An argument has been raging for some time as to which party in the Middle East conflict is more interested in peace and quiet. Israel claims that it wants peace and stability, that it made what it calls a generous offer for peace and that all they got in return was suicide attacks.

Palestinians insist that they want peace and that the illegal Israeli occupation and exclusive Jewish settlement activity in Palestinian lands is the problem. As to the generous offer, they state that returning occupied lands is not charity but an internationally mandated right and that just like the US insisted on all of Kuwaiti territory be returned to its owners, so Palestinians demand that all of the occupied West Bank and Gaza be returned.

But while this argument has not been settled, no one seems to be able to find a way to identify who is keeping the pot boiling and more importantly who is derailing various local and international attempts at reaching a cessation to the violence.

Even though both sides might not be aware of it, recent events on the ground have shown a strange unholy alliance between extremist Palestinian groups and hard line Israeli military and political officials. Whether it is militant Palestinian Muslim groups or the hawkish Israeli prime minister, both seem to benefit more from violence than from long periods of quiet.

This phenomena has been seen of and on for some time but in the past three weeks it has become much clearer to any neutral observer. Whenever the issue of a negotiated ceasefire had been discussed in the past, Israel’s prime minister has insisted that first a period of absolute quiet must prevail. What Sharon means by quiet is not a unilateral one but rather a one sided effort. Israel’s leaders continuously insist that they want Palestinians to stop their violent resistance and suicide bombings before they can go back to the negotiating period.

Six days after the Palestinian Authority unilaterally observed a cease fire, last December, Israel’s assassinated a senior leader of Arafat’s Fateh movement Raed Karmi from Tulkarem thus putting the Palestinian leader in an impossible position as he tried unsuccessfully to stop his own militants from taking revenge.

Four hours after the Islamic spiritual leader Sheik Ahmad Yasin declared on Arab TV stations that the Hamas movement was considering a unilateral cessation of attacks inside Israel, a one ton bomb was fired from an F-16 fighter on a residential Gaza neighborhood killing a senior Hamas leader as well as more than a dozen children and women. Again the cycle of violence was intensified.

This Tuesday, the first day of implementing the Gaza and Bethlehem First plan Israelis once again sabotaged the deal. The agreement between Palestinian security officials with the Israeli Defense minister and leader of the Labor Party Beniyamin Ben Eliazer became worthless when a special Israeli army unit assassinated a secular Palestinian militant in Ramallah.

What is evident in all these ceasefire attempts is that Israelis refuse to commit upon themselves a cessation of anti Palestinian violence. Israelis also refuse to stop expropriating Palestinian lands, expanding settlements, house demolitions, deportations using human shields and assassinations. Many Israelis have criticized these acts that which the international community considers crimes of war according to international humanitarian law.

Radical Palestinian groups also have little incentive for a prolonged period of quiet. As long as they are carrying out anti Israeli attacks their popularity among frustrated Palestinians continues to rise. If there is quiet and the beginning of negotiations then they will be in a corner, they will either be seen as spoilers of a historic peace agreement or they will have to make political compromises which will make them no different than mainstream Palestinian groups.

By insisting on Palestinian unilateral quiet, Israelis accomplish both their military as well as their political objectives. They can continue to have a free hand in taking revenge on every Palestinian they consider has used violence against them. If Palestinian respond the Israelis can blame Palestinians for the continuation of the violence and they declare that they are free from paying the political price which they know they will have to pay in any long-term solution. If on the other hand Palestinians take the beatings and not respond then Israel can declare a victory on Palestinians thus they can easily dictate the terms on any future political settlement.

In order to break this cycle of violence between Sharon’s army and Palestinian militants, outside help is needed. International mediators efforts can’t begin until there is a genuine enforceable ceasefire that includes both sides commitment not to attack the other side. The Bush administration should make this the number one priority and should be ready to declare to the parties and to the entire world which side is really for peace and who is interested in keeping the current unacceptable violent status quo.

My 14-year old son, Bishara, and his cousin ran into trouble this week. They were loitering in Bethlehem’s Manger Square during the few hours of the lifting of the curfew when they were confronted by much older teens who wanted to shake them down for money. The incident ended peacefully, but the fact that it took place in the center of Bethlehem in the middle of the day is telling of a much bigger problem that is taking place in the Palestinian territories.

With the heavy Israeli onslaught on the Palestinian Authority and its various security forces, coupled with the reoccupation of all major West Bank cities, Palestine is in danger of witnessing an unprecedented state of lawlessness.

The presence of tanks and armored Israeli vehicles in the center of Palestinian towns has naturally resulted in the disappearance of the uniformed Palestinian police, who have been targeted by the invading Israeli soldiers. But these new/old Israeli occupiers are not taking any direct involvement in day-to-day activities in Palestine. Bunkered in their fortified tanks, Israeli soldiers don’t make any effort to interfere with the activities of Palestinians. Thus the stage is left rife for any individual or group of individuals to fill this new power vacuum.

My description of the situation should not in any way be interpreted as a call for Israeli interference but simply to state the fact that the continuation of this strange security situation is endangering the internal social stability of Palestinian life.

The deteriorating economic situation as a result of the 23-month-old siege and the four-month-old incursion/curfews also plays into the hands of thugs who look for well-to-do persons to go after. If those who fall prey to these gangs are unable to defend themselves, it won’t take long for these cases to be repeated without these individuals having any viable recourse.

Palestinian courts, which are normally expected to protect the weak, have become completely paralyzed because of the absence of any executive enforcement body.

