how could today’s article not mention Israel’s rejected two-state proposals in 2000. 2001 and 2008 and Abbas’s unwillingness now to meet with either Israeli or American leaders? And what % of WB Palestinians would be covered by any annexation?. Don’t most live in cities which would not be affected?
@Art
Thats actually the point. Israel will annex the land where Jewish settlers on it which literally crisscrosses the West Bank. What land left for the Palestinians will essentially be carved up. They wont be able to go anywhere without having to cross parts Israel controls.
3
Given the high number of stories written on this topic in the last few weeks, it is truly remarkable how virtually all are absent any input from Palestinian sources. A real failure in reporting, rendering invisible those who will bear the brunt of these proposed policies.
2
the amazing thing is Netanyahu to get elected is promising to take the west bank and in the United states president Trump gave sway the Golan heights to score with Jewish voters here . democracy is strange for it to work . you have to steal other people's land to get elected
3
As the intentions of the Likud Party become more evident, it needs to be remembered that the intentions of the neighboring Arab countries have changed little in the past 70 years. Since 1948, they have initiated several wars with the expressed goal of ‘pushing the Jews into the sea’, they have continued to educate their children to aspire to martyrdom by killing Jews, and in 1967, called for the Khartoum Conference where they agreed that there would be ‘no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel and no peace with Israel’. Egypt and Jordan eventually signed peace treaties but little else has changed as far as the Arab mindset regarding Israel. Nothing happens in a vacuum, and the events of today’s election in Israel cannot be totally disconnected from the reality that has existed in the region for so many decades.
2
@Malone Cooper Please stop with the old, old news and the old, old justifications for keeping Palestinians under Israel's boot. Palestinians recognized Israel's "right to exist in peace and security" multiple times.
The Arab League Peace Initiative would offer Israel full diplomatic and trade relations with 57 Arab nations in exchange for a just peace with the Palestinians. It has been on the table since 2002, renewed in 2007 and again in 2017. Where have you been, Malone?
And by the way, let's talk about the Jewish "hilltop youth" of the settlements whose hatred and cruelty knows no bounds. You know, the ones who were outside the courtroom where Jewish terrorists were being tried for firebombing a Palestinian home and killing an entire family, chanting "Mahummed is on the barbecue." The ones who spray Palestinian fields with sewage and uproot 100 year old olive trees. The ones who rarely suffer any consequences for their sordid acts.
6
I highly doubt we will ever see either full annexation or serious moves towards a two state solution.
Neither have any benefits to the right wing factions of Israel. It is easier to dangle the promise of peace and a two state option than make it a national policy of full annexation and integration. The latter would mean they’d have to come to terms with voting rights, citizenship, etc. which would result in losing power or coming to terms with the rest of the world that they are a de jure apartheid state.
3
“Annexation of the West Bank” is just a friendly way of saying “ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.”
Annexation of the West Bank doesn’t occur, and hasn’t occurred, without demolishing Palestinian homes and expelling Palestinian families from these homes to replace them with people of another faith. If that’s not ethnic cleansing, I don’t know what is.
Since “annexation” of the West Bank is nothing new, what Bibi is promising is essentially a more rapid form of ethnic cleansing. Let’s just be clear about that.
7
We can all theorize about what annexation of settlements in the West Bank will look like as far as ethnic cleansing is concerned. But let’s remember that back in 1947, East Jerusalem and the entire West Bank were 100% ethnically cleansed of all Jews by the Jordanians. Jews had been living in these areas for centuries. The Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest site, was closed to Jews and used as a dumping ground. Tombstones from the Mt. Olives Jewish cemetery were used to build roads in East Jerusalem and historic Jewish buildings and institutions in the Jewish Quarter were demolished. This is what ethnic ethnic cleansing looked like in 1947. This is no excuse for ANY future ethnic cleansing, but it is worth remembering the history.
3
It's just as well that that two-state nonsense be put to bed. At no time since the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin did any Israeli government ever have any intention of allowing it.
8
Accelerationist view: full annexation as a prelude to a civil rights movement that leads to one fully democratic state. This might be the solution that is most achievable and respects the rights of the oppressed.
6
That’s the understatement of the year!
