It might be said that this was the first U.S. recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, though a whole polemic has grown up around Truman’s personally crossing out the second reference on the document…

More recently, Glenn Kessler wrote from Washington in the Washington Post late last year (2 October 2010) that former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said, in a speech in November 2001, that “Palestinians must eliminate any doubt, once and for all, that they accept the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state“.

After an internet search, I found this Colin Powell speech posted here and here.

BUT, Kessler wrote in his recent WPost (or WAPO) article, “Powell doesn’t recall how the phrase ended up in his speech” … “David Ivry, then Israeli amb to US, says he ‘persuaded an aide’to slip Jewish state reference in Colin Powell 2001 speech…Kessler wrote that David Ivry said he contacted Powell aide Richard Armitage, but Powell said that he asked and Armitage doesn’t remember this either … However, Kessler reported, “Aaron David Miller…who wrote 1st draft of Powell speech, said..[the reference to the need for Palestinian recognition of a Jewish state]..didn’t ring many alarm bells“… This October 2010 article by Glenn Kessler in the Washington Post is published here.

So, the Israeli Ambassador whispered into the ears of some U.S. State Department officials, and Powell mentioned it in his 2001 speech — and now only Aaron David Miller remembers how the reference [to the need for Palestinian acceptance of "the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish State"] got into the this Powell speech?!

Next reference is a clear Israeli demand, in point 13 of Ariel Sharon’s May 2003 list of 14 “reservations”, or objections, to the American/European/Quartet’s Road Map: “In connection to both the introductory statements and the final settlement, declared references must be made to Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state”…

Then, it comes up again only in 2007, as a demand (ignored by Palestinian negotiators by Ehud Olmert at the start of the American-led Annapolis process of Direct Negotiations…

Now, it is an insistent demand of Benyamin Netanyahu (recognition as a Jewish State, or alternative version as the “state of the Jewish people:) every time the American administration of Barack Obama mentions anything about resuming talks with the Palestinians…

And recently Obama has shown, again [in his two speeches in May, the first at the State Department, the second to AIPAC], that for the U.S., at least, there is no problem to say that Israel is a Jewish State, or the homeland of the Jewish people. Obama’s words, in May, were: “A lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland of the Jewish people”.

See Obama’s May 19 2011 Remarks [at the State Department] on the Middle East and North Africa, here:

“For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure … Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection. And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist … What America and the international community can do is to state frankly what everyone knows — a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people, each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace …

So while the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their full potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

As for security, every state has the right to self-defense, and Israel must be able to defend itself -– by itself -– against any threat. Provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism, to stop the infiltration of weapons, and to provide effective border security. The full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in a sovereign, non-militarized state. And the duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated.

These principles provide a foundation for negotiations. Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basic security concerns will be met. I’m aware that these steps alone will not resolve the conflict, because two wrenching and emotional issues will remain: the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees. But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of both Israelis and Palestinians”

Obama’s words to AIPAC on May 21 2001, here, were:

“I have said repeatedly that core issues can only be negotiated in direct talks between the parties. (Applause.) And I indicated on Thursday that the recent agreement between Fatah and Hamas poses an enormous obstacle to peace. (Applause.) No country can be expected to negotiate with a terrorist organization sworn to its destruction. (Applause.) And we will continue to demand that Hamas accept the basic responsibilities of peace, including recognizing Israel’s right to exist and rejecting violence and adhering to all existing agreements. (Applause.) And we once again call on Hamas to release Gilad Shalit, who has been kept from his family for five long years. (Applause.)

And yet, no matter how hard it may be to start meaningful negotiations under current circumstances, we must acknowledge that a failure to try is not an option. The status quo is unsustainable. And that is why on Thursday I stated publicly the principles that the United States believes can provide a foundation for negotiations toward an agreement to end the conflict and all claims — the broad outlines of which have been known for many years, and have been the template for discussions between the United States, Israel, and the Palestinians since at least the Clinton administration.

I know that stating these principles — on the issues of territory and security — generated some controversy over the past few days. (Laughter.) I wasn’t surprised. I know very well that the easy thing to do, particularly for a President preparing for reelection, is to avoid any controversy. I don’t need Rahm to tell me that. Don’t need Axelrod to tell me that. But I said to Prime Minister Netanyahu, I believe that the current situation in the Middle East does not allow for procrastination. I also believe that real friends talk openly and honestly with one another. (Applause.) So I want to share with you some of what I said to the Prime Minister.

Here are the facts we all must confront. First, the number of Palestinians living west of the Jordan River is growing rapidly and fundamentally reshaping the demographic realities of both Israel and the Palestinian Territories. This will make it harder and harder — without a peace deal — to maintain Israel as both a Jewish state and a democratic state.

Second, technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself in the absence of a genuine peace.

Third, a new generation of Arabs is reshaping the region. A just and lasting peace can no longer be forged with one or two Arab leaders. Going forward, millions of Arab citizens have to see that peace is possible for that peace to be sustained.

