Israel Rejects Solana Call for Imposed Peace...

By: Earth News

13.07.09

Jerusalem - Israel on Monday squarely rejected a call by the European Union's top diplomat for the United Nations to go ahead and recognize Palestine, if the parties themselves were unable to make peace by a fixed deadline. The to-be-recognized Palestinian state's borders should be based on those of those before the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, in which Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan and the Gaza Strip from Egypt, Javier Solana told a lecture in London on Saturday.

"Territorial exchanges can be negotiated between the parties, on the basis of the 1967 line. The various territorial offers fluctuate between 6 and 2 per cent," he said, referring to the amount of the West Bank Israel should be allowed to annex to keep its main settlement blocs.

"It should not be impossible to find a figure. The parties can negotiate within this margin, not outside."

Calling it a "novel idea," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said it would run "contrary to all prior Security Council resolutions, the road map and past agreements between Israelis and Palestinians."

"All these state clearly that the only way to achieve peace is through direct dialogue between the two parties."

Peace could not be "imposed from the outside," he told the German Press Agency dpa.

He denied, when asked, that the Israelis were concerned by the new idea raised by Solana, calling it "still very unclear" and pointing out that it would be problematic to implement an imposed solution.

"How will they enforce the solution that the Security Council will have adopted?" he asked. "How will they enforce a border? How will they enforce whatever they decide on Jerusalem. How will they enforce the solution they will find on the refugee problem?

"This is complete nonsense. ... Nowhere in the world has the UN decreed a solution. If it were so easy, why not call upon the Security Council to simply decree peace everywhere around the globe? Why just the Middle East?"

But the West Bank-based administration of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas welcomed the idea, saying it indicated a greater willingness of the international community to take on a more active role in solving the conflict.

"We welcome these statements, which come within the framework of the responsibilities of the international community, because the Palestinian issue was created by the UN partition resolution of 1947," Nimr Hammad, Abbas' political advisor, said in a statement published on the official Palestinian Wafa news agency.

"If there is no progress in the bilateral negotiations, then this position by Solana reflects a major (taking of) responsibility."

The outgoing EU foreign policy chief had told the lecture at the Ditchley Foundation, a British organization promoting international relations, that foreign mediators should set a timetable for Middle East peace negotiations.

"If the parties are not able to stick to it, then a solution backed by the international community should be put on the table," he said.

This, he argued should be done through a UN Security Council resolution that should include "all the parameters of borders, refugees, Jerusalem and security arrangements."

The UN would then accept the Palestinian state as a full member, and set a calendar for implementation of the solution.

He said its outline was already well know, detailed in the so-called Clinton Parametres and the Taba negotiations of late 2002, and "even the Geneva Initiative," a virtual 2003 peace agreement signed by leading moderate Israeli and Palestinian intellectuals, which resolves all outstanding problems in a detailed manner.

"I strongly believe the time has come to, finally, bring this conflict to an end. The international consensus is there," Solana said according to a transcript from his office.

"Time," he argued, "is of the essence" and the second half of this year "crucial if we want to offer a real choice to the Palestinian people when they (are scheduled to) vote in January 2010."

Solana's remark come amid a rise in international pressure, following elections in Israel on February 10, in which the right-wing bloc of parties headed by new Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party won a majority of mandates. Although Netanyahu has - since taking office in March - adopted the two-state solution, his preconditions have failed to erase concerns of more stagnation in the peace process.