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A Wish List, Not a Road Map
(Financial Times-UK) Shlomo Avineri - The Middle East "road map" is a wish list, not a map, setting down the rough contours of what should be the nature of a Middle East peace, with the emergence of a Palestinian state living peacefully next to Israel. But why do the U.S. and the other members of the "quartet" believe they can now succeed when the same ideas failed so dismally to achieve a peaceful outcome at Camp David and Taba in 2000? The road map does not take into account the political realities that led to failure to reach agreement in 2000. Most Israelis who supported the Oslo accords are no longer convinced that the Palestinians are reconciled to the existence of Israel. The political will - on all sides - does not exist for an overall agreement. In other recent inter-ethnic conflicts - Kosovo, Bosnia, Cyprus, and Kashmir - the conventional wisdom is that a definitive "solution" is unreachable. Only in the Middle East does the conventional wisdom persist that a solution can be found. Yet here, too, one should aim at conflict management, not an elusive solution to the conflict.