A Palestinian State Made by Israel
Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu stated tonight that any possible Palestinian state in the future will have to be surrounded from the east and
the west by the Israeli army. According to Netanyahu the “Palestinian state” will also have Israeli army soldiers on its borders with Jordan in order to prevent weapons smuggling into the West Bank. In his speech he said nothing about Gaza as a part of the Future Palestinian state but assured that Israel will never make another mistake by leaving the Palestinian state without an Israeli surveillance.
The Prime minister also stated that today Israel is surrounded by missiles from the north and the south and therefore it will not only have to get anti missiles system but also prevent similar mistakes which happened in the past and brought Israel into this situation today. Netanyahu also stated that Israel is doing everything possible in order to convince the Palestinians to return to the negotiations table and blamed the Palestinians for their pre-conditions. Prime Minister Netanyahu said that the Palestinians started by asking for stopping the settlements building, and then started to demand that the building must stop in Jerusalem too, and soon they could start to ask for a pre-recognition of the borders issue.
Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech comes before the arrival of George Mitchell to the area. The real problem in Mr. Netanyahu’s latest and former statements is that every description he gives to the future Palestinian state makes it becomes less as a state and more like autonomy. Netanyahu blames the Palestinians for their demand regarding the settlements building which was supposed to be asked before signing Oslo and continues to claim that Israel is ready to make peace with the Palestinians. The West Bank which was supposed to be the heart of any possible future Palestinian state became a target for the Israeli settlers and government who continue to occupy it and turn it into settlements.
It seems that Mr. Netanyahu is the one who is putting pre-conditions and leaves nothing for the Palestinians to ask for. Considering Jerusalem the united capital of Israel and authorizing the government and the settlers to continue their occupation and widening it in the West Bank makes the words “Palestinian state” become an illusion. Drawing the borders of the future Palestinian state in Israeli hands and saying that the Israeli army will be the one who will control its borders with other states is just another reason to identify Mr. Netanyahu’s ideas for a Palestinian state as something which is completely different from any known “state” expression.
Prime Minister Netanyahu wants the Palestinians to keep on living in their current situation and maybe give them another small part of the West Bank “b” territories. What Mr. Netanyahu wants is a Palestinian autonomy similar to Scotland. In other words he does not wish to control the Palestinian people and be responsible of their matters but wants to keep the whole land under Israel’s control. I hope that my analysis is not right because if it is then Prime Minister Netanyahu is seriously far away from reality or any chance to reach a compromise with the Palestinians.
Unfortunately the Israeli people continue to support such ideas and pretend as if it is a generosity from Israel to give the Palestinians some of their rights back. Today most of the Israeli people are convinced that they did enough effort to reach peace with the Palestinians but the latter wanted war instead. These fake ideas which were started by former Israeli leaders only to mind discussing their failure in achieving political success in dealing with the Israeli Palestinian conflict will only bring more obstacles in the way to a real agreement.
From the beginning the PLO stated clearly that any solution with Israel will have to include real solutions for the issues of Jerusalem, the refugees, the 1967 lands, and the prisoners. Israel was never clear about anything since Oslo since what its former leaderships wanted was a directing of the conflict until someone else takes the lead and starts another round. It is well known that the state which occupies a land which is not a part of its territories is the one which become responsible of the matters of those who live on it, applying the international law demands while occupying it, and seeking a compromise with the other state which was attacked.
The price which Israel paid and continues to pay today is not because of the Palestinians but because of its former decisions which included the occupying of the Palestinian lands. Not only that Israel occupies the land but also is building apartheid systems in dealing with the Palestinian population living under its control. East Jerusalem is a good example to notice this. Palestinian residents who live in East Jerusalem do not hold any kind of nationality and are considered permanent residents of the city. The Israeli law is applied on them even though they are not Israeli citizens and are considered people under occupation.
None of the International law demands to assure human rights for them are respected or applied. Instead they are not given citizen’s rights and are judged according to citizen’s law. They are separated from each other because of the wall, suffer from crucial community problems, and are not allowed to form any kind of civilian leadership to fix their situation. All of this proves that what Israel wants is a one side solution written by Israel and applied by it exactly as it did when it withdrew from Gaza from one side.
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A bargaining posture, surely, in anticipation of substantive talks some time reasonably soon. Mahmoud Abbas is under enormous pressure from all sides to come back to the negotiating table. He has held out so far for the requirement made by Barack Obama early on in his presidency that all settlement building activity in the West Bank and East Jerusalem should cease. But since the US administration has itself abandoned that position, Abbas is unlikely to hold out for very long.
I write at length about this in my blog (address above).
Dear Neville
I agree with you about the pressure made on Abbas. To my mind if he goes back to negotiations without achieving the settlements demand he will be destroying what is left from his reputation and the negotiations and peace strategy. With all respect..this condition should have been made since Oslo.