Nov. 29, 2007
Olmert: Palestinian State Vital To Israel
Israeli P.M. Warns Otherwise "Israel Is Finished" With Apartheid-Like Struggle
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President Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas walk back to the Oval Office after Mr. Bush spoke in the White House Rose Garden, Nov. 28, 2007. (Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty)
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President Bush, center, flanked by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, left, and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, right, makes a statement on the Middle East peace process in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2007. (Getty Images)
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President Bush, center, walks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, left, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, right, to the opening session of the Mideast conference at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2007. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, left, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, right, shake hands as President Bush looks on at center, during the opening session of the Mideast conference at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2007. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
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Photo Essay Annapolis Summit U.S. hosts high-stakes Mideast peace conference at U.S. Naval Academy.
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Interactive Mideast Conflict Events, key players and a history of the world's most unstable region.
Such a scenario, he said, would mean "the state of Israel is finished."
While Olmert has long said that the region's demography is working against Israel, the comments published in Haaretz were among his strongest as he prepares a skeptical public for the renewed peace talks launched at this week's conference in Annapolis, Md.
It will be a hard sell, reports CBS News correspondent Robert Berger: two polls show that 42 to 50 percent of Israelis believe Annapolis was a failure.
Olmert's reference to apartheid was particularly explosive because Israeli officials have long rejected any comparison to the racist system once in place in South Africa.
Olmert was en route back to Israel at midday Thursday, and his office could not immediately confirm the accuracy of the published comments in Haaretz.
In other developments:
Before leaving Washington, Olmert briefed Israeli reporters and gave a different interpretation to the Annapolis summit, reports CBS News correspondent Howard Arenstein. Olmert said that even if the two sides reach an agreement by the end of 2008, that doesn't mean Israel will have to implement it until it gets what it wants from the Palestinians. That includes peaceful relations with Gaza and other Palestinian obligations from the "road map" peace plan.
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That's unlikely to happen. Hamas warns it won't allow Abbas to implement Phase 1 of the road map plan, dismantling militant groups. Hamas official Halil Abu Lelleh said the Annapolis conference gave the U.S. the authority to wipe out the armed struggle, reports Berger. He described the U.S. as the enemy of the Palestinian cause.We are looking for a two-state solution, not a three-state solution.
National Security Adviser Stephen HadleyThe Palestinians want to form an independent state in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and east Jerusalem - areas that Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war.
Many Israeli demographers believe that with their higher birthrate, the Arab population of these areas, combined with Israel's own Arab population, could soon exceed the Jewish population in Israel.
Jews are a solid majority inside Israel proper, comprising roughly 80 percent of the population of 7 million. However, if the West Bank and Gaza are included, Arabs already comprise nearly half the population of the region.
To ensure that Israel can maintain its character as a democracy with a solid Jewish majority, Olmert supports a large withdrawal from the West Bank and parts of east Jerusalem, following Israel's pullout in 2005 from Gaza.
"The day will come when the two-state solution collapses, and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights," Olmert told Haaretz. "As soon as that happens, the state of Israel is finished."
Israel's 1.5 million Arab citizens have the right to vote. But the estimated 3.9 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza do not have Israeli citizenship.
In the interview, Olmert warned that Israel risks losing the support of influential American Jewish groups if it retains control of the Palestinians.
"The Jewish organizations, which were our power base in America, will be the first to come out against us," he said, "because they will say they cannot support a state that does not support democracy and equal voting rights for all its residents."
Olmert, a hard-liner early in his career, in recent years has repeatedly warned that Israel cannot remain both Jewish and democratic if it holds on to the West Bank and Gaza. But he has never used the South African analogy in public, though officials say he recently made the same argument in a closed meeting with lawmakers.
At the U.S. peace conference in Annapolis, Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas formally relaunched peace talks, which broke down in violence seven years ago, and pledged to reach an agreement next year.
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- [Olmert said] "failure to reach a peace agreement could plunge Israel into a South African-style apartheid struggle."
Wow, so Israel finally admits they have been oppressing the Palestinians like South Africa did to the Africans! Good on them, in my travels in South Africa, most of the whites I talked to were happier now that their country has renounced apartheid - and why not, oppressing people rarely makes you feel better about yourself in the long run.
Posted by pakaal at 02:00 PM : Nov 30, 2007,,,
You may be on to something, the U.S. should pass a Law that all illegal immigrants must receive the legal U.S. minimum wage! Watch how fast we solve our illegal immigrant problem! - Reply to this comment
- Would it be such a bad thing if the state of Israel was "finished"? Oops. Me say something bad.
