The new Israeli "peace initiative" drafted by Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is nothing more than a placebo. It is designed for internal Israeli consumption and consumption by the United States and Europe in response to their pressuring Israel for positive movement toward ending the occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

Doctors often prescribe placebos to patients who they feel are suffering from ailments that are not necessarily physiological, hoping that the patient will think that the medicine contains some active ingredient that will cure their ailments. Such medication may have been believed successful during the Oslo Peace Accords, but the latest 12-month round of bloodletting has done additional physical damage to Palestinian rights, and, thus, any treatment must be real and immediate.

The few details of the new "initiative" that have been made public are so bizarre that it is a wonder that it is being presented at all. Sharon makes no mention of dismantling illegal Israeli settlements, large or small, and the plan will leave in place three Palestinian West Bank cantons or bantustans (aside from the Gaza Strip) surrounded by Israeli troops, with full Israeli control of the roads and highways.