Recognize a Palestinian State Now

By George Thompson

(Scene: the Oval Office. Time: 10 a.m. January 9, one day after the new president is inaugurated. Seated in a semicircle of chairs in front of the president's desk are his closest advisers, including the new secretary of state, Ted Koppel)

PRESIDENT: Good morning, gentlemen. First things first: (checks items on fingers) Gorbachev appears to be fairly firm in the saddle. He's continuing to pull his troops out of Afghanistan, and he's stopped shipping arms to Cuba and Nicaragua. And, with the last of the contras en route to Miami, the Arias peace plan is making progress. There's a good chance the Angola truce will hold. And, now that the Iranians are ready to face reality (slight smile), having released our hostages at an opportune time for us all (pauses as group laughs, then looks at his advisers, his face hardening). Now, it's time to take on the Israel lobby in this country. (Slams hand on desk.) I want us to be the first to recognize a Palestinian state.

That's the way the scene should be played.

Recognizing the PLO and the need for a Palestinian state should be the first item on the president's foreign affairs agenda. Whether it will or will not be is problematic, but the logic for such a move is irrefutable. Only a few other trouble spots looming on the international horizon should be of particular concern to the US. Only South Korea comes anywhere near the Palestinian issue in immediate importance.

Growing pains in Burma, South Africa, and South and Central America should take a back seat to the poverty-stricken neighbor on our southern border. But even the ticking time-bomb of a poverty-stricken, overpopulated Mexico is less important than bringing peace to the Holy Land.

Israel's greatest resource is its people. They should be able—at long last—to lay down their arms and live in peace with their neighbors. They are entitled to the knowledge that their defensible borders will be protected by international guarantees. So, too, should the Palestinians have land they can call home.

And nobody is in a better position to bring down the curtain on the killing than an incoming president in the early days of his administration.

That's the way this scene should be played.

George Thompson, a retired Foreign Service officer, is a nationally syndicated columnist and television talk show host.

Only If It Recognizes Israel First

By Allen C. Brownfeld

The new president must begin by recognizing that massive US aid to Israel has provided that country with the means to occupy and settle the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Since our financial aid has been given in the form of a blank check, we confront the unusual situation in which the US disapproves of the construction of Jewish settlements and the expulsion of Palestinians from the territories, yet continues to finance policies there which are impediments to peace. The new president should revive the peace plan originally proposed by President Reagan and rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Shamir. Unfortunately, the Reagan administration placed no pressure whatever on Israel to move toward peace. Instead, despite Shamir's rejection of the peace plan, the administration decided to speed up delivery to Israel of 75 F-16 jet fighters and acceded to Israel's request for a memorandum of agreement to institutionalize US-Israeli strategic cooperation.

The idea that UN resolution 242, which calls on the parties to trade peace for land, has been fulfilled by Israel's return of the Sinai to Egypt, which is Shamir's position, was described by the New York Times as "mostly sophistry." Historically, Golda Meir, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin, Abba Eban, and other Israeli leaders have agreed that resolution 242 applies to all occupied territories. Former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and former Undersecretary Joseph Sisco declared that, "ruling out the 'territory-for peace' formula makes negotiations virtually impossible and negates any ... hope for progress toward peace."

The new president should also start talking to Palestinians. Many in Israel agree. Maj. Gen. Avraharn Tamir, director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, declared while on a visit to Washington in September that "everyone knows" the PLO is viewed by Palestinians as their "national organization." He declared: "There is no replacement for them. So the question is not how to replace the PLO, but how to change it."

The new president should help to establish a Palestinian state in the occupied territories, with the precise boundaries and nature of such an entity to be resolved through negotiations. That state, if it recognizes and makes a peace treaty with Israel, should be recognized by the US.

Allen C. Brownfeld is a nationally syndicated columnist and associate editor of the Lincoln Review and of America's Future.