For Israel, the return to the 1967 borders would be catastrophic; it would have to uproot hundreds of thousands of Jews from areas in Judea and Samaria, as well as from Jerusalem. Its security would be threatened by hostile Palestinians (a Hamas takeover of the West Bank is almost inevitable given the PA corruption and abuses) commanding the Samaritan high ridges and the Jordan Valley. Israeli cities and the civilian population would become targets for Iranian supplied Hamas rockets. Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv, only 9 miles from the Samaritan hills would be paralyzed by the threat of rocket fire on airliners taking off or landing.
Arafat broke the Oslo Accords when he launched the Second Intifada (violent uprising) against Israel in September 2000. Mahmoud Abbas, his successor, has had ample opportunities to reach an agreement with Israel. Abbas has negotiated with three Israeli Prime Ministers. Sharon (who withdrew Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip in 2005, and uprooted 9000 Jewish residents from their homes, handing the Strip to the Palestinians), Olmert (who made far-reaching concessions that included a Palestinian capital in eastern Jerusalem, and bringing tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees into Israel) and Netanyahu (who agreed under pressure to a Two-State solution and a Palestinian State in the West Bank). With Netanyahu, Abbas not only set preconditions to the negotiations, but refused to agree to a settlement that recognized Israel as a Jewish State.
To insure its security, Israel must annex Area C – the area currently under Israeli civilian and military control as designated by the Oslo Accords. There will, no doubt, be an international outcry and broad condemnations of Israel, but this plan may be the only way to prevent a disaster for the Jewish State. In annexing Area C to Israel, which includes the Samaritan mountain ridges, the Jordan Valley, and the Jewish settlement blocks, Israel will be required to provide Israeli citizenship to approximately 50,000 Palestinians who reside in the area.
Areas A and B under the Oslo Accords, called for full Palestinian control in A and civilian Palestinian control in B as well as Israeli military presence. These areas include all of the West Bank cities and the villages surrounding them. The Palestinians would then be able to declare a state unilaterally, and Israel would then withdraw its forces from area B.
To create a stable and durable government, the Palestinians should seek to form a federation with the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Optimally, the Jordanian monarch would be above the government and would insure against corruption. The Palestinians would be able to have full self-government in the West Bank or be part of a combined Jordanian-Palestinian government. This may not be Obama’s vision for a Palestinian State, but it is a viable solution to an intractable problem. Israeli action as described above is the only way to break the current impasse between Israel and the Palestinians.
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