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Senate Hearing on the Roadmap Leaves More Questions than Answers
October 15, 2003
by Nino Kader

On the day that three  Americans were killed in Gaza, I attended a hearing on Capitol Hill on the peace process. The title of the hearing was, "Middle East Roadmap: Overcoming Obstacles." The speakers for the day's hearing were going to be addressing the Sub-committee on Near Eastern & South Asian Affairs, which is part of the powerful Committee on Foreign Relations.

The experts included: Mr. Dror Etkes, Director of Peace Now's settlements watch project; U.S. Ambassador Dennis Ross, now with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Rabbi Michael Melchoir, a Knesset Member and former Deputy Foreign Minister of Israel and Dr. Boaz Ganor, Executive Director of the International Policy Institute on Counter-Terrorism.

A missing voice
After a brief introduction, a question was posed by Senator Corzine, "How do we get beyond this?" Each person had their own answers, but what was missing from the group of experts was an Arab voice. The experts spoke extensively about Israel's role in the current situation and also went in-depth about the Arab motivation and mentality. What surprises me is how readily the committee members took their opinions about Arabs to be fact.

It would greatly benefit this influential committee to assemble a more balanced panel if they want to get the whole picture. There are excellent speakers and organizations throughout Washington, the American Task Force on Palestine is one example, who understand the issues and can speak reasonably and comprehensively about Palestinian concerns.

Without fully understanding the root causes and motivations of the violence it will be impossible to solve it. What has become apparent is that using military force against Palestinians, who have reached such a broken state as to almost welcome death, is not going to succeed. And even if it did, as Winston Churchill once remarked, "Success is never final."

I now have a deeper understanding why certain decisions in the past have been made - the Senators simply are not hearing all of the story. It is as if there was a hearing on African-American culture and not a single panel member was African-American.

One panelist bent the truth so much that I began to wonder whether or not there was an established procedure for an audience member to object. Meanwhile, I continued to listen as the panelists pontificated about how to reduce the motivation and means of the terrorist Palestinians. Never once did anyone raise the possibility of asking a group of Palestinian intellectuals for their input on the matter.

The root of the problem
Fight terror by getting to its roots and in order to do that one needs to understand it. What we need to be doing is improving the day-to-day lives of the Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation in Gaza and the West Bank. First and foremost we need to bring an end to the humiliating thirty-seven year Israeli occupation of the Palestinian people. That in and of itself will eliminate 90% of the violence.

Next, we need to be building them schools, hospitals, job skills training centers, Boys & Girls Clubs and similar types of endeavors. Empowering the people and giving them hope for a better future will make everyone safer.

In the last three years alone 2,535 Palestinians have been killed because of the violence and 2,071 of them were civilians according to Miftah. To a population of only 3.5 million those numbers are staggering. The equivalent in U.S. lives would amount to having over 200,000 Americans killed in just 3 years.

One of the reasons often cited among Palestinians for supporting groups like Hamas is that they build "hospitals & schools" while no one else offers much of an alternative to this population that has an unbelievable 70% living below the poverty line of $2 day. This can and has to change.

What are they thinking?
What Americans need to understand is the mind-set of the Palestinians and what it is that they value most. A poll on Arab beliefs conducted by Zogby International found one of the things that matters most in life is, "Their ability to lead meaningful and productive lives, their ability to provide for themselves and those whom they love." Is that so different from us?

A particularly alarming study done by the Gaza Mental Health Foundation found that by the age of 18 the average child who grew up in the Gaza Strip will have witnessed a Palestinian death at the hands of Israeli forces. This only furthers the cycle of violence which needs to end.

We as Americans need to give them hope and the dream of the values we hold dear - "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," because at the root of all the violence is the fact that many have simply lost hope and that is a very dangerous thing.

It's not too late to make a difference, let's invest in and build their future today. After all, peace in the Middle East will lead to increased security here in America.

Let me end with the rest of the Winston Churchill quote, "Success is never final. Failure is never fatal. It is courage that counts." Let's have the courage to do the right thing.