Cabinet Secretary Gideon Sa’ar, speaking with Arutz-7 today, was asked to explain the principles of the Tenet agreement. His response: “It is a document dealing with the required steps - arrests of terrorists, orders to stop terrorism, etc. - in order to reach a real ceasefire.”

Ed. note: Some of the relevant passages of the Tenet Agreement are as follows:
“The operational premise of the work plan is that the two sides are committed to a mutual, comprehensive cease-fire… The security organizations of Israel and the PA agree to immediately initiate the following specific, concrete, and realistic security steps to reestablish security cooperation and the situation on the ground that existed prior to 28 September [2000]: Resumption of security cooperation, and measures to enforce strict adherence to the declared cease-fire and to stabilize the security environment - including no attacks by Israel against [targets such as] headquarters of Palestinian security, intelligence, and police organization [, while the PA will “move immediately” to apprehend, question, and incarcerate terrorists…]”

Asked how these vague obligations can be enforced, Sa’ar responded, “Israel and the U.S. have the tools to gauge whether they have been fulfilled. As of now, we both agree that it has not happened yet - but when it happens, we’ll know… At this point, I have my doubts whether it will happen, as even with Zinni and Cheney here, we have seen no signs of it in the past days, nor in the past eight years…”

The Cabinet Secretary denied that the U.S. has exerted pressure on Israel: “There has been no pressure during this visit [of VP Cheney], it was a very successful visit, and in general I don’t think we can talk in terms of pressure with this Administration. There may be disagreements, but nothing like pressure…”

Dr. Yossi Olmert, a Middle Eastern affairs expert who served as director of Israel’s Government Press Office under Prime Minister Yitzchak Shamir, later told Arutz-7, “It’s clear that the Israeli decisions of late are in order to prepare the way for the American attack on Iraq, but the problem is that this is a matter of months, not weeks… It’s hard for me to even conceive of a situation in which Israel would be able to practice restraint for such a long time in the face of increasing terrorism. So we have to see what will happen…”

“In any event,” Olmert continued, “the Palestinians continue their terrorism, and they are doing this because - unpleasant as it is to hear - they feel they are winning. We had some accomplishments in the anti-terrorism offensive, but everyone agrees that we lost by stopping it in the middle…”

Olmert said that we have no choice but to make sure that we score a military victory in this war: “It’s true that by looking at Cheney’s body language when he mentioned Arafat’s name, you can tell exactly where the U.S. stands on this issue, but we must be determined and unfailing… The truth is that I am greatly concerned, because I hear what our American friends are saying: After Sep. 11, George Bush and Dick Cheney gave us a perfect opportunity, four months in which to take care of this war - but we didn’t do it, and look what happened.”

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 21st, 2002 and is filed under hotnews.