1
Netanyahu out today would be a good start. Then the courts go after him and his corrupt entourage. Now replace Netanyahu with Trump in the first sentence....and we finally have hope that a two state solution becomes reality. That is the only viable solution. The discussion who was here first is not leading to any solution of the conflict. And after decades of suffering (primarily by the Palestinians) we need a solution. Kushner will not deliver it.
4
It is impossible to fully express the complexity of the situation in a comment section, but here goes. Annexation of the West Bank, I agree, has been occurring slowly for the past several decades. At the same time, Palestinians have exhibited disunity and their extremists have egged on extremist Jews. This annexation business hasn't happened in a vacuum.
The reality, however, is that beyond the headlines, most Palestinians and Israeli Jews would opt for peace. Talk of annexation, again, gets headlines, as do people in the BDS movement who simplify a complex situation and view everything through a prism of evil Israel vs. the poor victimized Palestinian Arabs. For those with some history in the region, like my family, Yemenite Jews who arrived at the turn of the 19th century, it was not always the powerful Jew vs. the weak Arab. I did not vote for Trump, but I have to admit that his recognizing the Golan Heights as part of Israel now doesn't seem to me to be reckless, considering that it was from those Heights that Israel almost lost the 1973 Yom Kippur War. If the Arab armies had won, I wonder what land they would have allowed the Jews to retain. Talk about annexation!
15
"On a sidewalk in Bethlehem, where a group of young men were hanging around outside a store, one of them, Mahmoud Marazek, 23, painted a bleak picture of their lives. “Around us are settlements; we are being choked,” he said. “There’s no work. There’s no economic movement.”
In the first years after 1967, Israeli Jews from Jerusalem took their cars to garages in Bethlehem for repairs, went to Palestinian dentists in Bethlehem, shopped in their grocery stores and it was not just Bethlehem.
And then the Palestinians started murdering them and took the terror to downtown Jerusalem.
Big surprise. Economic movement wound down.
26
@Joshua Schwartz Palestinians did what every other people in the world would do when occupied: RESIST. If you don't understand that then you haven't learned anything from your own history.
11
@Léa Klauzner There are of course those who claim that it is the Palestinians who are the occupiers.
3
Israel won the West Bank in the Six-Day war, back in 1967. No one ever noticed that Israel did not annex the territory at that time.
Why does it seem likely to happen now? Because the Palestinians were not willing to make any compromises in order to achieve an independent state.
In 2005, Israel created an independent Palestinian state in Gaza. Nobody knows this, Nobody will ever know it.
The BDS Movement is fighting against an independent Palestine by telling the Palestinians that Israel is the most evil state on earth. BDS is one of the reasons that the Palestinians continue to reject a state of their own because of a boundary dispute.
20
@George Jochnowitz
In fairness to the readers here should you provide full disclosure about your political leanings and writings?
For example you wrote "Israeli politics is very complicated. It became simpler when President Obama’s rigidity convinced many Israelis that nothing could be gained by working with the United States to bring about a peaceful withdrawal from disputed territories. Obama made some Israelis decide that a tough stand was required."
Ref: https://www.jochnowitz.net/Essays/How-Obama-Elected-Netanyahu.html
https://www.jochnowitz.net/PolReg.html
10
The Palestinians have every legal and moral right to fight for their freedom and liberty using any and all means necessary employed by the founders of America and Israel.
Either all men and women are divinely naturally created equal persons with certain unalienable rights of life,liberty and the pursuit of happiness or none are.
American taxpayers give Israel arms and money that pay for the occupation,blockade/siege, exile and 2nd class citizenship that denies the humanity and equality of 6 million Palestinians under the dominion of 6.1 Israelis.
46
@Blackmamba
Don't look now but that 'free money to Israel' = lots of American jobs. Whether arms dealers should inherit the earth is another conversation, but for all the wailing and gnashing of teeth in the West, our economies benefit from selling the bullets.
8
@Blackmamba
In all seriousness it’s the Arabs who don’t want the jews there. Really, look up the history of the region known as Palestine. The only reason why “Palestinians” exist is because when the state of Israel was designated so was the state of Palestine at the exact same time.
16
@Comp
The "lots of American jobs" come from taxpayers. And its not "lots of jobs" its more like "lots of value for shareholders in arms industries."
I can create lots of jobs for glaziers by breaking windows. I guess we should be paying Israel to break windows for us too.
