zaterdag 15 december 2012

Balestijnse leiders op Twitter


 
Waarschuwing: satire!

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Balestinian leaders on twitter

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Down with the infidels, down with the Jewish dogs! Kill them all! #Israel has NO right to exist! Never!

hamasgroupie @Baumgarten
I understand you are ready to accept the two state solution?!

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
@hamasgroupie Of course one for Hamas, one for Fatah. For the time being.

Lying Dutchman @erekat
Ha-ha. Let her tell the Germans!

Doublespeak @AbuMazen
@Khaled: You are right, brother! @Westerners: "I don't agree with Khaled Mashaal's statement on the non-recognition of Israel."

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
They will buy it, I bet one of my spacious villas.

Explosive Belt @al-Zahar
@Doublespeak: From now on, I will follow you. Beware!

Lying Dutchman @erekat
Resigned once again from my position as chief negotiator. Or not.

Khaled @KhaledMashaal
Just sitting in the jacuzzi and laughing myself to death while reading DER SPIEGEL in English.

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Shortest joke ever? Elections in #Palestine.

Khaled @KhaledMashaal
Now, THAT was hilarious! Crazy shit.

Doublespeak @AbuMazen
Ha-ha-ha – elections in Balestine! Best thing since sliced bread!

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Still undecided: Have we now been the helpless victims of Israeli aggression oder are we glorious, victorious fighters?

Lying Dutchman @erekat
Victims for the Europeans, heroes for the Arabs. It works, believe me!

Explosive Belt @al-Zahar
Believing Erekat! Holy shit, ya´allah!

Khaled @KhaledMashaal
Would you buy a used car from Erekat? Would you kiss my ass?

hamasgroupie @Baumgarten
Wish I could!

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
By the way, @hamasgroupie: I just received a perfumed letter by Ulrike Putz…

hamasgroupie@Baumgarten
Woah! Woah!
Putz what a tramp, hussy, tart!

Erhard Arendt @palaestinaportal
Graet victory in Gza! For a just piece in the Middle, East!

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Hey, @Doublespeak: The Zionist will freeze your taxes ´til March 2013! He he he.

Doublespeak @AbuMazen
@ismail the ripper: Bloody bastard!

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Keep calm, collaborator! Ever slipped behind a motorcycle? Just kidding.

Lying Dutchman @erekat
Just told CNN: 20.000 people massacred in Gaza during latest Israeli aggression.

ismail the ripper @haniyeh
Or so. The main thing: We brought the Zionists to their knees!

Explosive Belt @al-Zahar
Bad news: Ahmad martyred, Zionists killed him. One bystander lightly injured.

Lying Dutchman @erekat
Another war crime! Have to call my friends at CNN. See you.

Shisha @michaellueders
Smoked a water pipe or two. And again, Deutschlandradio is asking for my expertise. Shiiiit…

 

Avigdor Lieberman moest toch aftreden

 
Een dag eerder zei Lieberman nog dat hij niet zou aftreden, maar anderen dachten daar blijkbaar anders over, en vrijdag maakte hij alsnog zijn aftreden bekend, al zal dat waarschijnlijk maar tijdelijk zijn. Onzeker is nog hoe dat de verkiezingen zal beïnvloeden.
The deal Liberman signed to bring Yisrael Beytenu into the Likud saved his political allies and ensured his political future.
Imagine if Yisrael Beytenu was running on its own and Weinstein would prevent Liberman from running. His party might have vanished overnight.
Now he has 15 seats in the top 42 on the joint Likud-Yisrael Beytenu list, regardless of whether he is prevented from running.
Now, even if he does have to resign later on, he will still have a political base to return to if his trial ends successfully. 

________________

 

Analysis: Liberman's not going anywhere

http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=295882

By GIL HOFFMAN

12/13/2012 22:32

Unless the A-G or the Supreme Court obligate Prime Minister Netanyahu to fire Liberman, he is not going anywhere.

 

 

At every Yisrael Beytenu political event, the rostrum from which party chairman Avigdor Liberman speaks says: "Our word is our bond."

In August 2009, Liberman said at the Knesset, "If the attorney-general decides to indict me, I will resign from the cabinet that moment."

Related:

·        Liberman must resign immediately, Center-Left says

·        Analysis: What took the A-G so long on Liberman?

Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein's office officially announced the foreign minister's indictment shortly after 4:30 p.m. on Thursday. He is still foreign minister.

But at a press conference at a Tel Aviv bar where he went to woo young voters, Liberman explained that when he had made his commitment, he had been referring to the big case against him in which the charges against him were dropped, not the little case that resulted in his indictment, which is based on events that happened after he made the promise.

He said he would consult with his lawyers but also keep in mind the will of his voters.

His lawyers, however, already told him he did not have to quit, and his voters will tell him the same thing.

Unless Weinstein or the Supreme Court obligate Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to fire Liberman, he is not going anywhere.

After the election, Weinstein will have to rule whether Liberman can be appointed foreign minister again, but even then, chances are, nothing will prevent Liberman from continuing his attacks on unfriendly European countries.

Netanyahu released a statement supporting Liberman and downplaying his indictment.

Liberman pointed out that he had been under investigation for 16 years. The more high profile the investigations were, the stronger Liberman got politically. The legal establishment that tried to bring him down played into his hands time and time again.

Ahead of past elections, it looked as if the State Attorney's Office would finally bring him down. This time, he took extra precautions.

The deal Liberman signed to bring Yisrael Beytenu into the Likud saved his political allies and ensured his political future.

Imagine if Yisrael Beytenu was running on its own and Weinstein would prevent Liberman from running. His party might have vanished overnight.

Now he has 15 seats in the top 42 on the joint Likud-Yisrael Beytenu list, regardless of whether he is prevented from running.

Now, even if he does have to resign later on, he will still have a political base to return to if his trial ends successfully.

With the most serious charges against him dropped, Liberman will probably only get stronger politically. His voters believe he was wrongly pursued, and they believe his case.

He might be overly blunt, he might have crossed ethical and perhaps even legal red lines. But it cannot be denied that Liberman appears to be honest. His word is indeed his bond.

 

Paralellen tussen geschiedenis van Tjechië en Israël

 

Tsjechië stemde als enige EU lidstaat tegen de Palestijnse statusverhoging in de VN Algemene Vergadering. De tsjechische ambassadeur in Israel legt uit waarom.

"We strongly feel that the only way to achieve peace here is through bilateral direct negotiations. We know this from our past in negotiating with the Slovaks," he said, referring to the negotiations with the Slovaks that led to the dissolution of Czechoslovakia and the establishment of a separate Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. "I'm not saying this is the same situation, but we know the solution can't be imposed on the outside but must be negotiated on the ground."

And the second level has to do with a century of Jewish-Czech relations dating back to Tomas Masaryk, the founder and first president of Czechoslovakia, who was the first statesmen to visit the Yishuv; to 1948 when Czechoslovakia provided Israel with arms during the War of Independence; and to former president Vaclav Havel who was the first president of a former Iron Curtain country to visit Israel, doing so in April 1990. 

 

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'Israel and 1938 Czechoslovakia are similar'

http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=295915

By HERB KEINON

12/14/2012 07:42

In interview following 'Post' Conference, Czech ambassador warns against relying too much on international community.

 

 

 

Czech Ambassador Tomas Pojar was in the hall attendingThe Jerusalem Post Diplomatic Conference in Herzliya on Wednesday when Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman made an example of his country, saying Israel was not about to become "the second Czechoslovakia."

"All expressions and promises of commitment to Israel's security from all around the world remind me of similar commitments made to Czechoslovakia [in 1938], and the pressure made on the Czech president to partition the Sudetenland," Liberman said. "After all the promises and guarantees that were provided, Nazi Germany occupied all of Czechoslovakia, bringing an end to its existence."

Pojar, in an interview afterward with The Jerusalem Post, replied with a "yes and no" when asked whether there was validity in that historical comparison.

No, he said, because the situation in 1938 in Central Europe, and in the world, was drastically different than the situation today. "The parallels are interesting, but it is not as if you can easily implement the lessons from one situation onto another, a century or half-century later."

But still, he said, there are similarities.

"There are certain parallels in that Czechoslovakia was the only democratic country in the entire region at the time," he said. "There are parallels about how much guarantees you can get from outside, and how much you should rely on them."

Pojar said that in addition to his country's tragic experiences during World War II, it also had experiences under communism.

