| For peace to begin, Israel must end occupation and settlements  By Jim Vitarello As chairman of the Human Rights Mission of my local church for the past 12 years, I have been deeply involved in the Middle East conflict. In an effort to form coalitions with other churches in the Washington area, I joined the Middle East Peace Committee of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington. Our committee, which consists of Christians, Jews and Muslims, has sponsored several forums at the National Cathedral on such issues as the Israeli occupation and settlements and has adopted a declaration on this issue entitled: On Ending the Occupation. Below is an excerpt from this declaration: The long and oppressive occupation of Palestinian land must end. This humiliating occupation, over thirty years of military control, has debilitated the economy and the livelihood of the West Bank and Gaza Strip populace and has brought the Palestinians to a level of extreme frustration. Coupled with this grievance is the existence and continuing expansion of the settlements. When United Nation resolutions on settlements are ignored, when the United States does not use its economic and political power to achieve the changes it has advocated, it is no wonder that the Palestinians protest the denial of their rights and their independence. Once stones, now unfortunately bullets and bombs, each explosion of their anger brings a military response. On March 18, the United Methodist Board of Church and Society issued a similar Statement on the Middle East, noting that: Israel will find peace and security through ending the illegal occupation of Palestinian and Arab territories. Four different American administrations, from Lyndon Johnson to Jimmy Carter, have declared the occupation and settlements illegal and inconsistent with international law. Yet our country has blocked repeated attempts by the United Nations Security Council and the Geneva Convention to formally determine whether Israel has violated numerous Security Council resolutions and the Geneva Accords, which prohibit an occupying power from building permanent civilian settlements and to which Israel is a signatory. After more than 30 years of waiting, most of the Palestinian people have lost their patience with the international community and their respect for international law. They see that the illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza have increased every year since they first began in 1968, one year after the 1967 War and Israeli military occupation. Total settler population in 1972 was only 1,500 but by 1993 (the beginning of the Oslo Accords) it jumped to 109,784 and escalated to 213,672 by 2001. Nearly 50,000 settlers were added during Prime Minister Baraks 18-month tenure alone and he supposedly was the Israeli peace candidate. These do not even include Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem, which is also part of the occupied territories. As of 2000, 170,400 Jewish settlers lived in East Jerusalem neighborhoods. Baraks so-called generous Camp David proposal, which was never set forth in writing, denied the Palestinian state viability and independence by dividing Palestinian territory into four separate cantons entirely surrounded by Israel. The Camp David proposal also denied Palestinians control over their own borders, airspace and water resources while legitimizing and retaining 80 percent of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including numerous Jewish only roads to the settlements. Although this proposal only gave Palestinian administrative control over their historic neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, President Clinton persuaded Barak to offer full sovereignty over Palestinian East Jerusalem in the final talks at Taba, just before the Israeli election which Barak lost to Ariel Sharon. It is now up to President Bush to decide whether he wants both parties to return to Taba or continue escalating the violence and killings. Jim Vitarello, a member of Foundry UMC in Washington, D.C., can be reached at
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