12
Just because a half century occupation of an entire people, most who have never known anywhere else as home, with severe living restrictions on not just criminals and militants but every man woman and child, Palestinians have no excuse as to why they fail to recognize how wealth and power means everything. While it's true that no group of current white Europeans would suffer such a fate, it's time they face reality and face the future in good cheer.
7
“Hey look, Israel and the rest of the word is rapidly moving past us trying to reach some kind of deal with Israel because of our intransigence and terrorism. Maybe we should try something else, like try and negotiate some kind of peace deal” said no “Palestinian” ever.
15
@Robert
"Nah-then we'd have to quit making $2.6B in international aid disappear every year into Swiss bank accounts and payments to terrorists, with no infrastructure for a future state to show for it."
10
@Robert
Terrorism worked for the Zionists. It drove the British out and the Arabs after them. Good for the goose, good for the gander.
17
@Joe
Excuse me but you don't think terrorism has been tried by the Palestinians? What has it achieved? Nothing. Your analogy with Britain is flawed. Israel wasn't British land; the English didn't live there. Israelis do. While Egypt and Jordan signed peace treaties, the PLO and now PA do nothing. It's clear why the PA leadership talks but does nothing. To actually sign a 2 state agreement is to signoff on their own death sentence. Even Arafat with all his standing couldn't manage to sign an agreement with a willing Israel PM and government during the Clinton administration (read Dennis Ross book).
I'm not for annexation of the West Bank but nature abhors a vacuum.
2
The first sentence reads: If Israel were to annex parts of the occupied West Bank.....
Actually, it should read, When Israel annexes parts of the West Bank.
This is not an if but when.
The world seems to protest and condemn almost anything Israel does.
This overwhelming criticism only leaves us feeling, Why not just do what we need to and want to do? The reality is that it is never a better time to just go ahead, make it a fait accompli, and give the world time to deal with it.
The Palestinians will never have anymore of a state than they now do ( Gaza).
The irony is that Arabs living in Israel proper, who are all eligible to vote, could throw out Netanyahu and the entire Zionist government tomorrow ( election day) if they would simply go to the polls and vote. They have the numbers to do it.
And, yet, they find all sorts of reasons to refrain from doing so.
So the Jewish voters will continue to elect those who will inevitably annex more land and no one in Israel will be surprised when the world yells, Foul.
So what?
At this point, when we know that the world hates Israel why even bother to pander to them?
8
@simon sez We pander to Israel at the rate of $3.8 BILLION (with a B). About $10 million per day. The single largest foreign recipient, by a significant amount.
8
I thought Jared was going to fix the whole Middle East. Wasn’t everyone before him just a bunch of dummies waiting for a really smart, scholarly, charismatic guy whose integrity no one ever questioned like him to bring everyone together? It can’t be that complicated. What’s the holdup?
28
@Daniel Mozes Sorry, Jared is busy right now fixing the nation's infrastructure and retooling our government. After that, he'll fix the Arab-Israeli issue and maybe some other things.
Manifest Destiny in the US...from sea to shining sea....and what of all the inhabitants who are already there ? The 18th and 19th century in America was not just a wake up call to the indigenous population, it was their death knell.
And so Israel, in order to try to survive decades of death threats, has their own manifest destiny.
Who shall judge ?
3
@ZEMAN History shall judge. We're ASHAMED of the way we treated our indigenous peoples. It's Israel's pride, the dispossession and humiliation of Palestinians. The world has actually moved on from the loot-and-pillage norms of the 17th,18th and 19th century -- are you unaware it's 200 HUNDRED years later?
Let's talk apples and apples -- treatment of natives in the 20th century. At about the same time as Israel was founded, Alaska became a state. An Act of Congress made an exemplary settlement with our natives, including $1 billion, 400 million acres and all the resources in them. Plus, the biggie - all our natives are CITIZENS. I'll put that up against Israel's record any time.
Moreover, since 1949, acquisition of land via war has been unacceptable under international law. Of course, the settlements themselves are illegal under international law. If Israel goes through with this it should be warned -- it will become a true pariah state, an apartheid regime, and will suffer the consequences just as South Africa did.
24
@ZEMAN
You know Germany had their own manifest destiny. Do you judge them?
7
I think we need to get our house in order in regards to Puerto Rico before we criticize other nations for treatment of its citizens...
