Friday, May 30, 2003

Middle East Balance? QUOTE OF THE DAY "The world we want can only be achieved when we truly care for the well being of everyone on this planet." - - Rabbi Michael Lerner MAY 30th IN HISTORY: 1909 - - National Conference on the Negro convened, resulting in the formation of the NAACP. RHINO HERE: With the recent Mid-East PR push by the shrub gang dubbed "The Road Map To Peace", and yesterday's meeting between Ariel Sharon & the new Palestinian Prime Minister Abbas, and the planned meeting between them & bush the lesser, those relying on the major media for their info might believe peace by shrub is a possibility. Rhino wishes it were so. But given the main mover behind the White House scenes of these events is the man who facilitated & protected Central American dictators who were murdering their people in the 80's & lied to Congress while doing it, Elliot Abrams... Back in Political Forefront Iran-Contra Figure Plays Key Role on Mideast Back in Political Forefront ...and given that the "Roadmap" doesn't mandate any substantial land concessions by the Israeli Government, while making the Palestinian "Authority" responsible for controlling Hamas et al, which everyone knows they can't, the plan seems doomed, if the real intent is to create peace. Meanwhile, Congressman & Democratic Candidate for President Dennis Kucinich, (D-OH), working with Rabbi Michael Lerner of the Tikkun Community, are holding a "Teach-in to Congress" on Mideast peace in Washington DC June 1-4. They are putting forth what seems to me to be the most reasonable proposal for creating an atmosphere in which both sides might see a way to live together, if that's truly what both sides want. They're asking for assistance in the effort & I urge those interested to read their proposal, sign their petition and say a prayer or 2 for their efforts. The Resolution to Present to Congress at The Tikkun Teach-In, June 1-4, 2003 A Balanced Solution to the Middle East Mess Tikkun Community | 08.28.2002 http://www.tikkun.org/index.cfm/action/teachin2003/mode/resolution.html Sign The Resolution At: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/Tikkun/petition.html 7:31:29 AM    comment

