Israel official: No Palestinian state in '67 lines
Source: AP
JERUSALEM (AP) -- A senior Israeli official says the government will not agree to the borders that the Palestinians are demanding for an independent state.
Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon said Israel would not let such a state be established within the regional boundaries that existed prior to the 1967 Mideast war. Palestinians want east Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza - territories captured by Israel in that war. Danon's remarks were broadcast on Israel Radio Sunday.
His remarks came ahead of another visit by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to the region this week.
The government has distanced itself from similar comments made by Danon last week.
Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_ISRAEL_PALESTINIANS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-06-09-02-55-12
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John2
(2,730 posts)why I say U.S. national security should not be tied to Israel or any Foreign State. Israel would not exist, if it wasn't for the United States in the first place. The U.S. created Israel and they need to handle them. They have no choice if the U.S. demands Israel respect the U.N. accords.
There is no way in Hell, Israel became such a powerful military Force, without the U.S. providing them with the resources. That is my allegation. My state of North Carolina has more population than the number of Jews in Israel. North Carolina would be bankrupt or taxes would be very high, if they supported a military like the Israelis does. They are getting military assistance from elsewhere. Think about what happened after 1948. These were displaced Jews, that lost everything after World War II. Think about how quickly they got armed with superiority in that Region. There is no other logical explanation but they got assistance to gain a military superiority. It points towards the U.S. and probably the British also. Think about the environment of the U.S. also. It was still a very racist country. These are the same people that supported racist South Africa at the time. This has nothing to do with being anti-Semitic too. It has more to do with Justice. Jerusalem needs to be an International city for both Jews, Christians and Muslims. The Israelis should be thankful they have a Homeland at all, after people helped them after the Holocaust. That is how I see it.
karynnj
(59,504 posts)Let's use your state of North Carolina. Pretend that Virginia, South Carolina and Tennessee ALL called for North Carolina to not exist and attacked it several times over the last half century. One thing that North Carolina has in common with Israel is that both have a high concentration of brilliant research scientists. In North Carolina I suspect that a lower percent are working on defense or offensive weapons than in Israel. Some of the credit for the Israeli military is due the Israelis.
The current situation - the occupation - contradicts democratic and Jewish values -- and Israel claims to be both. They really have a choice and they have to know that the current situation will not (and should not) last.
Not to mention that the statement is attacking the wrong position - the Arab League is backing modifications to the 1967 borders - something they had not done before.
byeya
(2,842 posts)their state and the NCers fled to the states you mention. Even with the invasion - supported by some of the big powers - the NCers are willing to compromise, but that's not enough.
As an aside, the 1967 borders are not defensible and to have a lasting peace, both sides should start out feeling secure.
karynnj
(59,504 posts)with them. I don't think the land mass even of the entire area is defensible just by existing. Steps need to be taken to make both sides secure - as you say.
former9thward
(32,026 posts)The Israelis should be thankful they have a Homeland at all, after people helped them after the Holocaust. That is how I see it.
I am sure that is how YOU see it. The countries of Europe, who have a long, long, history of hating Jews, were happy to create a 'homeland' in a arid land without any natural resources. That way they could be rid of them. They expected the Arabs would finish Europe's job of killing all of them. But they should be thankful...
John2
(2,730 posts)There was no final agreed upon resolution by the U.N. They needed agreement from both sides.
The U.N. did not create any state called Israel. The agreement on the table was a two state solution for the Plestinian Mandate. There was no such state named Israel in the U.N. The votes for the ageeement depended on member states. Both sides had to agree to it. It was the United States, that influenced U.N. members to support the plan on the table. The Arab countries rejected it.
It was Ben Gurion declared the independant state of Israel without U.N. approval. The country that had sole responsibility for the Palestinian Mandate before the U.N. was Great Britain. So lets proceed with our analysis. There were maybe only thousands of Jews in the palestinian Mandate at the time. The British Government had a Policy of not letting any more Jews settle in the palestinian territory. Ben Gurion set up a resistance to British policies and attacked British Government facilities. I hope you are still following the critique? Ben Gurion and Jewish militants or extremists, were once labeled Terrorists by the Bitish Government.