5
I wonder if the Hamas on- going violent crackdowns on Palestinian protesters (protesting Hamas, not Israel) might be a "Blow to Peace"? Then again, I wonder why that got no or scant coverage. Well, did anyone actually expect coverage of that?
19
Oh no! Heaven forfend--the Palestinians might use this as an excuse to get violent? How surprising.
Give me a break.
19
@Comp
No one of importance will get stabbed. We know that for sure.
2
There is a simple way to start a peace process.Leaders in Gaza and West Bank accept a Jewish State,give up 3% of the West Bank territory.In exchange for that Israel give them a land bridge to connect Gaza to the West Bank.
The Palestinians who lost land get reparations as well as Jews ,one million of them, will get reparations from Arab countries who were forced out.
Immediate family reunification on a compassionate basis limited to a small number should be acceptable to both.I don't see the Israelis going back to Poland or Germany in mass nor see them living under Sharia law as second class citizens.
13
@George Kornitzer
How about everyone lives under democratic law? Palestinians are not going anywhere, and neither are the Jews. Or, how about Israel accepts Palestine's "right to exist"?
BTW, most Mizrahim will tell you they left their Arab and Persian homeland for the same reason the Ashkenazim from Europe and the U.S. did: to help build the Jewish state.
1
I actually think Israel should annex 5 miles into the West Bank as a buffer, and relinquish the rest. The country is way to narrow in the middle as it is, making its major cities much too vulnerable to attack.
I also think Jordan should contribute some land to a Palestinian State. Jordan, which is over 50% Palestinian, was part of historic Palestine, before the British gave it away to the Hashemite kingdom in 1922. Why shouldn’t they give up some territory? They can certainly afford it given the vast amount of Palestine it already has.
Someone has to start looking at the bigger picture here.
14
@Steven Roth Pretty arrogant to expect another country to solve Israel's problems, created by its wars of expansion.
Your "history" is complete fiction. Jordan (formerly Transjordan) was promised to the Hashemites in 1915, pre-Balfour; it was NEVER part of historic Palestine and NEVER in play for the "Jewish homeland" scheme, having been specifically excluded in two separate treaties. Jordan was autonomous under the mandate, had its own government by 1921 and was an independent nation by 1946, two full years before Israel was created.
And, by the way, an independent Jordan rewarded the national aspirations of Arabs who fought and died alongside the British in WWI. Jews took on no such wartime burden in the Levant and in fact attacked the Brits in Palestine savagely, bombing soldiers and civilians indiscriminately and at will, creating modern terrorism.
19
@sharpshin Actually, your history is also pretty fictional. The Hashemites were supposed to be rewarded with what is now Saudi Arabia; Hussein was then the Sharif of Mecca. Hussein got all huffy when asked to sign on to the Palestine Mandate, where the League (and the San Remo Conference) ratified the idea of a Jewish homeland in Mandatory Palestine. Prior to the Mandate, there was no "historic Palestine"; on census documents in the US my grandparents listed themselves as having been born in the 1890's in either Syria or Turkey (depending on the decade)--which was sort of like once listing Sicily, and ten years later, Italy.
It's true that the Jewish population of Palestine did not take on the burden of WWI. They all lived in Turkish-dominated neighborhoods, except the ones sent into exile. They were not the slightest bit responsible for attacks on the Brits.
Perhaps you could check out where your non-facts come from....before you provide your fictional versions of reality.
11
@sharpshin. Judge not lest he be judged, at least when it comes to history.
First, you need only look at a map of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine in 1922 to see that Jordan was part of the initial territory. In fact, the UK’s 1923 decision to “temporarily” exclude Jewish settlement in Transjordan was hotly contested by the League of Nations Mandate Committee.
Second, the 1915 MacMahon-Hussein correspondence was intentionally vague on boundaries, was premised on the fanciful notion that the Ottoman holdings (minus the Holy Land) would become an Arab State under the Emir Hussein but that the Arabs would earn it by leading a revolt to assist the British and Comminwealth forces. That last bit only happened in the movie “Lawrence of Arabia.” In real life, most Arabs fought with the Turks against the Brits. The Jewish spy network in the Holy Land provided more effective assistance to the Allied cause than did the Arabs. The Jewish Legion also assisted the British war effort. So to say that the Arabs failed to live up to their part of the bargain would be to state the obvious.