All this had embedded in the Czechs' "natural skepticism," and a disinclination to believe in immediate "grandiose ideas and miraculous solutions."

"We are the most atheistic, non-religious nation in Europe, if not in the entire world," he asserted. "We don't believe in miracles, and we don't believe in political miracles and the solutions of ideologies that [posit that] something can be easily implemented and solved."

Pojar said the Czechs realize "there are huge differences between war and peace. It is not only either war or peace... Even some interim solutions are sometimes better than crumbled expectations because of grandiose ideas."

The ambassador said one of the lessons the Czech Republic learned from its past is that "we strongly believe that solutions cannot be imposed from the outside, because they do not work."

That firm belief is one of the reasons why the Czech Republic, alone among the 27 EU countries, voted with Israel and seven other countries at the UN on November 29 against upgrading the Palestinian status at the UN to that of nonmember state observer.

That vote, and strong Czech- Israeli ties, makes it a good time to be Prague's envoy to Israel, he acknowledged. He said that following the vote he received numerous letters, emails and phone messages from Israelis thanking his country for its support, with a few people calling the embassy and saying they now were going to buy Czech-made Skoda cars.

In another incident, the partner of an employee at the Czech Embassy received free dental work following the UN vote. "He wanted to pay, but they said no, this time it is for free," Pojar said.

The Czech vote, said Pojar, could be explained on two levels.

On the first level, he said the Czech Republic has made clear it does not support unilateral steps by either side.

"We strongly feel that the only way to achieve peace here is through bilateral direct negotiations. We know this from our past in negotiating with the Slovaks," he said, referring to the negotiations with the Slovaks that led to the dissolution of Czechoslovakia and the establishment of a separate Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. "I'm not saying this is the same situation, but we know the solution can't be imposed on the outside but must be negotiated on the ground."

And the second level has to do with a century of Jewish- Czech relations dating back to Tomas Masaryk, the founder and first president of Czechoslovakia, who was the first statesmen to visit the Yishuv; to 1948 when Czechoslovakia provided Israel with arms during the War of Independence; and to former president Vaclav Havel who was the first president of a former Iron Curtain country to visit Israel, doing so in April 1990.

The UN vote, the ambassador said, was in line with "a tradition of very close links between the Czechs and the Jewish people, and between the Czech Republic and Israel."

Pojar, whose father served as Czechoslovakia's first ambassador here from 1990 to 1994, dismissed the notion that Prague, with its vote at the UN, somehow stood up against the rest of the EU. He said that the Czech Republic would have preferred had there been a consensus EU opinion on the matter, and would even HAVE abstained if the entire EU bloc did so. "It is not the Czech Republic that broke the consensus," he said.

Fourteen EU countries voted for the Palestinian resolution, 12 abstained and only Prague voted against. The consensus crumbled when France declared it would vote for the resolution.

Pojar said this vote has not hurt his country's standing inside the EU, and that "no one was surprised at our vote." He also said the position had "wide popular support among the Czech people.

"It is definitely not something that can hurt the [Czech] government, because this is not the major issue that people vote on," he said. "Our decision was not domestically driven one way or the other."

Regarding the statement issued on Monday after a meeting of the EU's 27 foreign ministers that earned Jerusalem's wrath because of its harsh condemnation of Israeli settlement plans, but a tepid denouncement of Hamas's pledge to destroy Israel, Pojar said, "If the statement was written in Prague, it would have been written differently."

He said that what was important in these types of declarations was not necessarily the exact wording, but rather the balance, or lack of balance, in the statements. He pointed to the clause in Monday's EU statement dealing with Gaza, which called for the "immediate, sustained and unconditional opening of crossings" of goods and people from the Gaza Strip, saying that while the crossings were an important issue, they were not the main problem in the Strip.

"The main problem [in Gaza] is that it is ruled by a terrorist organization, a totalitarian organization with totalitarian views," Pojar said. "The real problem of Gaza, and the security and prosperity and freedom of its people, is the regime in Gaza – not the crossings."

Asked if Europe takes Hamas's statements calling for the destruction of Israel seriously enough, he said he could not speak about the EU, but that he did not feel the "mainstream European elites" did so. The elites, he said, were "sometimes detached from reality, and not only about the Middle East, not only about Islamists, but also about the economic situation.

