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Byline: BRIAN MITCHELL
President Bush has a vision: "Two states, living side by side, in peace and security."
To both sides in the Middle East, Bush's vision looks more like the handwriting on the wall. It reads: "The intifada is over. The Palestinians lost. Get over it."
Bush was the first American president to call publicly for a Palestinian state. But his long-awaited peace plan has emboldened hard-liners on both sides and disappointed moderates who sincerely want a two-state solution.
"This is God's gift to Osama bin Laden," London-based Arab journalist Abdel-Bari Atwan told Reuters. "Bush pleased two people -- the ultraright-wing Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and the ultraright-wing fundamentalist bin Laden. He confirmed bin Laden's argument that America is for Israel and Israel is America."
The Israeli take is much the same.
"Bush adopted the Israeli position," writes Haaretz, Israel's largest daily newspaper. Yasser Arafat "has now been told to go home and pay the price for acts of terror against Israel. Bush wholly accepted the Israeli interpretation of the conflict."