Political activists on the pro-Israel left have noted that the new Roadmap to Palestinian-Israeli peace, while flawed, offers a lifeline for rescuing Palestinians and Israelis from the quicksand into which they have fallen. Should the Jewish peace camp and all who seek a just peace lend their support to the new plan-or they should they seek to reform it or replace it in toto? To answer this question we must understand the good, the bad and the ugly in the Roadmap.

The Good

Much of the good in the Roadmap is found in Phase I, which has near-term relevance. Phase I incorporates all of the elements from the Mitchell and Tenet plans that Americans for Peace Now and the Zionist left endorse, applying lessons learned from Oslo's failure. It requires a series of mutual political, security, economic and humanitarian confidence-building measures which promote a genuine truce-a cessation of all Palestinian-Israeli violence, disarming of Palestinian terrorist groups and redeployment of Israeli forces to the positions they held prior to the outbreak of the intifada-paving the way for a return to peace talks. But the Roadmap adds other novel components which were absent from these early plans. These include:

1. political reform which sidelines Arafat through the creation of an empowered Prime Minister (Abu Mazen)-who appoints an Interior Minister (Mohammed Dahlan) genuinely committed to thwarting terror and consolidating the Palestinian security services under his control (much as Israel's Chief of Military Intelligence told the Knesset he believed Abu Mazen would do): political reform thus leads, it is hoped, to security reform;

2. economic reform under Finance Minister Salam Fayyad, a respected former International Monetary Fund official, to stop funneling PA money towards terrorism and to end other forms of corruption, which undermined popular support for the PA when it pursued peace talks with Israel.

3. The broader Arab context: The Roadmap also calls in Phase I for squelching broader Arab funding for terrorism. A step forward was achieved in this regard by eliminating Saddam's regime and its $25,000 gift to the family of every suicide bomber. Saudi and Iranian money and other forms of support, routed through Syria and Hezbollah, would have to be cut off too; that is the clear intent of the Roadmap and of current US policy. The Roadmap improves on the Mitchell Report by recognizing not only the destabilizing role played by some Arab states which support terrorism, but also by requiring moderate Arab states to play a constructive role in supporting progress as the parties advance along the road. It does so, in part, by calling on these states to restore diplomatic and trade links with Israel during Phase II. It also incorporates the goal of a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace following the hoped-for success of Phase III. A Palestinian-Israeli final accord is envisioned as a prelude to peace treaties between Israel, Syria and Lebanon, and "Arab state acceptance of full normal relations with Israel." But the Roadmap offers little beyond the expression of the fond wish for such broader peace and normalization. Wish fulfillment in this, as in so many areas addressed by the Roadmap, will depend in no small part on how robust and sustained a commitment the US demonstrates in shepherding all parties towards this end. To its credit, the US and the Quartet have attempted to stress the vital role of the broader Arab context in promoting the Roadmap. They have invited Arab states to participate in two international conferences along the way—during the second and third phases—both designed to foster Palestinian-Israeli progress, lend broad Arab legitimacy to the process and encourage public support for the Roadmap in the Arab world. As the parties negotiate final status issues in the third phase, it is clear that wide Arab and Muslim support for compromises on the Palestinian refugees—many of whom resie in Ara countries—and on Jerusalem will be needed to bolster the willingness of Palestinian moderates to reach pragmatic solutions on these issues which would be acceptable to a moderate Israeli government.

4. Settlements: The plan also requires the "immediate dismantling of the settlement outposts" and a settlement freeze (including "natural growth") in Phase I, so that security and political confidence-building measures are taken more or less simultaneously. Palestinians demonstrate a new commitment to stop terror and to create responsible government; "among the [Israeli] steps discussed with the US were the release of a certain number of security prisoners, speeding up the transfer of Palestinian tax revenue that has been frozen for more than two years, moving troops back from a mutually agreed-upon area where the PA would then take over security control, and dismantling a number of illegal settlement outposts." (Jerusalem Post, April 21, 2003) Before, Israel's steps on settlements were not understood to be near-term confidence-building measures, but the heavily conditioned, and never-reached, reward after a long Palestinian cease-fire, which Sharon regarded himself as free to sabotage at will with aggressive new IDF operations, which often prompted new revenge attacks by Palestinian terror groups.