And just as the context has changed in the Middle East, so too has it been changing in the international community over the last several years. There’s a reason why the Palestinians are pursuing their interests at the United Nations. They recognize that there is an impatience with the peace process, or the absence of one, not just in the Arab World — in Latin America, in Asia, and in Europe. And that impatience is growing, and it’s already manifesting itself in capitals around the world.

And those are the facts. I firmly believe, and I repeated on Thursday, that peace cannot be imposed on the parties to the conflict. No vote at the United Nations will ever create an independent Palestinian state. And the United States will stand up against efforts to single Israel out at the United Nations or in any international forum. (Applause.) Israel’s legitimacy is not a matter for debate. That is my commitment; that is my pledge to all of you. (Applause.)

Moreover, we know that peace demands a partner –- which is why I said that Israel cannot be expected to negotiate with Palestinians who do not recognize its right to exist. (Applause.) And we will hold the Palestinians accountable for their actions and for their rhetoric. (Applause.)

But the march to isolate Israel internationally — and the impulse of the Palestinians to abandon negotiations –- will continue to gain momentum in the absence of a credible peace process and alternative. And for us to have leverage with the Palestinians, to have leverage with the Arab States and with the international community, the basis for negotiations has to hold out the prospect of success. And so, in advance of a five-day trip to Europe in which the Middle East will be a topic of acute interest, I chose to speak about what peace will require.

There was nothing particularly original in my proposal; this basic framework for negotiations has long been the basis for discussions among the parties, including previous U.S. administrations. Since questions have been raised, let me repeat what I actually said on Thursday — not what I was reported to have said.

I said that the United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps — (applause) — so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

As for security, every state has the right to self-defense, and Israel must be able to defend itself –- by itself -– against any threat. (Applause.) Provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism, to stop the infiltration of weapons, and to provide effective border security. (Applause.) And a full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in a sovereign and non-militarized state. (Applause.) And the duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated. (Applause.)

Now, that is what I said. And it was my reference to the 1967 lines — with mutually agreed swaps — that received the lion’s share of the attention, including just now. And since my position has been misrepresented several times, let me reaffirm what “1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps” means.

By definition, it means that the parties themselves -– Israelis and Palestinians -– will negotiate a border that is different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967. (Applause.) That’s what mutually agreed-upon swaps means. It is a well-known formula to all who have worked on this issue for a generation. It allows the parties themselves to account for the changes that have taken place over the last 44 years. (Applause.) It allows the parties themselves to take account of those changes, including the new demographic realities on the ground, and the needs of both sides. The ultimate goal is two states for two people: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people — (applause) — and the State of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people — each state in joined self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace. (Applause.)

If there is a controversy, then, it’s not based in substance. What I did on Thursday was to say publicly what has long been acknowledged privately. I’ve done so because we can’t afford to wait another decade, or another two decades, or another three decades to achieve peace. (Applause.) The world is moving too fast. The world is moving too fast. The extraordinary challenges facing Israel will only grow. Delay will undermine Israel’s security and the peace that the Israeli people deserve.

Now, I know that some of you will disagree with this assessment. I respect that. And as fellow Americans and friends of Israel, I know we can have this discussion.

Ultimately, it is the right and the responsibility of the Israeli government to make the hard choices that are necessary to protect a Jewish and democratic state for which so many generations have sacrificed. (Applause.) And as a friend of Israel, I’m committed to doing our part to see that this goal is realized. And I will call not just on Israel, but on the Palestinians, on the Arab States, and the international community to join us in this effort, because the burden of making hard choices must not be Israel’s alone”. (Applause.)

The use of the phrase “Jewish State” has never been hard for any American administration to pronounce, but what its meaning is no longer a simple recognition of fact, but a taking of sides in a conflict that the U.S. has been trying to mediate, by direct management, for the past four years…

Prime Minister Netanyahu: “I have set very clear policy; I did this in my 14.6.09 Bar-Ilan University speech. [The full transcript in English-language translation is posted here] There I said as follows: If the Palestinians recognize a Jewish State, if they shelve the idea of the Palestinian refugees’ right of return, if they have a demilitarized Palestinian state that recognizes the Jewish state – I tell you here and now that I will go with this to the end and that no coalition consideration will stop me, and I have no doubt that a majority will support me.”

Question: “Then perhaps [Foreign] Minister [Avigdor] Liberman is correct when he says, ‘Let us go for a long-range interim agreement and not a permanent agreement immediately, within a year, like you want?”

Prime Minister Netanyahu: “If we get into this discussion, we will likely hit a wall; a wall named Jerusalem, perhaps a wall named refugees. It could be that the result would be an interim agreement. It’s possible. I do not rule this out, including in the talks that we have held. I said that it’s possible. If we say this in advance, it is not certain they will come so easily. But it could be the result of a diplomatic process; I am not certain that it should be its primary goal.”

