So here is the excerpt. Please read and see the truth, see past the lies where Israel is castigated as truculent, as obstinate, as refusing to face facts and refusing to surrender it all. As you will read in the summarized version of history to begin either later today or tomorrow - unless some other demand takes precedence - this is not why or what we want. We wish to have a land of our own, a land where to be a Jew is an item of pride, where one can wear symbols of Judaism with pride and with no worry, where one day we will not be killed as we sit in restaurants or in synagogues or in our homes or on a bus and not face death in our own homeland. And make no mistake about it. Do not fall for the statement that the settlements are in the way. There was a time when there were no "settlements" other than the ones that the people of Israel set up, paid for, bled over, died for and all within the smaller boundaries of this land. And yet, there were the raids and the killings and the pogroms in Hebron and other towns and villages, the ambushes and why? Because the truth is that the Arabs with so many other countries where no one seemingly has any trouble accepting the designation of so many as the Moslem or Islamic Republic or Kingdom of..... want NO Israel, a Jewish state, no where, no how, with no borders they approve of for they want no presence of it at all and they wish to take the land from the river to the sea, their slogan. So again, read this excerpt and see the truth and see why there is so much anger and grief and bewilderment at the attacks on a country and a people that have contributed much to the world and yet what do they get in return? You answer that.
In a speech at the State Department on Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry cast the majority of the blame on the lack of Israeli-Palestinian peace on the Israelis, ignoring Israel’s history of repeatedly making risky overtures for peace with the Palestinians, only to receive terrorism in response. Israelis voted in Labor’s Ehud Barak to the premiership in 1999 specifically because he promised to make peace with the Palestinians; in 2000, he met with then-PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat at Camp David and offered the Palestinians 92% of the West Bank, all of the Gaza Strip, and eastern Jerusalem as its capital. Israel even proposed that a maximum of 100,000 refugees would be allowed to return to Israel on the basis of humanitarian considerations or family reunification, and an international fund would be created to compensate the Palestinians. Arafat rejected the offer. Sweetening the deal, the Clinton administration suggested that the Palestinians control 97% of the West Bank and the entirety of the Gaza Strip, with a land-link between the two, as well as a capital in East Jerusalem. Barak endorsed the Clinton Parameters; again, Arafat rejected them. After having rejected Israeli peace offers at Camp David with no counter-offers of his own, Arafat chose to launch the murderous Second Intifada, killing more than 1,500 Israelis between 2000 and 2005.
In 2005, Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, only for that territory to be taken over by Hamas in a Palestinian civil war in 2007. Ever since, Hamas has used the Strip as a base from which to launch attacks on Israelis, using rockets and underground tunnels, and Gazans live under the grip of Hamas’ authoritarian rule.
In 2008, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas 93.7% of the West Bank; the remaining 6.3% would be made up with land swaps. He also offered to take in 5,000 refugees over five years; an international committee to oversee Jerusalem’s holy sites; and an international fund consisting of billions of dollars, administered by Norwegians, to compensate Palestinian refugees. In a May 2009 interview with The Washington Post, Abbas admitted that he had turned down the offer and said, “The gaps were wide.”
The government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to an unprecedented 10-month freeze in settlement construction in November 2009 only for the Palestinians to say it was insufficient and then call for an extension when it expired. Netanyahu said he would do so if the Palestinian Authority recognized Israel as the Jewish state; the PA refused.
When the Obama administration proposed a framework for a peace agreement in 2013, the Netanyahu government accepted it, while the Palestinians turned it down. Even still, Israel was willing to talk with the Palestinian Authority, until Fatah and Hamas announced a unity government in April 2014. Hamas refuses to reject violence and terror against Israel and Israel refuses to negotiate with it. The Palestinians adopted a policy of trying to skirt direct negotiations and internationalizing the conflict via the United Nations and other international forums.
In 2005, Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, only for that territory to be taken over by Hamas in a Palestinian civil war in 2007. Ever since, Hamas has used the Strip as a base from which to launch attacks on Israelis, using rockets and underground tunnels, and Gazans live under the grip of Hamas’ authoritarian rule.
In 2008, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas 93.7% of the West Bank; the remaining 6.3% would be made up with land swaps. He also offered to take in 5,000 refugees over five years; an international committee to oversee Jerusalem’s holy sites; and an international fund consisting of billions of dollars, administered by Norwegians, to compensate Palestinian refugees. In a May 2009 interview with The Washington Post, Abbas admitted that he had turned down the offer and said, “The gaps were wide.”
The government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to an unprecedented 10-month freeze in settlement construction in November 2009 only for the Palestinians to say it was insufficient and then call for an extension when it expired. Netanyahu said he would do so if the Palestinian Authority recognized Israel as the Jewish state; the PA refused.
When the Obama administration proposed a framework for a peace agreement in 2013, the Netanyahu government accepted it, while the Palestinians turned it down. Even still, Israel was willing to talk with the Palestinian Authority, until Fatah and Hamas announced a unity government in April 2014. Hamas refuses to reject violence and terror against Israel and Israel refuses to negotiate with it. The Palestinians adopted a policy of trying to skirt direct negotiations and internationalizing the conflict via the United Nations and other international forums.
More to follow later.
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