BARRON: An end to conflict

The wisdom of youth

By Andrea Barron | Tuesday, July 8, 2008

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There was Ehud Olmert, prime minister of Israel, promising to freeze all Jewish settlements in the West Bank and remove 300 roadblocks to make it easier for Palestinians to get to work, attend school and farm their land. Then Mr. Olmert said he would dismantle over 100 settlements and unauthorized outposts to show Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that Israel was serious about concluding a peace agreement before the end of the year.

Mr. Abbas took advantage of this opportunity to launch a major program to revitalize education and create the economic infrastructure for a future Palestinian state, including establishing an extensive microcredit program like the one Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus started in Bangladesh.

And on the Gaza front, not only did Israel and Hamas sign a ceasefire but Israel agreed to gradually lift the blockade around Gaza if Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh ended the anti-Semitic rhetoric coming from some Hamas ministers and mosques. Could this really be happening in the Middle East? Not quite yet. This "Ehud Olmert" was really Rahool Patel, an Indian-American from Rutgers University in New Jersey. "Mahmoud Abbas" was Dez Clodfelter from Furman University in South Carolina and "Ismail Haniyeh" was Barbie Arroyo, a Puerto Rican student studying counterterrorism at Point Park University in Pittsburgh.

They were among 24 college students participating in "Camp David III: Negotiating the Road to Israeli-Palestinian Peace," a two-week seminar held in May. The seminar was sponsored by The Washington Center for Internships and Academic Seminars in Washington, D.C.

The students, who came from universities throughout the United States and Mexico, spent seven days listening to more than a dozen speakers representing all perspectives on the Arab-Israeli conflict. Then they set out to craft creative solutions to challenges on three negotiating tracks: the Israel-Palestinian Authority track, Gaza and the Syrian track.

There were tough compromises to make, especially on the final day of the seminar when students "negotiated" in a marathon 11-hour session. Israel could keep most major settlement blocs, but thousands of West Bank settlers living near Jerusalem would have to be transferred to Israel proper. Palestinians would have to be satisfied with a very limited "right of return" to Israel - almost all refugees would have to accept compensation instead. Both Israel and the new state of Palestine would have their capitals in Jerusalem, but an "Old City Religious Committee" comprised of Jews, Muslims and Christians would control the sacred city's holiest sites.

Can the next American president learn anything from the Camp David students about moving the Israeli-Palestinian peace process forward? The first step the new administration can take would be to press Israel to stop all settlement expansion - in small and large settlements and Jerusalem too. Israel says it would annex the large settlement blocs as part of a peace accord with the Palestinians anyway, so what's the problem? The problem is that every new apartment complex, every new road, every new school built in a settlement or East Jerusalem gives ammunition to the enemies of peace who want to undermine the moderate Palestinian government headed by Mr. Abbas and Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad. In fact, if settlement expansion continues, there will probably never be a peace agreement.

Second, the U.S. should work closely with Mr. Fayyad, the international community and foreign investors to create what the Palestinian prime minister calls "positive facts on the ground" - a new Palestinian city near Ramallah, schools, wells and other community projects, even wireless Internet access across the West Bank. The idea is to generate economic activity, improve people's daily lives and create a modest degree of hope for the future. But this strategy alone is not enough. All settlement expansion must stop and Palestinian security forces must continue to improve so people feel safe from street crime and armed gangs.

At the annual conference of the pro-Israel lobby, American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), held in early June, former Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh said that if Israel "cannot show the Palestinians that it pays to negotiate with Mr. Abbas, they will turn to Hamas." He said the window of opportunity is rapidly closing, and that if there is not more progress, Israel could be faced with "two Hamas-run entities"- one in Gaza and one in the West Bank.

If the next president wants to be more successful than the Bush Administration on the Israeli-Palestinian peace front, he has to be at least as brave as the Camp David students, who got past their own individual prejudices and stubborn negotiating positions to imagine a new Middle East.

Andrea Barron is Program Manager for International Affairs at The Washington Center for Internships and Academic Seminars and director of the Camp David III Seminar.

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