Lapid’s warning over settlements
THE second largest party in Israel’s coalition fired a strong warning shot against right-wing aspirations on Sunday, threatening to bring down the government if it tries to solidify control over the West Bank.
Since the collapse of peace talks in April, the right has grown louder with its calls for Israel to assert sovereignty over parts of the West Bank, and several prominent members of the government favour this “annexation” option. They include politicians who are close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But Finance Minister Yair Lapid, leader of the Yesh Atid party declared at a conference on Sunday, that should there be “an attempt to annex even one settlement unilaterally, Yesh Atid will not only bolt the government, it will bring it down”.
He said: “Zealous right-wing forces are pushing us toward the delusional idea of annexation, which will lead us to the disaster called a bi-national state. I don’t know if this is a public relations exercise or a true intention, but we will not allow this to happen.”
Lapid opposed Netanyahu’s position that borders between Israel and a future Palestinian state can only be decided by negotiation with the Palestinians, and called for Israel to start the border-setting process unilaterally. By doing this, he argued, Israel will prove that it is serious about peace.
He laid out a three-stage plan. To start with, Israel would unilaterally withdraw from parts of the West Bank that don’t have settlements or security importance, and freeze settlement building. In stage two, Israel would withdraw from outlying settlements and leave only settlement blocs. In stage three, final borders would be set through negotiations.
“We need a concrete, predictive map that will determine where construction can increase and where it should cease,” said Lapid. “Israel should initiate rather than react and in order to do that we must draw our own borders first on paper, and then on the ground.”
He claimed that Israelis need to stop seeing negotiations as a gesture to the Palestinians, rather view them as a way of protecting their own interests, saying: “We must stop asking what do the Palestinians want and begin asking what do the Israeli people want. The answer is security and to be separate.”
Netanyahu mocked Lapid at a Likud faction meeting on Monday, claiming – without referring to him by name – that his “haphazard plan whose results will be similar to those of the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza”.