   While the Mitchell Report called for "freeze all settlement activity, including the 'natural growth' of existing settlements," it meekly suggested that the Israeli government "should give careful consideration to whether settlements which are focal points for substantial friction are valuable bargaining chips for future negotiations or provocations likely to preclude the onset of productive talks." The Roadmap supplements the Mitchell requirement of a settlement freeze with the demand for immediate dismantling of settlement outposts during Phase I. Moreover, while the Palestinians continue to observe a truce, maintain security cooperation, and consolidate democratic reforms during Phase II, the plan calls for Israel to take "further action on settlements" to "enhance maximum Palestinian territorial contiguity" for the creation of a Palestinian state in provisional borders. The Roadmap thus repairs one of the primary structural flaws in the Oslo Accords—the deferral of all Israeli action to remove, and refrain from expanding, settlements until a final status agreement is reached at the end of Oslo's five-year interim period. That period, of course, extended to seven years, so that by the end of the Oslo decade the number of settlers in the West Bank and Gaza had doubled from roughly 100,000 to 200,000. With no agreement reached in the final status talks at Camp David and Taba, settlement proliferation has continued with the construction of over 100 settlement outposts under the Sharon government. The Roadmap operationalizes, more effectively than the Mitchell Report, the latter's own recognition that "security cooperation cannot long be sustained if meaningful negotiations are unreasonably deferred, if security measures 'on the ground' are seen as hostile, or if steps are taken that are perceived as provocative or as prejudicing the outcome of negotiations."

5. External Monitoring and Compliance Verification: Another way the Roadmap improves significantly over Oslo is by introducing an external monitoring mechanism on the ground to oversee both sides' compliance with their commitments. In practice, this will be carried out by American monitors from the CIA. The EU, Russia and a representative of the UN Secretary General will be consulted and given a role in deciding with the US when both sides have met the conditions for advancing from each phase of the Roadmap. The US, fresh from its encounter with the lack of French, German, and Russian fortitude over both Iraqi sanctions enforcement and real compliance with the UN inspection regime, will exercise a veto over any decisions to advance along the Roadmap which fudge on fulfillment of obligations by either side. The Roadmap requires a consensus judgment by all members of the Quartet as to whether "conditions are appropriate to proceed" from phase to phase. Much as some European states deprived the US of the unanimity it sought at the UN Security Council for a resolution authorizing the use of force to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, so the US will regard itself at liberty to withhold assent if the EU and Russia support further Israeli concessions if the Palestinians have failed to fulfill their obligations. Under the new draft US implementation plan, the on-the-ground monitoring committee responsible for measuring performance would be chaired by a U.S. official. Virtually all aspects of the plan's implementation would be handled by the U.S.-led committee, though it would draft confidential reports that would be forwarded to representatives of the EU, the United Nations and Russia. The committee would also be responsible for its own budget, with expenses to be shared equally by the members of the Quartet.

   According to the plan, the US will take a central role in monitoring implementation, heading the "on-the-ground monitoring committee," as reported in the Washington Post (April 26, 2003): "Among the issues the U.S.-led committee would track are the implementation of security measures by the Palestinians, the reform of Palestinian security services, the building of Palestinian institutions, the reform of the Palestinian Authority's finances, the dismantling of Israeli settlement outposts erected since March 2001 and a freeze on settlement activity. Four specialized groups would also be set up under the supervision of the U.S.-led committee, according to the document. One, on humanitarian issues, would be chaired by a European. But the key subcommittee, on security issues, will be chaired by the U.S. official heading the coordinating committee. The security panel would include the Egyptian, Jordanian and European representatives. Two other groups would monitor Palestinian reforms and 'special functions,' such as settlement construction and the removal of settlement outposts."

