From the Liveblog of
Sunday, June 7, 2015
Herzog warns against binational state
In his address at the Herzliya Conference, Zionist Union leader Isaac Herzog says “the biggest threat to the existence of the State of Israel” is a binational state.
“In about a decade, the Arabs between the Jordan and the Mediterranean will be a majority and the Jews a minority. The Jewish national home will become the Palestinian national home. We will be again, for the first time since 1948, a Jewish minority in an Arab state.”
“I want to separate from the Palestinians. I want to keep a Jewish state with a Jewish majority. I don’t want 61 Palestinian MKs in Israel’s Knesset. I don’t want a Palestinian prime minister in Israel. I don’t want them to change my flag and my national anthem. I don’t want them to change the name of my country to Isra-stine,” he says.
The current government is doing nothing to advance diplomatic initiatives, he says. He says 20 of the 30 Likud MKs are opposed to a Palestinian state.
Herzog urges a regional initiative to disarm and reconstruct Gaza. Herzog says that if he was prime minister, he would work every day toward peace efforts with moderate regional partners, establish the Jordan Valley as Israel’s security border, advance confidence-building measures with the Palestinians, and spearhead an international effort to rebuild Gaza.
Herzog condemns the “brainwashing” of the UK students who voted in favor of a boycott of Israel, but says Netanyahu hasn’t done enough to stop it.
The Times of Israel Community.