When Tel Aviv's market resounds to fruit sellers shouting, "The boss has gone crazy!" it means that produce is being sold at ridiculously low prices.
In the world's capitals a similar cry is now being heard but it is not about the price of tomatoes. It refers to the reelection of US President George W. Bush.
The president is seen as a crazy cowboy. He has attacked Afghanistan and Iraq; now his neocon handlers would like him to go on to attack Syria and Iran. They want him to establish subservient regimes in the Middle East, station permanent American garrisons in the region, control the world's oil market - and help Ariel Sharon to fulfill his plans.
Middle Eastern rulers have speedily concluded that, in his second term of office, President Bush can do pretty much as he pleases. Every one of them has rushed for cover in the nearest political cave.
Syria's Bashar Al Assad has started a peace offensive, to the sound of a hundred angelic trumpets.
Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, who presents himself as President Bush's "viceroy", has suddenly discovered that Sharon is his long-lost brother and a man of peace.
The Jordanian ruler, King Abdullah II, is making similar noises, after taking the opportunity to clip the wings of his younger brother.
Iran's rulers, the tough Ayatollahs, executed a hasty withdrawal and agreed to give up their nuclear program.
Finally, the Palestinians are uniting behind Abu Mazen, the leader favored by President Bush.
Optimism is enjoying a field day as winds of hope blow through the region. Diplomats fly in, hoping to capitalize on anticipated successes, while international commentators, prophets who have an uncanny ability to foresee the past, prattle on about "the Middle Eastern spring" (which is a geographical misconception. Spring may be Europe's symbol of hope but in the Middle East it is autumn, when nature reawakens after the hot, dry summer).
Have these hopes any substance?
One can examine, for example, Syria's seductive offer of negotiations without preconditions. Will Sharon accept?
Once, in the throes of a political debate in the Knesset, I addressed the prime minister, Golda Meir: "It seems to me that you are faced with a fateful decision: whether or not to give the West Bank back to King Hussein or not to give it back to the Palestinians." Today Sharon is faced with a similar dilemma: what to do first - not to give the Golan back to the Syrians or not to return the West Bank to the Palestinians?
Like his predecessor, Ehud Barak, Sharon would not dream of giving the Golan back. Even if he had been ready to do this (and he is not), he would not dare to propose the evacuation of the dozens of settlements there.
In his autobiography Bill Clinton recounts what happened the last time Syrian-Israeli peace was placed on the agenda. Barak asked Clinton to call a Syrian-Israeli conference.
Clinton, eager to garner an international success, readily agreed and was pleasantly surprised when the Syrians dropped their former demands and agreed to Israeli demands. Then, at the very last moment, when everything was ready for signing, Barak told Clinton that he had decided to call the whole thing off.
Now there is no Clinton around and Sharon has no need to pretend. He remarked contemptuously that Assad talks about peace only because of American pressure. So what? Isn't this the perfect opportunity to achieve peace?
Sharon rejected the Syrian offer out of hand. While Assad offered peace without preconditions, Israel insists that he must rid Damascus of Palestinian leaders and disarm Hizbullah in Lebanon. That means that Assad must give up every single one of the few cards he holds before negotiations can begin. One has to be naive to believe that then Sharon would then give up even one single settlement. The more so since Bush has made it quite clear that he does not want negotiations with Syria because they would make it harder for him to launch any military assault.
Therefore, all the hope is now concentrated on the Palestinian front. If Abu Mazen is elected president of the Palestinian Authority next month, will real negotiations then start?
It does not look that way. Sharon has indeed agreed to withdraw the army from the towns on election day - but not before. In the meantime, Sharon's offensive goes on relentlessly: last week another "targeted assassination" was attempted, practically every day Palestinians, including children, are being killed, the systematic humiliation at the roadblocks goes on, the building of the infamous wall continues, settlers regularly uproot Palestinian olive groves without hindrance. One of the candidates for president, left-leaning Mustafa Barghouti was stopped at a checkpoint and severely beaten by soldiers.
However, the real question is not whether there is a temporary easing of restrictions, as a gesture toward Abu Mazen and, more importantly, toward President Bush, but whether Sharon is ready to enter into genuine negotiations for the establishment of a real Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital and a return to the pre-1967 green line, more or less. There is no indication of that.
True, Shimon Peres declares that he is going to join the government in order to facilitate the Gaza disengagement, and that immediately afterward he will push for a solution for the West Bank. But those declarations are empty rhetoric, calculated to silence opponents in his party. After all, when he served as a minister in Sharon's previous government, he did practically nothing for peace. Now, when everybody knows that he wants to stay in the government whatever happens, he will achieve even less.
In the new government Sharon can do what he wants. If he wants to he can implement the "disengagement plan"; if he wants to, he can annex most of the West Bank.
"The boss has gone crazy!"? The last thing President Bush will do is to put pressure on Sharon to pay up.
Uri Avnery is an Israeli journalist and veteran peace activist
Bush backs Sharon's refusal to pay the price for peace
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