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YOSSI BEILIN:
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No alternative

One of the most interesting features of the criticism of the Oslo process is the absence of an alternative that has any chance of being accepted by the two sides.

Except for the ideas of "transfer," "Jordan is Palestine" or suggesting to the Palestinians to make do with a small autonomy forever, no one has suggested any real alternative to an Israeli-Palestinian settlement that would ensure Israel a stable Jewish majority and put an end to the violence between the sides.

It is no wonder, then, that the "road map" formulated by the "Quartet" headed by the US proposes nothing but extending the Oslo interim period until 2005 with the addition of the factor of the Palestinian state within temporary borders: there simply is no alternative.

The Oslo Accords were signed against the backdrop of rising Palestinian violence, the abduction and murder of soldiers and further actions that led to the temporary expulsion of 415 Hamas members to Lebanon a few months earlier. A day after it was signed, an Israeli-Jordanian Declaration of Principles was signed in Washington, that led within a year to a peace accord between the two states.

Most of the countries of the Arab world opened up to us for business, tourism and economic ties. Diplomatic relations were established between Israel and many countries, the tertiary and secondary Arab boycotts were lifted, Europe upgraded our status in relation to the European Union and our status at the UN was upgraded. Tourists came to Israel and an economic "boom" characterized those years alongside continuous and unprecedented growth. Immigrants could be resettled in relative comfort, and immigration grew while emigration dropped. The absolute number of poor people declined, as did the inequality between the various deciles, and unemployment shrunk by half.

Hopes of an immediate reduction of violence were dashed all at once in February 1994 - after a relatively quiet period - when a religious settler, a doctor in IDF uniform, a captain in the Israeli army, murdered 29 Palestinian worshipers at the Cave of the Patriarchs. Exactly 40 days later came a Palestinian suicide bombing that killed Israelis in Hadera.

The five years granted to the Oslo period gave those who wanted to undermine the process a long enough time to do so through political and violent means. The Rabin assassination, the election of Binyamin Netanyahu and his decision not to keep the Oslo agreement, and the fact that by May 4, 1999, the day the final settlement agreement was supposed to be signed, not one single discussion of it had taken place.

All that together created the deep crisis that not even Ehud Barak, as prime minister, managed to prevent. The awkward management of the negotiations by Barak, the Palestinian leadership's lack of courage and the continuous frustration on the Palestinian street, all led to the point where Ariel Sharon's unnecessary and provocative visit to the Temple Mount became the excuse for the Intifada that has not stopped since.

The only reasonable decision that remains now is to return to the negotiating table, to the place where talks broke down in January 2001, and to reach the final settlement as soon as possible in the spirit of the Clinton plan: two states along the 1967 border with mutual changes, Jerusalem as the capital of both, and security arrangements including a demilitarized Palestinian state to solve the refugee problem without giving them the right of return to Israel.

The mistake of the Oslo agreement may have been that it followed Menachem Begin's Camp David Accords and Arafat's Madrid Conference and included a five-year interim period that has since turned into 10, and counting. The sooner the final settlement materializes, the better for us all.

The writer is a former Labor MK and cabinet minister.