Abbas’ Departure Makes It Official: Mideast ‘Road Map’ Has Failed

Re “Abbas’ Departure Leaves Peace Plan at Crossroads,” Sept. 7: You write that the Mideast “road map” is in danger of failing because of the resignation of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas. Yet the road map was dead the moment Abbas stated that he would not confront Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other terror groups. Dismantling the Palestinian terror groups was the primary obligation assigned to the Palestinians under the first phase of the road map. When a party signs a contract and then announces after the signing that it will not undertake its major obligation, the contract becomes worthless.

Josh Baker

San Francisco

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Since President Bush’s grandiloquent performance at Aqaba three months ago announcing the road map, he has refused to do any of the things necessary to make it work. The latest result is the resignation of the unsupported, beleaguered Abbas.

Bush failed to pressure Israel to end its barbarous occupation of the West Bank; Bush failed to pressure Israel to dismantle the settlements; Bush failed to pressure Israel to tear down the separation barrier snaking across the West Bank; Bush failed to pressure Israel to release the 6,000 or more Palestinians it is holding in captivity; and Bush failed to pressure Israel to stop its murder campaign against the Palestinians, which has gone on unabated.

Bush could instantly bring Israel to heel by terminating aid to that country -- financial, diplomatic and military -- or by merely threatening to terminate it.

Richard Herman

Costa Mesa

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Re “Blows to Israel Must Never Go Unanswered,” by Martin Peretz, Commentary, Sept. 5:

Peretz has given us a sure recipe for permanent war between Israel and the Palestinians. With the same sort of posturing on the other side we could face several more decades of bloody trading in suicide bombings and rocket attacks.

The first true steps toward peace, both in Israel and across the region, will come only when significant numbers of sensible people on both sides recognize together that violent blows must be answered not with more lawless violence but with scrupulous adherence to the rule of law and, where necessary, civil disobedience.

Until then, opportunistic leaders like Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat will continue to treat ordinary people as human shields, while thinkers like Peretz cheer from the sidelines.

David Schaberg

Irvine