Question: “Are you indicating a possible change in policy, which says that there will be additional phases, the transfer of additional areas to the Palestinians, as you have already done in the past?”

Prime Minister Netanyahu: “I am not going into details on this.”

Ma’an News Agency reported later that “A spokesman for Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas shot down the suggestion. ‘For the Palestinians, any suggestion of reaching an interim agreement is unacceptable because it omits Jerusalem and the issue of refugees’, he said. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat also dismissed Netanyahu’s suggestion, saying: ‘interim solutions are rejected part and parcel … It’s now time for final solutions that include Jerusalem, refugees, borders, security, settlements, water and the release of all Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails’, he said … Direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians, the first for nearly two years, began in Washington on September 2. But they stalled when a partial 10-month freeze on Israeli settlement building expired on September 26. The Palestinians refused to resume negotiations without a new moratorium and Washington admitted on December 7 that it had failed to convince Israel to renew the building curbs. Palestinian negotiators have emphasized a set of alternatives to new talks, including seeking recognition of a Palestinian state along the borders that existed in 1967, before the Six Day War”. This was reported here.

This is an improved formulation over the earlier version (which former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon included in Israel’s 14 reservations to the U.S.-backed Road Map in 2003) of requiring acceptance of a “Jewish State”.

However, there is no real clarity about what, exactly, that would mean. Palestinians fear it is formula to withdraw rights and citizenship from the one million or so (20-25% of Israel’s population) who are Palestinian Arabs, and that it also means agreement acquiescence in wiping out any and all residual claims of some 4 or 5 million Palestinian refugees and their descendants living in a diaspora around the world.

So far, it is a dialog of the deaf.

Palestinians of almost all political views react with outrage, anger… and smoldering fury.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) is reported to have just said, in New York, that “Israel can call itself… the Jewish-Zionist Empire”, if it wants. This is reported on YNet, here.

Now, according to a report today in the Jerusalem Post, Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon caused a spat with Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad at a periodic meeting of major donors at UNHQ in New York. According to the JPost’version, “Ayalon refused to approve a summary of the meeting which said ‘two states’ but did not include the words ‘two states for two peoples’ … What I say is that if the Palestinians are not willing to talk about two states for two peoples, let alone a Jewish state for Israel, then there’s nothing to talk about’, Ayalon told the Post in a telephone interview. ‘And also, I said if the Palestinians mean, at the end of the process, to have one Palestinian state and one bi-national state, this will not happen … I also said that I don’t need the Palestinians to say Israel is a Jewish state in Hebrew. I need them to say it in Arabic to their own people’.” This JPost report is published here.

So, what does that mean, exactly? Each state should have only one people? You can see where this is leading… it’s confirming the worst fears of the Palestinians, of course. What I have written, in the past, in several places, is that the Palestinians have already accepted Israel as a Jewish State when Yasser Arafat issued the Declaration of Independence of the
Palestinian State in November 1988, then more explicitly (at U.S. insistence) in December 1988 — which explicitly accepts
the UN General Assembly resolution 181 of 29 November 1947, partitioning the British mandate of Palestine into two states, one Arab and one Jewish.

The Palestinians seem to have forgotten…

Earlier, according to the same YNet report, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu “told the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations that the recognition would be a central part of peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. ‘Just say it’, Netanyahu called on Abbas. ‘Say yes to a Jewish state’. The prime minister explained that he was insisting on this because ‘this is a move the Palestinians have refused to make for 62 years. Its significance is Palestinian recognition of the right of the Jewish people to self-definition in their historic homeland. I recognized the Palestinians’ right to self-definition, so they must do the same for the Jewish people’.”

In an interview with Ma’an News agency, also according to this YNet report, Abbas reportedly said that “if Israel wants negotiations in which the Palestinians recognize it, then it must also recognize a Palestinian state”.

By coincidence, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was asked about this whole matter in an interview for Palestine TV conducted by Maher Shalabi (who did the extraordinarily embarassing “The Cedar and the Olive Tree” program in refugee camps in Lebanon recently, in which he grandly handed out $100 U.S. dollar bills after asking stupid questions like, “What is the capitol of Palestine?”).

Here is an excerpt:
” (Maher Shalabi of Palestine TV) QUESTION: I mean, when you talk about Jewish state –

SECRETARY CLINTON: “Yes”.

QUESTION: — don’t you think you’re imposing the outcome of the negotiation and many times, you’re saying, “We want to impose the outcome”?

SECRETARY CLINTON: “Well, of course, that, to me, is a fact, that if you go back and look at the original UN documents, and even if you look at some of the PLO documents over the last many years, everyone recognizes that Israel is a homeland for Jewish people. Palestinians have the right to work toward a homeland for themselves. And I don’t think that takes anything away from either side in saying that”. The full transcript of this interview is available on the State Department website, here.

Palestinians could live as a “free” people, side-by-side with the Jewish people, with each having its own “national existence”, Netanyahu said, if (1) they recognize Israel as the national state of the Jewish people, and if (2) they agree that “the Palestinian entity must be demilitarized”, with Israel retaining a real defensive edge with “ironclad” security guarantees.

