JERUSALEM: Israel’s prime minister turned down a regional peace initiative last year that was brokered by then-US Secretary of State John Kerry, former American officials confirmed Sunday, in apparent contradiction to Benjamin Netanyahu’s stated goal of involving regional Arab powers in resolving Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians.
Netanyahu took part in a secret summit that Kerry organized in the southern Jordanian port city of Aqaba last February and included Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. The secret meeting was first reported by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz1
According to two former Obama administration officials, Kerry proposed regional recognition of Israel as a Jewish state — a key Netanyahu demand — alongside a renewal of peace talks with the Palestinians with the support of the Arab countries.
Netanyahu rejected the offer, which would have required a significant pullout from occupied land, saying he would not be able to garner enough support for it in his hard-line coalition government.
The initiative also appeared to be the basis of short-lived talks with moderate opposition leader Isaac Herzog to join the government, a plan that quickly unraveled when Netanyahu chose to bring in nationalist leader Avigdor Lieberman instead and appoint him defense minister.
Herzog tweeted Sunday that “history will definitely judge the magnitude of the opportunity as well as the magnitude of the missed opportunity.”
Two former top aides to Kerry confirmed that the meeting took place secretly on Feb. 21, 2016. According to the officials, Kerry tried to sweeten the 15-year-old “Arab Peace Initiative,” a Saudi-led plan that offered Israel peace with dozens of Arab and Muslim nations in return for a pullout from territories captured in the 1967 Mideast war to make way for an independent Palestine.
Among the proposed changes were Arab recognition of Israel as the Jewish state, recognition of Jerusalem as a shared capital for Israelis and Palestinians, and softened language on the “right of return” of Palestinian refugees to lost properties in what is now Israel, the former officials said.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were still not authorized to discuss the secret meeting publicly, said the Egyptian and Jordanian leaders reacted positively to the proposal, while Netanyahu refused to commit to anything beyond meetings with the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
One of the officials said the main purpose of the meeting was to start a regional peace process that Netanyahu said he wanted. However, he said it was not clear if the Arab states would have gone along with it either.
He said it appeared that Netanyahu was not interested in more than meeting Abbas and some Arab leaders and promising unspecified confidence building steps. This was not enough for anyone at the meeting and would not have been enough to get other Arab states to even express willingness to pursue a regional approach, the former official said.
“We saw it as building on, or updating, but certainly not superseding” the 2002 Arab initiative, one of the officials said.
A second former official said other Gulf Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, along with the Palestinians, the Europeans and the Russians, were also consulted as part of the process.
The officials said opposition inside Netanyahu’s hard-line government, which is dominated by nationalists opposed to Palestinian independence, presented a formidable obstacle. But he said the Arab partners also showed varying degrees of enthusiasm, with the Palestinians most concerned about concessions forced on them.
In Cairo, el-Sisi’s office issued a statement late Sunday that appeared to implicitly confirm that the meeting took place. It said Egypt been working toward a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “It is in this framework that Egypt has sought to bring closer the positions of the relevant parties and supported any meetings or initiatives aimed at discussing Practical ideas that would revive the peace process,” said the statement without directly mentioning the Aqaba meeting.
Netanyahu himself did not address the newspaper report in his weekly Cabinet meeting and his office refused to comment. Instead, the prime minister focused on last week’s visit to Washington to meet new President Donald Trump.
At that meeting, both Trump and Netanyahu talked of searching for new ways forward with the Palestinians and raised the possibility of involving the broader Arab world in a new peace process.
Netanyahu called the meeting “historic” and one that strengthened the two countries’ longtime alliance. He said at the end of meeting, Trump shook his hand and told him it was a “new day” in Israeli-American relations.
After eight years of testy ties with Barack Obama, Netanyahu seems to be relishing Trump’s warm embrace. The new president has broken from his predecessor in adopting friendlier positions to the Israeli government regarding a tough line on Iran, a vaguer stance on Palestinian statehood and a more lenient approach to West Bank settlements.
Netanyahu said the two leaders see “eye to eye” on Iran and a host of other issues. “There is a new day and it is a good day,” he said.
But in a joint press conference last week, behind the warm smiles there were signs of trouble ahead.
Trump asked Netanyahu to “hold off” on Jewish settlement construction in occupied territories the Palestinians claim for a future state. Netanyahu said Sunday that the sides have formed joint teams to coordinate settlement construction.
In a striking departure from longtime American policy, Trump also refrained from supporting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While this pleased Netanyahu’s hard line coalition partners, Trump still said whatever solution is reached would have to be acceptable to both sides.
That has raised questions about what kind of agreement could be reached. The alternative, a single binational state, could require Israel to grant citizenship to millions Palestinians under its control, threatening its status as a Jewish-majority democracy.
Lieberman, the Israeli defense minister, said that for him a Palestinian state remains the preferred outcome — and it should come through the type of regional structure Netanyahu reportedly rejected.
“My vision, it’s the endgame no doubt, two-state solution. I believe that it’s necessary for us to keep the Jewish state,” he said at the Munich Security Conference. “The Palestinians don’t have capacity to sign a lone final status agreement with Israel. It’s possible only as a part of an all-regional solution, not an incremental process but simultaneously.”
Netanyahu spurned secret peace offer, US ex-officials
Netanyahu spurned secret peace offer, US ex-officials
Israel attacks southern Lebanon, Bekaa Valley
- Lebanon insists on return of residents to border villages as a prerequisite for discussing any economic zone
BEIRUT: Two people, including a Hezbollah member, were killed, and more than five others injured on Sunday in Israeli airstrikes carried out without warning on towns in southern Lebanon and the northern Bekaa Valley.
