Tag Archives: oslo accords

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EU Report on Israel: Saving the Two State Solution?

Jonathan Cook
Jonathan Cook

Jonathan Cook

Nazareth – Already-strained relations between Israel and Europe hit an all-time low this week after a leaked internal European report on the so-called peace process criticised Israel in unprecedented terms.

The document, which warned that the chances of a two-state solution were rapidly fading, appeared to reflect mounting exasperation among the 27 European member states at Israel’s refusal to revive talks with the Palestinians.

Israeli newspapers, reporting on the developing crisis, have led with headlines such as “Israel vs Europe.” One, Israel Today, known to be close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, recently announced “Europe becomes irrelevant,” in an echo of a rebuff to the Europeans issued by Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s far-right foreign minister. Continue reading →

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A Palestinian Spring; When?

Sami Jamil Jadallah
Sami Jamil Jadallah

Sami Jamil Jadallah

One would think that out of all the countries and people, albeit “invented” in the Middle East, the Palestinians would be leading the way to a full Arab Spring, Fall, Summer and Winter until the armed and colonial Jewish Occupation comes to an end. Surprisingly, this has not been the case.

More surprising is the fact that after meeting in Cairo a couple of weeks ago, Palestinian leadership, both Fatah and Hamas, had talks of holding elections! As if the elections of a government in the service of a Jewish Occupation is the most pressing issue at hand for Palestinians—more pressing than ending the Jewish Occupation.

The Oslo Accords, an outcome of the so-called ‘peace process’ not only killed any chance at ending the longest military and colonial occupation in modern times—it also killed and snuffed out the First Palestinian Intifada, truly the first Arab Spring. Continue reading →

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Bibi the Bamboozler to Settlers: ‘America Won’t Get in Our Way…It’s Easily Moved’

RealNetanyahu

Richard Silverstein, 17 July 2010

Israel’s Channel 10 secured a video (Hebrew) recorded in 2001 during the height of a Palestinian terror campaign against Israel and the settlements.  It records a condolence call Bibi Netanyahu, recently “retired” from politics after losing the prime ministership several years earlier, pays on a group of West Bank widows whose husbands had been killed by Palestinian attacks.

For those on the Israeli right who claim that the Oslo Accords broke down due to Palestinian terror or any such thing, watch this and you will see that Bibi brags that he destroyed Oslo.  Even if you discount this by half as the braggadocio of a macho Israeli politician, it’s still eye-opening.  Gideon Levy too has written about this footage in Haaretz.

Note in the first passage how Bibi brags that he has America wrapped around his thumb.  The cynicism is breathtaking.  Here is Dena Shunra’s translation:

Bibi:…The Arabs are currently focusing on a war of terror and they think it will break us. The main thing, first of all, is to hit them. Not just one blow, but blows that are so painful that the price will be too heavy to be borne. The price is not too heavy to be borne, now. A broad attack on the Palestinian Authority. To bring them to the point of being afraid that everything is collapsing…

Woman: Wait a moment, but then the world will say “how come you’re conquering again?”

Netanyahu: the world won’t say a thing. The world will say we’re defending.

Woman: Aren’t you afraid of the world, Bibi?

Netanyahu: Especially today, with America. I know what America is. America is something that can easily be moved. Moved to the right direction.

Child: They say they’re for us, but, it’s like…

Netanyahu: They won’t get in our way. They won’t get in our way.

Child: On the other hand, if we do some something, then they…

Netanyahu: So let’s say they say something. So they said it! They said it! 80% of the Americans support us. It’s absurd. We have that kind of support and we say “what will we do with the…”  Look. That administration [Clinton] was extremely pro-Palestinian. I wasn’t afraid to maneuver there. I was not afraid to clash with Clinton. I was not afraid to clash with the United Nations. I was paying the price anyway, I preferred to receive the value. Value for the price.

In the following segment, Bibi boasts about how he emptied the Oslo Accords of meaning by an interpretation that made a mockery of them:

Woman:  The Oslo Accords are a disaster.

Netanyahu: Yes. You know that and I knew that…The people [nation] has to know…

What were the Oslo Accords? The Oslo Accords, which the Knesset signed, I was asked, before the elections: “Will you act according to them?” and I answered: “yes, subject to mutuality and limiting the retreats.” “But how do you intend to limit the retreats?” “I’ll give such interpretation to the Accords that will make it possible for me to stop this galloping to the ’67 [armistice] lines. How did we do it?

