Tuesday, November 16, 2010

An Astute Observation

...Palestinians, he said, must act, because Israeli settlement construction means “the longer the waiting period, the lesser the space” for the Palestinian state-to-be.

In reality, as both Abbas and Western leaders know, refusing to make a deal has proven a surefire way for Palestinians to increase the amount of land on offer. Four decades ago, Israel’s left proposed the Allon Plan, under which Israel would cede 70 percent of the territories. By 2000, Ehud Barak was offering 88 percent. The Clinton plan upped the figure to about 94 percent, and in 2008, Ehud Olmert offered almost 100 percent (after territorial swaps). Each time the Palestinians refused an offer, either Jerusalem or Washington sweetened the deal in the hopes of finally getting them to say yes.

From Evelyn Gordon

But I will make my own observation - that the Pals. claim for 100% is pretty strong in any case:

In ARTICLE IV of the Oslo Accords' Declaration of Principles on JURISDICTION we read:-

Jurisdiction of the Council will cover West Bank and Gaza Strip territory, except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations. The two sides view the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a single territorial unit, whose integrity will be preserved during the interim period.
That's one reason I opposed Oslo.

Even that qualifier, "except for issues that will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations", which could exclude the Jewish communities and the territory they're on, is not enough to cancel the clear implication that all of Judea and Samaria was what the Arab side inserted as the geographical delineation of the PA territory.

^

No comments: