Request a genuine Arab peace initiative

Dear Professor:

Shame on the University of California, Berkeley, for the attack on Jews at Zellerbach Playhouse.

Request a genuine Arab peace initiative.

The first step in a true Arab Peace Initiative should be to give descendants of Palestinians, who were born in the Arab countries, full citizenship rights in their countries of residence. The wealthy Arab countries should provide all the needed help for the full integration of these refugees in their present countries of residence, including the eradication of all the refugee camps. According to UNRWA, about 2,700,000 Arabs of Palestinian descent live today in Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan, among them, more than 2,000,000 are in Jordan.

This is long overdue: this is an elemental recognized right for all descendants of refugees in all the other conflicts in the world: the right to rebuild their lives in their countries of residence. The Palestinians became the exception to the rule: They were kept for generations as refugees in the Arab countries to sustain and provide a justification for the continuation of the war against the State of Israel.

Israel did its part by integrating more than half a million Jewish refugees from the Arab countries. Around half of the present Jewish population in Israel is descendent from Jewish refugees from Arab countries. It is time for the Arab states to do their part in integrating the Palestinian refugees in their countries of residence.

The second step in a true Arab Peace Initiative is for the Arab countries to support the 242 United Nations Security Council resolution. This means support the reunification of the West Bank with Jordan. A mini-state consisting of the West Bank, 40 miles wide by 55 miles long, and the Gaza Strip, 24 miles long by 6 miles wide, is a quimera. It will be a source of continuous instability and friction in the region, and a fertile ground for unrelenting irredentist ideologies, of the like of Hamas.

Following the model of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, the West Bank will be demilitarized (as the Sinai Peninsula is). The final recognized international borders between the State of Israel and the unified Jordan-West Bank State, replacing the 1949 armistice line, will be decided through negotiation, but will resemble the pre-June 1967 armistice line, with some territorial swaps here and there.

Unfortunately, all the Arab peace initiatives that have been floated through the years look more like a “2-stage solution,” instead of a “2-state solution”:  First stage, the establishment of an ephemeral Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza; and second stage, the elimination of the State of Israel by waging “the war of return” of millions of Palestinian refugees to the State of Israel within its pre-June 1967 borders, or, as these initiatives tersely say, the implementation of UNGA’s 194 resolution. (See, for example, the Arab Peace Initiative from 2002)

There were two groups of refugees created by the long conflict between the Arab world and the Jewish people: All the Arab “peace” initiatives only recognize one. It is time for the Arab states to recognize the Jewish State, and take care of the Palestinian refugees, as Israel took care of the Jewish refugees from the Arab countries.

Jaime Kardontchik, PhD (Physics)

Silicon Valley, California

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The above letter was sent to many professors at the various campuses of the University of California. If you agree with the contents of the letter, please, cut and paste, and send to the academic staff at the US universities in your state. A letter in the same spirit to your representative in Congress is also recommended.

For more details about the proposed Arab peace initiative see chapter 9 of my book “The root of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the path to peace, “ (March 2024 edition). The book can be read and downloaded for free at:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364057784_The_root_of_the_Arab-Israeli_conflict_and_the_path_to_peace