Narrator: The Oslo Accords stated at the time that Israel would gradually hand over territories to the Palestinians in three different pulses, unless the territories in question had settlements or military sites. This is where Netanyahu found a loophole.

Netanyahu: No one said what defined military sites. Defined military sites, I said, were security zones. As far as I’m concerned, the Jordan Valley is a defined military site.

Woman: Right [laughs]…The Beit She’an Valley.

Netanyahu: How can you tell. How can you tell? But then the question came up of just who would define what Defined Military Sites were. I received a letter – to my and to Arafat, at the same time – which said that Israel, and only Israel, would be the one to define what those are, the location of those military sites and their size. Now, they did not want to give me that letter, so I did not give the Hebron Agreement. I stopped the government meeting, I said: “I’m not signing.” Only when the letter came, in the course of the meeting, to my and to Arafat, only then did I sign the Hebron Agreement. Or rather, ratify it, it had already been signed. Why does this matter? Because at that moment I actually stopped the Oslo Accord.

Woman: And despite that, one of our own people, excuse me, who knew it was a swindle, and that we were going to commit suicide with the Oslo Accord, gives them – for example – Hebron…

Netanyahu: Indeed, Hebron hurts. It hurts. It’s the thing that hurts. One of the famous rabbis, whom I very much respect, a rabbi of Eretz Yisrael, he said to me: “What would your father say?”  I went to my father. Do you know a little about my father’s position?

…He’s not exactly a lily-white dove, as they say. So my father heard the question and said: “Tell the rabbi that your grandfather, Rabbi Natan Milikowski, was a smart Jew. Tell him it would be better to give two percent than to give a hundred percent. And that’s the choice here. You gave two percent and in that way you stopped the withdrawal. Instead of a hundred percent.” The trick is not to be there and be broken. The trick is to be there and pay a minimal price.

Here are a few of Levy’s choice characterizations of Bibi’s performance in this video:

…Israel has had many rightist leaders since Menachem Begin…but there has never been one like Netanyahu, who wants to do it by deceit, to mock America, trick the Palestinians and lead us all astray. The man in the video betrays himself in his own words as a con artist, and now he is again prime minister of Israel. Don’t try to claim that he has changed since then. Such a crooked way of thinking does not change over the years.

Forget the Bar-Ilan University speech…this is the real Netanyahu. No more claims that the Palestinians are to blame for the failure of the Oslo Accords. Netanyahu exposed the naked truth to his hosts at Ofra: he destroyed the Oslo accords with his own hands and deeds, and he’s even proud of it. After years in which we were told that the Palestinians are to blame, the truth has emerged from the horse’s mouth.

…The government of Israel is led by a man who…thinks that Washington is in his pocket and that he can pull the wool over its eyes.

It should be noted that Bibi isn’t the only prime minister who boasted of such manipulation of the U.S.  Dov Weisglass, Ariel Sharon’s Mephisto bragged of “putting the peace process in formaldehyde” via the Gaza withdrawal.  He too claimed he had George Bush wrapped around his little finger (though he didn’t say which one).

This seems to be a fashion among right-wing Israel prime ministers.  They come to believe their own press clippings.  But really who is to blame for this but American presidents who allow Israeli leaders to outwit and outmaneuver them?  When has an American president, except perhaps George Bush pere, ever stood up to Israel and won?  And I’m rapidly coming to the conclusion it won’t ever happen with the current president.

Source: Bibi the Bamboozler to Settlers: ‘America Won’t Get in Our Way…It’s Easily Moved’

See also:


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Netanyahu exposed and more

Mazin Qumsiyeh

Mazin Qumsiyeh, 17 July 2010

Young people do what is called ‘party hopping’: going from one party to another in the same night when the parties are held in parallel time.  You get to meet more people but you have the disadvantage of not spending enough time at one place to really get connected.  We decided this Friday to try a similar thing for the Friday demonstrations in Bethlehem area and hop-visit Al-Walaja, Al-Ma’sara, and Wad Rahhal. Maybe that was because we missed the action but in any case, it was not a good idea.  While we did meet more people, we missed the real actions (although we had a small dose of tear gas remnants in Al-Ma’sara!). Life here never has a dull moment.  Six homes were demolished in East Jerusalem on the 13th, we are giving lots of talks to internationals visiting here, there are many summer camps for young Palestinians, we meet new people every day who are interested in helping, popular resistance acts are everywhere, we have new projects and ideas that take work that are being launched….   The news around us (good and bad) give us fuel for further action.

