"outposts," building the "separation fence" and settler-only "bypass roads," incursions of the army into Palestinian towns, "targeted liquidations," demolition of homes, and uprooting of plantations), on the one hand, and the lethal Palestinian attacks inside Israel on the other hand, put the Palestinian citizens of Israel in an intolerable position.

87. The natural inclination of the Arab citizens of Israel to help their brethren on the other side of the Green Line conflicts with their desire to be accepted as equal citizens of Israel. At the same time, the fear and hatred of the Jewish population in Israel against all "Arabs" is growing, and threatens the foundations of equality and civil rights. These processes came to a head in the events of October 2000, immediately after the outbreak of the al-Aqsa Intifada, when the Israeli police opened lethal fire on Arab citizens.

88. These processes, together with the re-emergence of the

"demographic problem" on the Israeli agenda, cast new doubt on the "Jewish democratic state" doctrine. The internal

contradiction between these two attributes, which has not been resolved since the founding of the State of Israel either in theory or in practice, is more conspicuous than ever. The exact meaning of the term "Jewish state" has never been spelled out, nor the status of the Arab-Palestinian minority in a state officially defined as "Jewish." The demand to turn Israel into a "state of all its citizens" and/or to give defined national rights to the ArabPalestinian minority is being heard more and more, and not only from Arab citizens.

89. As a result of all these processes, the conflict is becoming less and less an Israeli-Palestinian confrontation, and more and more a Jewish-Arab one. The support extended by the vast majority of the Jewish Diaspora to Israel, irrespective of its actions, and the adherence of the Arab and Muslim masses to the Palestinian

cause, irrespective of the attitude of their leaders, have

consolidated this phenomenon. The assassination of Hamas

leaders Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in March 2003 and Abd-al-Aziz

al-Rantisi three weeks later fanned the flames even more.

A new peace camp

90. The new peace movement must be based on the understanding that the conflict is a clash between the Zionist-Israeli movement, whose "genetic code" directs it to take over the entire country and

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