JERUSALEM: A far-right member of the Israeli government said yesterday the idea of establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank had reached a “dead end”.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu distanced himself from the comments, but the Palestinian chief negotiator said they were “part of Israel’s plan to destroy any possibility for a Palestinian state.”
Industry and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett, a leader of Jewish settlers living in occupied territory, has long opposed a Palestinian state, and his latest remarks underscored deep divisions over the issue inside Netanyahu’s coalition.
“The idea that a Palestinian state will be formed in the land of Israel has come to a dead end,” Bennett told a settlers’ conference. “Never in the annals of Israel have so many people expended so much energy on something so futile,” said Bennett, who heads the ultranationalist Jewish Home party.
Efforts by US Secretary of State John Kerry to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, which collapsed in 2010 in a dispute over settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, have shown little sign of progress.
Israel captured those areas, along with the Gaza Strip, in a 1967 Middle East war. When asked about the comments, Netanyahu said: “Foreign policy is shaped by the prime minister and my view is clear. I will seek a negotiated settlement where you’d have a demilitarised Palestinian state that recognises the Jewish state.”
Reuters
