In his press conference with Prime Minister David Cameron in London on Wednesday, President Obama explained his thinking as to why he insisted that the first step in seeking a peaceful two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians must be an agreement by Israel to accept the 1967 borders with mutually agreed-upon land swaps. Here is what he said:
It is going to require wrenching compromise from both sides. In the last decade, when negotiators have talked about how to achieve that outcome, there have been typically four issues that have been raised. One is the issue of what would the territorial boundaries of a new Palestinian state look like. Number two: how could Israel feel confident that its security needs would be met? Number three: how would the issue of Palestinian refugees be resolved; and number four, the issue of Jerusalem. The last two questions are extraordinarily emotional. They go deep into how the Palestinians and the Jewish people think about their own identities. Ultimately they are going to be resolved by the two parties. I believe that those two issues can be resolved if there is the prospect and the promise that we can actually get to a Palestinian state and a secure Jewish state of Israel.
This recent statement clearly reveals the underlying flaw in Obama's thinking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There is no way that Israel can agree to borders without the Palestinians also agreeing to give up any claim to a "right of return." As Palestinian Prime Minister Fayyad Salaam once told me: each side has a major card to play and a major compromise to make; for Israel, that card is the West Bank, and the compromise is returning to the 1967 lines with agreed-upon adjustments and land swaps; for the Palestinians, that card is "the right of return," and the compromise is an agreement that the Palestinian refugees will be settled in Palestine and not in Israel; in other words, that there will be no right to "return" to Israel.
President Obama's formulation requires Israel to give up its card and to make a "wrenching compromise" by dismantling most of the West Bank settlements and ending its occupation of the West Bank. But it does not require the Palestinians to give up their card and to compromise on the right of return. That "extraordinarily emotional" issue is to be left to further negotiations only after the borders have been agreed to.
This temporal ordering -- requiring Israel to give up the "territorial" card before the Palestinians even have to negotiate about the "return" card -- is a non-starter for Israel and it is more than the Palestinians have privately asked for. Once again, President Obama, by giving the Palestinians more than they asked for, has made it difficult, if not impossible, for the Palestinians to compromise. Earlier in his administration, Obama insisted that Israel freeze all settlement building, despite the fact that the Palestinians had not demanded such action as a precondition to negotiating. He forced the Palestinians to impose that as a precondition, because no Palestinian leader could be seen as less pro-Palestinian than the American President. Now he's done it again, by not demanding that the Palestinians give up their right of return as a quid for Israel's quo of returning to the 1967 borders with agreed-upon land swaps.
So it's not so much what President Obama said; it's what he didn't say. It would have been so easy for the President to have made the following statement:
I am asking each side to make a wrenching compromise that will be extraordinarily emotional and difficult. For Israel, this compromise must take the form of abandonment of its historic and Biblical claims to what it calls Judea and Samaria. This territorial compromise will require secure boundaries somewhat different than the 1967 lines that led to war. Resolution 242 of the Security Council recognized the need for changes in the 1967 lines that will assure Israel's security. Since 1967, demographic changes have occurred that will also require agreed-upon land swaps between Israel and the new Palestinian state. This territorial compromise will be difficult for Israel, but in the end it will be worthwhile, because it will assure that Israel will remain both a Jewish and a fully democratic state in which every resident is equal under the law.
For the Palestinians, this compromise must take the form of a recognition that for Israel to continue to be the democratic state of the Jewish people, the Palestinian refugees and their descendants will have to be settled in Palestine. In other words, they will have a right to return, but to Palestine and not to Israel. This will be good both for Palestine and for Israel. For Palestine, it will assure that the new state will have the benefit of a large and productive influx of Palestinians from around the world. This Palestinian diaspora should want to help build an economically and politically viable Palestinian state. The Palestinian leadership must recognize, as I believe they do, that there will be no "right of return" of millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants to Israel. Compensation can be negotiated both for those Palestinians who left Israel as a result of the 1948 wars and for those Jews who left Arab countries during and after that same period.
It's not too late for President Obama to "explain" that that is what he really meant when he declared that Israel must remain a Jewish state and that any Palestinian government that expects compromises from Israel must recognize that reality. Central to Israel's continued existence as the nation-state of the Jewish people is the Palestinian recognition that there can be no so-called "right of return" to Israel, and that the Palestinian leadership and people must acknowledge that Israel will continue to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people within secure and recognized boundaries. Unless President Obama sends that clear message, not only to the Israelis but to the Palestinians as well, he will not move the peace process forward. He will move it backward.
Why do you put the word "return" in quotes in paragraph 3? Also, what is the motivation behind the Israeli government's continued settlement building?
Many thanks,
Webb
Are you familiar with international law ?
Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country. -Article 13(2), Universal Declaration of Human Rights (10 December 1948).
The Geneva Conventions of 1949.
Having considered further the situation in Palestine ... Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible." -UN General Assembly Resolution 194 (11 December 1948)
UN Resolution 3236 "reaffirms also the inalienable right of the Palestinians to return to their homes and property from which they have been displaced and uprooted, and calls for their return".[53]
Resolution 242 from the UN affirms the necessity for "achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem."
"The last two questions are extraordinarily emotional....Ultimately they are going to be resolved by the two parties. I believe that those two issues can be resolved if there is the prospect and the promise that we can actually get to a Palestinian state and a secure Jewish state of Israel."
How is it a betrayel of Israel to say that the 2 sides will each have to 1) give up their key elements
2) it is up to them to agree on those things..
1) As you well know a certain amount of money has been discussed as compensation.
2) And that the Facts on the Ground (i.e. LAND SWAPS) is the same thing as saying
that the Settlements would make an agreed upon Israel much wider than the 9 Miles of
pre 1967.
What Obama has done is begin restoring The US as an Honest broker that wants both sides to thrive ---which the Repbulicans constantly destroy Reagan
no mr. dershowitz, the big compromise by israel is jerusalem or the east part of jerusalem. obama is right from an OBJECTIVE point of view- it clear that israel needs it's security needs fullfilled and it's clear IT WILL give back all of the territory it occupied (with swaps...). what needs to be debated debated is the two CORE issues- the right of return and jerusalem. the problam is israel has become spoiled by the clear american bias of the past two decades and now, when there's finally an objective president in the white house, israel acts like that spoiled child when he does not get what he wants for the first time. like that child, the pain of of not getting what u want when u want it will become easier to cope with the next time.....
let's start from the top- U.N resolution 181 designated the west bank to the ARAB state not the Jewish one. second- as an Israeli who's grandfather fought in the 1947 war as a battalion commander i can tell u that Israel kicked most of the Arab refugees that were displaced during that war. don't be naive, if u ask the vast majority of Jews living today in Israel they will tell u we should have done a better job....
third- Israel never meant to give back any land it occupied in the 1967 war. the dream for a Jewish state in the ENTIRE holly land is still alive and kicking today and was always the leading theme in Israels history, especially in the first 40 years.
fourth- as an Israeli i support the existence of the Jewish state with all my heart. what u r suggesting will turn Israel in two a multi-national state and it will become: 1. an apartheid state in which only Jews will enjoy civil and political rights (isolated from the western-democratic world) or 2. a country with a new flag, national anthem, language(Arabic will be the first language) and ext.
essentially, it's a choice between embracing western modernity ( with Israeli attributes) or embracing the Jewish religion.
as far as right of return - not happening. move on.
jerusalem? the arabs should be happy to get a 22nd arab state where the jews have 1. jerusalem is the only holy city for jews. it's not a holy city for islam. never mentioned in the koran. mohammed never set foot in jerusalem. jews pray for a return to jerusalem every day. arabs should stop attacking, stop wasting the billions of dollars in aid on weapons and attacking jews, and start peacefully building their institutions and society so they can prosper.
i'm sick of hearing the arabs complain and sick of hearing how everything is israel's fault. it's a lot of propaganda.
Obama knew exactly what he was proposing. I am sure that he and his advisers talked endlessly before Obama stabbed Isreal in the back. ( with his cleverly crafted speach)
Dont you get it? Obama betrayed Isreal. He knew what he was doing and he did it. He sided against Isreal and betrayed them
Peace will never come about until the United States stops indulging Israel's every demand like some spoiled adolecent.
That embarassing spectical the other day with congress (both sides) cheering and shrieking like 13 year old girls at a Justin Bieber concert was a national disgrace. And a clear message to the world that the USA is not an honest broker in the mideast "peace process".
Our involvement should be over, it's absolutely give up time. Neither the Israelis or the Palestinians care remotely about peace, just about getting their way (of course this relates to them as a whole, not individuals). We should neither support either of these sides nor attempt to mediate peace. The former because noone is blameless and the latter because it's proven to be futile.
Dershowitz: ”Israel [is and should] remain both a Jewish and a fully democratic state in which every resident is equal under the law.” But in education, employment, housing, marriage - surprise, surprise, non-Jews are not equal in the Jewish State. Imagine the US a “Christian State” where Jews were “assured” that they would be “equal under the law.” A “Jewish State” confers rights and privileges on some citizens over others based on ethnic background, and that is unacceptable in the 21st century. Israeli Jews should live in security, but they must accept equality with their fellow residents. Until then, they will never know security, no matter how many arms they accumulate and how ruthlessly they use them.
http://www.marksquotes.com/Founding-Fathers/Washington/