Report: Netanyahu Open to Palestinian State With ‘Temporary Borders’

Palestinians Have Repeatedly Rejected Idea

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly suggested that he would accept a Palestinian state with temporary borders as a conciliatory move to the Palestinian Authority.

Israel has been under pressure to make some sort of move to help restart the peace process after killing the indirect peace talks with a massive settlement expansion in occupied East Jerusalem last month.

But exactly how much of an “offer” this is remains to be seen. Netanyahu seems to be offering up the temporary borders idea as a way to continue the settlement expansions with impunity, and as a way to defer the issue of East Jerusalem until his government has more time to build more settlements in the city.

The proposal is hardly a new one, and it is one that Mahmoud Abbas has rejected repeatedly. Though it is certainly a better deal than the Likud government has offered before, it still seems well short of the Palestinian calls for a settlement freeze and an actual independent state.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.