Middle East Monitor / September 22, 2022
Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid has been criticised harshly by rivals and allies alike, including government’s ministers, for saying that he supports the two-state solution.
According to Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked on Twitter, the prime minister has “no public legitimacy to entangle Israel with statements that cause damage to the country.” Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar tweeted: “Establishing a terror state [sic] in Judea and Samaria [the occupied West Bank] will endanger Israel’s security.”
Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett also tweeted: “There is no place or logic in floating anew the idea of a Palestinian state… Even Israel’s true friends do not expect us to compromise on our security. There is no reason to volunteer to do so.”
Drawing a line completely under the status quo, Bennett insisted that, “There is no place for another country between Jordan and the [Mediterranean] Sea.”
In a revealing statement which exposed Israel’s total lack of trustworthiness, and the naivety of Palestinian Authority officials for playing along and maintaining security collaboration with the occupation state, the right-wing Likud party confirmed that former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “managed to keep Palestinian issues off the world agenda for years.” Lapid, the party added, “has returned PA President Mahmoud Abbas to centre stage in less than a year.”
Lapid’s support for a two-state solution, which most people accept is dead in the water, was dismissed as another “PR stunt” by Arab parliamentarian Aida Touma-Sliman. “While he is declaring his support for a Palestinian state on the world stage, in Israel he is leading the entrenchment of the occupation,” she pointed out.