Enters the United States of America and President Truman after World War II. The two countries that gained the most and became World Powers after World War II were the U.S. and U.S.S.R. The British a lot of War debts and owed a lot to the U.S. There were Zionist organizations, mainly in the U.S. wanted to create a homeland for displaced Jews. A lot of countries refused to accept them, including immigration policies were tightened in the US. and Britain. So they chose Palestine and surveys were done among Jewish groups, about this proposed homeland. The only problem was, there were already people there.
The U.S. ignored it, and the British did not The U.S. used the plight of holocaust Jews to embarrass British Foreign Policy. Instead, the British washed their hands of the Palestinian Mandate and left it for the new U.N. to decide. That is when the U.S. Government stepped in as the biggest supporter of Israel. Just like today, the U.S. has enormous influence in the U.N. over countries they give aid to, militarily and domestically. If the U.S. don't gets its way, then you'll pay for it.
Now we are talking about a few thousand Jews, the Bitish once labeled a Terrorist group. All of a sudden, within a short period of time, they become the most powerful military in the Middle East. We are talking about from 1948 and their first Wars with Arab armies. We are talking a Decade or two. They have a sophisticated Air Force and mechanized armored divisions. Much of it was American and British made. I hope you are still following me?
Those few hundred thousand Jews became millions. Millions that had no possessions when they entered the new state of Israel. The new U.N. had no state except the U.S. to enforce Resolutions. Do you still maintain the U.S. did not create Israel? Israel had no Military Industry within the country. They had to build one with outside help. Not only that, these new settlers were given economic assistance and promised land if they came to Israel. Many left countries like Poland. There are only an estimated, 5,000 Jews left in Poland, from what was about 3-4 million. It is the exact copy of the Apartheid Policies of South Africa, whom the U.S. and Israel both supported at the time.
Israel needs the U.S. period for existance. Just how many times has the U.S. saved Israel with a veto in the U.N.? Remove all those vetos since Israel came into existance, they would not exist today. They would be worst off than North Korea, with sanctions. So do you still maintain, Israel's existance, does not depend on the United States?
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Gee, I wonder how that happened.
So many off-the-rails comments in this post that it's a wonder a person can believe any of it.
Its nice to see someone explain something from an historical fact basis instead of emotion. There is no disputing the history that is left for any of us to read and of course interpret. Unlike past historical records that can have holes or gaps in them where we have to guess, this is recent in the timeline of organized country history and I for one am thankful you took the time to lay that out.
byeya
(2,842 posts)We not only finance them, we let them set our policy. The priorities of the two countries are not identical, no two countries are, and this is a case of USA first.
Plucketeer
(12,882 posts)because they're our "coal mine canary" for the Rapture.
on point
(2,506 posts)cpwm17
(3,829 posts)It's one state now and it will always be one state. Unfortunately almost half of Israel/Palestinian citizens are denied their rights by the dominant religion.
Israel is the poster child for why theocracies are bad. Religions are enemies of freedom and are inherently selfish, some more than others.
former9thward
(32,026 posts)So all of the Islamic states are good. Can a Jew practice their religion in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria or any of the Islamic states? A follower of Islam can certainly practice in Israel. The only solution is a two state solution. When the Palestinians recognize that perhaps there will be peace. Not before.
cpwm17
(3,829 posts)You should have figured that out by now.
You're changing the subject to another theocracy: Saudi Arabia. Another alleged allie of the US. The US knows how to pick winners.
former9thward
(32,026 posts)But you just picked out one. Interesting. Why don't you name an Islamic theocracy where Jews can practice freely? Palestinians have always blocked a two state solution. At Camp David Arafat was given everything he wanted. And then he came up with new demands. That is always how negotiations with the Palestinians have gone.
Douglas Carpenter
(20,226 posts)for FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting)
http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/the-myth-of-the-generous-offer/
The seemingly endless volleys of attack and retaliation in the Middle East leave many people wondering why the two sides can't reach an agreement. The answer is simple, according to numerous commentators: At the Camp David meeting in July 2000, Israel "offered extraordinary concessions" (Michael Kelly, Washington Post, 3/13/02), "far-reaching concessions" (Boston Globe, 12/30/01), "unprecedented concessions" (E.J. Dionne, Washington Post, 12/4/01). Israel’s "generous peace terms" (L.A. Times editorial, 3/15/02) constituted "the most far-reaching offer ever" (Chicago Tribune editorial, 6/6/01) to create a Palestinian state. In short, Camp David was "an unprecedented concession" to the Palestinians (Time, 12/25/00).