- Reply to this comment
- Well, the one on the right was on the left
And the one in the middle was on the right
And the one on the left was in the middle
And the guy in the rear was a Methodist - Reply to this comment
- [Olmert said] "failure to reach a peace agreement could plunge Israel into a South African-style apartheid struggle."
Wow, so Israel finally admits they have been oppressing the Palestinians like South Africa did to the Africans! Good on them, in my travels in South Africa, most of the whites I talked to were happier now that their country has renounced apartheid - and why not, oppressing people rarely makes you feel better about yourself in the long run. - Reply to this comment
- "...failure to reach a peace agreement could plunge Israel into a South African-style apartheid struggle.
Such a scenario, he said, would mean "the state of Israel is finished."
Odd, Ahmadinejad was thoroughly roasted by the "invade Iran" warmongers for this very same statement. He knows that Israel doesn''t want, and never has wanted, a viable Palestinian state. He knows that Israel and the US will make totally unreasonable conditions, which Palestine will be forced to reject, and then they will try to make the Palestinians out to be the "bad guys".
This meeting is doomed to fail, and the continuation of apartheid will be the beginning of the spiral to the end for Israel.
Just like Olmert, and Ahmadinejad, have said. - Reply to this comment
- -Unfortunately it''''''''s not Democrats who were at the origin of this step... Nontheless, Repukons are waking up and feeling the heat had they not done this summit in Annapolis. Barrack was going to pull the carpet under their feet.
Posted by grazinggoat at 06:30 PM : Nov 29, 2007,,,
I don''''t agree with you a lot but, bullseye!
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Posted by tbweb at 11:25 PM : Nov 29, 2007
-We don''t need to agree, all the time, but like the chiefs, who don''t agree, end up by giving up their stone-carved ideas, beliefs and political approaches... One is anything but intelligent if their pre-conceived views are not self-criticised, adjusted. A bit to the right for lefties and a bit of decent of liberal pragmatism for rightwing neo-cons, and people can get to shake hands. - Reply to this comment
- CBS News: ''''Olmert: Palestinian State Vital To Israel
Israeli P.M. Warns Otherwise "Israel Is Finished" With Apartheid-Like Struggle''''
- Can''''t believe it. This reetaarrd is saying, now, what we were saying for decades, at least thinking! LOL!
-Stayin'''' over 50 yrs encapsulated like a germ capsule in the host body, as if it were in a hostile environment cannot be, and is just not successful.
-Communications and public relation activities such as this meeting are essential to warm the relations between the two belligerent people, for inter-relations to start and develop.
-Muslims and Jews are alike, in their solitude in the world, pragmatism of life view...
-Unfortunately it''''s not Democrats who were at the origin of this step... Nontheless, Repukons are waking up and feeling the heat had they not done this summit in Annapolis. Barrack was going to pull the carpet under their feet.
Posted by grazinggoat at 06:30 PM : Nov 29, 2007,,,
I don''t agree with you a lot but, bullseye! - Reply to this comment
- CBS News: ''Olmert: Palestinian State Vital To Israel
Israeli P.M. Warns Otherwise "Israel Is Finished" With Apartheid-Like Struggle''
- Can''t believe it. This reetaarrd is saying, now, what we were saying for decades, at least thinking! LOL!
-Stayin'' over 50 yrs encapsulated like a germ capsule in the host body, as if it were in a hostile environment cannot be, and is just not successful.
-Communications and public relation activities such as this meeting are essential to warm the relations between the two belligerent people, for inter-relations to start and develop.
-Muslims and Jews are alike, in their solitude in the world, pragmatism of life view...
-Unfortunately it''s not Democrats who were at the origin of this step... Nontheless, Repukons are waking up and feeling the heat had they not done this summit in Annapolis. Barrack was going to pull the carpet under their feet. - Reply to this comment
- If a Palestinian state were "vital" to Israel, as Olmert claims, they could have come to an agreement years ago. The Israeli regime finds it impossible to utter a word of truth.
Livni knows good and well that they have no relations with her government...they have nothing to say to her officially...that is what "non recognition" is all about...yet CBS simply prints her whining without comment...And Condumlizzard Lice''s attempt to equate her experience in the South with the daily life of the Palestinians is patently absurd...Even the apartheid of the old South African regime does not approach the ghetto-ization, murder, kidnappings, arrests, torture and abuse that Palestinians face daily.
If the Arab states have anything to contribute it would be to advise Bush and his fellow clowns that they are not married to the dollar and the Western Oil cartel and Bush can either press Israel for peace or Americans will be pushing their cars to work when they start selling crude on the Iranian international oil market in Euros...that might get the negotiations going...yes, indeedy. - Reply to this comment
- realpatriot1,,,,, It''s a double CD, he''ll eat some cookies & fall asleep
- Reply to this comment
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