Israeli minister of economy and leader of the Jewish Home Party, Naftali Bennett, has suggested a new plan for peace in Palestine, calling for dismantling the security barrier in the West Bank and letting Palestinians govern themselves.
According to Al Ray, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, Bennett said that Israel will not negotiate with a Palestinian government which includes Hamas, saying that he will instead promote a Stability Plan throughout Israel’s new Knesset legislative session.
‘Palestinians living in certain portions of the West Bank (known as Area A and Area B) should govern themselves. They should hold their own elections, run their own schools, issue their own building permits and manage their own health-care system. In short, they should run their own lives. Israel should not interfere in day-to-day governance,’ he said.
He explained that, in order to achieve this plan, Israel must allow Palestinians complete freedom of movement and, in turn, facilitate the removal of all roadblocks and checkpoints in the West Bank, with special attention being given to the security barrier erected, over the last decade, to defend against what he claimed were Palestinian terror attacks during the Second Intifada.
He added that Israel should work with the international community to promote the Palestinian economic development in areas A and B.
According to Bennet, Al Ray reports, waiting for perfect solution to the conflict has affected the Palestinian economy:
Up to his plan, the occupation power would annex the remaining part of West Bank, known as Area C, and exercise sovereignty over the likes of occupied east Jerusalem and Golan Heights. In addition, Palestinians who live there would be offered full Israeli citizenship.
Bennet: ‘This arrangement might not be the utopian peace Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat imagined when they shook hands in the White House Rose Garden, in 1993. But it offers Palestinians independent government and prosperity, while ensuring Israeli security and stability.’