 

Het E1-dilemma gaat bij rechts Israel meer om het principe dan om het land

 

Ik zie het nog niet gebeuren, maar hij heeft hiermee wel een punt:

There lies an opportunity here, though. Concrete declarations by Mahmoud Abbas allowing some Jews to remain in a future state of Palestine, and gestures regarding protection of Jewish holy places in the West Bank would significantly alter the equation. While it may seem counterintuitive, by recognizing on some basic level that Jewish settlers have a connection to the land and promising protection of Jewish holy places, Abbas will have lessened the actual need for current settlement building. While there will always be a contingent on the far-right that will never be satisfied, Netanyahu would have the political cover to try for the settlement freeze that many are calling for. Absent some sort of recognition from the Palestinians on the type of issues that Netanyahu and his constituency cares about, calls for a Settlement Freeze are unlikely to have any effect.

 

De reden dat Israel na de VN beslissing aankondigde meer huizen te gaan bouwen, was niet alleen of zozeer om een lange neus naar het Westen te trekken, maar vooral om de Joodse verbondenheid met het land dat heel de wereld Palestina noemt, te benadrukken. In die zin was het een heel logische stap, wat overigens iets heel anders is dan een verstandige stap. Zoals veel pro-Palestijnen benadrukken dat we moeten inzien en erkennen, hoe groot het offer is voor de Palestijnen om afstand te doen van Israel als deel van hun gewenste land, waarmee zij zich nog steeds verbonden voelen al zijn de meesten er nog nooit geweest, zo helpt ook begrip voor het feit dat Israel, en de kolonisten, zich werkelijk en oprecht verbonden voelen met plaatsen op de Westbank. Zelf heb ik deze verbondenheid van de kolonisten van dichtbij gezien toen ik in 2006 op een groepsreis in Israel een excursie maakte naar een religieuze nederzetting. 

 

RP

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For Israel’s Right, E1 is a matter of the heart

http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/for-israels-right-e1-is-a-matter-of-the-heart/

DECEMBER 11, 2012, 6:30 PM

Josh Nason is a Masters Candidate in Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) [More] 

 

As soon as Israel announced its settlement construction plan in the E1 area between Jerusalem and Ma’aleh Adumim, the mostly predictable reactions poured in. The Europeans threatened punitive measures against Israel for the Settlement construction. Leaders on the American Jewish Left, such as Rabbi Jill Jacobs, condemned the American Jewish establishment for its silence. The New York Times declared that this would divide the West Bank.

Israel certainly is not doing itself any favors by timing this announcement after losing so decisively at the United Nations, and making it look like settlements are some sort of punishment. But while the outcry against this settlement announcement may halt or postpone this particular batch of building, it is unlikely to alter the dynamic of the Settlement issue, because it fundamentally misreads the Israeli Right. The Israeli Right cares deeply about language and symbolism. Settlements are not merely houses to them, but a tangible statement about Jewish rights to the land and Jewish history in Judea and Samaria. This is the same reason why Bibi Netanyahu holds recognition of Israel as a Jewish state as the most important point in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, and why the current government places so much emphasis on Palestinian incitement.

The critics of the E1 settlement announcement are correct that it pushes peace farther away. But not for the reasons they say. The building in the E1 area, if it ever gets built, does not significantly alter the map of the West Bank. It would make travel from Ramallah to Bethlehem more difficult and further enclose East Jerusalem. However, absent an Israeli willingness to relinquish Ma’aleh Adumim, this was always going to be a trouble spot in final status negotiations. Creative solutions such as a bypass road have already been proposed. Alternatively, if a deal was within sight, and Israel had already agreed to remove thousands of settlers from across the West Bank, it is hard to imagine that moving an additional 3,000 would be the deal-breaker.

This is not to belittle the difficulties involved in solving the issue of borders and territory. The map of the West Bank has been negotiated over for so long that each side feels significantly constrained by the map. As such, tiny changes to the status quo become overly magnified as the supposed negotiating room shrinks.

The real reason that this announcement pushes peace farther away is that it reinforces the dichotomy between how the Israeli Right views the conflict and how their critics want them to view the conflict. So long as settlement announcements are responded to solely with rebukes and lectures about maps, the Israeli Right will remain committed to the symbolism embodied in settlements, namely Jewish connection to the Land of Israel.

