Monday, July 18, 2011
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
11
Li LIKE THE DAILY ON FACEBOOK
You deserve a factual look at ...
Are the Palestinians Ready for Peace?
Why Arab intransigence makes peace most unlikely.
Just as all the presidents since Harry Truman before him, President Obama is spending much time, effort, and
political capital trying to bring about peace between Israel and the so-called Palestinians. If history is any guide,
he will be as unsuccessful in this endeavor, just as every one of his predecessors.
What are the facts? a word was heard about forming a Palestinian state in
Many attempts at peace. In order to understand the area. After the 1967 Six-Day War, in which the
the unlikelihood of peace in the Middle East, it is Israelis trounced the combined armies of Egypt,
necessary to trace the history of peace-making Syria, and Jordan, Jordan's occupation of the "West
attempts between Israel and the Palestinians. Bank" ended and so did Egypt's occupation of Gaza.
Virtually all of them resulted in complete failure. At that time, Israel offered the hand of friendship to
Here is a list of only the most important of such the Arabs, which was rudely rejected when the Arabs
events, issued the Three No's of Khartoum: No Peace, No
The enmity of the Arabs Negotiation, and No
against the Jews in their "If the Arabs had accepted the 1947 Recognition of Israel.
midst and the violence Another important
against them predates the partition plan and had not invaded opportunity that would have
creation of the Jewish state. the nascent Jewish state ...they radically changed the history
There were some peace could be celebrating their country's of the Middle East was
proposals during the British 63rd of missed.
Mandate (prior to 1948), but anniversary peace..' Never-ending efforts at
they were in vain and deserve peace. In 1993 and 1995
little mention in this narrative. Notable was the Peel Israel and the PLO signed the Oslo Accords with the
Commission proposal in 1937, in which the creation aim of creating a Palestinian state within five years.
of an Arab state was suggested, but the Arabs rejected Israel agreed to withdraw from parts of the West
it. Bank and Gaza. Israel turned over most of its
The most important proposal in the history of administration of the territories to the Palestinian
peace making was the 1947 U.N. Resolution to create Authority (PA). But, the Palestinians violated their
a large Arab state with the Jews receiving two commitments, thus scuttling the agreement.
disjointed pieces, consisting mostly of much of the In 2000, Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered to
coastline and the Negev Desert. Jerusalem was to be withdraw from 97% of the West Bank and 100% of
internationalized. The Jews accepted the plan. The Gaza. That proposal also guaranteed Palestinian
Arabs totally rejected it. Instead, they invaded the refugees the right to return to the Palestinian state
nascent Jewish state with the armies of five Arab and offered reparations from $30 billion of
nations, in hopes to "drive the Jews into the sea" (one international funds that would be collected to
of their favorite imageries). Of course, that isn't the compensate them. Arafat rejected the deal.
way it turned out. Instead, about 650,000 Arabs fled In 2003, Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon
the area, mostly under the goading of their leaders. agreed to negotiate with the Palestinians according
Remarkably, their descendants, even today, are called to the "road map" formulated by the United States,
"refugees," supported by the United Nations, which Russia, the European Union, and the U.N. The
means mostly by the United States. Palestinians never fulfilled their obligation to
Every year for the last 60+ years, the Arabs normalized relations with Israel and to arrive at a
memorialize the "Nakba" (catastrophe) of the comprehensive peace. Another missed opportunity!
creation of the State of Israel. But, of course, without In 2005, Israel unilaterally decided to evacuate
the war that they imposed on Israel, there would be every soldier and citizen from Gaza. The "reward" for
no "Nakba." Just as Israel, the Arabs would now be Israel's evacuation was for the Palestinians to launch
able to commemorate the 63rd anniversary of their rockets into Israel from Gaza at an almost daily rate.
Palestinian state. There were further attempts in 2007 by Prime
From 1948 to 1967, Jordan occupied the "West Minister Ehud Olmert and in 2010 by Prime Minister
Bank." During the nineteen years of their tenure, not "Bibi" Netanyahu, but all have ended in failure.