Nevertheless, today Arabs rule over some 99.75% of the former Ottoman holdings while the Jews are the only indigenous people in the region that succeeded in re-establishing their independence. They govern the remaining 0.25%. The Kurds, Assyrians and other indigenous peoples are not so fortunate and have 0%.
So injustices flowed from the WWI disposition, it’s not the Arabs who suffered them.
12
I just looked up the definition of lebensraum: "the territory that a state or nation believes is needed for its natural development, especially associated with Nazi Germany."
Talk about irony!
35
If Israel annexes the land so it becomes part of the Country (state) or Israel, what kinds of rights will the people who live there have? Can they vote in Israel elections? Have an Israeli Passport? How about land rights? if prior to annexation it was recognized that farmer Joe had property rights to his land, will these be recognized after the annexation?
Seems that if Israel annexes, then so comes legal rights under Israeli law. Or is this a means to take away lands from the Palestinians? Just like the whites took lands from American Indians?
29
@Peter. Good points and ones that need to be discussed.
1
Take the camera and focus on the other side of peace negotiations. It's easy to lambast Israel for its mostly natural growth in the large settlement blocs (little growth in the small, isolated ones), known as creeping annexation. What about the natural growth of Palestinians in the west bank, few of whom actually leave, save Christians, mostly from Bethlehem? What about the growth of Israeli Arabs, Muslims and Christians, in Israel proper, few of whom leave? If a "secular and democratic" Palestine were to emerge, would it/could it accommodate any Jews, let alone a 20% population? That is the percentage of Arabs living as citizens in Israel; shouldn't a two state peace deal be reciprocal?
As to Jordan insisting that their Palestinians return to the west bank, it would essentially depopulate the overwhelming majority of that country, which is heavily Palestinian. They know darn well neither the west bank Palestinians, nor Israel, can or will reabsorb millions more on land that cannot sustain so many more. Precisely the type of talk that destroys peace possibilities, more than the Jewish population in the west bank.
So, any brave reporters willing to ask Khalil Shikaki, or another Palestinian, how do they see a true two state solution, one that allows for freedom of workers, economic and security ties, and devoid of terrorism and Jew hatred?
We NEVER read about how they envision two side by side states. Maybe, just maybe, because they don't believe in it.
21
@Rosalie Lieberman Finally an opinion that includes the entire picture!
5
@Rosalie Lieberman
The PA has agreed that Jewish residents will be allowed to reside in an independent Palestine the same as Israeli Arabs. The reality is that they know that Israel will never relinquish their promised land in Judea and Samaria.
6
@Joe. Oddly enough, both Abbas and Erekat do not agree with you. Even if they did make such promises, who would trust them to protect Jews and their property? After all, the “constitution” of Palestine provides that its laws will conform with Sharia and, in that context, Jews and Christians are simply not equal to Muslims before the law.
7
It’s true of course that the real endgame that Israel envisions is expulsion of Palestinian people from the West Bank - after all the country’s entire foundation is based on ethnic cleansing. Israel can’t at this point - even with Trump in office - outright send in the military and throw people out of their homes. So the plan is to make life in what little territory is left to the Palestinians so unbearable that they “choose” to leave. This plan, euphemistically called things like “indefinite status quo” or “peace process” depending on which ethnic cleanser you ask, is clearly supported by all major political forces in Israel.
20
@Christian Haesemeyer
Speak to Israelis and you find the "Greater Israel" group is on the fringe they want peace but not at all cost.
5
Why not annex all the West Bank and Gaza and give everyone living there citizenship? Let all those who want to participate in democracy do so and those that don’t can sit back and let history move past them. I agree Palestinian have dropped the ball many times, but Israelis have a moral obligation to continue to work towards peace every day.
10
@Mark
Peace is a two way street. The Palestinians have a moral, and survival, obligation to work towards peace, every day.
Have you heard of any peace initiatives on their part in the last 10+ years? Not even a hoarse whisper of one?
2
@Rosalie Lieberman
Yes I have. Its the same one they have repeated. Vacating the occupied territories. Division of Jerusalem. A just settlement for the refugees.
Only Israel doesnt want to let go of their lebensraum and claims Jerusalem in its entirety as theirs and refuses to allow any Right of Return for Arabs (while exhaustively calling for Jews to "return" as much and soon as possible.)
