American position on the PA

[Saint Marcus]

The US wants the PA to become more democratic. Yet it also wants Arafat out.

What would happen if Arafat was democraticly (re)elected?

And what would happen if the democratization of the PA results in the election of Hamas members (or other terrorists)?

[DinoDoc]

The position is that the US would like a leadership not compromised by support of terrorism.

[drake]

The position is that the US would like a leadership not compromised by support of terrorism.

Unlike Sharon right

[Boris Godunov]

Saint Marcus, the Bush administration has shown no regard for democratically-elected governments in the past (Venezuela), and is itself not quite one, so why would it be inconsistent of them to not support a democratically-elected PA?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by drake
Unlike Sharon right

Sharon isn't a terrorist.

[DinoDoc]

BTW, was the election of Arafat actually certified as fair by an international body? Or is his election as valid as those in Iraq?

[Urban Ranger]

That's just silly move attempting to pull wool over everybody's eyes. The US knows that they can't get rid of Arafat, so Dubya is basing his support of a Palestinian State on his removal. He's thinking that, if the PA rejects his demand, he'd just shrug his shoulders and say, "Hey I tried."

It's clear as day how one-sided this proposal is, with absolutely no demand for Israel, nothing like removing all settlements on the West Bank, nothing like withdrawing from occupied territories.

[Ming]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
and is itself not quite one

Oh please... not that crap again.

[Boris Godunov]

Ming: It stings because it's true!

[Roland]

Well, Arafat's election was fraud-ridden but it's unlikely it affected the outcome. Bush's election saw only little fraud, but that was likely decisive.

Apart from that, Bush saying that Arafat lacks democratic legitimacy is mildly amusing.

[DanS]

What Bush said makes a lot of sense. I have little faith that either of the current leaders can move toward peace. It looks to me like Bush thinks this as well, with Arafat going this year and Sharon going in the next couple of years. It's sort a mid-term bet.

Arafat isn't going to last much longer anyway. What is he, 80 years old? Sharon's an old fart too.

[Saint Marcus]

the problem is that the Palestinians are more likely to elect a hardliner than a moderate, with all these Israeli actions going on (right or wrong). I think that elections are the worst thing that can happen in the region.

[Arrian]

If the Pals want to elect a hardliner, fine - they will then have to live with what that hardliner does as their leader (same as Israeli's having to live with having Sharon running the show). I hope they don't, of course. Arafat, so far as I've heard, is basically ignoring the part about getting rid of him and is welcoming the rest of it. We'll have to wait and see how it all pans out. I wouldn't get your hopes up, though.

-Arrian

[DanS]

"the problem is that the Palestinians are more likely to elect a hardliner than a moderate"

Oh how naiive you are, Marcus. How many hundreds of billions of dollars is it worth to the U.S. to make this problem go away?

Uncle Sam's a big spender.

[Arrian]

"I'll take the moderate for $500 million, Alex."



-Arrian