RHINO'S BOTTOM LINE - Middle East Charade RHINO'S BOTTOM LINE Middle East Charade by Rabbi Michael Lerner After reassuring his colleagues on the Israeli Right that he has no intention of abandoning any of the major settlements which he helped to create to guarantee that Israel would retain control over most of the West Bank, Ariel Sharon publicly "accepted" the Road Map to Peace proposed by President Bush. While retaining control over most of the West Bank, Sharon will now be willing to talk about a Palestinian state in what amounts to less than 12% of pre-1948 Palestine. To show his "good faith," Sharon will dismantle some of the many settlements that have been set up by handfuls of Israeli nationalists in the past two years, while Israel retains control over most of the settlements in which some 240,000 Jews have created a de facto Occupation on the West Bank. To protect those more serious settlements which he boasted in the 1980s would create "facts on the ground" that would forever guarantee Israeli control over much of the West Bank, Sharon is now portraying himself as a "realist" and is willing to allow Palestinians control over what will be a country that is smaller and less economically viable than Long Island. For the sake of achieving these essentially meaningless concessions, the Palestinians will have to prove that they can control Hamas and suppress all those who might engage in acts of violence against Israeli civilians. Otherwise, Israel will no longer be required to follow through with this road map and actually grant Palestinians the sham state Ariel Sharon envisions. Palestinian Prime Minister Abbas may grab at any straw being offered to him by President Bush, but he and other Palestinian moderates are unlikely to be able to convince the extremists that they have achieved some significant victory or that the prospect of continued Israeli occupation over the majority of the West Bank seems like an outcome worthy of abandoning their armed struggle. The best the moderates can say to the extremists is, "If you end violence now, then we can travel down this path at the end of which will lie...a negotiation about what a Palestinian state will be." Well, for those who understand that such a negotiation between a powerful Israel and a powerless Palestinian people is not likely to produce much more than the outcome Ariel Sharon describes to his right-wing audiences. What would work? President Bush could reverse the order of his Road Map, insisting that the negotiations about the final settlement take place now, at the moment that the US has the greatest post-Iraq war credibility with Israelis who should feel some appreciation for the U.S. willingness to destroy the hostile Iraqi regime. A final settlement that provided Palestinians with a state that roughly approximated the size and integrity of the pre-1967 West Bank and Gaza would be a serious accomplishment sufficient to build a majority Palestinian support for peace. Once that had been agreed upon, Palestinian moderates could win the war for the minds of their own people, and while some acts of violence would almost certainly continue, Hamas and related violent groups would become increasingly isolated as the Palestinian majority sought to implement the rest of the Road Map. Instead, the current plan rewards the terrorists and violence-prone on both sides. It communicates a clear message: "We know that you oppose a peaceful resolution of this conflict. To get your way, all you have to do is engage in acts of violence, provoke the other side, and then we will give you just what you want-a halt to any progress down this road to peace." So the charade is win/win for Ariel Sharon and President Bush. Sharon can appear to be making dramatic concessions while in fact giving little besides dismantling of a few trailer homes on remote hills that he has labeled "illegal settlements" (as if there were any other kind). Bush portrays himself as having delivered on his promise to make serious progress toward Israel/Palestinian peace without actually demanding an end to the Occupation, and his Road Map conveniently postpones the moment of reckoning till after the 2004 elections. Yet for those of us who are aware of the painful suffering that the Occupation has brought to the Palestinian people and that acts of terror have brought to the Israeli people, this latest round of false promises and road maps leading nowhere will generate yet a new level of sadness at an opportunity that is still being missed. The Resolution for Middle East Peace (http://www.tikkun.org/index.cfm/action/teachin2003/mode/resolution.html) being introduced by Congressman Dennis Kucinich on behalf of the Tikkun Community takes on even greater importance given this charade. The Resolution specifies exactly what Bush's Road Map leaves out: the details of a settlement that would be balanced and fair to both sides. It calls for a Palestinian state that would be created in all of the West Bank and Gaza (except, as Palestinians and Israelis agreed at their negotiations at Taba in 2001 just before Ariel Sharon was elected, for "minor border adjustments" to ensure that the Jewish sections of Jerusalem including the Wall could be part of Israel), reparations for Palestinian refugees (but also for Jews who fled Arab lands, plus funds to resettle West Bank settlers back inside the pre-67 borders of Israel), serious military arrangements to provide lasting safety for both Israel and Palestine, and support for a process of Truth and Reconciliation between the two sides aimed at fostering a new spirit of generosity and healing between the two sides. If you can't come to Washington-and it's not too late to register now at www.tikkun.org (http://www.tikkun.org) or by calling (510) 526-6889, you could still help us by calling your Congressional representative and asking them to endorse the Resolution for Middle East Peace and, minimally, to come to the teach-in the morning of June 3rd when it will be held at 2261 Rayburn House Office Building between 10 a.m. and noon. And we ask you to continue to collect signatures and endorsements of community groups, religious institutions, and elected officials all through the next year, so that we can present this perspective to the national conventions of the various political parties and educate them about why the Road Map isn't working and what could be done to change that. And we invite you to join us in doing this kind of local education by creating The Tikkun Community in your location and doing outreach around these ideas (contact us: community@tikkun.org). So, when you hear the president and the prime minister of Israel talking about how sorry they are that isolated acts of violence have made it impossible for them to continue to insist on ending the occupation, you'll know how distorted their story really is-and can explain that to others. In the long run, the power of the Tikkun Community will derive not from our (non-existent) financial power-on that front we will never be able to compete with the pro-Ariel Sharon lobby-but from the strength of our moral vision and our consistent intellectual analysis. And all of that strength lies on our most basic spiritual understanding: that every human being is equally precious, that our fates our fundamentally intertwined, that we are part of the Unity of All Being, and that the world we want can only be achieved when we truly care for the well being of everyone on this planet. Whether you be a secular humanist, a meditator, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Jew, a Christian, a Muslim or a devout atheist, if you are willing to build a politics based on that recognition, and to publicly affirm the possibility of a world based on kindness and generosity, you should join the Tikkun Community and help us figure out the next steps. Love and blessings, Rabbi Michael Lerner Community@tikkun.org "RHINO'S BLOG" is the responsibility of Gary Rhine. (rhino@kifaru.com) Feedback, and requests to be added or deleted from the list are encouraged. SEARCH BLOG ARCHIVES / SURF RHINO'S LINKS, AT: http://www.rhinosblog.info RHINO'S OTHER WEB SITES: http://www.dreamcatchers.org (INDIGENOUS ASSISTANCE & INTERCULTURAL DIALOG) http://www.kifaru.com (NATIVE AMERICAN RELATIONS VIDEO DOCUMENTARIES) Articles are reprinted under Fair Use Doctrine of international copyright law. http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html All copyrights belong to original publisher. 6:42:02 AM    comment

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