Kesher Talk

Pundit reactions to Bush's speech yesterday: Fresh from my mini-vacation, I return to an editorial bonanza regarding Bush's speech. I posted all of this at my Op/ed blog Opinion Native, but I figured I would put it here too.

There seem to be two categories of articles. The first group is nearly completely supportive of the speech and Bush's plan. The other group is more skeptical, usually because Bush didn't offer enough incentive to the Palestinians to reform. Here's a link to each article separated into two groups with a quote from each:

Supportive Editorials:
Boston Herald: "Any electoral competition in these circumstances is likely to degenerate into a contest over who has been and can be the most beastly to Israel."
Chicago Sun-Times: "His policy springs from the fundamental truth that has existed since September of 2000: No Palestinian violence, no Israeli violence."
Cleveland Plain Dealer: "There was, as expected, no room in Bush's long-awaited proposal for the man whose name he did not speak, who for decades has been the central figure in Palestinian affairs - Yasser Arafat."
Houston Chronicle: "And he focused, as he should even if Sept. 11 had never happened, on the current major roadblock to peace: Palestinian terrorism as funded and condoned (and at least at times orchestrated) by Arafat."
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: "...Bush set himself a Mideast peacemaking agenda that is vastly more ambitious - and would require far more presidential leadership - than anything Clinton devised."
NY Daily News: "The future belongs to the peacemakers, not the warmongers."
New York Post: "Can the Palestinian people rise to the occasion? History - not to mention current events - suggests otherwise."
Washington Times: "The president must impress on certain members of his administration that they must not undermine his message, with schemes of their own, in the days ahead."


Skeptical Editorials:
Boston Globe: "To help Palestinians avid to reach that democratic destination, Bush will need to assist them more immediately with funds for rebuilding destroyed Palestinian towns and ending Israel's reoccupation of those towns."
Charlotte Observer: "The Palestinians face a difficult challenge. They are asked to build a nation though they exercise none of the powers of nationhood and no guarantee that doing so would achieve their ultimate goals."
Los Angeles Times: "No matter how contemptible Arafat may be, the U.S. needs to tread warily in declaring who is, and is not, a proper leader of other countries or peoples."
New York Times: "The Israelis and Palestinians need a road map in which a concession by one will be followed by a concession from the other."
San Diego Union-Tribune: "For the Mideast quarrel to be fairly resolved, both sides must compromise, and Bush has asked for no compromises from Israel."
USA Today: "The most obvious problem with Bush's plan is that it fails to give Palestinians a realistic prescription."
Washington Post: "He gave little substance yesterday to what, if the Palestinians do reform, he would support with respect to such difficult issues as borders, contiguity and Jerusalem."

posted by Rami @ 6/25/2002 01:41:44 PM