Analysis: Reconsideration of Our Passion for PLO Statehood After Tisha B’av

The time has come to ask all those of us who had supported the concept of a Palestinian Arab state to recognize the error in our ways.

The concept of ceding a sliver of the land to another people may have been a good one. After all, why should neighbors not find a way to make peace with one another.

However, the Arabs reject the idea, and continue to demand that three million of their refugees return to where they came from in 1948 and that the return of the Jews to our land cease and desist.

Those of our fellow Jews who have advocated sovereignty for Palestinian Arabs do not do so out of malice or hatred of the Jewish people.

They advocate such an idea out a theoretical concept of justice and self-determination.

My own personal involvement of twelve years on the Israeli Left led me to meet with and dialogue with many sympathizers to the PLO on the other side.

PLO activists asked what they thought to be reasonable: We will give you peace if you ive up your obsession for Zion.

From Day One of the Oslo process, Arafat has been taking Truth Serum every day and proclaiming to his people that the purpose of the process is the conquest of the entire land.

Three million residents of the UNRWA Arab refugee camps believe him and they ready themselves to join forces with his trained and welll motivated Palestine Liberation Army of 50,000 to liberate the land of Israel.

A guerilla army against a nation with a strong army? Ask the FLN in Algeria and the NLF in Vietnam. These are the models for the PLO

The leaders of Israel, anxious in their passion for peace after one hundred years of war, moved quickly to cede territory and to provide training, arms and cooperation with Arafat’s military forces, while Arafat was arming and training the Hamas.

Yet the tragic mistake was in the speed of the Oslo process.

The late General Aharon Yariv, who conceptualized the very concept of “territory for peace”, put it best: “The Oslo process misinterprets our concept. We never said territory BEFORE peace. We said territory FOR peace”.

The ideal peace deal was with Jordan. Israel made a deal with the Hashemite kingdom in 1970 and signed the deal with King Hussein in 1994. The Jewish state first wanted to see how Hussein would behave. And Israel tested him, during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the 1982 Lebanon invasion, the 1987-93 Intifada and the 1991 Gulf war. Only then did Israel sign a formal peace treaty with King Hussein.

That is not what happened with Arafat, the PLO and the new Palestine Authority. They see the Oslo process as a stage of war with the state of Israel, and they view the ceding of territory as a stage of surrender. Those who support this Olso process should take “Tisha B’av” and its message to take stock of reality.

When Arafat says JIHAD, he means it.