Last night, Sinai Temple and StandWithUs sponsored a debate between Alan Dershowitz and Hussein Ibish on the topic “America, Israel and the Middle East: Can There be Reconciliation?” moderated by Rabbi David Wolpe.
Ibish is Senior Fellow at the American Task Force on Palestine and Executive Director of the Hala Salaam Maksoud Foundation for Arab-American Leadership. From 1998-2004, he was Communications Director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. He has made over 3,500 radio and TV appearances and written for many papers.
It showed. He made a polished and articulate presentation, and it was nice to witness a civil discussion (and hopefully Dershowitz will soon be invited to a mosque to repeat the debate). But the audience was probably left with a mistaken impression of Palestinian public opinion.
Ibish suggested the audience should go to the website of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, where he said one could find a September 14-16 poll demonstrating that “we need not speculate” about what “the majority of the Palestinians want: we know.”
He read poll findings that 74% want permanent status negotiations between Abbas and Olmert, 59% want Hamas to negotiate with Israel, 63% would support reciprocal recognition of two states after a peace agreement is reached, and 77% support the call for a ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinians. He concluded by saying “So there you have it.”
The poll is indeed informative. Here are some of the findings Ibish did not read to the audience: In Question 20, Palestinians were asked the following question:
According to Olmert’s plan, Israel will evacuate within a few years most of the settlements in the West Bank, while realigning into large blocks of settlements along the line of the separation fence. Do you welcome or not welcome this plan?
3.9% “definitely welcome it,” 22.1% “welcome it,” and 69.5% either “do not welcome it” or “definitely do not welcome it.”
In response to Question 27, 24.4% of Palestinians thought that “lasting peace” was possible between Israelis and Palestinians. A total of 74.7% thought it was “impossible” or “definitely impossible.”
Question 38 asked whether Palestinians supported the “collection of arms from armed Palestinian groups and factions, stipulated in the Road Map as a PA commitment.” 53.8% opposed or definitely opposed it.
It’s nice to learn that the Palestinians want permanent status negotiations, but those negotiations are part of Phase III of the Road Map they already agreed to, to be preceded by the dismantlement of the terrorist infrastructure (Phase I) and a state with provisional borders (Phase II).
In other words, the majority of Palestinians oppose the Phase I obligation of the plan they accepted but did not carry out (even after Israel exceeded its own Phase I obligations by withdrawing completely from Gaza), and are apparently now anxious to skip Phase I and II altogether and reach a new agreement — one they would presumably promise to uphold, particularly if it uprooted all settlements, included a right of return, gave them the Temple Mount, moved Israel back to indefensible borders, etc. in exchange for “recognition.”
In the meantime, according to the poll, a total of 63% “agree that Palestinians should use the same methods as Hezbollah such as the launching of rockets at Israeli cities” and 57% “support armed attacks against Israeli civilians inside Israel.”
So there you have it.