But due to "Arafat's recalcitrance" (L.A. Times editorial, 4/9/02) and "Palestinian rejectionism" (Mortimer Zuckerman, U.S. News & World Report, 3/22/02), "Arafat walked away from generous Israeli peacemaking proposals without even making a counteroffer" (Salon, 3/8/01). Yes, Arafat "walked away without making a counteroffer" (Samuel G. Freedman, USA Today, 6/18/01). Israel "offered peace terms more generous than ever before and Arafat did not even make a counteroffer" (Chicago Sun-Times editorial, 11/10/00). In case the point isn't clear: "At Camp David, Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians an astonishingly generous peace with dignity and statehood. Arafat not only turned it down, he refused to make a counteroffer!" (Charles Krauthammer, Seattle Times, 10/16/00).
This account is one of the most tenacious myths of the conflict. Its implications are obvious: There is nothing Israel can do to make peace with its Palestinian neighbors. The Israeli army’s increasingly deadly attacks, in this version, can be seen purely as self-defense against Palestinian aggression that is motivated by little more than blind hatred.
Locking in occupation
To understand what actually happened at Camp David, it's necessary to know that for many years the PLO has officially called for a two-state solution in which Israel would keep the 78 percent of the Palestine Mandate (as Britain's protectorate was called) that it has controlled since 1948, and a Palestinian state would be formed on the remaining 22 percent that Israel has occupied since the 1967 war (the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem). Israel would withdraw completely from those lands, return to the pre-1967 borders and a resolution to the problem of the Palestinian refugees who were forced to flee their homes in 1948 would be negotiated between the two sides. Then, in exchange, the Palestinians would agree to recognize Israel (PLO Declaration, 12/7/88; PLO Negotiations Department).
Although some people describe Israel's Camp David proposal as practically a return to the 1967 borders, it was far from that. Under the plan, Israel would have withdrawn completely from the small Gaza Strip. But it would annex strategically important and highly valuable sections of the West Bank--while retaining "security control" over other parts--that would have made it impossible for the Palestinians to travel or trade freely within their own state without the permission of the Israeli government (Political Science Quarterly, 6/22/01; New York Times, 7/26/01; Report on Israeli Settlement in the Occupied Territories, 9-10/00; Robert Malley, New York Review of Books, 8/9/01).
The annexations and security arrangements would divide the West Bank into three disconnected cantons. In exchange for taking fertile West Bank lands that happen to contain most of the region's scarce water aquifers, Israel offered to give up a piece of its own territory in the Negev Desert--about one-tenth the size of the land it would annex--including a former toxic waste dump.
Because of the geographic placement of Israel’s proposed West Bank annexations, Palestinians living in their new "independent state" would be forced to cross Israeli territory every time they traveled or shipped goods from one section of the West Bank to another, and Israel could close those routes at will. Israel would also retain a network of so-called "bypass roads" that would crisscross the Palestinian state while remaining sovereign Israeli territory, further dividing the West Bank.
Israel was also to have kept "security control" for an indefinite period of time over the Jordan Valley, the strip of territory that forms the border between the West Bank and neighboring Jordan. Palestine would not have free access to its own international borders with Jordan and Egypt--putting Palestinian trade, and therefore its economy, at the mercy of the Israeli military.
Had Arafat agreed to these arrangements, the Palestinians would have permanently locked in place many of the worst aspects of the very occupation they were trying to bring to an end. For at Camp David, Israel also demanded that Arafat sign an "end-of-conflict" agreement stating that the decades-old war between Israel and the Palestinians was over and waiving all further claims against Israel.
Violence or negotiation?
