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May 23, 2003/Iyar 21 5763, Vol. 55, No. 39
Peace plan blasted at confab
ERIC FINGERHUT
Washington Jewish Week
WASHINGTON - Dangerous ... satanic ... a disaster ... a road trap. Those were some of the ominous descriptions of the "road map" for Middle East peace given by speakers and attendees at the Interfaith Zionist Leadership Summit, May 17-18, which brought together vocal opponents of Israeli-Palestinian nego-tiations from both the Jewish and Christian communities.
With suicide bombings in Israel fresh in everyone's minds, the approximately 400 people who came to the District's Omni Shoreham hotel on May 18 cheered as a procession of speakers said the latest attacks were just additional evidence that any kind of Palestinian state arising out of the road map would be a reward for Palestinian violence, and would end up as simply a new "terrorist state."
Several of those attending said that Palestinians should be taken in by already existing Arab countries, similar to Israel's welcome of Jews exiled from Arab states more than 50 years ago. Or they endorsed the idea recently promoted by Israeli Tourism Minister Benny Elon of moving the Palestinians to Jordan, even though Jordan has not indicated any interest in such a plan.
A number of attendees said they were not worried about a showdown between Presi-dent George W. Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, believing that Bush would choose the Defense Department over the State Department in the battle for policy preeminence.
But whatever the White House does decide, Israel should make its own decisions, said Zionist Organization of America president Morton Klein. To a standing ovation, he told the crowd that the United States. and other countries have "no moral right to tell 6 million Jews how to defend themselves."
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