New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman
reveals the details he believes will be included in U.S. Secretary of
State John Kerry's lsraeli-Palestinian peace proposal • Friedman:
"Kerry's mission is the last train to a negotiated two-state solution."
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry
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Photo credit: AP |
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will be
presenting a framework Israeli-Palestinian peace proposal shortly,
according to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who in a Tuesday
column titled "Why Kerry Is Scary" revealed details of what he believes
will be included in the proposal.
According to Friedman, Kerry's plan "is
expected to call for an end to the conflict and all claims, following a
phased Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank (based on the 1967 lines),
with unprecedented security arrangements in the strategic Jordan Valley.
"The Israeli withdrawal will not include
certain settlement blocs, but Israel will compensate the Palestinians
for them with Israeli territory," he wrote. "It will call for the
Palestinians to have a capital in Arab east Jerusalem and for
Palestinians to recognize Israel as the nation state of the Jewish
people. It will not include any right of return for Palestinian refugees
into Israel proper."
Friedman explained that for the last six
months, Kerry has been "letting the two sides fruitlessly butt heads,"
but he is now "planning to present a U.S. framework that will lay out
what Washington considers the core concessions Israelis and Palestinians
need to make for a fair, lasting deal."
The epicenter of the drama, according to
Friedman, is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Friedman wrote: "U.S.
and Israeli officials in close contact with Netanyahu describe him as
torn, clearly understanding that some kind of two-state solution is
necessary for Israel's integrity as a Jewish democratic state, with the
healthy ties to Europe and the West that are vital for Israel's economy.
But he remains deeply skeptical about Palestinian intentions."
Friedman continued, "Although Netanyahu has
started to prepare the ground here for the U.S. plan -- if he proceeds
on its basis, even with reservations, his coalition will likely
collapse. He will lose a major part of his own Likud party and all his
other right-wing allies. In short, for Netanyahu to move forward, he
will have to build a new political base around centrist parties.
"To do that, Netanyahu would have to become,
to some degree, a new leader -- overcoming his own innate ambivalence
about any deal with the Palestinians to become Israel's most vocal and
enthusiastic salesman for a two-state deal, otherwise it would never
pass."
Friedman warns that "If either or both [sides]
don't agree, Kerry would have to take his mission to its logical,
fanatical conclusion and declare the end of the negotiated two-state
solution. ... If and when that happens, Israel, which controls the land,
would have to either implement a unilateral withdrawal, live with the
morally corrosive and globally isolating implications of a permanent
West Bank occupation or design a new framework of
one-state-for-two-people. ... Israelis and Palestinians need to
understand that Kerry's mission is the last train to a negotiated
two-state solution. The next train is the one coming at them."
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro said on
Wednesday at the Institute for National Security Studies conference that
the American document "is very much drawn from ideas the parties have
put on the table themselves," adding that "very little of it will be
purely American authorship."
Strategic Affairs, Intelligence and
International Relations Minister Yuval Steinitz said on Wednesday at the
INSS conference that "Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President
Mahmoud Abbas] may not be funding or encouraging terror acts against us,
but the man who denied the Holocaust as a young man, is today denying
the existence of the Jewish people and their right to a state."
Opposition Leader MK Isaac Herzog (Labor)
said: "We are steadily approaching the point of no return from which
separation will no longer be a realistic option. This situation will
lead us to a very difficult process that will end in a binational
state."
Obama and King Abdullah to meet
Meanwhile, U.S. President Barack Obama is set to meet
with Jordan's King Abdullah in California in February to discuss Syria
and the Middle East, the White House said on Wednesday.
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