There lies an opportunity here, though. Concrete declarations by Mahmoud Abbas allowing some Jews to remain in a future state of Palestine, and gestures regarding protection of Jewish holy places in the West Bank would significantly alter the equation. While it may seem counterintuitive, by recognizing on some basic level that Jewish settlers have a connection to the land and promising protection of Jewish holy places, Abbas will have lessened the actual need for current settlement building. While there will always be a contingent on the far-right that will never be satisfied, Netanyahu would have the political cover to try for the settlement freeze that many are calling for. Absent some sort of recognition from the Palestinians on the type of issues that Netanyahu and his constituency cares about, calls for a Settlement Freeze are unlikely to have any effect.

I am not holding my breath that this will happen. For Abbas to make any sort of gesture regarding even the slightest recognition of legitimacy to settlements or a Jewish connection to the West Bank would be a huge step, and a tremendous risk. However, to truly change the dynamic surrounding settlements one must understand where the Israeli Right is coming from. Rather than being obsessed with maps, those who criticized the E1 settlement decision should instead be looking at how to change the dynamic.

 

vrijdag 14 december 2012

Huizenbouw en kolonisatie in bezet gebied

 

Toen de VN een paar weken geleden de status van Palestina verhoogde naar die van waarnemend niet-lid, waren de Tibetanen, Koerden, West-Saharanen, Basken, Cataloniërs en Turks-Cyprioten waarschijnlijk behoorlijk jaloers. Zeker de eerste twee hebben minstens zoveel recht op een staat, zo niet meer, dan de Palestijnen, maar zullen hem niet krijgen omdat ze niet door Israel maar het machtige China en Turkije worden bezet. Ook deze landen doen aan kolonisatie, aan landjepik en huizenbouw. Maar daar hoor je zelden wat over. Sommige sympathisanten van de Palestijnen beweren met droge ogen dat de Israelische bezetting de enige of langstdurende of ergste bezetting is van de moderne tijd en dat daarom de hele wereld zich nergens anders mee bezig mag houden. 

 

RP

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December 13, 2012 

Where's the Coverage? Construction in Truly Occupied Territory

http://blog.camera.org/archives/2012/12/wheres_the_coverage_constructi_1.html

The media has been in a tizzy about potential Israeli construction of several thousand housing units on the outskirts of Jerusalem in an area known as "the E-1 corridor." Coverage has included two error-laden New York Times stories, columns by Maureen Dowd and Thomas Friedman, numerous op-Eds and an editorial. The Los Angeles Times ran multiple articles and an editorial that played fast and loose with the facts, Agence France-Presse misreported the story as did National Public Radio. Other media similarly either mangled the facts or, at the very least, flogged the story to death.

It's not a new story, either. CAMERA reported on the same misinformation in the media in 2005. While The New York Times made two corrections, prompted by CAMERA, the relentless focus on potential E-1 construction has been notable. And not a shovel has hit the ground yet.

The same cannot be said for the huge and numerous construction projects completed and underway in the truly occupied, once-independent state of Tibet.

On page 17, The Times ran an article about the dozens of recent self-immolations in Tibet protesting Chinese occupation but this article does not mention the construction at all. (The newspaper did publish an op-Ed about Tibet in which the writer describes asking for directions at a construction site.) There was a Times blog post which included a number of photographs of Tibet along with text saying that the region is changing and is basically... uglier. But there is nothing in the pages of the Grey Lady about the massive Chinese construction in Tibet that comes close to the reproach reserved for proposed Israeli construction in Jerusalem and Jerusalem's suburbs.

What about other media coverage of Chinese construction in Tibet? Virtual silence. Although Reuters reported that thousands took to the streets of New York City protesting Chinese occupation of Tibet, there was not a word about the construction.

How much construction is there? More than the 3,000 housing units contemplated for E-1? You betcha.

The Chinese government itself declares:

[Vice chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Region] Gong Puguang said that urbanization rate in Tibet had reached 25 percent by the end of 2010 from less than 3 percent during the initial post-liberation period. The urban infrastructure had continuously been perfected, road frames formed, urban water and gas supply further popularized, comprehensive capability for preventing disasters steadily improved.