See our full analysis here.

The Israeli organization Peace Now responded to the Netanyahu speech with this critique:
“Bibi is still Bibi, perhaps more sophisticated but without a real message for the State of Israel.
Without vision, without a course of action and without any willingness to lead Israel to the necessary decisions, Netanyahu tried to remake himself, but even the pair of words ‘Palestinian state’ is no magic formula that can cover the political nakedness of Netanyahu and his government.
In Netanyahu’s vision of an upgraded autonomy called a ‘demilitarized Palestinian state’, the lives of the Palestinians will be dictated solely by the whims of the government of Israel in Jerusalem”…

The Peace Now critique continued:
Worrying elements of his speech:
• Netanyahu did not speak of the Palestinians as equal partners, neighbors whose fate is dependent on one another, partners in a long and complex process that requires trust-building, cooperation and a joint war on the extremists on both sides.
• Netanyahu chose to describe the Palestinians as of one cloth, in sweeping generalizations, using patronizing and arrogant language and referring in his speech to the Palestinians as if they were a primitive tribe subject to the graces of Israel.
• Not a word of self-criticism about Israel’s mistakes over the years, not a word about the moral need to put an end to the occupation, not a word about the Palestinian’ s right to negotiate with Israel as equal partners in a real process.
• Freedom of movement and a normal life are a prize the government is willing to give the Palestinians in exchange for their loyal behavior towards Israel.
• The government of Israel would have complete freedom to act, to build, to establish facts on the ground and to expand construction in the settlements
Such an arrogant and aggravating attitude by one side, that wishes to dictate terms to the other side, will never lead to a real agreement of peace and reconciliation between peoples … The Prime Minister’s office was quick to characterize the speech as representing the broad Israeli consensus among the nation today, this is clearly untrue and Peace Now will continue its work to expose the real Netanyahu government and push for a real peace to end the conflict”.

One report in Haaretz today states that “for the Israeli public, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech on Sunday evening was a big success. Right and left, Kadima and Likud, new immigrants and old-timers all found something they liked in the address at Bar-Ilan University.
For example, in only a month, Netanyahu’s approval rating has jumped 16 percentage points from a low of 28 percent the day after the cabinet debate over the budget on May 14. The 44 percent achieved yesterday comes a day after the speech. Public support for Netanyahu’s speech is sky-high, even though Israelis do not have illusions about the prime minister’s motives, which they generally attribute to American pressure … Netanyahu hit a bull’s-eye in the Israeli public consensus with his speech. This is reflected in the results of a Haaretz-Dialog survey conducted yesterday under the auspices of Prof. Camil Fuchs of Tel Aviv University. The numbers show that when Netanyahu deals with leadership on defense and policy matters without scare tactics, the public supports him … The Israeli public overwhelmingly supports Netanyahu’s speech – 71 percent … In terms of internal Israeli politics, Netanyahu put himself in the center of the political map. Most Kadima voters, 49 percent, say Tzipi Livni should join the coalition as a result of the speech, while 37 percent of Kadima voters disagreed … The survey shows that 90 percent of Likud voters, an incredible figure, agreed with what Netanyahu said in his speech. Maybe they are aware that a Palestinian state will not emerge as a result, so they are not worried. In addition, 73 percent of Likud voters say Netanyahu said the right things. The public liked the speech not just because it was based on the Israeli consensus, but also because of its tone: moderate with a desire for peace and casting the blame for a lack of peace on the Arabs”. This report can be read in full here .

Col. (Res.) Shaul Arieli, a former staff advisor to former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, now a member of the board of the Council for Peace and Security, and one of the architects of the Geneva Initiative, wrote in Haaretz today that “The declarations about the need to crush the two-state idea have been replaced by rearguard skirmishes bent on preventing its implementation. In 1993, Ariel Sharon wanted to announce that if Likud returned to power he would cancel the Oslo Accords; Netanyahu announced that the autonomy program under Israeli control was the sole alternative. These declarations were quickly exchanged for talk about a ‘Palestinian state’ or a ‘demilitarized Palestinian state’… Netanyahu’s speech of regression has aligned him with the positions of Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu. They accept the idea of two states but try to torpedo it with conditions that render it ridiculous. That is what Netanyahu did when he said in his address that he was ready to begin peace negotiations immediately without preconditions: He demanded Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish people’s national home, agreement to a demilitarized Palestinian state, removing the refugee issue from the agenda, and maintaining united Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty – before starting negotiations … A survey conducted by the Institute for National Security Studies revealed that 64 percent of the population supports the idea of two states for two peoples, only 17 percent are prepared to expand settlements at the expense of a confrontation with the United States, and 77 percent support the idea of an evacuation-compensation law. The public should demand that Netanyahu stop throwing billions of shekels into barren plans. Instead, he must renew negotiations immediately without preconditions, accept the regional peace plan and present an Israeli plan that produces a Zionist outcome of a Jewish and democratic state living alongside a Palestinian state”. This commentary can be read in full here.

Haaretz’s Akiva Eldar wrote on Monday that “The prime minister’s speech last night returned the Middle East to the days of George W. Bush’s ‘axis of evil’. Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a patriarchal, colonialist address in the best neoconservative tradition: The Arabs are the bad guys, or at best ungrateful terrorists; the Jews, of course, are the good guys, rational people who need to raise and care for their children. In the West Bank settlement of Itamar, they’re even building a nursery school. No empathy for the refugees from Jaffa who lost their entire world, not a word for the Muslim connection to Jerusalem - neither a fragment of a quote from the Koran, nor a line of Arabic poetry. Netanyahu’s provincial remarks were not intended to penetrate the hearts of the hundreds of millions of Al Jazeera viewers in the Muslim world. Instead, he sought to appease Tzipi Hotovely, the settler Likud lawmaker, and make it possible to live peaceably with the settler foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman. Netanyahu’s demand that Palestinians recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people didn’t even leave him an opening for forging reconciliation with the Arab citizens in the country. The prime minister’s declaration that Jerusalem will remain he ‘undivided capital’ of Israel – only Israel – slammed the door before the entire Muslim world. And his Hebron is solely the city of the Jewish patriarchs; the Arabs have no such rights at all. The Palestinians can have a state, but only if those foreign invaders show us they know how to eat with a fork and knife. Actually, without a knife. The demilitarization of the Palestinian state was mentioned in the Clinton guidelines, the Taba understandings and the Geneva accord, as was the right of return to Palestine, not Israel. The difference between these documents and the Bar-Ilan address is not only that the former recognized the Palestinians’ full rights to the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The real difference lies in the tone – in the degrading and disrespectful nature of Netanyahu’s remarks. That’s not how one brings down a wall of enmity between two nations, that’s not how trust is built”. Akiva Eldar’s article is posted in full here.

Haaretz correspondent Aliyana Traison wrote that “It will go down in history, along with the Oslo Accord and the Camp David treaty, another historic speech of vague validations and vows to break. Cowering to U.S. pressure, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said just about nothing in his much awaited foreign policy speech at Bar Ilan University on Sunday evening, when he called for immediate peace talks without preconditions and a Palestinian state stripped of military capabilities. No preconditions from the Palestinians, Netanyahu meant to say. Israel, on the other hand, is free to scold its neighbor for starting this conflict and delaying a viable final settlement by refusing to recognize it as a Jewish state. No preconditions, but the Palestinian Authority must first topple Hamas or at least cut off all contact. No preconditions, except these conditions. It is impossible to hold peace negotiations without preconditions. Such diplomacy is subversive procrastination. Both sides of this conflict have demands, but rather than open up negotiations with these conditions in mind, they deny their respective red lines and allow the peace process to roll in infinite still motion. Israel and the Palestinian Authority both have preconditions; they need to lay them down and abide by them to get the peace process started again. The Palestinian Authority must concede to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and in return, Israel needs a concrete plan of withdrawal from parts of the West Bank … The Old City of Jerusalem (and then later with Syria, parts of the Golan Heights) must be divided appropriately, with free access to the citizens of both countries involved. West Jerusalem and the Jewish Quarter would remain under Israeli control, as its capital, and East Jerusalem and the Muslim Quarter would be Palestinian, as their capital. The rest would be annexed to international supervision, with United Nations troops standing guard. Following these steps comes the creation of a Palestinian state. Netanyahu declared that he would endorse such an entity if the international community could guarantee its demilitarization. There are a handful of countries out there without an offensive army, Japan and Costa Rica, for instance; Palestine would not be the first. Should a demilitarized Palestine be established, then Israel would have to compromise for denying a sovereign democracy the right of defense. Israel and Palestine must therefore sign a pact of non-aggression as a concession for a demilitarized state”. This commentary can be read in full here.

On Netanyahu’s choice of ministers, Avnery wrote that “All these appointments look like the desperate efforts of a cynical politician who does not care about anything other than returning to power, and then quickly putting together a cabinet, whatever its composition, paying any price to any party prepared to join him, sacrificing even the most vital interests of the state”.

The worst problem, Avnery stated, is in the political field, “Because there the unpreparedness of Netanyahu meets the overpreparedness of Obama. Obama has a plan for the restructuring of the Middle East, and one of its elements is an Israeli-Palestinian peace based on ‘Two States for Two Peoples’. Netanyahu argues that he is not in a position to respond, because he has no plan of his own yet. After all, he is quite new in office. Now he is working on such a plan. Very soon, in a week, or a month, or a year, he will have a plan, a real plan, and he will present it to Obama. Or course, Netanyahu has a plan. It consists of one word, which he learned from his mentor, Yitzhak Shamir: ‘NO’. Or, more precisely, NO NO NO – the three no’s of the Israeli Khartoum: No peace, No withdrawal, No negotiations. (It will be remembered that the 1967 Arab summit conference in Khartoum, right after the Six-day War, adopted a similar resolution.) The ‘plan’ which he is working on does not really concern the essence of this policy, but only the packaging. How to present to Obama something that will not sound like ‘no’, but rather like ‘yes, but’ … As a taster for the ‘plan’, Netanyahu has already presented one of its ingredients: the demand that the Palestinians and other Arabs must recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’.”

