Finally someone in the Israeli parliament has the guts to speak out.
"If our friends in the world ask us to
commit suicide - even if they have good intentions - we will tell them
'no.'" – Naftali Bennett, head of Habayit Hayehudi party
Suggested by E. D. Botnick
HAARETZ
Bennett: We will not sit in a government that
accepts agreement based on 1967 lines
'Peace talks with the Palestinians have only
brought terror,' says economy minister and head of Habayit Hayehudi party.
Economy Minister Naftali Bennett. Photo: Emil Salman |
Israel's Economy Minister Naftali Bennett said on
Tuesday that his Habayit Hayehudi
party "will not sit in a coalition that, because of
international pressure, divides Jerusalem and puts our security at risk."
Speaking at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, Bennett
added: "We will never agree to give up a unified Jerusalem… we will never
accept an agreement based on the 1967 lines."
"Since the peace talks started there has
been a slowly-growing
intifada," Bennett said. "Peace talks with the
Palestinians have only brought us terror."
"If our friends in the world ask us to
commit suicide - even if they have good intentions - we will tell them
'no,'" Bennett said, about the international pressure to reach an
agreement with the Palestinians. "They tell us there is an occupation and
that it's immoral as Jews. Let me tell you this - we are not occupiers in our
land," he said.
Regarding recent
statements by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, according to which
the leaders of both sides will have to make "hard decisions," Bennett
said that "the easy decision was the disengagement [from Gaza] – to the
world's applause – but the difficult decision was to stand firm; the easy
decision was the Oslo Accords, but the hard decision was annexing Jerusalem and
the Golan."
Referring to the so-called demographic threat,
Bennett said that "They scare us with the demographic demon and that there
won't be a Jewish majority. That's incorrect; in fact, the opposite is true.
Arab birthrates are falling. The day after a diplomatic agreement, the
Palestinians will open their borders to hundreds of thousands refuges and their
descendants. Imagine driving on Highway 6 and seeing them lining the
fences."
As for the government's demand that Palestinian
incitement must end, Bennett said: "The Palestinian children of Oslo are
now 21 and they have grown up in the midst of deliberate, intensive and
poisonous incitement against us. The result is generations of terrorists. When
children are educated on explosive belts and anti-Semitic Sesame Street, the
Jew is turned into a devil. No agreement will change that. Only the
Palestinians are able to change it – ending Palestinian incitement is what will
pave the road to peace."
"Once we were told that we need to give land
for peace," Bennett concluded. "But today's Israelis know that what's
needed is a strong army and faith."
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