“We are now at a point where the choices narrow down and the choices are obviously real and difficult,” this is how US Secretary of State John Kerry described the outcome of his 10th round of talks with the Palestinians and Israelis. Negotiations between the Palestinians and Israelis resumed last July, following a three-year hiatus because of Israel's settlement activities. Initially, officials were hoping to reach a conclusion within nine months, but now it seems that the talks will last for much longer. The talks failed to make much headway, as Kerry's bundle of proposals, which he called a “framework”, was deemed too biased to the Israelis. During four days of shuttle diplomacy that saw Kerry meeting Israelis, Palestinians, Jordanians and Saudis, the top US diplomat strove to come up with a final settlement deal addressing the whole gamut of outstanding issues, including borders, security, Jerusalem, and Palestinian refugees. Kerry speaks of his plan in sanguine terms, calling it “fair” and “balanced”. But the Palestinians say that the plan undermines their basic rights. Not only does Kerry ask the Palestinians to recognise the “Jewishness of Israel”, but also his plans allow the Israelis to maintain presence on the Palestinian-Jordanian borders. Kerry's ideas for land swaps and for shared control of Jerusalem were also dismissed as unfair by Palestinians from across the political divide. Hamas official Salah Al-Bardawil commented on Kerry's plan by saying, “This is a cursed plan that aims to liquidate the Palestinian issue and undermine basic Palestinian rights regarding Jerusalem, land, and refugees.” According to Al-Bardawil, Kerry's plan aims in particular to eliminate the most important component in Palestinian rights: the right of six million Palestinian refugees to go home. “Kerry wants also to settle the Jerusalem question by placing it practically under Zionist control, despite claims that the Jordanians will have control of some holy places, and even Palestinian land,” Al-Bardawil stated. Kerry's plan would confer legality on Israeli settlements and allow settlers the right to have dual Israeli and Palestinian nationality, Al-Bardawil argued. Meanwhile, the same plan opens the way for the displacement of “1948 Palestinians” (Arabs who are now citizens of Israel), he added. According to Palestinian sources, the Greater Jerusalem proposal would allow Israel to annex nearly 10 per cent of the West Bank, including settlements near Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Rabah Mehanna, member of the political bureau of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), said that Kerry's efforts “benefit the Zionist occupation and its schemes in Jerusalem and liquidates the cause of the refugees by settling them in Australia and other countries” Mehanna warned the Ramallah government against “accepting a scheme that reinforces the Zionist presence in the Aghwar region, while allowing Israelis to settle freely in the West Bank.” Fatah Central Committee member Mohamed Ashtiya, who has resigned from the Palestinian negotiating team, also voiced his disapproval. According to Ashtiya, Fatah cannot possibly agree to the presence of one Israeli soldier or settler on Palestinian territories. Speaking in Bethlehem on the 49th anniversary of Fatah's foundation, Ashtiya said that “East Jerusalem and its holy places must be the capital of our state, and we do not agree to having our capital shunted to any other place.” Reacting to Israel's demands of security assurances, Ashtiya stated: “Is it fair to ask the prisoner to reassure the prison warden?” Ashtiya said that the Palestinians cannot possible recognise the “Jewishness of Israel”, as this would undermine Palestinian rights on numerous levels. By asking for recognition of its Jewishness, Ashtiya said, “Israel is trying to settle three accounts at once: a future account by blocking the return of the refugees, a present account by displacing the 1948 Palestinians, and a history account by imposing the Torah account of Palestine and denying the Christian and Muslim accounts.” Since negotiations resumed nearly five months ago, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's rightwing government has been trying to procrastinate or steer the negotiating process to its advantage. With every round of talks Kerry holds, Israel came up with ideas for building settlements, the most recent of which entails the annexation of the Aghwar region, which is nearly 27 per cent of the West Bank. Questioning the Palestinian commitment to peace, Netanyahu insisted that, “peace means recognising Israel as a home of the Jewish people.” The Israeli premier added that he could not agree to evacuate Israeli settlements situated outside the settlement constellations in the West Bank, because of their “importance” to the Jewish people, referring especially to the settlements near Hebron. Israel's hardline foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, while addressing the annual conference of Israeli ambassadors, said: “When I speak of a swap of land and people, in the triangle (of Arab villages in northern Israel)... this is not displacement. No one will be evacuated or forced to go. But the borders will be moved to Highway 6 (running from south Israel to its north).” Israel is proposing to offer land in the triangle area to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for its control on settlement constellations in the West Bank. If the Palestinians agree, this would allow Israel to rid itself of nearly 300,000 Arab Palestinians living in this area, thus reducing the number of Arab Israelis under its control. There are nearly 1.6 million Arab Israelis living in the country, equivalent to 20.7 per cent of Israel's total population of eight million. Lieberman said that he “will not support any peace deal allowing the return of one Palestinian refugee to Israel”. Furthermore, Israel wishes to maintain military presence on the borders with Jordan. The Palestinians have told Kerry that they cannot allow any Israeli soldiers to remain in their future state. Instead, the Palestinians said they don't mind having an international force deployed along the borders to keep the peace. The Netanyahu government has demanded the deployment of advanced defence and early warning systems on the borders between the West Bank and Jordan. Israel's defence minister, Moshe Yaalon, said that withdrawal from the West Bank could compromise the security operations of the Israeli army. The withdrawal, he warned, could also lead to the collapse of the Mahmoud Abbas government. The Hebrew website Walla! cited Yaalon as saying that Israel must not “repeat the scenario from the withdrawal from Gaza in the West Bank.” Israel “disengaged” unilaterally from Gaza in 2005, under Ariel Sharon. Two years later, Hamas took control of the Strip. Now that peace talks have stalled, it is likely that American peace brokers will ask both sides to continue negotiations until the end of 2014. The talks were originally scheduled to end April 2014.