Living standard of urban and rural residents has been steadily improved. Before liberation, over 90 percent of people in Tibet were homeless, but now 98.7 percent of farmers and herdsmen have their own houses, with per capita living space in urban areas and rural areas reaching 34.72 sq m and 22.83 sq m respectively. According to Gong Puguang, the urban housing security has basically been established in the whole region, with a rational housing supply system, effectively guaranteed right of habitation for urban and rural residents, and steadily improved residential quality.

Beijing boasts of constructing a vast system of highways, airports and railroads in Tibet. China admits to developing copper mines and at least one hydro-electric dam in the region.

The non-governmental agency Tibetan UN Advocacy, a pro-Tibetan group, published a speech from 1995:

[Tibet's capital of] Lhasa has seen extensive growth since the Chinese occupation. In 1959, the city had a population of 30,000, but by 1989 this had risen to 140,000 (plus a floating population of about 100,000) and is expected to reach some 200,000 by the end of the century. Much of this growth has been Chinese in character. The old Tibetan quarter of the city is now totally surrounded by Chinese concrete blocks and wide avenues. Since the reassertion of Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms in 1992, there has been an acceleration in growth. Lhasa has witnessed extensive construction work, much of which appears to be undertaken by Chinese labourers. Many economic activities are also increasingly falling under Chinese domination. Counting at the Tromzikhang Market in July 1994 revealed that over 70% of businesses were run by Chinese traders.

If Lhasa is an example of the Chinese transformation of a Tibetan city, the town of Bayi is an illustration of exclusive Chinese urbanisation in the middle of the Tibetan countryside. Bayi was constructed as a military-industrial town in the 1960s, and now has a population that is around 80-90% Chinese. There are only a handful of Tibetan shops in the entire town.

That was 1995. What has happened since? According to the Tibetan government in exile, led by the Dalai Lama (and by the way, be careful of this link as there may be a virus possibly planted by the Chinese government):

Under the guise of economic and social development, Beijing encourages the migration of Chinese population to Tibet, marginalizing the Tibetans in economic, educational, political and social spheres.

The railway between Gormo and Lhasa, which was officially opened in July 2006, has given further impetus to the vicious policy of flooding Tibet with Chinese migrants and thus making it demographically impossible for the Tibetans to rise up as in the case of Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang. It is estimated that the railway brings some 5,000 to 6,000 Chinese to Lhasa every day. Out of these, 2,000 to 3,000 return to their homes in China and the rest of them settle in Tibet indefinitely. If this trend continues unabated, it will not be long before what many perceive as Beijing's "final solution" to the question of Tibet will have achieved its desired goal.

That sounds like a big story. You'd think the press would cover it. Three to four thousand migrants from China arrive every day? They must need places to live – maybe even thousands of housing units. Unfortunately for the Tibetans, those housing units and the other construction are not outside Jerusalem. If they were, you can bet the Tibetans wouldn't have to ask... Where's the coverage?

 

donderdag 13 december 2012

Palestine Papers: discussie over "twee staten voor twee volken"

 

Een oude EoZ, maar vanwege de statusverhoging van de Palestijnen weer uiterst actueel. Bijna iedereen behalve wat verstokte zionisten gaat ervan uit dat president Abbas oprecht voor een tweestatenoplossing is en Israel die juist blokkeert door te blijven bouwen in bezet gebied. Uit onderstaand verslag van de vorig jaar uitgelekte Palestine Papers blijkt dat juist Israel een tweestatenoplossing voorstaat en de Palestijnen vaag blijven. Het gesprek vond plaats voorafgaand aan de vredesconferentie in 2007 in Annapolis, en ging erover wat er in de eindverklaring zou komen (die er vanwege de onenigheid niet kwam). Tijdens de daaropvolgende onderhandelingen (die een tijd lang tweewekelijks plaatsvonden) deed premier Olmert de Palestijnen een voorstel waarbij ze 98% van de Westoever zouden krijgen, en ook Abbas toonde zich soepel, bijvoorbeeld wat betreft een landruil van een paar procent. Op Israels voorstel heeft hij echter nooit een duidelijk antwoord gegeven, en eind 2008 zijn de Palestijnen de onderhandelingen gestopt vanwege de Gaza oorlog 

 

RP

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Thursday, February 10, 2011

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.nl/2011/02/palestine-papers-arguments-about-two.html

Palestine Papers: Arguments about "two states for two peoples"

 

In the preparation for Annapolis, the Israeli and Palestinian Arab negotiators discussed what a joint statement might look like. Tzipi Livni wanted to say that the end-game is two states for two peoples - and the Palestinian Arabs objected, for reasons that they themselves detailed.