Yuo're right its a two way street. Israel, as the dominant power should do its part to follow international law and stop settling the occupied territories.
4
Netanyahu is playing high-stakes poker for the election, but to win who: Israeli voters and his international audience of friends ??? And then there are his enemies both in Israel and internationally.
Remember his head is on the block with multiple serious charges against him which he cannot escape from.
If Netanyahu wins this election, I expect great turmoil and chaos in Middle Eastern politics … with great pressure to be exerted against Trump, his major ally and supporter. West Europe and other civilized countries will respond with revulsion. There would be great debates and requests for censure against Israel and threats of war in the UN.
Israel must face the ultimate reality and implement a Two-State Solution with Palestinians. President Obama's proposal of using the Green Line as a border with land-swaps for disputed parts of Jerusalem is the best workable solution.
10
Israel has a free hand - no western leader will dare to stop the creation of a Greater Israel. "Peace talks" were a sham and were never meant to succeed - 750000 Palestinians were ethically cleansed in 1947/48 - with thesecret support of the western powers at the time. The process has slowed but never stopped. It is now reaching a conclusion.
17
@Dominick Eustace it is easy to take this stance when you have half the facts or willingly ignore them.
Please take a moment to read more about the events leading up to the foundation of the state of Israel and what occurred on both sides.
Then next read about the Oslo accords when one side was willing to decide about everything other than the state of Jerusalem. That one side wasn't the one you are picking. In the time since Oslo, both sides could have moved on and made a very different future for themselves.
But the real problem is people like you and Netanyahu: both stuck in the past focused on the wrong of one side or another and how to create a future for "me" at the expense of "you".
The only way forward is for a very quick movement toward a new vision about the future, not the past and BOTH sides are guilty of the "oppression Olympics" and that is energy better spent on what comes next.
7
@Nathan I have a perfectly good peace plan. While it pursues its wars of expansion and seizes Palestinian (and Syrian and Lebanese) land, Israel neglects most of the land that it indisputably owns. Fully 80% of Israelis live on just 20% of the land within the Green Line.
Let them turn to the south and develop innovative cities, housing and infrastructure in the barely settled Negev, which is also full of neglected biblical significance. This is where West Bank settlers can be relocated to.
The tech developed would be much in demand by every desert nation or state in an era of climate warming. It would be a win-win for all. And for once would allow Palestinians to breathe free on their little scraps of land.
10
What peace process? There was a peace deal in 1995. The Palestinians kept on shooting. The Palestinians have not shown any interest in peace or a peace process.
30
@lsl
There is a fundamental problem on both sides. On one side you have Hamas and the PLO which don't want to recognize the right to exist of Israel.
On the other side, the true reality is that Israel was never going to give up the Golan heights or its gains in the West Bank. The true goal of the Israeli right was always to expand an take territory at the expense of the Palestinians.
So you say they who kept shooting or should you ask was the shooting provoked?
5
@lsl
The larger burden lies with Mr. Arafat. When the talks began two weeks ago, Israel was insisting on retaining full sovereignty over East and West Jerusalem while the Palestinians demanded a full return of the East, including the Old City and its religious sites. Mr. Barak moved far from his initial position, agreeing to consider expanded Palestinian sovereignty over parts of East Jerusalem. Mr. Arafat, encouraged by Egypt and Saudi Arabia to be unyielding, showed little interest in American compromise proposals. Washington should make clear its disappointment with Cairo and Riyadh.
https://www.nytimes.com/2000/07/26/opinion/failure-at-camp-david.html
6
@Peter Oh, Peter. You are so behind the times --- or just repeating the nonsense you've heard with zero regard for "true reality." The PLO has recognized Israel's "right to exist in peace and security" multiple times, most recently in 1993 when it met all diplomatic requirements. You can read those documents, as I did, on the website of the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
Hamas adopted a new charter in 2017 in which it accepted all agreements struck by Hamas. Hamas explicitly says it will accept a state along the 1967 lines with a capital in East Jerusalem, the very same plan on offer for 20 years.
Of course, the Arab League Peace Initiative has been on the table nearly as long, since 2002, renewed in 2007 and again in 2017. It has never even gotten a serious airing in Israel although it promises a broad, regional peace and full relations with 57 Arab nations in exchange for a just settlement with Palestinians.