   The American monitors will visit the settlement outposts and verify that they have been permanently removed, aided by satellite surveillance. They will physically check the settlements to confirm that no construction is continuing, no new bypass roads built, no more Palestinian land expropriated. They will also spend time in PA jails and oversee retrained PA security forces to insure that arrested terrorists stay behind bars and that the PA is indeed exerting maximal efforts to dismantle and disrupt terror activities and groups. They will mediate between Palestinian and Israeli security services as witness and arbiter to renewed security cooperation. Oslo allowed no external monitors; both sides flouted various elements of the agreements, and sometimes the other side didn't trumpet violations for reasons of expedience, or political weakness.

6. The Two-State Solution as Explicit Goal: Declaratively at least, the new plan improves over the Oslo Accords by making it explicit—for the first time—that the goal is a two-state solution. Oslo never explicitly affirmed this; its vagueness on this point permitted Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to insist early on in the Knesset that Oslo would not eventuate in a Palestinian state. Moreover, it allowed the Israeli public and its leaders to ignore the stark contradiction between the creation of a territorially contiguous, viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, where Palestinians would rule themselves and live at peace with Israel under a final peace treaty, on the one hand, and on the other, permitting the settlement population in these same areas to double. Land expropriations and creeping annexation continued throughout much of the territory, over which Israel never relinquished effective control—some 82% of the West Bank and large portions of Gaza remained under Israeli security control. The clash between expectations and reality helped undermine Palestinian support for negotiations, fueling despair and a growing belief that only violence would prompt Israel to leave the occupied territories—as Israel had in Lebanon only months before the intifada, after Hezbollah's long guerrilla campaign against the IDF and terror attacks on Israeli civilians in the Galilee.

Over time, Israeli public opinion on Palestinian statehood evolved, as Oslo's architects believed it would, with most Israelis coming to accept the need for a two-state solution, a recognition which has endured even through Intifada II. Unlike Oslo, the Roadmap affirms this clearly as its goal, and incorporates it progressively in practice. It does this in three ways:

• in its very name ("A Performance-Based Roadmap to a Permanent Two-State Solution to the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict");

• in its incorporation of the post-Oslo UN Security Council Resolution 1397, which calls for a vision of two states, Israel and Palestine, living at peace (an element missing from UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 from 1967 and 1973 respectively, as well as from the Oslo Accords);

• and by attempting to parse "statehood" into components which would allow for the creation of a Palestinian state in "provisional borders" with "attributes of sovereignty" by Phase II of the Roadmap—in the best case scenario, in some 42% of the West Bank (and perhaps all of Gaza)—rather than deferring statehood until the never-reached final status accord.

The Bad and the Ugly

But herein lies the rub. If the final status negotiations fail to make progress in phases II and III, and no permanent agreement is reached—as seems most likely under Sharon—the Roadmap will simply transform the interim agreement achieved, with a Palestinian state in less than half of the West Bank, and at best a small number of settlements removed, into the long-term status quo. This is precisely what Sharon wants—and what the Palestinians fear. Sharon intends for Israel to retain long-term security control over the borders—the Jordan Valley to the east of the Palestinian state and all other borders, plus the remaining 50-60% of the territory. He wants the settlements to remain in place: removing the outposts makes it appear as if he's offered a large concession, like a sale on marked up inflated prices. And at the same time, he wants the IDF to be freed of the burdensome task of policing the West Bank cities, having subcontracted that work once again to a now-reformed, chastened PA. He can then claim that Israel has now "really" ended the occupation, while retaining Israeli sovereignty and security control over virtually all the settlements, all borders, and more than half of the West Bank. The PA would be under obligation to maintain the ongoing truce and to thwart terror, even if the negotiations dragged on without producing anything concrete. Remember how Shamir promised he would have negotiated at Madrid for ten years—and yielded nothing?