Now, here, Avnery makes a distinction: “Most of the media in Israel and abroad have distorted this demand and reported that Netanyahu requires the recognition of Israel as a ‘Jewish State’. Either from ignorance or laziness, they obliterated the important difference between the two formulas. This difference is immense. A ‘Jewish State’ is one thing, a ‘State of the Jewish People’ is something radically different“.

Avnery explains what he sees as the distinction — though not everybody will agree with him: “A ‘Jewish State’ can mean a state with a majority of citizens who define themselves as Jews and/or a state whose main language is Hebrew, whose main culture is Jewish, whose weekly rest day is Saturday, which serves only Kosher food in the Knesset cafeteria etc. A ‘State of the Jewish People’ is a completely different story. It means that the state belongs not only to its citizens, but to something that is called ‘the Jewish People’ – something that exists both inside and outside of the country. That can have wide-ranging implications. For instance: the abrogation of the citizenship of non-Jews, as proposed by Lieberman. Or the conferring of Israeli citizenship on all the Jews in the world, whether they want it or not. The first question that arises is: what does ‘the Jewish People’ mean? The term ‘people’ – ‘am‘ in Hebrew … – has no accepted precise definition. Generally it is taken to mean a group of human beings who live in a specific territory and speak a specific language. The ‘Jewish People’ is not like that. Two hundred years ago it was clear that the Jews were a religious community dispersed throughout the world and united by religious beliefs and myths (including the belief in a common ancestry). The Zionists were determined to change this self-perception. ‘We are a people, one people’, Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, wrote … The idea of ‘the State of the Jewish People’ is decidedly anti-Zionist. Herzl did not dream of a situation in which a Jewish State and a Jewish Diaspora would coexist. According to his plan, all the Jews who wish to remain Jews would immigrate to their state. The Jews who prefer to live outside the state would stop being Jews and be absorbed into their host nations, finally becoming real Germans, Britons and Frenchmen. The vision of the ‘Visionary of the State’ (as he is officially designated in Israel) was supposed, when put into practice, to bring about the disappearance of the Jewish Diaspora … David Ben-Gurion was a partner to this vision. He stated that a Jew who does not immigrate to Israel is not a Zionist and should not enjoy any rights in Israel, except the right to immigrate there. He demanded the dismantling of the Zionist organization, seeing in it only the ‘scaffolding’ for building the state. Once the state has been set up, he thought quite rightly, the scaffolding should be discarded”.

OK, for what that’s worth. Now, Avnery turns back to Netanyahu, and writes that: “Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’ is ridiculous, even as a tactic for preventing peace. A state recognizes a state, not its ideology or political regime. Nobody recognizes Saudi Arabia, the homeland of the Hajj, as ‘the State of the Muslim Umma’ (the community of believers.) Moreover, the demand puts the Jews all over the world in an impossible position. If the Palestinians have to recognize Israel as ‘the State of the Jewish People’, then all the governments in the world must do the same. The United States, for example. That means that the Jewish US citizens Rahm Emmanuel and David Axelrod, Obama’s closest advisors, are officially represented by the government of Israel. The same goes for the Jews in Russia, the UK and France. Even if Mahmoud Abbas were persuaded to accept this demand – and thereby indirectly put in doubt the citizenship of a million and a half Arabs in Israel – I would oppose this strenuously. More than that, I would consider it an unfriendly act”.

Now, it’s important to note that the Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel are prime movers behind the Palestinian Authority’s refusal to make a calm, rational consideration of this demand, which has been made by the last two Israeli governments — once before the start of the Annapolis process, in November 2007, and now again recently.

Advice, like Avnery’s, from the Israeli “left” (which has a scattered and varied criticism of the demand, and multiple positions of their own), has most probably only bolstered and reinforced this rigid PA position. But it is far from clear that the interests of the Israeli Arabs coincide with the interests of those Palestinians who will only have the choice of being citizens of some future Palestinian state.

The PA has chosen to support the Israeli Arab position, as a purely political calculation — whether as payback, or as a deposit on some future reciprocal support (or both). However, this political calculation has only let Palestinians (in the West Bank and Gaza at least) off the hook. They haven’t needed to take the time to reflect on what this really might imply for them.

