Yoram Ettinger: President Bush was and is against this disengagement

Ariel Sharon and the Israeli press have succeeded in convincing many Israelis that Sharon is being pressured by president Bush. This is a convenient claim which deflects the blame and distorts the reality of Sharon's push towards expulsion. This article is an eye opener -- if only it was widely read ...

"Ettinger said that 'the morally and strategically justifiable demolition of terror regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan is inconsistent with the creation and bolstering of a terror regime in Gaza, Judea and Samaria.'

Sharon s pullout from Gaza, he added, 'is in sharp contrast to the U.S. war on terrorism because disengagement is perceived, in the Mideast, as cut and run, appeasement and cave-in.'

Asked why President Bush was pushing for it, Ettinger replied, 'When I visited Washington recently, I was told that President Bush was and is against this disengagement but it ws Sharon who pressured him. The tradition in Washington is that the administration does not second guess an Israeli prime minister. There was therefore no real deliberations on how this plan would affect U.S. interests in the region.'

Ettinger warned that the pullout will not be a stepping board to peace but a setback to peace because the only peace attainable in the Mideast is deterrence - driven peace. 'Disengagement undermines deterrence. Every square inch ceded by Israel to the PA, since the 1994 disengagement, has been transformed into a platform of hate - education and homicide bombing,' he said. "

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