Meanwhile, the Palestinians would be at a distinct disadvantage. If they violated the agreement and returned to terror, launching Intifada III, the IDF would reinvade and the situation would revert to the status quo ante—but with a vengeance. Only this time it would be well nigh impossible to extricate the IDF from the territories and to restart a peace process. So the Palestinians would be boxed in: check, and mate. They'd have to keep negotiating, getting nowhere, or break the agreement, with Israel retaining the key security and territorial cards, the Palestinians obliged to perform their own security role in their limited areas of sovereign control.

Israeli security officials, however, paint an entirely opposite scenario, in which Israel is placed at a strategic disadvantage as the parties enter Phase II. What if, as now appears likely, Abu Mazen and Dahlan are unable, despite their best intentions, to disarm Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, but only reach an agreement with them to temporarily refrain from attacks on Israel across the Green Line? What if these groups exploit a truce period to rearm, and Israel is compelled to withdraw its forces from Areas A and B, some 42% of the West Bank, and the Phase III final status negotiations collapse? If, under these conditions, Intifada III erupts, Sharon and company believe that Israel will find it difficult to reinvade the areas relinquished, for both military and political reasons, and international political pressure on Israel will mount to make concessions it—or the Sharon Government—is unwilling to make.

So the problem with the Roadmap is not in Phase I, or even Phase II when the Palestinian state with provisional borders is created. If we can get through Phase I, thanks to Abu Mazen's and Dahlan's efforts (assuming Abu Mazen overcomes Arafat's obstructionism), we might see a piecemeal cease-fire evolve over the next year or so, city by city, as previously envisioned in the Gaza and Bethlehem First Plan. Under that plan, the reformed Palestinian security forces would gain security control on an area-by-area basis, allowing Israel to redeploy troops and take down checkpoints in each area where the Palestinians demonstrated security control and effective anti-terror activity. A Palestinian state would be declared in the territory then under full Palestinian control, following Israel's redeployment in up to 42% of the West Bank. At that point, the peace forces should launch a campaign aimed at revising the Roadmap's Phase III with a bold and comprehensive approach that would be more likely to succeed, forestalling the collapse of the final status negotiations and preventing a new round of violence.

Reforming the Roadmap

Phase III of the Roadmap fails to provide real guidance on any of the final status issues; it leaves them vague, much as Oslo did, with some minor improvements. It does suggest a sharing of Jerusalem, and omits reference to the Palestinian claim of a right of refugee return to former homes and villages in Israel, calling instead for an "agreed, just, fair and realistic solution to the refugee problem." But these formulations are consistent with a wide range of solutions, many of which won't yield any kind of agreement. Hence Sharon can accept the Roadmap language on these issues now, even on Jerusalem, since the plan says nothing about Israel relinquishing sovereignty in any area of the city. Moreover, the plan's language implies that the territorial solution will be based on the pre-Six Day War borders, realizing an end to "Israel's occupation which began in 1967." But it doesn't make explicit that the final territorial solution will be anything like the Clinton Plan or a Clinton Plan Plus, under which the Palestinians would gain at least 95% of fully contiguous territory, plus land swaps of 3% (or more) from Israel proper in exchange for Israel's agreed annexation of three settlement blocs near the Green Line, as proposed at Taba, six months after Barak's less generous Camp David proposals were proffered and rejected. An agreed two-state solution is possible based on such Clinton Plan Plus parameters, whereby the Palestinians, having demonstrated their commitment over three years to a truce, to democratization and reform, and to becoming a responsible state, will enter into a final peace treaty under which they ultimately receive the equivalent of 100% of the territory of the West Bank and Gaza, comprising just 22% of mandatory Palestine, leaving Israel with 78%. The agreement would be finalized at the end of the three year Roadmap, and then implemented over a period of time to be negotiated (presumably one to three years).

