Roadmap: all but dead

No one should be surprised if Israel finally ditches the roadmap to peace in Palestine. In an interview with an Israeli newspaper, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said his government would not follow the roadmap and would remain in possession of much of the West Bank after withdrawing from the Gaza Strip. This virtually torpedoes the US-backed roadmap. Unveiled by President George Bush on April 30 last year, the roadmap was never wholeheartedly accepted by Mr Sharon and other Likud party hawks.

Prepared by the Quartet - the US, Russia, the European Union and the UN - it provided for Israelis withdrawal from occupied territories and the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state by 2005. Palestinian President Yasser Arafat accepted the roadmap, while Israel took some time before accepting it with some reservations.

One horrible fact here stands out: Mr Sharon has been encouraged in his turning away from the roadmap by no one other than President Bush himself. The US president made at least two observations that gave Mr Sharon the approving nod he needed. First, reacting to Israel's Gaza "disengagement" plan, Mr Bush said Israel would retain "some" West Bank land. He said this when Mr Sharon was his guest at the White House. Second, a few months later, Mr Bush said the 2005 deadline for the establishment of a Palestinian state was "unrealistic".

All along, instead of focussing on the roadmap, the Bush administration kept the Palestinian Authority under pressure, calling for reforms. The aim was to divert the world's attention from Israel's human rights violations in occupied territories and the need for bringing the occupation to an end.

Given America's categorical support and the EU's indifference to the Palestinian question, Mr Sharon feels he can get away with any crime. He can also annex the West Bank and Gaza the way Menachim Begin annexed the Golan Heights, and get in return nothing more than mild protests from Europe and North America. The reason why he cannot annex the occupied territories is basically demographic. If Gaza and West Bank are made part of a Greater Israel, that state will have only a thin Jewish majority.

However, given the higher Arab birth rate, Jews will become a minority in such a state in about 15 years. What, therefore, suits Israel is not outright annexation but a scheme in which Palestinians will live in mini-cantons. The existing Jewish settlements will stay, and the highways and other public works will be so planned that they would run through Palestinian villages and orchards. This way, the Palestinians will live in semi-autonomous 'Bantustans' on their own land. America should know that it is directly responsible for Israel's renunciation of the roadmap.

Its policies since 9/11 have served to encourage Tel Aviv in its defiance of the Oslo accords and the 2003 roadmap. It now uses the terrorism bogey to de-legitimize the Palestinian people's just struggle for freedom. It gets away with the killing of civilians in occupied territories, the blowing up of homes and targeted assassinations because these crimes evoke no condemnation from Washington. What these crimes do is add to the anti-American feeling in the Arab-Islamic world and strengthen religious extremism.

It is time Washington saw the relationship between the menacing rise of what the western media loves to call "Islamic terrorism" and what is happening in Muslim lands under alien occupation.

Role of intelligence

A bill has been moved in the National Assembly seeking to take civilian appointments to Inter-Services Intelligence out of the purview of the Federal Public Service Commission. These appointments, the bill proposes, should be made by the intelligence agency itself "in the larger interest of the country" - a catchall phrase now so frequently invoked that it is losing all its meaning.

The ISI is the military's overall intelligence outfit and is besides similar intelligence units in each of the services - the air force, the navy and the army. There are also civilian intelligence agencies as part of the police set-up. Key appointments to ISI are already made by the military; what the bill seeks to do is to let the agency recruit people directly from the civilian sector for posts in Grade 16 and above.

How it recruits civilians at present is hazy, like so much else with such 'sensitive' spy outfits. But apparently the appointments are vetted by the FPSC. Removing this check might mean letting ISI have a free hand to scout for people on the campus and other areas of civilian activity with all its consequences. It will further limit the accountability factor.

But the public debate about ISI has not been about its recruitment policy but its operational parameters and its jurisdiction. It has over the years become an intrusive presence on the country's political scene. It has been accused of patronizing militant elements and promoting particular political parties. Its interference in the electoral process has also been often criticized.

The 'war on terror' has apparently made its mandate even more flexible, and journalists have also felt its sting. We need intelligence and security, but whether the present apparatus is working efficiently and in the right direction should be investigated. Parliament and the government, rather than getting bogged down in procedural matters, should undertake a comprehensive review of the working of all intelligence agencies, clearly marking out the jurisdiction of each and ensuring that no agency is used for political engineering or to harass dissenters.

Preoccupation with the latter has led to confused objectives and independent, cavalier-like decision-making at cross-purposes with the 'national interest'.

Where is the law?

Patience seems to be running out with the government showing no signs of moving forward on a pending bill to prohibit the barbaric custom of honour killing that is practised in all four provinces. This was evident at a recent seminar in Karachi where speakers urged the government to get on with the task of enacting a law to discourage this scourge by penalizing its perpetrators.

At the moment, loopholes in legal provisions dealing with murder allow many guilty persons to escape punishment. The result is that very few, if any, of those who have committed murder in the name of protecting their "honour", have been given the exemplary punishment they deserve.

Speakers at the seminar also argued that laws banning honour killing would be ineffectual if the mindset of those subscribing to this feudal and tribal practice was not changed. There is no disputing this fact, but then a law prescribing suitable punishment for karo-kari and honour killing must be there as a starting point for campaigns to enlighten the people, or else the impression will gain ground that the government is not serious about rooting it out.

Unfortunately, this appears to be the case, as so far the government has done nothing beyond wavering on the issue. In this way, it continues to endanger the lives of many potential victims, who may not be guilty of any aberrant conduct but who are being targeted out of personal enmity. By banning karo-kari and honour killing, the government would be sending a strong message not only to the killers but to all those involved in questionable systems of parallel justice like jirgas and panchayats. Honour killing is one of the most brutal manifestations of tribal justice, and the sooner it is eliminated the better it is for the country and its people.