US Policy Towards the Muslim World by Kidwai M. Saleem;Kidwai M Saleem;

Author:Kidwai, M. Saleem;Kidwai, M Saleem;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: UPA
Published: 2010-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

IV

Collapse of the 2003 Road Map

The Performance-Based Road Map to a Permanent Two-State Solution to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict-known as the Road Map for Peace was introduced on April 30, 2003. It was hailed as a historic compromise as it makes a clear reference to a provisional Palestinian state, although its boundaries are unclear. Unlike the Oslo, the Road map refers explicitly to Israeli occupation and to ending it at the end of the process, but doesn’t call the occupation as illegal and that it must be brought to an end as per UN resolutions and international law. Unfortunately it has many of the structural flaws of the Oslo accords, like it calls for dismantling Israeli settlements established only since March 2001, leaving the bulk of settlements in place and reinforcing the geographic non-contiguity of Palestinian lands, whereas it expects the Palestinians to deliver great many things but is short on Israel.

The Road Map failed to take off and with the US attention focused on Iraq, the Palestine issue was largely left to Sharon even though the EU, UN and Russia occasionally took some interest whenever there appeared a crisis. Meanwhile, Israel continued with its policy of targeted killings of Palestinian leaders especially of Hamas. In the face of continued hostile policy from Israel and inability of Abbas to get Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian lands led to continued increase in the popularity of Hamas. In the Palestinian local elections held in May 2005, Fatah won control of 52 of the 84 municipal councils, Hamas won 24 and smaller factions took four councils. Another four were undecided. Compared to previous elections Hamas made strong inroads in key urban centers in West Bank and consolidated its hold in Gaza. It must be mentioned here that Hamas had boycotted the 9, January 2005 Presidential election. Although Abbas had shown that he is capable of controlling the security situation but the real crux was how far Israel will be honest in implementing its part of the promises. As seen before, by the end of 2005, Israel had withdrawn from Gaza and parts of West Bank and released few hundred Palestinian detainees, but large sections of the Palestinians still remained under Israeli occupation. It was clear that after decades of Israeli occupation and use of lethal force, Palestinian will to resist couldn’t be crushed by Israel. The US and Israel once again called for reforms in the Palestinian Authority [PA] and accused Abbas of not doing enough to contain Hamas and stop suicide bombings as well as the Qassam rockets. Abbas, did control a very difficult security situation and in all fairness acted with wisdom and worked slowly, to regain confidence and trust of the Palestinian people.

Although Sharon was applauded for his brave step to withdraw from Gaza but no other Israeli leader had “killed more Palestinian civilians or done greater damage to Palestinian civilian institutions and installations than this individual”. It was Sharon who transformed the idea of Greater Israel into reality. “For (Sharon) there was no green-line .

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