Oslo Demands on Palestinians Are Central to Statehood

To the editors:

Re "How Wye Failed the Palestinians (Opinion, November 10): In discussing the Oslo Accords, Amahl A. Bishara and Waqaas S. Fahmawi charge that the Accords do not allow for true Palestinian autonomy. Instead, they say, the Accords delegate to the Palestinian Authority "the dirty job of monitoring the activities of Palestinians and suppressing Palestinian struggle for true self-determination and human rights."

This is a troubling characterization of the daily maintenance of a potential Palestine. One hopes that those who would like to see a Palestinian state would take a more positive view toward the most basic elements of statehood. The running of day-to-day affairs and the regulation of citizens' activities ought to stand at the heart of any nationalist aspirations, and not be viewed as "dirty work."

Likewise, the belief in human rights, so central to the authors' arguments, requires that the "struggle for true self-determination" proceed along lines which respect these basic human rights. From this point of view, self-determination requires a certain amount of careful self-monitoring, one might say "suppression," of the violent strains within such a movement. Once again, this sort of watchfulness must not be seen as a toilsome burden. As a nationalist movement fighting for statehood, the Palestinian Authority must accept both these responsibilities. It ought not to see these tasks in the onerous light which Bishara and Fahmawi cast on them. November 11, 1998