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It's Time to Put Final Status Issues on the Table

With Condoleezza Rice preparing to return to the Middle East to rally support for the upcoming Arab-Israeli peace summit at Annapolis, the time has come to finally put the big issues on the table.

Rice's original goal was to hold the conference in November, but the tepid responses in the region have forced the Secretary of State to postpone the event--what promises to be the first multilateral peace summit since Madrid in 1991--until December.

Rice's legacy is on the line here. If she hopes to be seen as a great Secretary of State, then Annapolis must lead to substantive progress toward peace, and not just another meaningless photo-op.

But success will require both the Israelis and the United States to change their approaches to negotiations: stop trying to avoid the "final status" issues, and instead put them front and center. Five core issues will need to be addressed in order to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: the boundaries of a future Palestinian state, the refugee question, Jewish settlements in the West Bank, water rights, and Jerusalem.

The general contours of the solution to this century-old conflict have been understood for years. They were laid out at the failed Camp David summit in the summer of 2000 and refined at the Taba talks and in the Clinton Plan of January 2001: in essence, two secure and viable states, sharing Jerusalem. The devil is in the details, and those details are the five final status issues, which Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have "unofficially" discussed, off-and-on, since the first Oslo agreement was signed in September 1993.

The Oslo process was based on the assumption that a series of small, successful steps (such as redeployment of forces and security cooperation) would build a record of accomplishments and mutual trust between Israelis and Palestinians. Momentum from small successes would enable the parties to officially address the larger, final status issues at a later date.

But the Oslo framework was fundamentally flawed. The gradual, piecemeal approach enabled "spoilers" on both sides to step in and derail the process. Hamas and Islamic Jihad suicide terrorism began in the 1990s as a way to shut down Oslo. On the Israeli side, lone acts of terrorism such as Baruch Goldstein's massacre in Hebron and especially Yigal Amir's assassination of Yitzhak Rabin dealt serious blows to the peace process.

Yet it wasn't just extremist spoilers that killed Oslo. The main parties are to blame as well. Yasser Arafat never embraced the ultimate goal of Oslo: genuine peace between Israelis and Palestinians. His sincerity was always in doubt, and his unwillingness or inability to truly accept the existence of Israel became clear at Camp David, when he walked away from the most far-reaching offer ever presented by an Israeli government.

No, it was not a "generous" offer, but it was substantive. If Arafat really wanted to make peace, he would have made a counter-offer at Camp David, or gone on Israeli TV and explained to the Israeli public why he needed 100% of the West Bank and not just 95% to end the conflict. The Israeli public was ready to listen. Instead, and against the advice of his own entourage, Arafat rejected everything and stormed back to Ramallah. When the moment of truth arrived, he preferred violence over negotiation.

But Israel also shares blame for Oslo's failure. Jewish settlement expansion has continued unabated from 1993 until today. The Jewish population in the occupied West Bank has doubled since the Rabin-Arafat handshake on the White House lawn. As Palestinian historian Rashid Khalidi once said in a conversation, from the Palestinian perspective, "negotiating with Israelis is like negotiating over a pizza--while one side keeps eating the pieces."

Because actions speak louder than words in this conflict, there is no trust left between Israelis and Palestinians. Palestinian promises to end terrorism appear meaningless when juxtaposed with blown-up buses, Qassam rockets, and Palestinian cartoon characters calling for "death to the Jews." And Israeli (and American) talk of Palestinian statehood only inspire cynicism when contrasted with the reality of more bypass roads, more land seizures, and more Jewish housing developments in the West Bank.

Oslo's small-step approach long ago lost its efficacy. If Rice's peace summit is to have even a chance of success, addressing the final status issues must top the Annapolis agenda.

But before getting to Annapolis, the Secretary of State and her boss need to leverage America's special relationship with Israel and demand the immediate halt of Jewish settlement expansion. There is no excuse for allowing Israel to continue its counterproductive expansion of settlements in the West Bank--most of which will have to be dismantled anyway in a future peace agreement.

Some will argue that such a unilateral act would signal that Israel is "giving in" to terrorism. But for decades, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been characterized by a significant asymmetry of power. Even as Israelis (and American Jews) feel vulnerable to Palestinian terrorism, the reality is that Israel holds all the high cards. With the flick of a switch, Israel could shut off the lights in Gaza.

Instead, the US demand for an immediate halt to settlement expansion would greatly enhance Rice's credibility as a third party mediator, bolster the Israeli peace camp, and provide Olmert the cover to reject demands of the Israeli Right. It would also make it easier for key Arab states to join us at the table, and could instantly enhance Mahmoud Abbas' legitimacy and credibility in the eyes of ordinary Palestinians.

Rice's legacy is on the line, as is President Bush's. Now is the time for bold action.

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