The Camp David meeting ended without agreement on July 25, 2000. At this point, according to conventional wisdom, the Palestinian leader's "response to the Camp David proposals was not a counteroffer but an assault" (Oregonian editorial, 8/15/01). "Arafat figured he could push one more time to get one more batch of concessions. The talks collapsed. Violence erupted again" (E.J. Dionne, Washington Post, 12/4/01). He "used the uprising to obtain through violence...what he couldn't get at the Camp David bargaining table" (Chicago Sun-Times, 12/21/00).
But the Intifada actually did not start for another two months. In the meantime, there was relative calm in the occupied territories. During this period of quiet, the two sides continued negotiating behind closed doors. Meanwhile, life for the Palestinian population under Israeli occupation went on as usual. On July 28, Prime Minister Barak announced that Israel had no plans to withdraw from the town of Abu Dis, as it had pledged to do in the 1995 Oslo II agreement (Israel Wire, 7/28/00). In August and early September, Israel announced new construction on Jewish-only settlements in Efrat and Har Adar, while the Israeli statistics bureau reported that settlement building had increased 81 percent in the first quarter of 2000. Two Palestinian houses were demolished in East Jerusalem, and Arab residents of Sur Bahir and Suwahara received expropriation notices; their houses lay in the path of a planned Jewish-only highway (Report on Israeli Settlement in the Occupied Territories, 11-12/00).
The Intifada began on September 29, 2000, when Israeli troops opened fire on unarmed Palestinian rock-throwers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, killing four and wounding over 200 (State Department human rights report for Israel, 2/01). Demonstrations spread throughout the territories. Barak and Arafat, having both staked their domestic reputations on their ability to win a negotiated peace from the other side, now felt politically threatened by the violence. In January 2001, they resumed formal negotiations at Taba, Egypt.
The Taba talks are one of the most significant and least remembered events of the "peace process." While so far in 2002 (1/1/02-5/31/02), Camp David has been mentioned in conjunction with Israel 35 times on broadcast network news shows, Taba has come up only four times--never on any of the nightly newscasts. In February 2002, Israel's leading newspaper, Ha'aretz (2/14/02), published for the first time the text of the European Union's official notes of the Taba talks, which were confirmed in their essential points by negotiators from both sides.
"Anyone who reads the European Union account of the Taba talks," Ha'aretz noted in its introduction, "will find it hard to believe that only 13 months ago, Israel and the Palestinians were so close to a peace agreement." At Taba, Israel dropped its demand to control Palestine's borders and the Jordan Valley. The Palestinians, for the first time, made detailed counterproposals--in other words, counteroffers--showing which changes to the 1967 borders they would be willing to accept. The Israeli map that has emerged from the talks shows a fully contiguous West Bank, though with a very narrow middle and a strange gerrymandered western border to accommodate annexed settlements.
In the end, however, all this proved too much for Israel's Labor prime minister. On January 28, Barak unilaterally broke off the negotiations. "The pressure of Israeli public opinion against the talks could not be resisted," Ben-Ami said (New York Times, 7/26/01).
Settlements off the table
In February 2001, Ariel Sharon was elected prime minister of Israel. Sharon has made his position on the negotiations crystal clear. "You know, it's not by accident that the settlements are located where they are," he said in an interview a few months after his election (Ha'aretz, 4/12/01).
They safeguard the cradle of the Jewish people's birth and also provide strategic depth which is vital to our existence.The settlements were established according to the conception that, come what may, we have to hold the western security area [of the West Bank], which is adjacent to the Green Line, and the eastern security area along the Jordan River and the roads linking the two. And Jerusalem, of course. And the hill aquifer. Nothing has changed with respect to any of those things. The importance of the security areas has not diminished, it may even have increased. So I see no reason for evacuating any settlements.
Meanwhile, Ehud Barak has repudiated his own positions at Taba, and now speaks pointedly of the need for a negotiated settlement "based on the principles presented at Camp David" (New York Times op-ed, 4/14/02).
In April 2002, the countries of the Arab League--from moderate Jordan to hardline Iraq--unanimously agreed on a Saudi peace plan centering around full peace, recognition and normalization of relations with Israel in exchange for a complete Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders as well as a "just resolution" to the refugee issue. Palestinian negotiator Nabil Sha'ath declared himself "delighted" with the plan. "The proposal constitutes the best terms of reference for our political struggle," he told the Jordan Times (3/28/02).
