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“Obama plan” for West Asia peace

— Photo: AP

Yearning for peace: A Palestinian girl holds a sign reading in Arabic “It’s my right to live in peace” during a demonstration against the Israeli sanctions in front of the Egyptian Embassy in Gaza City, on Thursday.

DUBAI: U.S. President-elect Barack Obama could adopt a new four-point plan to resolve the Israel-Palestine issue, a leading Israeli daily has said.

According to Haaretz, Mr. Obama might agree to a plan that has been supported by two former National Security Advisers — Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski. The daily said both Mr. Scowcroft and Mr. Brzezinski have had access to Mr. Obama. While, Mr. Scowcroft has spoken twice to Mr. Obama after the elections, Mr. Brzezinski was close to the President-elect during the early stages of his candidacy.

The daily said the two stated in a recent Washington Post Op-Ed, a “kind of first draft” of what might emerge as: “The Obama Plan.”

Haaretz said it is anchored to an Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders, with slight alterations that should be mutually acceptable.

Palestinian refugees displaced in earlier wars would be compensated in lieu of exercising the right of return to pre-1948 Israel. Jerusalem would become a “real home” to two capitals, and the future Palestinian state would be demilitarised.

The daily points out Mr. Brzezinski had earlier this year made a similar four point proposal in the Financial Times.

In that article, he had advocated establishing “a real partnership” in undivided Jerusalem, which would include a Palestinian capital in the Old City.

The former NSAs have proposed stationing an international force, possibly comprising NATO forces, in order to allay Israeli concerns about a possible threat emerging from an independent Palestinian state.

Haaretz said that “to a great extent” the four-point plan overlaps earlier initiatives, such as the “U.N. Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338; the Reagan Plan from September 1982; the Clinton outlines of December 2000; and the Bush initiative presented at Annapolis.”

It also aligns with some of the Arab peace proposals such as the King Fahd Plan of 1981 and the Saudi initiative of King Abdullah that was revealed during the Arab League summit in 2002.

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