MIDDLE EAST: Palestine Liberation Organisation advertises peace plan in Israeli newspapers

Record ID: 349514

  • Title: MIDDLE EAST: Palestine Liberation Organisation advertises peace plan in Israeli newspapers
  • Date: 21st November 2008
  • Summary: SENIOR AID TO PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT MAHMOUD ABBAS, SAEB EREKAT, HOLDING A COPY OF THE PEACE INITIATIVE BETWEEN HIS HANDS CLOSE OF SEAL OF THE ARAB LEAGUE (SOUNDBITE) (English) SENIOR AID TO PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT MAHMOUD ABBAS, SAEB EREKAT, SAYING: "President Abbas believes that many in Israel did not know about it, did not know the substance. So he did something unprecede
  • Embargoed: 6th December 2008 12:00
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  • Reuters ID: LVA1P013S0C6DZKKWY32G89GN8D6
  • Story Text: The Palestine Liberation Organisation advertises advertisements explaining about the Arab peace initiative in Israeli newspapers to 'promote understanding' between the two peoples.
    The PLO took the unprecedented step of placing advertisements in Israeli newspapers on Thursday (November 20) to promote a six-year-old Arab peace plan for the region.
    Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestine Liberation Organisation published the full-page notices in Hebrew in four major Israeli dailies. They described the Arab plan, which was first proposed in 2002 but long found little interest from Israel.
    "Fifty-seven Arab and Islamic countries will establish diplomatic ties and normal relations with Israel in return for a full peace agreement and an end to the occupation," the text read, under Palestinian and Israel flags set side by side.
    Some Israelis welcomed the advertisements.
    "Well, it cannot hurt because I mean most of the problems here is neither side really understands the other party what they really want. So, may be it is good to explain this because, well there is a lot of spin going on so why not extra spin from another direction - that might help," one Jerusalem resident said.
    Others thought the gesture wouldn't have much affect.
    "I think that the whole thing is a little bit too late. I mean in 1967 Israel would have been happy to give back all the territory."
    Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who could become prime minister after Israel's election in February, has described the Arab initiative as an "opportunity" but said this month that peace needed to be hammered out in bilateral talks between Israel, the Palestinians and its Arab neighbours.
    "The initiative is positive in the respect that it calls on the Arab world to establish full peace with Israel when we will complete local peace agreements. But the Arab also understands what I'm saying now: You don't take a peace plan and put it on the table and say 'take it or leave it',"
    Livni said Thursday in Israel.
    In Ramallah, Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat explained the reason why the the PLO took out the advertisement.
    "President Abbas believes that many in Israel did not know about it, did not know the substance. So he did something unprecedented by publishing the Arab peace initiative in four major Israeli newspapers in Hebrew and at the same time he published the Arab peace Initiative in the three major Palestinian newspapers to tell the public read it and know about it, this is if Israel wants peace this is the shortest way to peace. Israel can have diplomatic relations, embassies with 57 Arab and muslim nations in exchange for its withdrawal to the 1967 borders," Erekat said.
    The Arab League proposal offers Israel peace and normal relations with all Arab countries in return for its withdrawal from all territory the Jewish state captured in the 1967 Middle East war -- the West Bank, Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights.
    The plan also calls for the sides to agree to a "just solution" for millions of Palestinians classed as refugees from homes and land taken by the new Israeli state in 1948.
    The advertisement panel, bordered by the flags of dozens of Arab and other Muslim states, also ran in Arabic in three Palestinian papers.
    Egypt and Jordan are the only two of 22 Arab League members to have peace accords with Israel. While some Muslim countries, like Turkey, have close relations, Israelis would like to trade with others, notably in Asia and the Gulf.
    Previous Israeli governments have either ignored or rejected the Arab initiative, which would require Israel to dismantle settlements which house hundreds of thousands of Jews.
    President Shimon Peres, whose position is largely ceremonial, said the Arab plan brought hope to the Middle East.
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