And, if they really were afraid that recognition of Israel’s “Jewishness” in one or another forms would result in either immediate ethnic cleansing (expulsion en masse of Israel’s Arab citizens as well as Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem), as well as of total barring of the return of any or all Palestinian refugees, they could have asked for guarantees from the international community that it would not happen. And they would have gotten such guarantees, which would be worth a lot more than the puffed-up pride they have now in being stubborn and resisting a critical examination of the demand

In any case, Avnery wrote that “The character of the State of Israel must be decided by the citizens of Israel (who hold a wide range of opinions about this matter). Pending before the Israeli courts is an application by dozens of Israeli patriots, including myself, who demand that the state recognize the ‘Israeli nation’. We request the court to instruct the government to register us in the official Population Registration, under the heading ‘nation’, as Israelis. The government refuses adamantly and insists that our nation is Jewish. I ask Mahmoud Abbas, Obama and everyone else who is not an Israeli citizen not to interfere in this domestic debate. Netanyahu knows, of course, that nobody will take his demand seriously. It is quite obviously just another device to avoid serious peace negotiations. If he is compelled to drop it, it will not be long before he comes up with another” …

Along the lines of Avnery’s argument, the Palestinian editor and co-Chairman of IPCRI (the Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information) Hanna Siniora proposed the following formula, and asked for reaction: “What about this: Israel is for the Israelis — and in this way we do not disenfranchise miniorities. How do you receive that formula?”

Siniora was speaking in answer to a question from an Israeli (in the audience at IPCRI’s 27 April discussion of the marked expansion in Israeli settlements in the West Bank since the start of the Annapolis process in November 2007) about PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ statement that he would refuse to recognize Israel as a Jewish State. The Israeli questioner did not respond.

Earlier on the same day, 27 April, the Foreign Press Association (FPA) in Israel held its annual General Membership meeting at the King David Hotel in West Jerusalem, and invited Palestinian negotiator Sa’eb Erekat to address the group after the business of hearing the treasurer’s report and the election of a new committee was over. One of the journalists asked Erekat, “What is the problem in accepting Israel as a Jewish State”.

Erekat was, in fact, prepared for the question. “Israel can call itself anything it wants … but when you signed the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, you did not put this as a precondition”.

Then, Erekat pulled out one (1) copy of a letter which he said was a reply from U.S. President Truman to a group of American Jewish leaders who had written, Erekat said, on 14 May 1948 (the eve of — or with the time difference, perhaps even after the proclamation of the State of Israel which happened at midnight) asking that the U.S. should accept Israel, Erekat said, apparently correcting himself as he spoke, as “the state of the Jewish people, or as the Jewish state”.

According to Erekat, the American Jewish leaders proposed this formula: “The U.S. recognizes the provisional government as the de facto government of the new Jewish State.”

But what happened, again according to Erekat, was that President Truman crossed out the words,
“the new Jewish State”, and replaced them with the words, “the State of Israel”.

That’s it, Erekat said, proof that even the United States did not recognize Israel as a “Jewish State”. To conclude his argument, Erekat, said: “Check the UN Charter, and see if the Vatican is recognized as a Catholic State”.

Well, first of all, the Vatican is represented by an observer delegation in the United Nations, and it has not been admitted to membership, so it’s identity has not been subject to any agreement or approval, as happens when states are admitted as full UN members.

And, second of all, it seemed to me that all Harry Truman was doing when he crossed out one phrase and replaced it with another, “the State of Israel”, was correcting the identification of the new entity as it was announced.

A couple of years ago, Uri Avnery, writing on this subject, said that what the name of the State of Israel would be, was not known in advance. In fact, it was not known until right up to the actual announcement.

The New York Times’ Isabelle Kershner, who was present at the FPA meeting, managed to get a look at the actual letter that Erekat gave to the outgoing chairman (Steve Gutkin of AP), and she later also took issue with Erekat’s argument [despite the very chummy "Hi Isabelle" that Erekat said when she asked a question on another subject at the FPA briefing ].

In a piece that had a few non-sequitors in its editing, Isabelle wrote that “Palestinian negotiators have refused to recognize Israel’s Jewish character in the past, contending that it would negate the Palestinian refugees’ demand for the right to return to their former homes and would be detrimental to the status of Israel’s Arab citizens, who make up a fifth of the population. In an attempt to bolster the Palestinian argument, Mr. Erekat on Monday produced a copy of a letter signed by President Harry Truman on May 14, 1948. In its original form, it recognizes the provisional government of the new Jewish state, but the typed words ‘Jewish state’ in the second paragraph have been crossed out and replaced with the handwritten words ‘State of Israel’.
Shlomo Avineri, a professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said Mr. Erekat was misinterpreting the American president’s intention. According to Mr. Avineri, the Truman letter had been prepared hours before Israel declared its independence, before the new country had chosen its name. It was later corrected by a Truman adviser, Clark Clifford, after the declaration of independence to call the country by its name, not to refute its Jewish character, Mr. Avineri said”. This article can be read in full here.

“…[T]his month, three generations since 1948, since your Nakba, this is what I ask you to consider:

“Your time is running out.