In a nutshell, I believe that we on the pro-Israel left who support the Roadmap are right to rally on its behalf because it offers the only realistic hope of stopping the bloodletting, beginning to reverse the settlement enterprise and returning the two peoples to the path of peaceful negotiation. While there is no moral equivalence between Palestinian terror and Israeli settlement building, there is a functional equivalence. The Palestinians sought in Oslo, and most continue to seek, a viable contiguous state in all of the West Bank and Gaza at peace with Israel: that entails political independence and freedom from Israeli domination. Removing the web of Israeli settlements, and the infrastructure of coerced military occupation, exclusive territorial and natural resource control which supports them, is a sine qua non for achieving this goal. The occupation and settlements—especially those built by right-wing Israeli governments in or near areas in the West Bank and Gaza heavily populated by millions of Palestinians—were meant to obstruct a two-state solution and enable Israel to ultimately annex all of the "Greater Land of Israel" from the river to the sea. The wisdom of the Mitchell Committee remains even more true today than before: "Some Israelis," concluded the authors, "appear not to comprehend the humiliation and frustration that Palestinians must endure every day as a result of living with the continuing effects of occupation, sustained by the presence of Israeli military forces and settlements in their midst, or the determination of the Palestinians to achieve independence and genuine self-determination. Some Palestinians appear not to comprehend the extent to which terrorism creates fear among the Israeli people and undermines their belief in the possibility of co-existence, or the determination of the government of Israel to do whatever is necessary to protect its people."

Israeli Jewish fundamentalism and extremism has helped breed Palestinian extremism, undermining support for moderate Palestinians (and Israelis) who have been willing to partition the land and live side by side with Israel. Palestinian terrorism has bred support for Israeli militarism and hard-line leadership, coupled with tolerance for ongoing settlement activity. Since Oslo, Israelis have sought enhanced long-term security through peace, by ending the national conflict between the two peoples through a final, comprehensive political agreement. But Oslo completely failed to stem the proliferation of the settlements, whose population doubled during the Oslo decade, thereby undermining Palestinian faith in negotiations with Israel, strengthening support for violence. Oslo, by deferring all settlement-related issues until the final status talks—which failed seven years hence—left Israel free to continue growing and building the settlements, outposts and bypass roads. In an unholy alliance, Palestinian and Israeli ultra-nationalists hijacked Oslo. Any new peace effort must insure that the aspirations of both peoples—for the Palestinians, a contiguous state in the West Bank and Gaza, free of Israeli settlements and military control, for Israelis, freedom from violence and terror, real security—are seriously addressed from the outset and throughout the negotiation and implementation process.

If we can realize the goals set out in Phase I of the Roadmap during the coming 6-12 months, the atmosphere will radically change for the better. That would be a more propitious time to address the flaws in the Roadmap's approach to the final status issues. Israelis will be more open to entertaining the concessions required by the approach we on the left will propose, having seen an end to the intifada and a period of truce take hold. Palestinians too will be more open to such proposals because they will have seen—for the first time in history—numerous settlement outposts and some settlements permanently dismantled, and an ongoing settlement freeze which prevents even "natural growth," neither of which were addressed under Oslo. They will have seen the IDF withdraw from their cities and from the areas surrounding them, with numerous sources of oppression removed, including many checkpoints at which they are often detained for long periods and sometimes killed. They will have seen their living conditions begin to improve through the humanitarian relief efforts and new economic aid which will have been offered to the new Palestinian administration. And they will see an ongoing commitment from the US and the international community to remain involved on the ground insuring mutual compliance, thereby keeping the process on track.

