(2 of 4)
Israeli disenchantment is only half the problem. The peace process has been heading for the rocks over the steady expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, already home to 120,000 people. Though Rabin's Labor-led coalition pledged to ``freeze'' settlements upon taking office in 1992, the government actually plans to complete 30,000 additional housing units, prompting widespread Arab demonstrations and threats by Palestinian officials to quit the peace talks. Two weeks ago, the Israelis promised Arafat what Environment Minister Yossi Sarid called ``a very deep freeze, one with no nonsense.'' But after the Beit Lid massacre, the government approved the construction and sale of 4,000 units in occupied land around Jerusalem. Says Mohammed Subieh, the Cairo-based general secretary of the P.L.O.'s parliament-like Palestine National Council: ``Rabin has put us in a bad position. He is not helping himself or us.''
The process so far has not delivered amity. Since Rabin and Arafat signed the first accord in September 1993, 112 Israelis have been killed by Palestinian radicals bent on wrecking the settlement. In the same period, 195 Palestinians have died at the hands of Israelis. Many of them too were innocent civilians, such as 14-year-old Mohamed Abed Ghani, who died last week in the West Bank city of Nablus when Israeli soldiers fired into a crowd of students who were jeering at them.
Worse than the blood-soaked statistics is the growing fear on both sides that nothing will improve. Palestinians and their Arab allies are increasingly persuaded that Israel has no intention of expanding self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho to the rest of the West Bank. Planned Palestinian elections are six months overdue, and Israel has yet to move any of its occupying troops out of the territory. After Beit Lid, Arafat also blamed Palestinian militants for the delays. Said he: ``Every time we get nearer to retrieving in our hands the West Bank and extending the national authority, a new problem surfaces.''
For his part, Rabin pleaded with Israelis in a televised address not to give in to ``moments of weakness.'' But a poll in the daily Ma'ariv showed that while 37% of Israeli Jews are willing to proceed with the peace process, 50% want to suspend it--the highest negative ratings so far. The Prime Minister could not accede to their wish. ``We are heavily invested in this process,'' explained government spokesman Uri Dromi.
About all Rabin could offer is more security measures. As he has done after every attack, he temporarily shut Israel's borders to Palestinian workers, barring 40,000 of them from crossing daily from the West Bank and Gaza Strip--a form of collective punishment that serves only to inflame Palestinian anger. More than a hundred alleged militants were rounded up in the West Bank. Security forces were allowed to continue the tough interrogation tactics introduced after the Tel Aviv bus bombing. Since then the Israelis have arrested 1,500 Palestinians and claim that information extracted from the detainees has enabled the government to forestall three suicide attacks, one car bombing and the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier.