From the article you linked: He added “You can’t carry out the things that were laid out in the Bar Ilan speech... when all you have on the other side is terror. There are no forces for peace, no partner for peace,” he said. “This speech was given before the Arab storm - the so-called Arab spring - which has overwhelmed the Middle East bringing with it radical Islam. Any territory which would be handed over would be taken over by radical Islamists.” Before the election he said you cannot have two states "today". Nuances and words are important. I heard him interviewed and he explained exactly what he said and meant. The Palestinian Authority is aligned with Hamas, a terrorist organization dedicated to the destruction of Israel, not peace. The Palestinians walked away from U.S. led peace talks in January. http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...48d532-9691-11e4-aabd-d0b93ff613d5_story.html You can't have two states today if Hamas stays in control of the Gaza Strip and is part of the Palestinian Authority government. Last year, Hamas launched over 4000 rockets against Israel. Also from last year: On 10 March, Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip, unveiled a monument to its rocket attacks on Israeli cities and towns, a life-sized model of an M-75 rocket in Gaza City. The group declared that the attacks "managed to take the battle to the heart of the Zionist entity (Israel)". On 23 April, Fatah and Hamas signed a reconciliation deal.
Oh, is that his justification for reversing 40 years of Israeli and US policy to win a close election? Policy that we have defended in the UN with veto after veto. He hung us out on the line to dry. All of our problems in the middle east stem from supporting the Israelis. We have done so because they have always pledged not to annex the West Bank, but to return it to the Palestinians in return for peace. Something the Israelis have lied about all along as they continue to annex part of it and build settlements in the rest of it. You don't build towns and settle you people in a land that you seriously intended to give back to its people. Continued establishment of settlements flies in the face of the Oslo Accords, which Israel signed and has ignored ever since. They cannot be trusted any more than can the Palestinians, who are divided and cannot find a leader. Where have you been? The Palestinian Authority and Hamas have been at odds for years. Hamas fought them and broke away in Gaza which they control. They hate each other. The Palestinian authority controls the West Bank and there have been no rocket attacks from there. You conveniently left out the key detail. They walked away because Netanyahu established more Israeli settlements in the West Bank on land taken forcibly from Palestinians during the peace talks, and in direct defiance of the United States which has never supported Israeli attempts to annex the West Bank. It was intended to scuttle the talks. Hamas is not a part of the Palestinian Authority any more than Hezbollah is. Fatah is the party that controls the Palestinian government. And the Palestinian Authority launched zero. Which fell through and never happened. In the midst of negotiations to resolve the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, the Shin Bet revealed an alleged plot by Hamas to depose Fatah rule in the West Bank. This would be achieved by deploying Hamas cells around the West Bank to incite a third intifada and overwhelm Palestinian Authority forces. More than 90 people were arrested. President Abbas said the plot was "a grave threat to the unity of the Palestinian people and its future.
Red there has been zero real evidence since 1947 that the Palestinians want any deal but one that would wipe Israel off the face of the earth. You can try to blame Bibi and the Israelis but the palestinians have walked away from every deal including those brokered by the Isreali left. It maybe more likely that every Isreali concession over the years has been taken as a sign of weakness by the Palestinians and continued pressure by Kerry and the Obama administration fed the idea. Was Netanyahu's move provocative? Yes but until you get a serious move by the Palestinians and their various backers I wouldn't come to the. Table.
Likewise Israel wants the same thing. But Jagger said, "You cain't always get what you want". Both sides at this point know that they will have to deal with each other. And neither side is particularly flexible. The point I am making is that Israel has overwhelming strength and has no motivation whatsoever to concede anything. The second point is that Israel's military strength is based on $3 billion in annual aid from the US. Everything they do has our return address on it. It is the basis for all of our trouble in the middle east. The third point is that Israel's best interests and the best interests of the United States are not the same. Now they want us to crush Iran for them, like we crushed Saddam for them. How did that work out for us? I'm not defending the Palestinians here, they can be counted on to make the wrong decisions time after time. I suggesting that Yahu is trying to tell the United States what to do instead of the other way around. He wants us fighting all of their enemies. He wants our money, unconditionally without having to respect our interests.
Man, Yahu pulled a flip flop Mitt Romney would be proud of. It's strange how similar this is to the Republican Party, how they have to go so far to the right to be electable for the party. I'm glad I don't live there, what a fucking dump, and hell hole.
He flipped again. Now he is apologizing publicly to the Israeli Arab citizens that he racially profiled. http://www.wsj.com/articles/netanyahu-apologizes-for-comments-about-arab-israeli-voters-1427133443
So what? It's local politics Red. What do you care and what effect will this have on any so called peace process? I know you don't like him Red but get serious about something important. The report today that Isreal spied on us then gave info to the congressional Rs is very worrisome. Whatever my opinion of the present administration and the way they handle negotiations with our enemies (and Iran is an enemy) that action deserves rebuke and if the Rs did anything but report it that is almost treason.
Did you read my posts? He shocked the world with his repudiation of the the two-state solution and directly impacted 40 years of US policy, the Camp David Accords, the Oslo Agreement, and many other frameworks for peace that the Israelis have previously supported. It's a very big deal, it is international, not local, and you should realize it. His flip-flop calls into question his sincerity and the validity of Israeli diplomacy. The racial element is especially disturbing considering the Holocaust history behind the founding of Israel and our own sensitivity to decades of Jim Crow era disenfranchisement of minorities. As long as we back Israel with billions of dollars in military aid, Israel is seen as an arm of US policy internationally. Stunts like this hurt us directly. It smacks of non-democratic behavior which we certainly cannot support in that fashion. Israel has a long history of spying on the US. We have convicted Israeli spies in US prisons and they regularly lobby to get them released.
It's not the Isreali spies. Hell we spy on everyone from Great Britain to Russia. It's if they gave info to R congressmen and they used it for political gain. To me that's very different than the letter.
I agree with the second part of this statement 100%. I disagree about it only being local politics. Netanyahu's promise to abandon a two-state solution and then using the race card to get out the vote from the hard right bloc in Israel is going to have international ramifications. The ripple effect will not help with any kind of potential peace agreements, although I do agree with you that the Palestinians are not truly interested in, or incapable of creating a consensus for, peace. As to the actions of congress, I think an investigation into it is at least in order, regardless of who participated republican or democrat.
