Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Going proactive. Israel itself should sponsor a state for Palestine at the UN.

Una proposta interessante e coraggiosa.
Non a caso viene da una persona in grado di risolvere correttamente un 
reality check come questo: "Gli ebrei non sono più sotto il tallone di 
uno Zar, o di un Califfo, o di un signore medievale, o di un imperatore 
romano.".
Un reality check che sarebbe pleonastico per chiunque abbia la capacità 
di osservare in modo obiettivo la realtà ma che, evidentemente, per i 
lettori ai quali si rivolge Dana Gordon non lo è affatto, visto che ha 
ritenuto necessario sottoporglielo.
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Going proactive
By DANA GORDON
09/04/2011 22:08
Israel itself should sponsor a state for Palestine at the UN.
To reverse the tide of tired opinion at the UN, and for Israel globally, 
what is needed is an idea that has never been tried. What the 
Palestinians need is a state of their own. There is another tide at 
flood in the Levant, and with this untried idea Israel can channel that 
freed, swirling energy to its own – and the Palestinians’ – advantage.
Israel, with the backing of the US and other allies, should sponsor its 
own bid for a Palestinian state to be presented to the UN for approval 
in September, or as soon as possible – preferably before Palestinian 
leader Mahmoud Abbas acts on the one he has planned.
This document would include all the necessary protections Israel needs, 
and the US could say that not only would it not veto this one in the 
Security Council, but it would vote yes – only, of course, if the 
necessary parts were included.
Could the US, – or Israel, for that matter – be trusted to pull this 
off? I don’t know. It would be tricky. But one must hope they can.
It certainly would disarm, so to speak, a lot of people. It would call 
the Palestinians’ bluff for sure. If they and their allies refused such 
a proposal, the blame for its failure would clearly be on them. Israel 
would be largely off the hook, and it would be clear as the Negev sun 
that the Palestinians (and their friends) want only to destroy the 
Jewish state.
On the other hand, it might really work and result in a new, peaceable 
state if the great majority of Palestinians want one – if they have the 
courage to keep their brethren in line, and to reject not the state 
handed to them on a silver platter (yet again), but the true betrayal, 
the old cowardly backroom refusal of a state by their leaders. The 
independent state of Palestine would be there on offer, in public, take 
it or leave it.
Contorted Objections to this idea have come from friends of Israel. But 
many of these objectors don’t get the value of it.
It has been said that “Israel would be the first to recognize a 
legitimate and peaceful Palestinian state.” The key word there, 
“recognize,” is reactive.
Something else has to happen beforehand. The beauty of this new idea is 
that it’s proactive. It turns the tables: Instead of being on the 
defensive, Israel has the chance to seize the offensive for once, 
perhaps for the first time since 1948 (the advantage it seized in 1967, 
great as that was, was reactive). And this would be a peaceful 
offensive, a powerful one. Israel can do this.
Israel is strong now. And this will make it stronger.
Proposing alternative language for the Palestinian UN initiative – as 
some among the US and its friends are trying now – is also reactive, and 
it’s indirect. It’s like slinking in the back door. But Israel proposing 
a Palestinian state at the UN would be original, direct and preemptive. 
It would not come from countries perceived as Israel’s proxies, nor from 
its less trustworthy “friends,” nor from its enemies. It could not be 
portrayed as a lack of diplomatic courage or morality on Israel’s part.
All countries and political factions in the world would have to 
recognize it as proposed by Israel itself, and most would accord Israel 
greater respect for having done this. The motivations of those who 
trivialize or debase the proposal would be clear, as well. In the best 
sense, the whole process would be transparent, there for all to see.
This move could at least level the playing field for the debate on the 
world stage. And it could, if enacted with the passion for getting 
things done for which Israelis are noted, result in peace in the Levant.
Israel should take the initiative, take control of the process. It 
doesn’t just have to react. The Jews are no longer under the thumb of 
the czar, or the caliph, or a medieval overlord, or a Roman emperor; 
they don’t have to tread so exceedingly carefully. Israel is free to act 
on its own.
At times I despair that the only future for Israel is to hunker down and 
wait. To wait until the vast majority of Arabs and Palestinians evolve 
into a reasonable, humane people controlled not by the bloodthirsty 
fantasy of wiping out Israel and killing the Jews, but by the desire to 
enjoy life and build their own prosperity. To wait while the 
Palestinians learn to move beyond their self-defeating habits of 
violence and rejectionism, their negative history of failing themselves. 
This could take how long – 50 years, 100 years, another millennium? 
Might as well try something bold in the meantime. Maybe they’ll get it.
The writer is an author and visual artist based in New York. His writing 
has been published in Commentary Magazine, the Wall Street Journal, the 
New York Sun, and the New York Times.
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?ID=236668&R=R1
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Sostieni Rete ECO
http://rete-eco.it/it/sostienici.html

  based in New York.