Leaks reveal ground Palestinians were prepared to concede

A leak of 1,600 confidential position papers belonging to Palestinian Authority negotiators curiously embarrassed the PLO but also undermined Israel’s claims it has no “partner for peace” in the Mid-East political process.

by Bernard Purcell
Friday, January 28th, 2011

Both sides originally tried to diminish the significance of the papers which were published by al- Jazeera, but Palestine Authority negotiators eventually dropped their original claim that they were “forgeries”.
The documents showed that Palestinian negotiators were privately prepared to shift on several issues they had publicly declared were non-negotiable or sacrosanct.

Among the issues on which they were prepared to back down was acceptance of Israel’s annexation of Palestine’s capital Jerusalem and a reduced right of return for five million displaced Palestinian exiles and their descendants.

The papers show negotiators were prepared to severely limit the number of those allowed to return to Israel from 100,000 over 10 years to a total of just 10,000.

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About The Author

Bernard Purcell is Tribune's Chief Reporter
  • swatantra

    The fact is Israel is not even the slightest bit interested in a settlement. Take a look at the land the Palestinian allegedly were preared rto conceed, mere patches here and there, amidst a whole swathe of Israeli territory, very silmilar to the bantustans of South Africa, No Arab in their right minds would agree to that proposal. Only a viable Palestine one entity, with East Jerusalem. The Isaeli and Christians can have the rest of Jerusalem.The present unrest in the ME should be making the Israelis very anxious.If the Muslim Brotherhood take over States like Tunisia Egypt Syria, Lebanon etc The Israelis are finished. Israel should have settled while it had the chance. Now its too late.

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