Moving to a Final Peace Treaty

Hope will have been restored on both sides for a renewed thrust towards a peaceful solution to the conflict. That will be the most advantageous time to advocate that the US put forth a clear and bold set of proposals, based on the progress achieved at Camp David and Taba. Such proposals will aim to resolve the territorial issue in a final way, leaving no doubt that most settlements must be removed—an issue that remains entirely untreated in the Roadmap. They must include a workable solution for a true sharing of Jerusalem, dividing sovereignty between Jewish and Palestinian neighborhoods, as outlined in the Clinton Plan and at Taba, thereby insuring that the political and religious needs of both peoples are met. And they must include a resolution to the refugee issue which, while offering symbolic recognition for both Israeli and Palestinian historical narratives, affirms Israel's right to exist as the state of the Jewish people, next to Palestine as the state of the Palestinian people, while embodying a hard and fast mechanism which is fully consistent with a two-state solution, precluding any right of return of Palestinian refugees to former homes and villages in Israel. Gilad Sher, Israel's Chief Negotiator at Camp David and Taba, has written in Just Beyond Reach, his Hebrew account of the negotiations, that with a little flexibility on Israel's part on symbolic language, the Palestinians will gain what they need to accept practical language which makes clear that the agreed pragmatic mechanisms represent a final resolution of refugee claims. The pragmatic formula envisioned will safeguard Israel's right to Jewish national self-determination and its demographic and political character as a Jewish state.

Such bold and creative ideas will fall on deaf ears on all sides if floated under present conditions. Mitzna ran on something like this platform, and even if he would have had a year, rather than just three months, to present himself and his ideas to the Israeli public, Israelis would have been reluctant to return to such far-reaching concessions prior to seeing credible evidence that they really have a trustworthy peace-seeking partner in the Palestinians. Likewise, the Bush Administration will not consider proposing such far-reaching ideas to the Sharon government now, which will summarily reject them, with the ardent backing of much of the Israeli public. The Council on Foreign Relations and Palestinian political scientist Khalil Shikaki have suggested that the Bush Administration push through such revisions now, or at least articulate them publicly. This proposal is impractical, and more likely to cause the scuttling of the Roadmap than the fall of the Sharon government and the eruption of Palestinian-Israeli comity. Likewise, Sharon's demand that the Palestinians accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state before Israel takes any confidence-building steps regarding the settlements is designed to impose a condition which the new Palestinian administration will, under present conditions, prove unable to meet, thereby dooming the process before it ever gets off the ground, condemning Israelis and Palestinians to endless war. The Roadmap cannot be front-loaded now by either side with conditions which will only lead to its abortion. The time for Roadmap reform is after the birth of the healthy infant, as it begins to mature following its first baby steps. Palestinians and Israelis must crawl, then walk, before they are expected to contemplate a sprint to the finish line.

Timing is everything, and the time to fix the flaws in Phase III of the Roadmap is once we pass the hump of Phase I. If Abu Mazen fails, I doubt that the failure to have fixed these flaws at the starting gate will be the primary cause of his inability to deliver on the Palestinian end of the bargain. Abu Mazen knows that Palestinian political leverage will increase dramatically when the Palestinians deliver on a truce and on political, economic and security reform, and receive some Israeli political concessions on the settlements, humanitarian conditions, prisoner release and the easing of movement in Palestinian areas. Only thus will they be able to return to the negotiating table, having deprived Israel of its biggest excuse for avoiding further concessions on territory, statehood and settlements. As long as the violence rages, Sharon can claim that Israel has no negotiating partner, that there is no room for substantive concessions now, but that he will accept such "painful concessions" down the road when the Palestinians fulfill their obligations. So deliver they must, if they want to gain the advantage on Sharon, and call his bluff; Abu Mazen and Dahlan, unlike Arafat, understand this.