Here are some sections of the discussion:

Tzipi Livni: Two states is the ultimate goal of the process. But also part of the TOR [Terms of Reference document they are drafting.] Each state is the answer to the natural aspirations of its people.

Saeb Erekat: [Raises roadmap language regarding unequivocal duty to accept each state as is. Reads from the roadmap.]

TL: To say the idea that two nation states contradicts the roadmap..…

SE: [But we’ve never denied Israel’s right to define itself.]
If you want to call your state the Jewish State of Israel you can call it what you want. [Notes examples of Iran and Saudi Arabia.]

TL: I said basically that our position is a reference to the fact that each state is an answer to the national aspirations of their people.

Akram Haniyeh: There was an article in Haaretz saying that Palestinians would be stupid if they accept this [i.e. the Jewish state].

TL: Someone wrote the Palestinians?

Ahmed Querei [AA]: I want to say two state solution living side by side in peace security stability and prosperity, Palestinian democratic state independent with sovereignty, viable with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Tal Becker: That’s all? [Sarcastically.]

AA: Yes that’s our position. Two state solution living side by side in peace security stability and prosperity, Palestinian democratic state independent with sovereignty, viable with East Jerusalem as its capital. This is what we want to have. This small sentence.

TL: I just want to say something. ...Our idea is to refer to two states for two peoples. Or two nation states, Palestine and Israel living side by side in peace and security with each state constituting the homeland for its people and the fulfillment of their national aspirations and self determination...

AH: This refers to the Israeli people?

TL: [Visibly angered.] I think that we can use another session – about what it means to be a Jew and that it is more than just a religion. But if you want to take us back to 1947 -- it won’t help. Each state constituting the homeland for its people and the fulfillment of their national aspirations and self determination in their own territory. Israel the state of the Jewish people -- and I would like to emphasize the meaning of “its people” is the Jewish people -- with Jerusalem the united and undivided capital of Israel and of the Jewish people for 3007 years... [The Palestinian team protests.] You asked for it. [AA: We said East Jerusalem!] …and Palestine for the Palestinian people. We did not want to say that there is a “Palestinian people” but we’ve accepted your right to self determination. 

AA: Why is it different?

TL: I didn’t ask for something that relates to my own self. I didn’t ask for recognizing something that is the internal decision of Israel. Israel can do so, it is a sovereign state. [We want you to recognize it.] The whole idea of the conflict is … the entire point is the establishment of the Jewish state. And yet we still have a conflict between us. We used to think it is because the Jews and the Arabs… but now the Palestinians… we used to say that we have no right to define the Palestinian people as a people. They can define it themselves. In 1947 it was between Jews and Arabs, and then [at that point the purpose] from the Israeli side to [was] say that the Palestinians are Arabs and not [Palestinians – it was an excuse not to create a Palestinian state. We'’ve passed that point in time and I'’m not going to raise it. The whole conflict between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is not the idea of creating a democratic state that is viable etc. It is to divide it into two.] For each state to create its own problem. Then we can ask ourselves is it viable, what is the nature of the two states. In order to end the conflict we have to say that this is the basis. I know that your problem is saying this is problematic because of the refugees. During the final status negotiations we will have an answer to the refugees. You know my position. Even having a Jewish state -- it doesn’t say anything about your demands. …. Without it, why should we create a Palestinian state?

...There is something that is shorter. I can read something with different wording:
That the ultimate goal is constituting the homeland for the Jewish people and the Palestinian people respectively, and the fulfillment of their national aspirations and self determination in their own territory.


The joint declaration at Annapolis did not include any wording about the Jewish people, but afterwards President Bush said "The [final peace] settlement will establish Palestine as a homeland for the Palestinian people just as Israel is the homeland for the Jewish people...The United States will keep its strong commitment to the security of the State of Israel and its existence as a homeland for the Jewish people."


By the way, the Guardian definitely saw this memo, because it was the one that they and Al Jazeera misquoted as saying that Livni said she was against international law. (She didn't.)