August 2005 - A Historic Month

08/15/2005

Paul Munnis

Mark your calendars with the month August 2005. It is a very historic month. It marks the time that Israel returned the Gaza Strip to Palestine and it marks the advent of the Iraqi Constitution. These are two key checkpoints on the road map to peace for the mid-east.

Will they produce peace?

That still remains to be seen. The Israeli “settlers” are irate and distraught at being evicted from the lands that they occupied as a result of conquest stemming from the “Seven Day War.” In Iraq that nation is on the verge of a civil war over the new Constitution and over two key points: “federalization” and “women’s rights.” The existence of a constitution is not the same as a commitment by the citizens of Iraq to live by the rule of law embodied within that constitution. Nation building takes time.

These two events will change the course of history and we are just not yet sure how they will play out.

In Israel, Jewish settlers could seek to reoccupy the territories in defiance of the central government and leading to a civil war as a result.

In Iraq, the issues of sharing in oil profits, land for the Kurds, and an uneasy situation between the Shiites and Sunnis, all point the nation in a direction of civil war. The lack of freedom for Iraqi women could turn the women of America against the Bush Administration and put political pressure on the Iraq government as a result.

One thing is for sure: on all fronts and in both nations, there is now no turning back. Israel is committed to withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the United States now has its boots stuck firmly in sands of the Iraqi desert even as the neighboring nation of Iran becomes a nuclear wild card. God only knows where we go from here.

Both Democrats and Republicans want peace in the mid-east. Both Parties have worked to achieve it. All Americans hope that it materializes in a lasting way.