After the Wye Memorandum, Whither Land-For-Peace? Five Views

At the urging of the Palestinians and Americans, [Binyamin Netanyahu] agreed to let the CIA act as mediator in security operations involving the Palestinian Authority. Although the agency's exact functions have not been spelled out, Palestinian law enforcement official Jibril Rajoub said the CIA will be "a needed witness to balance Israel's claims of noncompliance by Palestinians." This role could prove significant if Israel continues to insist that Arafat stop all "anti-Israel incitement." Since this would mean censoring the press and radio along with speech, Arafat might refuse rather than impose police state tactics on the Palestinians in order to protect Israel's security. Fulfillment of an agreement requires the willingness of the stronger party to abide by it, especially when there is no outide authority to enforce it. Netanyahu has already given ample evidence that he is in no mood for reconciliation. As he and Arafat drew closer to an agreement last September the government cracked down even harder on the Palestinians. Three days after Clinton's announcement of "significant progress" toward peace, Israel closed down the borders of the West Bank and Gaza, giving as its reason a suspected terrorist attack. A partial closure, with several Palestinian communities under curfew, had been in effect since Sept. 10, when Israeli forces broke into a house near Hebron and shot to death two members of Hamas. The killing took place just as U.S. envoy [Dennis Ross] arrived in Israel to try to bring the two sides together, which led some to believe it was timed to undercut Ross's mission. The waves of protests and stone-throwing that followed the assassinations, and the response by Israeli forces, resembled low-level warfare. Israeli forces using rubber-coated steel bullets injured scores of Palestinians and killed a Jordanian man. On Sept. 30, an unidentified Palestinian threw three hand grenades at an army truck, wounding 13 Israeli soldiers. Soldiers who opened fire in response wounded 10 Palestinian passersby but failed to stop the assailant. The question still to be answered is whether the Wye agreement will have any effect on the day-to-day lives of the Palestinians. Amnesty International's report for 1998 described the occupied territories today as "a land of barriers, mostly erected by Israeli security forces, between town and town, village and village. It is at such barriers," the report says, "that many arrests, beatings, and shootings have taken place.