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French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe visits the
Holocaust museum Yad Vashem in Jerusalem in June.
tioning the United Nations for statehood
in September. For Israel, it would mean
Leslie Susser
halting settlement construction in the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
West Bank.
Juppe invited Netanyahu and
Jerusalem
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud
Abbas to an international conference in
t was a sign that ties between the
Paris in July to kick-start the process.
Obama and Netanyahu administra-
Abbas quickly replied in the affirmative.
tions remain strong despite the
Netanyahu said he would first consult with
apparent tensions when the two leaders
the Americans.
met at the White House last month.
The package was attractive to the
On June 6, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary
Palestinians
because of its clear focus
Rodham Clinton shot down a French pro-
on
the
1967
lines
and its relatively short
posal for renewed Israeli-Palestinian peace
timetable.
The
sweetener
for Israel was
talks that had put the Israeli leader in a
the
explicit
reference
to
"two
states for two
quandary.
,
'
implying
that
Israel
would be, as
peoples'
If Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Netanyahu
insists,
recognized
as the state
had accepted the French proposal, which
of
the
Jewish
people.
included a settlement freeze, his right-lean-
Nevertheless, Netanyahu found him-
ing coalition partners might have bolted
self
in a bind. He already had said no to
the government. If he refused, it would have
negotiations
structured that way when
made it seem like he was the intransigent
Obama
raised
the issue. Netanyahu insists
party in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations
the Palestinians first recognize Israel as a
— a perilous position as France and other
Jewish state as a sign of readiness to end
leading European states consider voting for
Palestinian statehood at the United Nations the conflict. In addition, Hamas, the ter-
rorist organization that is now part of the
in September.
During a visit to Israel and the West Bank Palestinian leadership following the recent
in early June, French Foreign Minister Main reconciliation with Fatah, must recognize
Israel's right to exist, renounce violence
Juppe outlined his plan for restarting the
and accept all previous Israeli-Palestinian
stalled peace process: The goal would be
agreements before a credible peace pro-
to establish two states for two peoples on
cess can be contemplated.
the basis of the 1967 lines with land swaps;
But perhaps even more important,
borders and security would be discussed
first, Jerusalem and refugees later. That part Netanyahu has serious issues with the
1967 lines plus land swaps formula. He
of the proposal mirrored Obama's call in
insists on maintaining an Israeli military
May for renewed Israeli-Palestinian talks.
presence in the Jordan Valley and, besides
But the French proposal also envis-
the large settlement blocs, he wants to
aged achieving a full-fledged permanent
retain security areas along the Samarian
peace deal within a year and a freeze of
mountain ridge as well as sites of historic
any unilateral steps in the interim. For the
importance such as Hebron.
Palestinians, that would mean not peti-
I
Ahead of Palestinian U.N.
gambit, Europe is in play.
This goes well beyond anything that
could be construed as being "based on the
1967 lines."
Were Netanyahu to accept the French
proposal, coalition partners like Avigdor
Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party might
quit the government, and Likud hard-liners
like Benny Begin and Moshe Yaalon might
challenge Netanyahu's authority.
Still, despite these very serious obstacles,
the prize for taking up the French offer was
tempting: Palestinian deferment of plans to
seek U.N. membership this year. There was
also a big stick: If Netanyahu rejected the
French offer, Juppe intimated that France
and several of its European allies would
vote for U.N. recognition of Palestine.
With Clinton's nix, Netanyahu is off the
hook.
Meanwhile, the Israeli Foreign Ministry
has quit trying to prevent the Palestinians
from securing the two-thirds majority they
need for recognition in the 192-member
U.N. General Assembly. Unlike in the U.N.
Security Council, where Obama has prom-
ised that the United States will veto any
unilateral vote on Palestinian statehood,
General Assembly votes do not carry the
force of international law.
Yet even in the General Assembly, Israel
hopes to secure as many "no" votes as
possible from democratic countries. This,
Israeli officials argue, would carry enor-
mous moral weight.
Thus the European Union, with its 27
democracies, is crucial. Over the past
two months, Netanyahu has traveled to
Berlin, London and Paris in an effort to
convince key European leaders not to back
Palestinian U.N. membership. Had he
been the one to reject the French offer, his
European strategy could collapse.
Netanyahu's critics say that even if
Israel wins this battle, a General Assembly
vote favoring statehood will deliver the
Palestinians a major diplomatic triumph
and possibly trigger a new wave of Arab
Spring-style protests in the West Bank.
The Israeli government's failure to take
serious action to pre-empt the Palestinian
U.N. move and its consequences has
drawn strong domestic criticism in Israel.
The most powerful voice has been from
Meir Dagan, who recently retired from his
post at the helm of the Mossad, Israel's
intelligence agency.
Dagan says that Israel should have
responded positively to the 2002 Arab
peace initiative, come up with an initiative
of its own and pressed for a negotiated
solution with the Palestinians. He also
has expressed deep discomfort with the
judgment of Israel's current political lead-
ers, hinting darkly that they might even
contemplate attacking Iran's nuclear weap-
ons program to divert attention from the
United Nations in September.
For now, a Palestinian U.N. move in
September is still not a foregone conclu-
sion.
By quashing the French plan, Clinton
kept the initiative firmly in Washington,
where the Americans are talking to both
the Israelis and Palestinians in an attempt
fo create conditions for a renewal of peace
talks that would render the Palestinian
U.N. gambit superfluous.
In the next few weeks, in what could be
the defining moment of his premiership,
Netanyahu will have to decide whether to
embrace a last-chance initiative to avert the
U.N. imbroglio in September or to stay put
and risk the potential diplomatic fallout
while keeping his coalition intact. ri
June 16 • 2011
23