Oslo’s bid for Mideast peace fades 25 years on
Not many will celebrate the accord due to the unfulfilled promises and flawed process
ANNIVERSARY
Ahandshake on the White House lawn sealing the first of the landmark Oslo accords inspired hope that Israeli-Palestinian peace could finally be achieved, but 25 years later those dreams have faded.
The September 13 anniversary of the 1993 accord, symbolised by the handshake between Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat, will not be celebrated by many who see the process as unfulfilled or flawed from the very start. For those who regard an Israeli and Palestinian state existing side-by-side as the only viable solution, salvaging the peace process and the achievements of the Oslo accords - a second followed in 1995 - is more urgent than ever.
“It was a defining moment for many of us,” said Gaith Al Omari, a Palestinian student in Jordan at the time and now a senior fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy think-tank. “There was a lot of hope maybe naive hope, but certainly a lot of hope.”
Al Omari, who served as an adviser to Palestinian negotiators in later talks, has no illusions about the current state of the peace process.
“In the long-term, there is no solution except the twostate solution,” he told AFP.
“In the short-term, there is absolutely no chance that it’s going to happen.”
His view is widely shared, with Al Omari and others pointing to what they see as Israel’s drift to the political right, a weakened Palestinian leadership and US President Donald Trump’s moves.
Trump pledge
Trump has pledged to reach the “ultimate deal” - IsraeliPalestinian peace - but has declined to commit to a twostate solution, for years the focus of international diplomacy. He has also sided with Israel on core issues in the conflict, such as recognising occupied Jerusalem as its capital, while publicly asking for no concessions in return.
But the Palestinians, who have cut off contact with Trump’s White House, say the Israeli occupation regime failed to abide by the accords notably by allowing hundreds of thousands more colonists in the West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967.
Their leadership, however, remains deeply divided between 83-year-old president Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip and refuses to recognise Israel. The Oslo accord of 1993 stated that “it is time to put an end to decades of confrontation and conflict” and “strive to live in peaceful coexistence”. While it did not specifically mention the creation of a Palestinian state, it led to mechanisms for selfgovernance, including the Palestinian National Authority, which has endured.
It was a defining moment for many of us. There was a lot of hope - maybe naive hope, but certainly a lot of hope.”
Gaith Al Omari | Senior fellow at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy think-tank