In secret talks with former Israeli President Shimon Peres, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas reportedly agreed that the Israeli army would guard Jewish settlements remaining inside a future Palestinian state.
The claims were made in an article by Israeli Channel 2’s diplomatic correspondent, Udi Segal, in a column for Maariv newspaper, with a translated version appearing in the Jerusalem Post.
Under the “Peres plan”, according to Segal, three main so-called settlement blocs would “remain in Israel”: Ma’ale Adumim (between Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley), Gush Etzion (south of Jerusalem) and Ariel (deep in the northern West Bank).
Israeli President Shimon Peres held a secret meeting with his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas two months a … http://t.co/EVl7s2c2gh
— Israel Herald (@israelherald) July 22, 2013
Other West Bank settlements (Segal names Ofra, Beit El, Hebron, Kiryat Arba, Eli, Shiloh and “a few other areas of settlement”) would “stay in a Palestinian state”.
However, Peres reportedly “secured an agreement in principle, from Abbas, that special IDF preparation teams and attack helicopters would serve as an immediate line of defense for the blocs that would be part of a Palestinian state with Israeli citizenship.”
Segal’s article adds new details to a story Peres had already made public. In May 2014, Peres told Channel 2 that Netanyahu had broken off talks he was conducting with Abbas, even though the two men had reached an agreement on “nearly all points of dispute”.
#MiddleEast @FedericaMog meeting Abbas & Peres: "a #ceasefire is in the interest of both #Israel & #Palestine" pic.twitter.com/k4AbRo96iQ
— Italy UN New York (@ItalyUN_NY) July 16, 2014
According to Peres: “Netanyahu was under the impression that former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, was about to present a better deal.” Peres said Abbas had agreed to Israel as “a Jewish state”, and to resolve the “refugee problem… in a just and mutually agreed upon fashion.”
(MEMO, PC)
