Olmert says time running out for two-state solution

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday time was running out for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

At an annual memorial ceremony for Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli prime minister killed by an ultranationalist Jew in 1995, Olmert again advocated a peace deal under which Israel would withdraw from nearly all of the occupied West Bank.

"If God forbid, we procrastinate, we could lose support for a two-state solution," he said, referring to the creation of a Palestinian homeland alongside Israel, a concept at the foundation of U.S.-sponsored peace negotiations.

"The decision must be taken now, without hesitation, before ... the narrow window of opportunity to plant (that) solution in the consciousness of our people and the nations of the world vanishes in front of our eyes," Olmert said.

Olmert has said that failure to establish a Palestinian state could lead to pressure on Israel to agree to a binational state including the West Bank and Gaza Strip, in which a higher Arab birthrate would eventually ensure Jews became the minority."

more

[Vegasaurus]

1. Olmert is on the way out

He has no political capital left.

There is no way that there will be a binational state without a bloody war,

Israel will never, ever agree to such a situation. It would need to be forced from the outside.

The status quo will continue, for awhile longer I'm afraid, no matter what Olmert says.

[subsuelo]

3. It has already agreed to it.

It has agreed by blocking a two-state solution for years. It has agreed by continued expansion and stealing more land from the native people. Now that it's too late, more and more people will continue to wake up to the reality of the emergent single state.

The question - what to do now with all those native people that have been forced into the reservation camps?

on edit - it looks like Israel has been working on one solution to that question - the answer: starve the population out by blocking food deliveries.

How very brave.

[LeftishBrit]

2. Interesting.

He's become much more openly left-wing and (from my point of view) reasonable since giving up on his political career. Of course, I assume that he now has no real influence. We'll see what Livni does - if she wins, which I hope she does!

[eyl]

4. To paraphrase Samuel Johnson

"leftism is the last refuge of the scoundrel".

An article I read yesterday argued that there's a perception that most journalists tend to the left and that their coverage, in turn, can influence the prosecution's zeal for pursuing criminal charges. If so, Olmert's recent statements can be seen as an attempt to curry favor with the press (and likely the more left-leaning politicians) in an attempt to avoid or at least blunt the criminal charges pending against him. As supporting evidence, the article presented Aryeh Deri and Ariel Sharon, both of whom took positions or policies to the left of their previous stances when facing criminal charges, with varying success (though in the case of Sharon, at least, I'd argue their were additional influences at work; I don't remember the Deri case enough to argue one way or another).

If this is Olmert's rationale, howeer, I'd say he left it way to late.

[azurnoir]

5. if I may

did you forget the :sarcasm:? The Samuel Johnson quote is "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel"

http://www.samueljohnson.com/refuge.html

[Behind the Aegis]

6. n/t