Detroit Ties Color Mood In Israel
CentralGalilee
n informal survey of Israeli
residents and Michigan visi-
tors in this partner region of
Michigan Jewry two hours north of
Jerusalem revealed cautious opti-
mism for a renewed chance at peace
in the wake of Yassir Arafat's death
last week.
• Sharon Steinbaum-Open, outgo-
ing Jewish Agency for Israel staff
professional in Partnership 2000's
Central Galilee-Michigan Region, is
an Israeli native who has lost close
friends to Palestinian terror. She
hopes for a negotiated peace, but is
deflated with each new terrorist
attack.
For her, Arafat symbolized the old
school of Palestinian military resist-
ance. "I had no trust in him," she
said. "His death could symbolize a
shift if the new Palestinian leader-
ship realizes the Jewish state is here
to stay instead of continuing to try
to break Israeli morale."
Under the right conditions, she
favors a Palestinian state and helping
Palestinians create infrastructure and
other systems that would allow them
to live decently. But she is not confi-
dent even that would end the con-
flict.
After the Oslo Accords of 1993,
she said, "the Palestinian Authority
received hundreds of millions of
dollars that all went to private bank
accounts of Arafat and his cronies."
"Corruption is so high in
Palestinian culture," she said, "I fear
that the leadership will go on attack-
ing and not want Israel to survive."
• Reuven Amsalem, director of the
Nana House for at-risk youth in
Nazareth Illit, heard about Arafat's
death just before Michigan Jewry's
Partnership 2000 steering committee
paid a visit the morning of Nov. 11.
"The first reaction among the kids,"
he said, "was, 'Thank God, a barrier
for peace just died. One barrier for
peace just vanished.'"
Amsalem called Arafat's death "a
gate to a better world, to a new gen-
eration with new ideas — and
maybe a new peace."
But that gate won't swing open, he
said, unless the Palestinians undergo
a cultural change that enables them
to accept and respect Jews as legiti-
mate partners in peace.
• Gabi Landau, managing director
for the Valleys Tourist Board of the
Emek Yizreal Valley Regional
Council, says, "There's a sense of
hope in the air, an opportunity not
to miss, for changes and agreements
that could bring peace.
"Palestinian commoners are so
tired of fighting," she said, hoping
Arafat's death recalibrates the mind-
set of Palestinians and how they
view reality.
"We have a matter of weeks," she
said. "Otherwise, we lose momen-
tum and the advantage caused by
Arafat's death — and the matsav
[intifida] normal' continues."
Landau favors a Palestinian state.
The problem is lack of a consensus
leader among the Palestinians.
"They've got to find their own
direction first," she said.
She urges interference from the
United States or European Union to
jump-start peace talks. To her, the
U.N. has become irrelevant.
• Hillary Murt, outgoing Ann
Arbor delegate to Partnership 2000's
Central Galilee-Michigan Region,
thinks real change can only happen
S.Steinbaum-Open Hillary Murt
if the Palestinians make the first
move.
"If Israel reaches out with an olive
branch," she said, "it'll put the new
Palestinian leaders at risk if they
take it."
Her hope: a new round of arm's-
length, but cordial, negotiations
accompanied by what she calls open
rhetoric among Palestinian leaders
to bridge the culture gulf that pre-
vents peace.
Reuven Amsalem Ehud Almog
• Ehud Almog, 17, of Ahuzzat-
Barak in the Jezreel Valley joined
Detroit teens on a Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Detroit-
sponsored 2004 summer mission to
Israel; he visited Detroit last spring.
The 12th-grader would like to talk
to Palestinian teens about "cross-cul-
tural relations between people, not
governments — just like Israeli teens
do with German teens."
Like other Israelis, Almos is wary
Gabi Landau
unless the Palestinians undergo a
culture shock.
"We all want peace, Israelis and
Palestinians, each in his or her own
way," he said. "There's nothing we
want to live in peace. They have no
want more in Israel; it's the first
),
other choice," he said. "They will
thing we are searching for.
continue to suffer otherwise." II
He believes Palestinians "really do
• 1987-1993 — Riots break out that grow
into the first Palestinian intifada, or upris-
ing. The fighting eventually claims the lives
estimated 1,100 Palestinians and 150
of
Israelis.
• 1988 — Arafat says the PLO accepts U.N.
Resolution 242, implies recognition of Israel
and, at least formally, renounces terrorism.
As a result, the United States opens a dia-
logue with the PLO.
• 1990 — The United States breaks off its
dialogue with the PLO after Arafat refuses
to condemn a terrorist attack carried out by
a member group. Arafat's support for
Saddam Hussein after he invades Kuwait,
and during the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq the
following year, leads Persian Gulf states to
cut off their funding for the PLO.
• 1991 — Arafat marries his 28-year-old
secretary, Suha Tawil. Born a Christian, she
converts to Islam.
• 1993 — Israel and the PLO agree on a
framework for peace in what later are called
the Oslo accords. The framework is signed
on the White House lawn, where Arafat
shakes hands with Israeli Prime Minister
Yitzhak. Rabin.
• 1994 — Arafat, along with Israeli leaders
Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, is awarded
the Nobel Peace Prize. Arafat returns to the
Gaza Strip after a 25-year exile.
• 1996 — Arafat is overwhelmingly elected
president of the Palestinian Authority.
Under heavy pressure, the PLO's parlia-
ment-in-exile votes to revoke sections of the
PLO charter calling for Israel's destruction,
but never completes the process.
• 2000 — Arafat refuses a peace plan pro-
posed by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak
at the Camp David summit. Later that year,
Palestinians begin a wave of terrorism that
intensifies after a visit to Jerusalem's Temple
Mount by Israeli opposition leader Ariel
Sharon. This becomes the second intifada,
which is still ongoing.
ROBERT A. SKLAR
Editor
A
• 2001 — Frustrated by Arafat's ongoing
support for violence, Israel confines him to
his compound in Ramallah, where he
remains until October 2004.
• 2002 -- The United States breaks with
Arafat after he is found to have lied about
P.A. involvement with a weapons ship arriv-
ing from Iran. President Bush later makes
replacement of leaders "not compromised by
terrorism" — a clear rebuff of Arafat — a
precondition for Palestinian statehood.
• 2004 — Arafat dies on Nov. 11 in a Paris
hospital.
❑
Jig
11 / 1 9
2004
31