MK's from Left urge Netanyahu to freeze 'settlement construction' rather than release terrorists
"A settlement freeze can always be stopped and 'thawed'," the MKs wrote. "But to undo the release of more prisoners and murderous terrorists cannot be undone. To the contrary, in releasing them there is the danger that they will return to terror activities and will continue to hurt Israeli citizens," they added.
"Therefore, we call on you to act immediately in order to switch the gesture of freeing prisoners and terrorists with the gesture of freezing settlements."
The MKs wrote that the move would be welcomed by the Zionist Right and the bereaved families whose relatives were victims of the terrorists.
In addition to [Labor MK's] Bar and Bar-Lev, the letter was signed by Labor's Eitan Cabel, Shelly Yacimovich, Nachman Shai, Moshe Mizrahi, Stav Shaffir, Itzik Shmuli, Erel Margalit, Miki Rosenthal, Michal Biran and Avishai Braverman. From Hatnua, MK David Tsur signed the letter and from Shas, MKs Ya'acov Margi and Yitzhak Cohen signed.Arutz Sheva has more of the letter.
"Before the negotiations with the Palestinians began, Israel was given the option of choosing between one of two gestures to the Palestinians. One Israeli gesture was to freeze construction in the settlements. The second option was the release of terrorist prisoners in several batches,” wrote the MKs.
"Unfortunately," they continued, "the government chose the gesture of releasing terrorists and not the other gesture it was offered - a settlement freeze."
The MKs called on Netanyahu to “replace the gesture” and freeze construction in Judea and Samaria.Well, yeah, if that was the choice at the outset, the government should have chosen the freeze. But it has never been clear that was the choice. It was more like the 'Palestinians' wanted both and were persuaded to make due with getting one officially and being able to protest the other.
In any event, there is no way that Obama-Kerry will let Israel do that without the 'Palestinians' consent, and you can bet that consent will not be forthcoming. Moreover, given that the 'negotiations' are doomed to failure (and were from the outset, but that's almost beside the point now), why should we make any substitute 'gesture' at all. Just cancel the terrorist release! So says Jewish Home MK Motti Yogev (with whom I agree on this one).
"I'm not in favor of continuing negotiations. I am in favor of us creating peace on the ground, first and foremost by annexing Judea and Samaria in stages, first in area C,” he told Arutz Sheva. “The Arabs would have better lives under Israeli sovereignty than anywhere else. Am I in favor of blowing up the talks? Absolutely. Let’s take things into our hands and give the Palestinians better lives than they would get in any other state.”
Yogev added that contacts with the Palestinian Arabs should be ongoing, but certainly not with the PA, which continues to incite against Israel even as talks are held.
"We should continue our relationship with the Palestinians, but not necessarily with the PA which seeks our destruction, and educates its children and its future generations towards that destruction,” he said. “There's nothing to talk to them about and certainly we should not make any ‘gestures’ to them. As for the American pressure, we have to know how to handle it.”
Yogev also made clear that he opposes the idea of releasing Jonathan Pollard in exchange for Israel releasing more terrorists, in the wake of recent rumors that the United States was considering releasing Pollard as a way of convincing Israel to continue the talks.
Tying the Pollard issue with the peace talks and with releasing terrorists is wrong and immoral, Yogev declared.
"Pollard should have been released a long time ago,” he said. “His punishment has been far beyond proportional for such an offense. He is in his thirtieth year in prison. They wouldn’t even let him go to his father’s funeral or shiva. If we take into account the fact that he is ill, there is a humanitarian issue here."
Yogev continued, "If the Americans are thinking about using Pollard as a bargaining chip, then this is yet another step in the moral deterioration of the foreign policy of President Obama and his Secretary of State, John Kerry, and we should not cooperate with this. I do not want to insult them. There is a lot of strategic cooperation between Israel and the U.S., but they have been showing their immorality bit by bit.”
“Pollard should be released unconditionally and murderous terrorists should not be released under any circumstances,” he added. “The U.S. would never release terrorists who carried out such cruel acts. Their pressure on us to release terrorists so negotiations continue, as well as pressuring us for a construction freeze, is one-sided and unethical, and tying Jonathan Pollard into it is grossly immoral.”
Yogev also said that he believed that Pollard himself would not want to see terrorists released in exchange for his release.There's just no point to these talks. In eight months, they have gone nowhere and accomplished nothing. In exchange for the privilege of talking to the Americans, Israel has released 78 murderous terrorists. A little common sense folks... Enough is enough!
Labels: Abu Mazen, Binyamin Netanyahu, Jonathan Pollard, Labor party, Palestinian terrorists, settlement freeze, Shas, Tzipi Livni
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:10 AM
3 Comments:
Who owns the land? Where is the GIS map with title info? The Jubilee Extended Lease info? Or is it a Govt Operation, where individuals are just shoved around. It is getting hard to keep the young, public-marxist education brainwash people (from multiple countries, including Israel and the US) in the camp of private property rights. And the bashing of "settlers" is a huge part of the problem. Stop lining up with Soros. Where is the Levy Report.
Interesting theory about the alleged "choice" between releasing terrorists and freezing the settlements and Jerusalem... I've never seen that before, but it has the potential to explain the seemingly horrible decision by Netanyahu and his government, if we assume that there never was a "choice" in the first place.
And regarding Shas, I feel an obligation to point out that only 2 out of their 11 MKs signed the letter, that their request was logical and not necessarily leftist, and that no other party has done as much, in the past, to restrain runaway peace talks, as Shas has. As just one example, recall how Shas singlehandedly delayed the extension of the 2010 settlement freeze.
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