Palestine Analysis: Breaking Down Israel's Counter Offer on Talks

On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that there would be no construction freeze in Jerusalem; however, he offered confidence-building gestures, such as allowing the opening of Palestinian Authority institutions in the eastern part of the city, transferring additional West Bank territory to Palestinian security control, and discussing all the core issues of the conflict during proximity talks with the Palestinian Authority.

Israel-Palestine Follow-Up:”Apartheid” Deportation Orders, Settlements

This counter-offer was put out by the Netanyahu Government through media organizations on Friday. The follow-up analysis was that Israel would announce an official shift in its Palestinian policy: willingness for an interim agreement in the West Bank that would include the establishment of a Palestinian state within temporary borders.


The formula of a Palestinian state within temporary borders was included in the second stage of the road map of 2003. However, this time the counter-offer, although it requires Israel to withdraw from more territory and perhaps even evacuate settlements, excludes the status of Jerusalem and only draws temporary borders with the West Bank.

U.S. Mideast special envoy George Mitchell met Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Netanyahu on Friday. Netanyahu, ready to take any dismissal of his offer as confirmation that the Palestinians are  “stubborn and rejectionist”, told Mitchell at the beginning of the meeting:

I look forward to working with the Obama administration to move peace forward. We are serious about it, we know you are serious about it and we hope the Palestinians respond.

Not only Ramallah rejected Israel’s counter-offer; Hamas’s leader in the Gaza Strip, Ismail Haniya, said Thursday that resumption of peace talks with Israel is a cover-up for the "Judaization of Jerusalem".

Meanwhile, the first signs of Israel’s new military order, which can deport tens of thousands of Palestinians from the West Bank, emerged. A Palestinian from the West Bank, Ahmad Sabah,was forcibly deported to the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, immediately after his release from detention in Israel.

Middle East Inside Line: End of Saudi Peace Initiative?, Hamas-Israel-Egypt Triangle, Israel's Fear Industry

Jordan's King on Middle East: Talking to the Chicago Tribune on Thursday, Jordan's King Abdullah warned of violence if no progress is made in restarting Palestinian-Israeli peace talks. Abdullah said:

If we hit the summer and there's no active [peace] process, there's a very good chance for conflict, and nobody wins when it comes to that.

Referring to the Saudi peace initiative, in which moderate Arab and Muslim states would normalize relations with Israel in return for West Jerusalem's complete withdrawal from occupied territory, Abdullah said:

We managed to get an extension of the Arab peace proposal, which terminates in July. There will be a committee meeting of Arab countries in July, and for us as moderate countries, we're going to be challenged by everybody else.

Nothing has happened; Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not interested in peace, so why keep the Arab peace proposal on the table?

As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Israel must do more to pursue peace with the Palestinians and to strengthen their institutions or risk empowering militant groups such as Hamas, Abdullah suggested the message to Washington that "Arabs have not played their last card":

I think it's up to us to do a lot of the heavy lifting at this stage.

Why should the burden be solely on Obama and Americans to stick their necks out if both parties are not willing to do enough of the groundwork?

Hamas-Israel-Egypt Triangle: As Hamas ordered the temporary closure of hundreds of smuggling tunnels around the town of Rafah, following Israel’s warning that Hamas was planning to seize tourists in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula), Israel Radio reported on Saturday that Egyptian forces had blown up a smuggling tunnel beneath the border with the Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the armed wing of Hamas (the Izz-as-Din al-Qassam brigades), Abu Obeidah, said a prisoner swap was not Hamas' only hope for detainees and that the group had a "strong strategy" for securing their release. He continued:

Useless, absurd peace talks failed to free the prisoners, but our fighters will release them by all means, including armed resistance.

The tension between Israel and Gaza is increasing, especially after Israel Defense Forces shot dead a Palestinian man on Friday. The Israeli army said he was attempting to plant a bomb along the border fence.

Israel's Fear Industry Goes Flat Out: Following an Iranian-hosted international disarmament conference which concluded that “a nuclear weapons-free Middle East requires the Zionist regime to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu underlined the “importance of the threat”:

Over the years, we have learned that the olive branch of peace will be achieved only if we remain strong, only if we are prepared to defend ourselves in the same way our fallen soldiers did at this site. They attacked from this site and other hills not out of lust for war, but out of belief in the righteousness of the goal of defending the Jewish people's one and only country.

President Shimon Peres filled in details:

We are a nation that yearns for peace, but knows, and will always know, how to defend itself.

Israel's strength springs from the strength of its faith, and its greatness emanates from the heroism of its sons. Today we grieve for their loss and are blessed by their legacy.

There are still those who wish to annihilate us. At their head is the autocratic Iranian regime that seeks to impose its rule on the Middle East, silence it with lethal weapons and launch an anti-Israel incitement campaign to deflect Arab fears.

On Monday, Defense Minister Ehud Barak tactically said that “there is no immediate existential threat from Iran” yet defined the challenge subtly as a “< href="http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1164024.html ">the number one potential existential threat to be stopped”:

I prefer to refrain from speculation about the future. Right now, Iran does not pose an existential threat to Israel. If Iran becomes nuclear, it will spark an arms race in the Middle East. This region is very sensitive because of the oil flow. The region is important to the entire world. The fact that Iran is not an immediate threat, but could evolve into one, means that we can't let ourselves fall asleep.

Barak’s summary last week also deserves consideration:

We have the pilots, the ground crews and the best planes in the world. Our air force is the supporting pillar of our operational capabilities against threats from both near and far.