Tuesday, April 02, 2002

When Palestinians have no hope


The measure of the failure of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is this: The Palestinians are stronger today than they ever have been.

It is strange to think that these bedraggled people, living in squalid refugee camps under the gun muzzles of Israeli tanks, could be gaining in strength, but it is a fact. The dynamic of this awful conflict has changed dramatically in a single year.

The Palestinian strength grows from evidence that an entire generation is ready to die for the cause. And another generation is ready to follow, for the Palestinian birth rate and population under 5 years old are twice that of Israel.

Warfare by collective immolation is not something that can be defeated by a conventional army. When Benjamin Netanyahu, Sharon's critic on the right, calls for "complete military victory," he can only be thinking of re-occupation of all the West Bank and Gaza, the bankrupt policy Israel abandoned a decade ago.

The Bush administration has much to answer for in the Middle East collapse. Bush blamed Clinton for being too involved in the Middle East, and so decided to do nothing. Sept. 11 is no excuse for the failure, for Bush did little before that date to deal with the Palestinian powder keg.

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