Arab League chief: Netanyahu using Saudi plan to dodge French push
Nabil Elaraby says PM is also eyeing trade with Gulf states, ‘doesn’t really want the Arab Initiative’
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent interest in the Arab Peace Initiative stems from his desire to elude the current French peace drive, the Arab League chief said in an interview published Monday, claiming further that the Israeli leader is also motivated by eagerness to expand trade in the Middle East — not reaching an agreement with the Palestinians.
Speaking to pan-Arab daily newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat, Nabil Elaraby dismissed Netanyahu’s new openness to the Arab Peace Initiative, which calls for a full Israeli withdrawal from all territory captured in the 1967 Six Day War, in return for normalized ties with the Arab world.
“He doesn’t really want the Arab Initiative; its terms are well known,” Elbaraby said.
The Israeli leader “only wants a way to enter the Gulf market to strengthen the economy,” Elaraby charged. “We won’t change the text of the initiative; why did Netanyahu wake up now? It’s to get around the French efforts.”
Netanyahu has indicated in recent weeks that he would be open to negotiating peace with the Palestinians on the basis of an updated version of the 2002 Arab plan. He said last week that the initiative “includes positive elements that can help revive constructive negotiations with the Palestinians.”
Elaraby said that the joint statement issued by participants at a Middle East peace summit in Paris last Friday would have been more aggressive in its demand for progress on Palestinian statehood, but the US campaigned to tone down the language.
The half-day summit in Paris — to which the Israelis and Palestinians were not invited — concluded Friday afternoon with a warning that violence and settlement activity are imperiling a two-state solution, and a call for an international conference on the issue before the end of the year.
The final summit communique from the 28 participating nations reaffirmed “the need for negotiations to establish a Palestinian state” and warned the current “status quo is not sustainable.”
The communique from the Paris conference was less harsh toward Israel than members of the Arab League had intended. Its general emphasis on the two-state solution was a compromise in which the US and EU tempered an effort by the Arab League for a statement more critical of Israeli policies, Western diplomats told the Israeli daily Haaretz at the time.
Israel quickly dismissed the gathering as a “missed opportunity,” claiming its participants had caved to Palestinian demands. The Palestinians, by contrast, welcomed what they called a “significant step” against Israel’s “apartheid policies in occupied Palestine.”
While France portrayed Friday’s meeting as a first step by the international community to weigh different options, Israel has flatly opposed French efforts, calling instead on the Palestinians to hold direct peace talks without preconditions.
The Times of Israel Community.