Netanyahu's 'diplomatic solution' another dead end
On June 29, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke at an Institute for National Security Research (INSS) conference titled “In the Absence of Progress toward a Final Status Agreement: Options for Israel.” Inevitably, Netanyahu addressed the abduction of the three teens, who — it was learned just a few hours later — were the victims of a deadly terrorist attack. He presented the abduction as the by-product of the dying Sykes-Picot agreement, which demarcated the British and French areas of control in the former Ottoman territories of the Middle East after World War I, as well as of the death of the secular dictatorships in the Arab world.
In other words, according to Netanyahu, the murder of the three teens who were hitchhiking in the heart of the West Bank has nothing to do with the Israeli occupation. Brutal terrorist attacks against settlers have nothing whatsoever to do with the struggle between the Palestinian national movement and the Zionist movement. It has nothing at all to do with the increasingly extreme conflict between Jewish and Muslim religious zealots, both of whom believe that land is more important than people. The people responsible for the abduction and murder of the three youths should be sought in the Arab Spring, which brought radical Islam upon us.
Netanyahu proudly said at the INSS conference, “At the beginning of the 'Arab Spring,' I was among those who were skeptical — to put it mildly — regarding the triumph of liberalism.” Let’s assume that the spirit of prophecy really did descend on Netanyahu. Still, the archives are overflowing with statements by Netanyahu dating from the 1990s blaming the Oslo Accord for bringing a wave of suicide attacks upon us. Following each bus bombing, he claimed that late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and President Shimon Peres were responsible for the situation — much like the slogan “They gave them [the terrorists] guns" from the same period, which accuses Rabin and Peres.
How does Netanyahu suggest stopping the forces of radical Islam, which replaced the secular dictatorships? By confining oneself deeper and deeper in the ghetto and sealing every breach in the fence surrounding it. We have set up an obstacle on every side except the east, Netanyahu told the conference attendees. All that is left is to build a fence from Eilat in the south to the Golan Heights. Would a fence along the Jordan River have saved the three teens from the murderers? According to him, the security fence running up to the river is what lies at the core of the two-state idea. And to ensure that there would be no misunderstandings, Netanyahu made it clear that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Shin Bet would control the Palestinian state for “a very long time.” But haven’t the IDF and the Shin Bet already controlled it for a very long time, or is 47 years not long enough?
Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/07/kidnapping-palestinians-state-netanyahu-idf-shin-bet.html#ixzz36QO3P4AC
