rights to a shared if not divided Jerusalem; and the rights of the Palestinian refugees to compensation if not to return to Israel.

While Israel may not agree to offer these Palestinian goals on a silver platter, the least it can - and must - do is promise that these objectives are reachable. If Israel promises to cooperate toward realizing these objectives without infringing on its own rights, the new Palestinian leaders will acquire leverage and credibility to negotiate not only with Israel, but also with various radical and violence-oriented Palestinian factions. For example, the new leaders must be able to show prospective benefits if they were to control Palestinian violence. They must be able to foresee Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian territories, cessation of targeted assassination, destruction of homes, uprooting of trees, and grabbing of Palestinian land. The new leadership must show its independence from Israel's authority within its own jurisdiction. Its security forces must be able to carry arms to be able to guarantee law and order. How else can the new leaders control violence and secure law and order when a decision to end the Intifada has been made? The opportunities for peace have always been there. The death of Arafat may have opened the eyes and minds of some leaders to see those opportunities.

But those opportunities must be highlighted and activated by the parties to the conflict, and by their mediating supporters, the U.S. on the side of Israel and Egypt on the side of Palestine. The Israelis and the Palestinians have suffered much, though in different degrees, and both are longing for peace and tranquility. It is within the capabilities of their leaders to transform the environment, take some preliminary confidence building steps, reopen the negotiations, and sail ahead, even in the face of a stormy sea, to make peace and security a reality. They cannot blame failure on Arafat any more. Let us hope that they act now and succeed.

It is evident that the United States (US) administration is bent on getting more and more involved in Middle East (ME) affairs, whether the ME people like it or not. Its "illegal" war in Iraq may be a part of its Greater ME Reform Agenda to create a US tailored democracy in all countries of the region. The effects of the war in Iraq are still in the making. Even so, the US seems to be already setting the stage for action in other parts of the ME. The most recent maneuver is the charge (which happens to be true) that Saudi Arabia restricts the freedom of worship within its boundaries. Saudi Arabia's behavior toward freedom of worship has not changed, but the US administration seems to consider the time ripe for confronting Saudi policies in the name of religious freedom as a human right. A more provocative recent action has been the United Nations Security Council resolution sponsored by the US and France, calling on Lebanon to refrain from amending its constitution to allow President Emile Lahoud to stay in office an extra three years without direct election. Though the Security Council resolution is not binding, it definitely expresses the antagonistic position of the US toward the Lebanese government. The resolution also calls on Lebanon to disarm and disband the unauthorized militias, and make the Lebanese army and police the sole armed legal force in the country. By the same token, the resolution calls on Syria to withdraw its troops from Lebanon and end its “occupation” of that country. Even as these declarations and warnings to Syria and Lebanon were being made, a message went to Iran threatening it with some sort of sanction if it does not abandon its nuclear program under UN inspection. This has been followed by a vote by the International Atomic Energy Agency to censure Iran for not halting the uranium enrichment program. There are at least three problems with US/UN declarations and policies. The first relates to the US manipulation of the concept of democracy. The second concerns outside interference in the internal affairs of another country. The third is the biased and un-even-handed US/UN approach to ME issues.

The argument against Lebanon's amendment of the constitution to extend the term of office of its current president is apparently based on various assumptions, such as: that the constitution must be obeyed and sustained as is, no matter what; that the initiative to extend the president's term comes from Syria; and that the amendment of the constitution to extend the term of the president is undemocratic. While respect of the constitution is vital, the Lebanese authorities did not violate their constitution by amending it. The constitution provides for its amendment by the Parliament when deemed necessary. With more than two thirds of the representatives voting for the amendment, it is hard to argue that their action is a violation of the constitution, or that it is undemocratic, given that members of the Parliament were elected in a democratic manner. It is obvious that the US considers the popular vote for a president to be the single most important symbol of democracy, even when more than half of the voting population are illiterate and uninformed, and all the voters are under grave pressure to vote one way or another, with little choice of their own. It would have been more beneficial for democracy and the US standing in the ME had the US/UN applauded Lebanon's compliance with its own constitution and for going about amending it in the constitutional way provided for that purpose, instead of meddling in its internal affairs, or trying to create a schism between Lebanon and its Syrian neighbor.

Interfering in the affairs of other countries is not new to the US. However, by interfering with Lebanon's constitutional action, the US/UN are essentially undermining Lebanon's sovereignty. The problem is that by interfering and undermining the country's sovereignty, the US/UN would be reducing the moral and political credibility of the Lebanese leaders were they to acquiesce and follow the urging of the outside forces. Silent diplomacy to persuade against amending the constitution of Lebanon or extending the term of office for its president would have been more promising of success and more protective of democracy than passing resolutions, especially non-binding ones. This dilemma became evident when the foreign ministers of the other Arab countries found it difficult to endorse the US/UN resolution because it interferes with Lebanon's internal affairs, even though some of them were in agreement with the spirit of the resolution. The UN resolution is in a way threatening to the Arab countries in general because there is no guarantee that similar interference in their own internal affairs would not be forthcoming.

The un-even-handed policy of the US in the ME is legend. The US tolerates autocracy and dictatorship in one country but not in another. It allies itself with one violator of human rights but not with another. And it respects the sovereignty of one country but not of another. Yet the US wonders why certain countries in the region do not cooperate with its policies, especially in matters that affect them directly, such as imposing democratic reform, whether the people of the given country like it or not. One case in point is the call on Syria to withdraw from Lebanon and end its "occupation" of that country, without saying a word to Israel about withdrawing from the Syrian Golan Heights and from the occupied Palestinian territories, as demanded by the UN. It should be noted that Syria came into Lebanon at the request of the Arab League to help stabilize conditions and put an end to its civil war, and it did. Subsequently, Lebanon and Syria agreed (1989) that Syria would withdraw its troops upon negotiation with Lebanon on that matter. So far there is little evidence that either the Arab League or Lebanon has requested Syria to withdraw. That Syria has influence on Lebanese politics, or society does not mean that it stays in Lebanon against the will of the Lebanese people or authorities. Even in this matter, silent diplomacy, patience, cooperation, and even-handedness would be more effective than accusations, threats, and non-binding resolutions.

The same applies to the US/UN position toward Iran's nuclear program. The threat of nuclear weapons, and other Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), is not new. Charges were made against Iraq and now they have been shown to be false or at least overly exaggerated. Syria has been accused of working on the manufacture of nuclear weapons but no evidence has been presented. Now Iran is the target of US/UN pressure to dismantle and abandon its nuclear program, yet no voice has been raised to pressure Israel to abandon its nuclear program, that many believe to be advanced enough to manufacture nuclear weapons. Israel does not even hide the fact that it has a nuclear program. Why, otherwise, would it be distributing radiation sickness pills to people in the neighborhood of its two nuclear generators? Evidently there is myth that Israel can be trusted with WMD, but no other country in the ME can be trusted. In fact no country in East or West can be trusted with WMD. When pressured, the US hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many observers believe that when Israel felt threatened with defeat in the first stages of the Yom Kippur war, it too contemplated use of WMD. Luckily the support of the US and a change in the tide of the war precluded the need to resort to those weapons. And now Israel is issuing warnings that it will not allow nuclear developments in Iran, thus playing the role of self-appointed policeman in the ME. The US watches and evidently approves of Israel's unilateral action, as if it were acting on its own behalf.

Syria ought to withdraw from Lebanon, if the Lebanese want it to withdraw. By the same token, Israel should withdraw from the Golan Heights and from the occupied Palestinian territories because the people in those areas want to be free of occupation. Similarly, Iran should not pursue a program of nuclear weapons, but nor should Israel or any other country in the region. The US would find it much more productive to pursue a policy of silent diplomacy, cooperation and understanding, and even-handedness in promoting democracy, and prevention of nuclear proliferation than resorting to force, threats of force, or biased policies and non-binding resolutions. Whether the US has been trying to provoke confrontation to justify sanctions or military actions against Syria and Iran, as some ME observers believe, is uncertain, but such a policy certainly would be destabilizing and in the long run destructive and counterproductive.