Bibi arrogantly claims never to even have read it. But of course, peace is the last thing he wants.
20
All the Palestinians need to do to stop Netanyahu from doing anything with the West Bank is to offer a reasonable peace proposal of their own.
Since the original 1947 U.N. partition vote, they have never offered any kind of peace proposal at all.
Poll after poll shows that the Israeli public wants a peace deal, and most do not want the West Bank, other than major Jewish settlements near the Green Line, and they expect to swap other land for those settlements.
Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert (previous Israeli Prime Ministers) both made important proposals, but they never got any response at all from the Palestinians.
Time is not on the side of the Palestinians.
They used to count on the Saudis and the Jordanians and the Egyptians to bail them out. Those countries are no longer interested.
The Palestinians could have had their own state in 1947.
All they had to do was say "yes".
Even after the 1948 and 1967 wars, the Israelis offered to trade land for peace.
It's not too late.
But it's getting close.
38
@G--A Palestinian state already exists. It's called Jordan and it was established in 1947 when the British mandate expired. The idea was that two states were to be created--one Jewish and one Arab. Unfortunately the Arab states rejected the Jewish state immediately and did everything they could to prevent the Jewish state from being born. A state of war has existed between the Jews and Arabs ever since.
How come no one has pressured King Abdullah II into taking the Palestinians into Jordan?
6
@sharon5101 Well, it's this old trope again. "Jordan is Palestine!" It's really shameless and open advocacy for expelling all the Palestinians to Jordan so Israel can have its messianic dream of Greater Israel. Lebensraum didn't work out so well for another blood-and-soil movement we all know.
Your "history" is completely, totally, absolutely false. Jordan was promised to the Hashemites in 1915, pre-Balfour. It was formerly known as Transjordan, never Palestine, and was excluded from the "Jewish homeland" scheme in two separate treaties. No partition plan (and there were four) addressed land other than that between the Jordan and Mediterranean.
Jordan had its own government by 1921 and operated autonomously during the mandate period. It was a fully independent country by 1946, two years before Israel was even created. It's pretty arrogant, really, to think you could "pressure" the country next door into solving the problems created by your own wars of expansion.
13
@sharpshin
You choose to forget that the original Palestine, pledged as a homeland for Jews, included Transjordan, which was about 75% of the land. When the British took that away, the western bank of the river was 25% of the total. Jordan is huge, compared to Israel, and could readily accommodate far more people. Not only would they refuse, they actually want to send back all the Palestinians to the west bank, which is the vast majority of its current population.
Sorry, but lots of crazy folks out there. Including some of their defenders.
5
Just once, I would like to pick up an article in the Times that quotes Palestinians who are criticizing Netanyahu in which one of them says, "Sure Netanayahu is bad, but that doesn't mean we are perfect and without blemishes ourselves."
25
@A. Stanton
That'll be the day.
11
@A. Stanton
There is something more than a little perverse about complaining that someone with a boot on their neck is insufficiently self-critical.
Of course anyone who actually knows Palestinians knows they complain about their leaders all of the time. They just don’t do it for the amusement of their oppressors.
4
@A. Stanton Always blame the victims, it's so convenient ....
4
There's a simple approach to changing the trajectory of the non-negotiations between the Palestinian Authority and Israel.
The PA could offer to restart negotiations--which they've refused to do for, oh, years--and actually put a realistic offer on the table--which they've refused to do, forever. Forget realistic offer, there's never been anything on offer--except "let's roll back to May 1967, and then we'll think about all the other things that bother us".
Absent a change in Palestinian strategy, why would anyone expect the current trajectory to re-orient?
22
This declaration serves two purposes in my view:
1) it energizes Netanyahus core supporters and other right wing parties.
2) it provokes a physical response from Palestinians so that Netanyahu can order the troops to gun them down in the streets and then tell his supporters "see, I told you so".
25
It's not that easy, can't just throw the blame on one side. This has been going on before I was born; before he was born, under many right wing, left wing leaders, it's more than just politics.
4
@Faspro
You can't judge a person by their color,by their ancestor's religion or national origin.Some Arabs hate all the Jews.They hated them before Israel was born.
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@George Kornitzer
Jews and Arabs lived peacefully together in Palestine for centuries until Zionist immigrants showed up with the plan to establish a Jewish state amidst a religiously and ethnically integrated population.
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