In an ideal world, we'd approach things differently. Given political realities, the Roadmap is indeed the only game in town; but it is much more than that. If the Bush Administration believes it really needs to demonstrate genuine progress on the Palestinian-Israeli front and seizes the opportunity in the aftermath of Persian Gulf War II, committing itself to the task at hand, the Roadmap offers hope for a historic turnaround. If it fails, it won't be due to conceptual flaws in the Roadmap, but from a lack of real will on the part of the Bush Administration, with more than a dash of Arafat's continued obstructionism mixed in. If Bush is reelected, he might be freed of electoral constraints imposed by next year's presidential race, allowing him to increase the heat on Sharon at the most critical juncture, as the Road Map enters Phase III. Bush has already apparently extracted a package of near-term confidence-building measures from Sharon to help bolster Abu Mazen, if he succeeds in demonstrating some progress towards ending Palestinian attacks, after having formed an empowered reformist cabinet with Dahlan as Interior Minister. As for Arafat's persistent blocking of Abu Mazen and the reformers in the Palestinian Legislative Council, the EU has demonstrated a willingness of late to join the US in pressuring Arafat and threatening him with further international isolation if he does not yield to Palestinian reform efforts.

Yet Shikaki and the Council on Foreign Relations have hit upon a crucial point which must be heeded by the Bush Administration as it escorts the parties down the first mile of the road. For the Roadmap to take off, the US must now clearly signal both parties that it will become seriously engaged in support of a workable permanent status agreement once the parties reach the final phase. The Oslo Accords employed phasing in the worst possible way, by deferring all the tough nuts—the final status issues of borders, statehood, settlements, water, refugees and Jerusalem—for the last round. The Roadmap innovates with a constructive gradualism by phasing in progress on several final status issues—statehood and settlements—in increments. But the same principle should be applied, as Shikaki notes, to the refugee issue. Once Israel evacuates settlements in Phase II of the plan, and a Palestinian state is declared in provisional borders, the new state should be called upon to begin rehabilitating refugees and resettling them in the vacated settlements, with generous international financial assistance.

Following a stable truce, continued Palestinian political, financial and security reform, the removal of Israeli settlement outposts, the improvement of living conditions for Palestinians and the creation of a Palestinian state in provisional borders, the stage will be set for a US-led international campaign to extract serious concessions from both Israelis and Palestinians, under a reformed final status Roadmap, to usher both across the threshold they approached, but fell short of, at Camp David and Taba. To get there, the Bush Administration must now use both carrot and stick: unless the Palestinians are given reason to believe that the US is fully determined to see the Roadmap succeed, they will fear being maneuvered into a dead-end with most of their legitimate aspirations left unfulfilled, and the Roadmap will emerge stillborn. Only an unflinching display of American resolve to keep the pressure on both sides to perform at every step will instill confidence in both Israelis and Palestinians that the US will play the necessary role when the long-awaited push for final status talks arrives. That will require not only regime change on the Palestinian side—the marginalization of Arafat and the emergence of an empowered moderate leadership—but on the Israeli side as well. No final status agreement is imaginable with a right-wing Sharon government in power. US-international parameters for a final peace accord should be unveiled when Sharon has served his historical purpose, having led Israel to a stable truce with a moderate post-Arafat Palestinian leadership. Perhaps only a hard-line Israeli leader like Sharon, together with a hawkish George W. Bush, can jump-start the kind of Palestinian political change needed for security reform and the emergence of a truce. Only then will the Israeli public, its confidence in diplomacy and Palestinian-Israeli peacemaking restored, be ripe to respond to an American-led international thrust to reach a permanent peace treaty which requires moderate leaders and governments on both sides of the ramparts. A new Israeli election will ensue from the US-Israeli tensions surrounding the release of American final status guidelines, following the collapse of the rightist Israeli coalition. Such an election, which Labor, Shinui, Meretz and other moderate Israeli parties will likely clinch, must follow the success of the Roadmap's second phase and the American presidential election. Either Bush will be reelected to a second term, freer of electoral worries to embark on the battle for the final peace, or a Democrat will win the White House, more willing to continue where Bill Clinton left off in the aftermath of Camp David.