Ariel Sharon responded by declaring that "a return to the 1967 borders will destroy Israel" (New York Times, 5/4/02). In a commentary on the Arab plan, Ha'aretz's Bradley Burston (2/27/02) noted that the offer was "forcing Israel to confront peace terms it has quietly feared for decades."
http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/the-myth-of-the-generous-offer/
sikofit3
(145 posts)Before we destroyed Iraq Jews could practice freely since it was a secular government, christians too!
Mosby
(16,319 posts)They are a democracy with a state religion like Germany, India the UK and many others.
The Palestinians and the Arab leadership have repeatedly refused to move the peace process forward, passing on offers in 1937, 1947, 1967, 2000, 2001 and 2007.
Violet_Crumble
(35,961 posts)While Israel's not a theocracy, civil matters like marriage are overseen by religious courts. It was a compromise Ben Gurion made with the Haredi to get them on board and supporting the new state.
Yr last line tries to portray the Palestinians as intransigent and unreasonable, which isn't correct. If the Palestinians were to offer Israel a solution to the conflict that involved Israel only retaining 1/8 of what it was, that would no more be an offer than the ones you've listed. And considering Israel flat-out refused to talk to or acknowledge the Palestinians until the late 90's, people should be very careful when trying to paint just one side as intransigent and unreasonable, especially when the OP is about a Right Wing member of a government stating their total opposition to a two-state solution...
Poll_Blind
(23,864 posts)Oh, Israel!
How can the sunrises seem full of hope and the sunsets full of accomplishment if there isn't someone cowering in chains at your feet?
Coiled up with the bodies of your nobler sons, slaughtered.
A fair tree, pruned into villainy.
PB
Pab Sungenis
(9,612 posts)why does anyone really think that they would settle for 1967?
As long as Israel exists, the Arab "Palestinians" will never be happy.
and in the past people were a little more candid about the goal:
In the Christian Arab village, the schoolteacher was an attractive lean young man, with prematurely gray hair, working in his garden in the cool of the evening. He had a good modern house, a young modern wife, and after six years of marriage, a first baby, a six-months-old girl named Mary, whom he and his wife so adored that neither of them took their eyes off the child at the same moment. He was healthy, prosperous, respected, freely doing his chosen work, loved and loving; by any standards, a fortunate man. After hours of listening to him, I had grasped the lacking clue, and felt hopeless.
-snip-
"The Arab governments and the Palestinian Arabs rejected Partition absolutely. You wanted the whole country. There is no secret about this. The statements of the Arab representatives, in the UN are on record. The Arab governments never hid the fact that they started the war against Israel. But you, the Palestinian Arabs, agreed to this, you wanted it. And you thought, it seems to me very reasonably, that you would win and win quickly. It hardly seemed a gamble; it seemed a sure bet. You took the gamble and you lost. I can understand why you have all been searching for explanations of that defeat ever since, because it does seem incredible. I don't happen to accept your explanations, but that is beside the point. The point is that you lost."
"Yes." It was too astonishing; at long last, East and West were in accord on the meaning of words.
"Now you say that you want to return to the past; you want Partition. So, in fact you say, let us forget that war we started, and the defeat, and, after all, we think Partition is a good, sensible idea. Please answer me this, which is what I must, know. If the position were reversed, if the Jews had started the war and lost it, if you had won the war, would you now accept Partition? Would you give up part of the country and allow the 650,000 Jewish residents of Palestine -who had fled from the war--to come back?"
"Certainly not," he said, without an instant's hesitation. "But there would have been no Jewish refugees. They had no place to go. They would all be dead or in the sea."
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1961/10/the-arabs-of-palestine/304203/6/
jessie04
(1,528 posts)They've never accepted Israel.
And they will never accept either.
Some /many have openly stated they want to kill all jews.
on point
(2,506 posts)Please make sure to differentiate between racial and political differences they are not the same.
The Israel had no right to take arab land period. That is what they were against.
Otherwise jewish people had lived there for centuries in total harmony. it is only when a religions state took land not belonging to them through terrorism that the problems started.
