Madam, – When the current Israeli government entered office 21 months ago, one of the first acts of Prime Minister Netanyahu was to outline his commitment to the goal of a Palestinian state and to call on the Palestinian Authority to enter direct negotiations without preconditions and with all issues on the table.
Twice in the previous nine years, other Israeli leaders had made generous offers aimed at reaching final agreement on two states for two peoples. Prime Minister Barak, at Camp David and Taba in 2000-1, and Prime Minister Olmert in 2008 both advanced proposals that met practically all the Palestinian demands, yet these were rejected without further discussion or counter-offer. In between came Israel’s withdrawal of all its military forces and all Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip, an opportunity missed by the Palestinians to begin the process of state-building.
None of these facts receive even a mention in your latest Editorial on the Middle East (“Another new beginning?”, December 14th) which instead speaks mysteriously of the difficulty of getting Israel “even to the point of setting out its stall on the substantive issues”.
Surely the place for setting out stalls is precisely at the negotiating table away from the glare of the media? Israel has been sitting at that table for 21 months, waiting for a negotiating partner to arrive at the other side.
The Palestinians have tried to place the onus on Israel for the breakdown of September’s short-lived talks, claiming that Israeli settlements are the main problem. Yet the facts show that Israel has built no new settlements in the West Bank for many years and that, 43 years after it gained control of the region in a war of self-defence, the built-up area of the settlements constitutes less than 1.7 per cent of its total area.
The removal of two-thirds of the security checkpoints has contributed to an economic growth rate that is one of the highest in the world.
Further, the current Israeli government imposed a 10-month moratorium in November 2009 on new building within existing settlements. The Palestinians still refused to join direct negotiations. Then, with just three weeks of the moratorium left, they demanded an extension of the very policy that had not been good enough to bring them to the table for nine months! In any peace agreement, both sides will have to make concessions.
Israel has made many since the Oslo peace accords were signed in 1993.
Palestinians should now be asked what concessions they are prepared to make. Are they prepared to recognise Israel as a Jewish state? Will they accept the historic Jewish connection to the Western Wall and the Temple Mount? Will they accept that the Palestinian refugees of 1948 are equalled in numbers by the Jewish refugees forced to flee the Arab states at the same time? Will they acknowledge the very real security concerns of Israel? Direct negotiations are the only path to the historic goal of reconciliation between Jews and Arabs, Israelis and Palestinians. The international community should redirect its pressure to those who seek to keep the Palestinians away from the table. – Yours etc.