The above chronology is only a partial one, giving only the most important highlights. There have been
negotiations, conferences, plans, and meetings almost uninterruptedly. All of them have foundered. The "all-
or-nothing" mentality of the Arabs, their unwillingness to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and the Arabs'
expressed desire to destroy the hated Jews, have kept peace from flowering. What a shame! If the Arabs had
accepted the 1947 partition plan and had not invaded the nascent Jewish state with the armies of five Arab
countries, they would not now have the need today to commemorate their "Nakba." They could be celebrating
their country's 63rd anniversary, their enduring peace with Israel, and could be part of the tremendous
prosperity that Israel has brought to that region of the world.
This message has been published and paid for by FLAME is a tax-exempt, non-profit educational 501 (c)(3) organization.
Its purpose is the research and publication of the facts regarding
developents in the Middle Etand seaxouing talse propaganda that
might hate the interess ofihe United Stats nd s allies in that atea of
the world. Your tax-deductible contributions are welcome. They enable
Facts and Logic About the Middle East us to pursue these goals and to publish these messages in national
P.O. Box 590359 U San Francisco, CA 94159 newspapers and magazines. We have virtually no overhead. Almost all
Gerardo Joffe, President messas an tote lat froreducational work, for these clariftag.
To~1. reev .. FL M upats .66 *esie Iw~atadoi~
University launches
new online directory
ITS aims to increase
security, simplicity
with MCommunity
By BETHANY BIRON
Editor in Chief
As part of the quest to increase
security and transparency in the
directory system, members of
the University's Information and
Technology Services team imple-
mented MCommunity, a new sys-
tem that launches today.
Accordingto Janet Eaton, ITS
communication documentation
lead for MCommunity, the pro-
gram serves as an "identity man-
agement system" that will replace
the old University's Online Direc-
tory and provide a more modern
interface to search for information
on University affiliates.
"It will provide easier access
to the directory information,"
Eaton said. "It will be easier to find
people in groups and it will even-
tually be used for provisioning of
computing services to students,
staff and faculty so that people get
the appropriate access to the ser-
vices they need."
John Gohsman, executive
director of the NextGen program
office - an internet technol-
ogy program that aims to advance
computing services for Univer-
sity members - echoed Eaton's
sentiment and said implementing
MCommunity will be "a really
easy transition" for students and
provide a simpler forum for Uni-
versity members seeking contact
information.
"(It will have) better usabil-
ity, better accessibility for stu-
dents with disabilities and there
are some other things planned
that I think will benefit students
down the road, but I think those
will probably be transparent to
students as well as it goes to the
point of provisioning computing
resources," Gohsman said.
As part of their initiative to
make the directory more user
friendly, Dana Fair, web market-
ing and communications specialist
at the University, said ITS engaged
with groups on campus to garner
feedback about how they would
like the program changed.
"In the onset (ITS) had input
from students so they were able
to get their feedback before they
actually moved into this," Fair
said. "Students were actually able
to say what they wanted."
According to Gohsman, devel-
opment of the program originally
started in the fall, but design work
started before then as part of the
University's plan to update the
older interface, which was origi-
nally created in the 1990s.
In addition to providing easier
accessibility for students, the Uni-
versity aims to increase privacy for
students by hiding home addresses
and phone numbers by default and
instead having students and fac-
ulty members enter this informa-
tion themselves, which is different
from the old system.
Gohsman said the updated
service will also automatically
remove non-affiliates from the
directory by utilizing human
resources and alumni systems
to ensure that only true Univer-
sity members can use computing
resources. However, it will pro-
vide a sponsor system that will
allow people who aren't a part of
the University "through normal
channels" to receive access, such
as visitinglecturers.
He added identity manage-
ment has been particularly dif-
ficult for institutions of higher
education as opposed to the cor-
porate world since often time pro-
fessionals and students come from
all over the nation for brief peri-
ods of times to engage in research
endeavors.
"Our researchers interact with ,
a lot of researchers from other
institutions, so it brings in some
different challenges around affili-
ation," Gohsman said.
He added this has been a
problem plaguing much of higher
education, and the University has
been collaborating with other uni-
versities to pursue the best meth-
od of action.
"Higher education has been
grappling with this issue and
we're part of a number of con-
sortiums across higher education
trying to think about this," he
said. "So we've been working with
(universities) extensively on this
over the years to the point we're
implementing (identity manage-
ment programs) a little bit quicker
than others."