In other news Meg Ryan and Dustin Hoffman decided not to attend the Jerusalem film festival after the Gaza raid and are added to the growing list of International artists boycotting the apartheid state.  We must intensify the demand for total boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against the apartheid state of Israel.

While the [Israeli apartheid] prime minister is dispensing promises about easing restrictions in the territories, Israel is expelling hundreds of shepherds from the Jordan Valley http://www.haaretz.com/magazine/week-s-end/twilight-zone-gestures-to-the-palestinians-1.302315

But here is the real Netanyahu in a private conversation about how he stopped the Oslo accords (partial English translation at bottom of video):


Gideon Levy wrote about this in Haaretz earlier this week
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/tricky-bibi-1.302053

Translated from Hebrew: Yediot’s legal affairs editor on “the emergence of apartheid and fascism” in Israel

http://coteret.com/2010/06/23/yediots-legal-affairs-editor-on-the-emergence-of-apartheid-and-fascism-in-israel/

Mark Barverman: Something wonderful happened…

http://markbraverman.org/2010/07/report-from-the-presbyterian-general-assembly-part-1/
Inspiring: Children confront soldiers in Nabi Saleh

Beit Jala Demonstration 4 July 2010

AIC video: Al-Walaja Reality

Shooting a blindfolded Palestinian is ‘unbecoming behavior’ and only if caught on tape httpv://www.imemc.org/article/59136

In Spanish with English subtitles: Intifada

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Netanyahu offers to come to … Ramallah

DSC00777

Marian Houk, 1 July 2010

In public remarks after his meeting with U.S. Special Envoy George Mitchell this evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu offered to come to Ramallah if the Palestinian side were ready for direct negotiations.

It would be a first.

Netanyahu told Mitchell, in front of the cameras: “I call on President Abu Mazen to come to Jerusalem. I’m prepared to go to Ramallah. I think that this is the only way that we’ll solve the intricate problems that we’re discussing between us”… This statement was sent around by email from the Israeli Government Press Office, part of the Prime Minister’s Office.

Mitchell is currently conducting a fourth or fifth round indirect, or “proximity” talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.

But Ramallah is Area A (a category dating from the Oslo Accords, designating where Palestinian Authority security forces have nominal control) — and Israelis are barred from entering Area A…

There are big red signs around the West Bank [ sometimes in the wrong places, actually, such as just after passing through Qalandia Checkpoint, on the way to Ramallah, where there are areas that are still legally Jerusalem by Israeli definition, such as Qafr Aqab and Semiramis, and that still must pay Jerusalem taxes, though they get virtually no services], warning Israelis — who can otherwise roam freely, say, to visit friends in the settlements — that they are approaching an Area A [usually a "built-up" Palestinian city -- though even they can have parts which are classified Areas B or C -- such as Abu Mazen's house above Balloua...]

No Israeli can enter Area A without facing fines (5000 shekels, for endangering him/herself and the rescue services that would have to be called up if he/she calls for help or, G-d forbid, gets in trouble. There have been stories about people heading to weddings in the settlements who ended up in the middle of Qalandiya refugee camp while relying on their car’s Israeli GPS systems, which do not acknowledge either political reality or even the actual geography of the West Bank — in many areas of which the Israeli GPS simply goes blank…

Perhaps Netanyahu has been inspired by all the recent almost-irresistable media stories about cafes + malls + more in the “Tel Aviv” of the West Bank.

Meanwhile, there are still regular IDF and Border Police incursions in the West Bank — mainly at night, which is believed to be more protective to the Israeli forces on the prowl, but also during the day.

After midnight, but before dawn this morning, for example, the IDF arrested 8 “wanted” Palestinians overnight in the West Bank. The way the IDF spokespersons unit just described this on Twitter is: “Overnight, IDF forces arrested 8 wanted Palestinians suspected for terrorist activity in J + S [Judea + Samaria, meaning the West Bank] region”

These incursions happen at least several times a week, sometimes almost every night. Both Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad have complained about this, publicly and reportedly privately as well, for months and more.

The atmosphere is … almost indescribable, especially to people used to feeling secure in their homes and in their beds, who will not really understand the tension and terror this sows.

Netanyahu offers to go to … Ramallah.  Why not?  Everybody is: two Haaretz journalists [not Amira Hass, who has lived in Ramallah for more than a decade, since 1997 as it happens] bylined a story published today, datelined Ramallah. Actually it was part of the outreach program of the new Palestinian Presidential media advisory team at the Muqata’a — six Israeli journalists were specially invited, given lunch, allowed to see the man close-up, and ask whatever questions they wanted for three hours.

