By Ari Soffer
As
US-brokered talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) continue,
amid pressure for further territorial concessions by Israel, a senior
Palestinian Authority official has told Syrian TV that any agreement will simply
be the "first stage" in eradicating Israel altogether.
Abbas Zaki
posted a clip of the interview - which was promptly translated and circulated by
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) - onto his Facebook page.
In response
to concern expressed by the interviewer that any US-imposed deal would be
"deficient", insofar as it would "only" require Israel to cede Judea and
Samaria, a smiling Zaki urges calm.
"You can
relax. We find ourselves united for the first time. Even the most extreme among
us, Hamas, or the fighting forces, want a state within the '67 borders [sic].
Afterward, we [will] have something to say, because the inspiring idea cannot be
achieved all at once. [Rather] in stages," he responded.
Zaki is a
senior member of the central committee of Fatah - the Arab nationalist party
which dominates the PA, and is headed by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
The strategy
to eradicate the Jewish state "in stages" via a combination of terrorism and
diplomacy, as opposed to in a single military conquest, has been voiced by many
PA officials in the past, who note that Israel cannot be destroyed in one fell
swoop.
Palestinian
Media Watch has exposed a string of such statements by senior officials in the
past, casting serious doubt over the viability of the Obama administration's
recent attempt to impose a solution to the conflict.
Earlier this
year, in a speech attended by Mahmoud Abbas, the PA's Religious Affairs Minister
explained that any treaties with Israel should be viewed as another "Treaty of
Hudaybiyyah" - a reference to a "temporary" deal signed by Islam's founder
Muhammed, which was promptly broken as soon as the Muslim armies were strong
enough to achieve victory.
In another
interview in 2011, Zaki was even more explicit:
"While the
agreement is on the borders of June 4, the President [Mahmoud Abbas]
understands, we understand, and everyone knows that it is impossible to realize
the inspiring idea, or the great goal in one stroke," he explained to Al
Jazeera.
However, he
continued, an agreement which would see the destruction and ethnic-cleansing of
Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria would itself prove strategically fatal
for the Jewish state in the long-run.
"If Israel
withdraws from Jerusalem, if Israel uproots the settlements, 650,000 settlers,
if Israel removes the (security) fence - what will be with Israel? Israel will
come to an end.
"If I say
that I want to remove it from existence, this will be great, great, [but] it is
hard. This is not a [stated] policy. You can't say it to the world. You can say
it to yourself."
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Palestinian
red lines make chances of US-mediated settlement slim
With
Abbas saying he can't accept Israel as a Jewish state 'as a Palestinian, as a
people, as the PLO,' Erekat eyes ICC lawsuit as path to statehood
US
Secretary of State John Kerry met on Friday with Palestinian Authority President
Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah for a talk that lasted several hours. On Saturday,
Kerry was heading back for another round of talks with Abbas and his negotiating
team, including chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb
Erekat.
On Friday, the London-based A-Sharq Al-Awsat paper published an interview
with Erekat that made waves due to Erekat's claim that Israel murdered
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and could do the same to Abbas. "This is the conduct of the Israelis," said Erekat. "Before they
killed [Yasser] Arafat by poisoning there were also voices from the [Ariel]
Sharon government saying that Arafat is an obstacle and that he must be gotten
rid of." Independent French, and later Russian forensic expertshave ruled out the possibility that the late Palestinian leader was
poisoned.
The other comments made by Erekat in his interview - the ones about the
ongoing negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians - were downplayed. But
they are actually very important: Erekat's statements demonstrate just how
wide the gulf between the two sides is, and suggest that Washington's chances of
reaching a framework agreement are slim, perhaps even very
slim.
First of all, Erekat stressed in the interview that the Palestinians will
not agree to have talks extended beyond the allotted nine months, set to end in
April. "Even a one-minute extension is impossible," he was quoted as
saying.
"Unlike what others say, the negotiations will be nine months long. The
objective is to reach an agreement on all issues pertaining to a final-status
deal. And according to the wording of the agreement with Kerry, there will be no
transitional or interim agreements," Erekat said.
Kerry made his way back to the region Thursday for another series of
talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders. This time, he was expected to
present both sides with a framework deal touching on all core issues. But with
April approaching fast and time running out, Erekat's words reflect a growing
impatience within the Palestinian Authority with what they see as Israeli
attempts to prolong negotiations.
"The US administration understands that the talks can't go on for nine
months, and so it is trying to cut them short in order to safeguard the peace
process and preempt the extension of negotiations," Erekat
said.
He added, however, that Israel was trying to thwart the peace process -
and US efforts - in "every way," with the latest example being an Israeli bill
to annex the Jordan Valley, which passed a key ministerial committee last
week.
Claiming that the last face-to-face talks with Israel's negotiating team
took place way back on November 5, Erekat presented a list of Israeli moves and
"crimes" that he said undermined the peace process and led him to resign from
the position of chief negotiator - a resignation that seems not to have taken
effect.
Erekat said that since then, there have been no direct talks, only
separate meetings between US officials and their Israeli and Palestinian
counterparts. Even these efforts did not bear fruit, he said, as Washington has
yet to present the two sides with an official
offer.
The top negotiator then revealed the contents of a letter Abbas had sent
US President Barack Obama following a particularly fraught Abbas-Kerry meeting
on December 8.
"In that letter, the president made clear what he would not be able to
accept as a Palestinian, as a people, as the PLO (Palestine Liberation
Organization). Firstly, we will not be able to accept Israel as a Jewish state,"
Abbas wrote, according to Erekat.
"Secondly, we will not be able to accept a Palestinian state with 1967
borders without Jerusalem. Thirdly, we will not be able to accept any Israeli on
Palestinian land, sea, air and border crossings following the completion of the
gradual withdrawal."
A fourth precondition reportedly set by Abbas was the instatement of the
so-called "right of return" for potentially millions of Palestinian refugees and
their descendants to Israel.
"I will not be able to accept any solution that does not grant the
refugees their right to the possibility to return and be compensated as per UN
Resolution 194, as well as one that does not allow for the release of
prisoners," Abbas reportedly wrote.
Erekat said Abbas presented these preconditions to the Arab League, which
transferred them to UN Security Council member states. This is in keeping with
Erekat's preferred strategy for achieving Palestinian statehood - appealing to
the European Union to recognize the Palestinian state while appealing to various
international bodies to sign treaties and protocols that would enable the
Palestinian Authority to file a suit against Israel at the International
Criminal Court (ICC) in The
Hague.
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