|
Trending Topics
|
Source: http://www.bitterlemons.org/issue/isr2.php
Israel's Interests Take Primacy
(bitterlemons.org) Dore Gold - Q: If Israel withdraws unilaterally, can the remaining territory be defined as a Palestinian state? Israel will approach the final boundaries that it regards as acceptable from the standpoint of its interest in retaining defensible borders, which has been a long-term interest of every Israeli prime minister since 1967. In his last address to the Knesset, one month before his assassination, the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin outlined his concept of defensible borders for Israel. There were elements that had nothing to do with security but with Israel's national history, e.g., his insistence that Jerusalem remain united under Israeli sovereignty. He also spoke of the need to retain settlement blocs and the Jordan Rift Valley "in the widest sense of the term." This was Rabin's legacy to the people of Israel.