The attacks came while the Mechanism Committee, monitoring the implementation of the ceasefire agreement between Lebanon and Israel, is experiencing “temporary paralysis.”
The date of its next meeting has yet to be confirmed, following the postponement of a session scheduled for Jan. 14 without a clear explanation.
Israeli airstrikes targeted the towns of Bir Al-Salasel, Khirbet Selm, Kfar Dunin, Barish, and Bazouriye, as well as the vicinity of the Nabi Sheet and Janta towns in the northern Bekaa.
The Lebanese Ministry of Health confirmed the fatality and injuries, while an Israeli military spokesperson said that the army attacked Hezbollah members working at a site used for producing weapons.
The strikes targeted a building where Hezbollah members were operating in the Bir Al-Salasel area in southern Lebanon. The building was being used to produce weapons, the spokesman said.
The Israeli army claimed that its airstrikes on the northern Bekaa targeted “Hezbollah military infrastructure,” adding that the “Hezbollah members’ activity at the targeted sites constitutes a violation of the agreements between Israel and Lebanon and poses a threat to Israel.”
The Mechanism Committee, headed by US Gen. Joseph Clearfield and tasked with monitoring the implementation of the cessation-of-hostilities agreement between Israel and Lebanon, is expected to resume its meetings on Feb. 25.
The committee leadership has not officially confirmed the date, which remains under discussion among its members.
An official Lebanese source told Arab News: “The failure of the Mechanism Committee to convene on Jan. 14, following two meetings that were held on Dec. 3 and 19 in Ras Al-Naqoura, indicates the existence of a crisis.”
The source said that “during the two previous meetings, Lebanon insisted on its two demands for the return of residents to border villages from which they were displaced and where their homes were destroyed, as well as the reconstruction of these villages. These two clauses constitute the foundation upon which negotiations must be built.”
The same source, who is involved in the Mechanism Committee’s meetings, said that “Lebanon’s only gateway for addressing the Israeli envoy’s proposition regarding the establishment of a border economic zone similar to a buffer zone is that the border villages must be inhabited by their residents from the Lebanese perspective. This condition cannot be overlooked under any circumstances.”
The source said that “this was discussed with the US side, in particular, and the statement issued by the US on Dec. 19 regarding the negotiations and the progress made by the Lebanese army south of the Litani River presented acceptable evidence that Lebanon is now at the heart of the negotiations.”
The source added: “Lebanon called on the Mechanism Committee to issue a statement endorsing the Lebanese army’s success in extending its control south of the Litani River, including acknowledgment from the Israeli side.
“However, through the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel only issued a statement referring to positives and negatives."
Last week, Lebanese Finance Minister Yassine Jaber confirmed to Arab News, in a special interview from Davos on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum, that “the proposal to transform the Lebanese border area into an economic zone was immediately rejected.”
The official Lebanese source attributed the reasons for the postponement of the latest Mechanism meeting to “a structural flaw within the committee, and to a crisis affecting the American delegation related to regional and international developments, in addition to an American-Israeli desire to exclude the French representative.”
The official source spoke of two dilemmas: “There is an Israeli enemy persisting in its violations of the agreement and in its attacks on Lebanon.
“On the other hand, the Israeli side submits evidence to the Mechanism Committee, including documents, photos, and videos, regarding Hezbollah’s restoration of its capabilities, at a time when its Secretary-General, Sheikh Naim Qassem, threatens civil war if Hezbollah’s weapons north of the Litani River are touched.”
The source added: “For its part, the Lebanese Army presents evidence and documentation of what it has accomplished south of the Litani. This means that the Lebanese Army is achieving what it is capable of achieving with flesh and blood. It is aware of the existence of remaining Hezbollah weapons depots and is pursuing them.”
The official source fears “a lack of progress in negotiations in light of all these documents, high-pitched statements, and the American complaint about the slow pace of negotiations.”
He added: “The positions of Hezbollah officials do not help Lebanon’s stance within the Mechanism Committee, particularly with regard to capacity building.”
The source said that “the adherence of the Hezbollah–Amal Movement duo to the Mechanism Committee does not mean their approval of any progress in negotiations.
“When Lebanon proposes expanding the Lebanese delegation to include, for example, a former minister, this constitutes horizontal expansion rather than the vertical expansion that would serve the negotiation process, which should involve specialized experts and technicians. Consequently, any collapse of the ‘Mechanism’ meetings would mean that Lebanon would be facing a very difficult moment.
“It appears that the history of Lebanese–Israeli negotiations is passing through its most dangerous phase today. The world is no longer negotiating with Lebanon solely over its rights, but over its ability to prevent war.”
The official source also stressed that the “Mechanism” constituted a fundamental point of intersection among the participating states despite the difficulties affecting its work.
He said: “The suspension of the committee’s work could be reflected in the issue of the exclusivity of weapons north of the Litani, as its absence would mean leaving matters without controls, pushing Lebanon into an even worse phase.”
The official source said that “raising the level of representation of the Lebanese delegation is not currently on the table, but it is an inevitable end that Lebanon may reach according to the logic of events.”
Lebanon is counting on the anticipated visit of Army Commander Gen. Rodolphe Haykal to Washington early next month, and on the Paris conference scheduled for March 5, to secure further support for the plan to confine weapons north of the Litani River.