District governors are also feeling the results of this power vacuum as their roles and powers diminish on a daily basis. These governors, who are supposed to represent the president in their district and command local security forces, have become as weak as their president, whose own political survival is in doubt.

IN THE absence of any organized executive powers, the Palestinian population is slowly reverting to tribal systems for solving problems. Communities are huddling together and staying in close touch with each other so as to act as a quick reaction force once any member of their collective is endangered. Naturally, such tribal solutions clearly play into the hands of the more abundant family, social, even religious groupings.

Political forces and factions play their role in this new tribalism, with the Fatah faction the more powerful because it is the only one that is not on the run from the Israelis and the remnants of the Palestinian Authority and police.

So far, most of the cases of lawlessness tend to be economic-based; there are few cases of homicidal criminality. Some private land grab cases are taking place, as well as building encroachment and forced evictions. Banks have for some time stopped providing any sort of credit to their clients because of their fear that they will not be able to enforce any asset reclamation if the debts are not paid.

Despite the presence of petty thuggery and some cases of property grabs, the Palestinian population, for the most part, has not allowed the situation to turn chaotic. While Palestinian police are not being seen in uniform, they are working nevertheless in civilian clothes to solve problems. Local officials in coordination with governors and security officials are seen constantly in trouble spots, trying to solve problems amicably, using whatever little leverage they still have. But with every passing day, their ability to keep a sense of stability becomes more difficult.

If the coming weeks don’t witness a breakthrough on the macro political/security level, the feeling among Palestinians is that at the micro level the danger of disorder and chaos is imminent.

Nothing is causing a perpetuation of the current Palestinian -Israeli violence more than the existence and growth of illegal Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

In June 1967 Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza strip (as well as the Golan and Sinai) saying at that time that they would relinquish these areas in return for peace. This Israeli claim has now been proven to be a public relations ploy. Palestinians and Arabs (see the latest Arab League Commitment) have continuously offered peace for land but Israel has refused to give up Palestinian territories.

If Israel real was willing to give up land for peace, one might ask, why has it built exclusive Jewish settlements on lands it intends to return?

Every Israeli government since 1967 has planned, built, subsidized and protected Jewish settlements and settlers in occupied lands. The Fourth Geneva Convention, which deals with cases of prolonged occupation states clearly that occupying powers are not allowed to expropriate land or to move its citizens to occupied territories. Since then, numerous UN General Assembly and UN Security Council resolutions have opposed Jewish settlement building, Official US policy has ranged from calling settlements "illegal" to "an obstacle to peace." Israel’s leading ally the US has repeatedly called on Israel to reverse its settlement policy without any success. US officials have asked Israel to "stop it , suspend it, end subsidizes to settlers, freeze it and take a time out," yet it has continued uninterrupted.

When the Oslo peace process began, respected independent Palestinians like Dr. Haider Abdel Shafi complained that the process will fail because it lacked an Israeli commitment to suspend settlement building during the five-year interim period. I remember during those days in 1994 that along with other Palestinian journalists I attended a special press briefing with Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres. When a journalist complained about the Rabin governments continued settlement activity, Peres tried to deny it. When he was faced with statistics of Palestinian lands expropriated for settlements and bypass roads he shrugged the issue aside. You ought not concentrate on this issue; he preached to us, all this will become irrelevant once there is a permanent solution that will see the West Bank and Gaza as an independent Palestinian entity.

Now eight years late the independent Palestinian entity has not materialized, the handful Palestinian cities that were evacuated by Israeli troops are now more brutally occupied with nearly two million Palestinians under permanent house arrest. The largest Palestinian city of Nablus has been under continuous 24-hour curfew for more than 16 days.

For sure Israel has paid a heavy toll for its policy of occupation, assassinations and collective punishment. Many in Israel want nothing less than their army leaving Palestinian territories. There is a small problem, however. The Jewish settlements dotting the Palestinian lands. From tiny hill top settlements to urban like cities, more than 130 of these exclusive Jewish only settlements have created a security nightmare for the Israeli army. And the Israeli public is paying a high price for their government’s policy of building and protecting these illegal outposts.

These exclusive Jewish settlements are turning Israel not only to a military occupier but also into an apartheid state. Jews living in the West Bank and Gaza get subsidized housing, reduced priced and more plentiful water supply, freedom of travel, no curfews and none of the settler relatives gets their homes blown up even if- as in the case of Hebron’s Baruch Goldstein- massacre 29 praying Muslims or the settler that killed a Palestinian teenage girl last week. Settler’s cars have different license plates than Palestinians, they don’t get stopped at checkpoints, they vote for Israel’s Knesset and get 24-hour army protection on West Bank and Gaza roads built and used only by Jewish settlers. The Palestinian population in the north of the West Bank was forbidden from driving on the roads this week. 44 Palestinian homes were relatives as a punishment for having a member of their family involved in attacks against Israelis.

The Bush Administration is on the record as supporting the creation of the state of Palestine in the West Bank and Gaza alongside the state of Israel within three years. Some members of this administration seem to think that this goal supported by the majority of Palestinians and Israelis as well as the internationally community can happen without a position on illegal settlements. The Israelis are given a free hand to violate international law and grant their army-protected bulldozers special status to continue stealing Palestinian lands to built Jewish homes in occupied lands.

A peaceful resolution to the conflict is possible. A determined and unified US administration can ensure that in the Middle East there is a secure Israel and a free Palestine. This can’t take place while one side plunders the land of the other. Settlements are clearly an obstacle to such a dream. One has to be stupid not to realize and accept that.