ZOA Report On “Two Months Since Bush Speech”: Palestinian Arabs Not Meeting Bush’s Conditions
News
August 26, 2002


NEW YORK- A new report by the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has found that during the two months since President Bush’s major Middle East policy speech, the Palestinian Arabs have not fulfilled any of the conditions that the president set forth before the U.S. will support creation of a Palestinian Arab state.


For a free copy of the report, please call the ZOA at 212-481-1500.


The major findings of the report, titled Two Months Since the Bush Middle East Speech, are:


* No crackdown on terror: While the Bush plan requires the Palestinian Arabs to “fight terrorists and dismantle their infrastructure,” they have not arrested terrorists, extradited any terrorists to Israel, outlawed or disarmed any terrorist groups, shut down any bomb factories, or punished any PLO factions involved in terror. During the two-month period, there were 226 Palestinian Arab terrorist attacks, in which 45 people were killed and 309 wounded.


* No end to incitement: Official Palestinian Authority television, radio, and newspapers are still filled each day with anti-Israel and anti-American incitement and support for violence.


* No new leadership: While President Bush insisted that the Palestinian Arabs elect new leaders, PA spokesmen defiantly rejected that call and said they will elect whomever they want.


* No meaningful reforms: There was no meaningful effort to fulfill the Bush plan’s requirement for total reform of Palestinian Arab governing agencies and the dismissal of all officials involved in terrorism or corruption. As part of an internal power struggle, Yasir Arafat fired several officials but then offered them alternative positions within the PA; he also hired a veteran terrorist as his new national security adviser.


The ZOA report notes that despite the Palestinian Arabs’ failure to meet the Bush plan conditions, President Bush and his spokesmen have claimed that the Palestinian Arabs are making “progress,” held meetings with Yasir Arafat’s top aides in Washington, and repeatedly stated that the administration is determined to create a Palestinian Arab state in the near future.


ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said: “Recent statements by President Bush and the State Department create the unfortunate impression that instead of their priority being to genuinely and definitively transform the attitudes and actions of the Palestinian Arabs toward Israel, the administration’s priority seems to be to establish a Palestinian Arab state in the shortest time possible, regardless of whether or not the Palestinian Arabs have really changed.”




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