One can only imagine the security arrangements [well beyond the usual IDF waiver form they would have been required to sign]…  But, then again, the IDF and Israeli security services have reportedly long been involved in coordination of all movements — and even escorting — of President Abbas and his Prime Minister Salam Fayyad around the West Bank. There is, after all, the great threat of the bitter enemy, “Islamic fundamentalism”…

Actually, some Israeli journalists, but more often some well-connected Israeli analysts, have been coming to Ramallah without any fanfare [for security reasons too, let's not forget]. And not just from the Israeli “left”, which means not Marxists but those opposed to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory, but also from the right. One of the more active analysts from former Israeli diplomat Dore Gold’s Jerusalem Center for Policy Affairs told me in 2009 that he had been coming on a weekly basis for a while, and if I remember correctly he was being briefed in the Palestinian Civil Affairs office run by Fatah’s Hussein ash-Sheikh (in the same building, just a bit more than a stone’s throw from the Israeli “Civil Administration” and Military Court at Beit El, where Fatah’s Mohammed Dahlan now has the entire top floor for his own media outreach operation).

The Haaretz story, co-authored by Aluf Benn and Akiva Eldar, that is one of the products of this Palestinian media outreach invitation is published here.

In it, we learn, for example, that Abu Mazen noted, with mild reproach, that the head of Palestinian Television [who is also the Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization or PLO], Yasser Abed Rabbo, invited Netanyahu for a PALestinian TV interview but got no response.

Perhaps Netanyahu is now ready to respond?

The Jerusalem Post’s report, which called this an “apparent charm offensive aimed at the Israeli public” is here, authored by Herb Keinon.

The JPost reported that Abbas “is willing to enter direct negotiations with the Netanyahu government, as soon as he hears from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu regarding Israel’s position on borders and security issues. Abbas, in the briefing with Israeli journalists Tuesday in Ramallah, said that originally he wanted to hear from Netanyahu whether he was willing to accept the understandings agreed upon by his predecessor, Ehud Olmert …

The JPost notes that “Abbas, who has come under pressure from the US to speak directly to the Israeli public, last spoke with the Israeli media when he gave an interview to Channel 2 at the end of April … When no answer from Netanyahu was forthcoming regarding the Olmert offer, Abbas said at Tuesday’s briefing, he sent a message through US envoy George Mitchell saying that he would suffice with an answer on only two of the issues: borders and security. ‘Answers like these are necessary to see if we are speaking the same language, and then it will be possible to continue. It is preferable that direct talks will not explode after 10 minutes, and then who knows when we will be able to renew negotiations again’, Abbas said.  Abbas said he would be willing to engage in direct negotiations with Netanyahu as soon as he received an answer”.

This apparently American-inspired Palestinian “charm offensive”, sullen though it may be at times, has been going on since the indirect or “proximity” talks presided by Mitchell have gotten well underway.

We may — or may not — be at a Sadat moment.

Abbas’ deputy as chief negotiator, Sa’eb Erekat, spoke to the INSS [Institute for National Security Studies] in Tel Aviv several weeks ago, and debated Israel’s Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor in Washington more recently. In the same line, Abbas himself recently met with members of the American Jewish community in the U.S.

On all occasions, it is safe to say, the two Palestinians had considerably more rosy assessments of the encounters than did their more-distrustful Israeli counterparts.

On top of that, Abbas’ Prime Minister Fayyad is about to meet the Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who is the effective rule of the West Bank in the Israeli government and practice — supposedly to discuss “security” [even though there was an uproar when his er formEconomic Minister, Basim Khoury, caused a storm of criticism when he spoke to Silvan Shalom at a meeting in Tel Aviv -- but that was before indirect talks began].

Fayyad is a legal permanent resident of [East] Jerusalem, of course — like the four elected Hamas-affiliated Palestinian parliamentarians who residency is about to be revoked [and they will be "deported", unless a court intervenes].   But Fayyad is not affiliated with Hamas.  So, he could easily meet Barak in either East or West Jerusalem, or anywhere in Israel.  Alternatively, Barak could easily make arrangements to show up somewhere in Ramallah [though no doubt with a huge and very obtrusive security escort], and take in all the supposedly glittery sights…

  • Marian Houk is the Editor of UN-Truth news site.