'When we have settled the land,' Rafael Eitan, then chief of staff of the Israeli Defence Force, said in 1983, 'all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle.' Over twenty years later, the Palestinians are struggling to consolidate a genuinely representative Palestinian Interim Self-Governing Authority and to handle the huge economic and political challenges resulting from Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, while the Sharon government finishes cantonising the West Bank, and Gaza remains walled off. Unable to achieve even the agenda Israel has set for it, the Palestinian Authority is cut off physically and diplomatically at every turn.

LRB 3 November 2005 | PDF Download