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By J. Zel Lurie
 DELRAY BEACH, Florida—While the head of the Army of Occupation, Minister of Defense Ehud Barak, was preparing to join the photo opportunity with President Obama at the United Nations, his soldiers were issuing demolition orders to no less than 55 homes in As-Sawiya and a neighboring village.
The soldiers were members of the Civil Administration, a branch of the Army of Occupation.
Please don’t misunderstand me. The Israel Defense Force (IDF) is one of the world’s finest armies, capable of defending Israel against all its enemies.
But the enemy in the West Bank is the impoverished Palestinians who are sadly watching Jewish settlers eat up their land. And the Army of Occupation has only one mission, to protect the Jewish settlers.
In recent months, the Army of Occupation has eased communication between city and village by removing many roadblocks and some checkpoints. Yet the Christian Peacemakers Team (CPT) which resides in At-Tawani in the Hebron hills reported earlier this month that the Army of Occupation had placed new earth mounds at the entrances to Palestinian villages, cutting off their communication with At=Tawani and the outside world.
When an ambulance is summoned from a Hebron hospital, the sick patient would have to be carried to the other side of the earth mound where the ambulance would be waiting.
The CPT also reported that five new trailers had suddenly appeared in the nearby hill settlement of Havat Ma’on, which is an illegal settlement under Israeli law and should be dismantled.
So much for a freeze on settlement construction which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to declare. George Mitchell, Obama’s Special Envoy to the Middle East, has advised Obama to accept Netanyahu’s promise “to refrain from new construction.”
Our objective is peace not a peace process Mitchell told the press at the UN after the photo opportunity. He and his boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, will continue intensive
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meetings with the two parties, searching out points on which they agreed and finding ways with which to bridge over the disagreements.
This is what Mitchell did for two years in Northern Ireland before reaching success. While he did not place a time limit on his work for an Israel-Palestine peace, two years would be a reasonable assumption. Both Obama and Mitchell have indicated that it would not be open-ended.
General Keith Drayton, who has been training the Palestinian police in Jordan, said in Washington recently that the new police force expects to be working for a Palestine state within two years. “We have a two year shelf.” he said.
Mitchell is working towards “a just, lasting and comprehensive peace,” President Obama said before the photo opportunity. What could be sweeter!
Obama went on: “Despite the obstacles, despite the history, despite the mistrust, we must find a way to move forward.”
General Barak was standing with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when Obama uttered these words. Obviously his Army of Occupation has taken a step back, not forward, when it issued 55 demolition orders in As-Sawiya. He should rescind the orders.
Afterwards at the picture taking Netanyahu, a consummate actor, was in his element. The photo in the Times captured him thrusting his hand forward while President Mohammed Abbas is reluctantly raising his hand.
The press called it a summit meeting. This was a misnomer. Historically summit meetings are called to seal agreements already made such as the signatures on the White House lawn by Arafat and Rabin. This was a photo opportunity when the parties and President Obama were tortuously brought together at the UN General Assembly.
Netanyahu, who for months has resisted the call to obey the 2003 roadmap that Ariel Sharon signed and freeze settlements, had the hutzpa in a Ma’ariv interview to challenge President Abbas to “tell his people directly that the conflict is over.”
If he were not the Prime Minister of the land that I love, I would tell the world what I think of him.
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