Answer to this old injustice?
One state solution that is secular (not jewish, christian or muslim)
Mosby
(16,319 posts)Kinda like many native american tribes like the Hopi who are also an ethno-religious tribe.
The Jews have as much rights to their ancestral lands in Israel as the Hopi tribe does in NE Arizona.
After all, religious Jews have been living in Israel and the Levant for 3000+ years.
on point
(2,506 posts)Please read your religious docs. You will find the land was already occupied the israelites stole it from the people who were there. It was NEVER their land.
Please differentiate between a religious, or racial group, from a political entity (Israel) which has no right to exist as a theocracy and is a crime against others.
Response to on point (Reply #24)
Post removed
oberliner
(58,724 posts)It is amazing that a post like this can stand here.
cpwm17
(3,829 posts)It shouldn't have been hidden. There are some serious deniers around here.
The Palestinians didn't voluntarily give up their land. They were expelled by force.
Zionists contradict themselves. First they claim that the land was given to them by God, or they magically have a right to live in Palestine due to Bible mythology. But when the Zionists took the land they claimed, the Zionists then claim that the Palestinians were really at fault.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)"The Jews" did not "steal Palestinian land".
Interesting how you are using "The Zionists" rather than "The Jews" in your post.
Early Zionists, incidentally were mostly secular and did not claim they magically had a right to live anywhere due to the Bible.
Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)Where should they go? they keep get pushed into smaller and smaller areas with little resources. It's really not that different from what we did to Native Americans.
Pab Sungenis
(9,612 posts)And if they hadn't revolted and started a war the same day the nation came into existence, they could probably still be living in peace. But they didn't want to live in a Jewish homeland.
So they started a war, and lost.
Should we give unlimited right of return to Mexicans who want to live in the Occupied Territories of New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada?
Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)We have very different view on this. I'll leave it at that.
Violet_Crumble
(35,961 posts)Most people with a knowledge of the conflict are aware that the Palestinians (btw, putting dit-dits around the word signifies a refusal to accept their existence, which is pretty extreme) have recognised the right of Israel to exist, so when Americans who clearly have a dislike of Palestinians pop up claiming to know what Palestinians think, I don't think it's worth paying any heed to.
Do you support a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem? If not, what do you think should happen to the Palestinians living in those areas? Should they be given Israeli citizenship or forced to leave those areas?
Pab Sungenis
(9,612 posts)until they became a convenient "victim" for the Arab states to rally around to try and destroy Israel at its birth.
There has never, at any time in history ancient or modern, been an independent nation of Palestine. The Romans renamed the province after a revolt in 135 CE as an insult to the Jews, taking the name of the Jews' historical enemies the Philistines. The name stuck through the Ottoman successor to the Eastern Roman Empire, and was maintained under the British Mandate.
Violet_Crumble
(35,961 posts)And they're deserving of all the same respect for their human rights as Israelis. Those who deny the existence of Palestinians and make out they only live for trying to destroy Israel are extremists.
So, are you going to answer the questions you've been asked? I'll repeat it: 'Do you support a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem? If not, what do you think should happen to the Palestinians living in those areas? Should they be given Israeli citizenship or forced to leave those areas? '
telclaven
(235 posts)Give Gaza back to Egypt.
Put the West Bank under Jordan.
There was never a "Palistine". There was the Ottoman province, then the British Mandate, called Trans-Jordan, then Palistine/Jordan. The Hashimites ended up ruling Jordan, but it's population is half Palistinian. Give them the rest, then let the Hashimites and Palistinians decide what kind of society they want to have.
sikofit3
(145 posts)am waiting for an answer to those questions...
Pab Sungenis
(9,612 posts)but not East Jerusalem. I would rather Jerusalem be an open city administered by the UN as was originally intended in 1948.
I also think Jordan should give up an equivalent amount of land for the Palestinian state, considering that a large chunk of its population is Palestinian.
But that's not going to happen because Rabin already offered everything but East Jerusalem and was rejected soundly. The "Palestinians" don't want a two state solution, they want the destruction of Israel.
And are you ever going to answer about what we should do with the Occupied Territories of Arizona, New Mexico, and Nevada?