“If you do not begin to act with all of your wisdom in moving toward statehood, you run the risk of becoming the Kurds of the Mediterranean basin, the Native Americans of the Middle East, permanently stateless, eternally denied.

“If you do not begin to rethink the course which the Palestinian national movement has taken, you must begin to consider the idea of a world without a Palestine. The world is beginning to feel more and more comfortable with that possibility, and it is time for you to think hard about the reasons why.

“We in the post-modern West have spent years educating ourselves to believe that all cultures are equally valid – with the possible exception, of course, of our own. We have taken it on faith that to criticize the culture of an indigenous people is obscenely imperialist, paternalist.

“In short, we gave you a pass. And we encouraged you to give yourselves one. In respecting you for your steadfastness, we refrained from calling you on your passivity. In accepting and amplifying your contentions as to Israel’s acts of wrongdoing, we chose not to hold you accountable for your own, or to explain them away as a function of occupation.

“You learned, over time, to hold Israel responsible for the whole of your plight. You learned, over time, to ignore, explain away, blame entirely on Israel, or otherwise deny the ways in which your actions and, in particular, your passivity, have deepened and fostered your misery. You learned to excuse your leaders their corruption, and their policy of foiling Israeli and foreign attempts to improve your conditions. You learned to excuse your Arab brothers their duplicity and their lip service and their exploitation and their cold shoulder and their contempt and their consummate failure to come to your aid.

“In the process, you may have grown accustomed to a definition of time, and of indigenous peoples, that bears re-examination. There is, first of all, this:

“The Jews are an indigenous people here, no less than you.

“The Jews have every right to have a nation here, no less than you.

“The Jews are stubborn and proud and fundamentally fierce as hell, no less than you.

“You have dismissed the Jews as a foreign influence. You have dismissed their history, waved away their blood and sinew tie to Jerusalem, acted as though they have no business here but evil.

“But in the decades you have spent misleading yourself about the true nature of the culture and the origins of the Jews, generation upon generation of Jews has been born here. They are natives. They are not going anywhere. And even the leftists among them are willing to die in defense of staying on this soil…”

The full Bradley Burston column published today, entitled The Palestinians’ Time is Running Out, can be read here .

Rabbi Hartman wrote: “While most Jews – but not all – clearly define Israel as a Jewish state, not every Israeli does. To ask a Muslim or Christian who is an Israeli citizen to regard himself as a citizen of a Jewish state is to expect him to declare himself a perennial outsider within his own country. It is perfectly legitimate, and even crucial, that Israeli Jews define Israel as a Jewish state. In the Jewish understanding of the rebirth of the State of Israel, we have returned to the Land of Israel to create a sovereign Jewish state; in our understanding, the Jewish national narrative is of necessity the majority narrative here. But to assume non-Jews – equal citizens of the State of Israel by virtue of the democratic principles at the basis of Israel’s self-understanding – feel the same way as Jews is not only unreasonable, it is nonsensical. To expect that a non-Jew will accept a Jewish national identity is to fail to recognize the complexity of the multicultural reality that is the modern State of Israel. We have made this mistake since 1948; while witnesses to the growth of the Palestinian minority in our midst, we have failed to come up with a category to accommodate their distinct Israeli identity. In relegating them to the status of perennial strangers in a Jewish state, we make it supremely difficult for this people to feel a duty of loyalty to Israel or any sense of equality living in it … There must be a Jewish narrative and a broader Israeli narrative that creates a collective space with bonds of loyalty toward citizens of the State of Israel who are either non-Jews or for whom the state’s Jewishness is not the central feature of their national self-understanding. The impoverished condition of the current political discussion on this issue assumes that anyone who relinquishes an exclusive claim to a Jewish narrative is a post or anti-Zionist. Many Jews fear that by surrendering the exclusivity of the Jewish claim to Israel they facilitate the destruction of the Jewish state. This, I believe, is a mistake. Multicultural states, of which Israel is but one example, require multiple national narratives to enable their different populations to participate. It does not require particular cultures to forfeit their own national self-understanding, but to give up the claim to define others’ collective identity … With respect to the peace negotiations now underway, it is both unnecessary and unreasonable to require the Palestinian people to accept Israel as a Jewish state. It is critical that they recognize Israel as an independent state against which they have no territorial demands or aspirations” …
This commentary was published in Haaretz today here.

The Palestine Liberation Organization’s late leader, Yasser Arafat, proclaimed a Palestinian State in 1988 on the basis of UN General Assembly Resolution 181, which stated that the British Mandate of Palestine should be divided into two parts, one Jewish and one Arab.

The JPost says that “A senior official in the Prime Minister’s Office said in response that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert insists that the Palestinians recognize Israel’s Jewish identity, as a condition for Israeli recognition of a Palestinian state … Meanwhile, Olmert told the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that the peace conference scheduled to take place in Annapolis in late November would last for a single day. The conference, the prime minister said, would serve to launch negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, and be a one-time event geared towards gaining international support for the talks”.

The JPost report is here.

Haaretz is reporting that Olmert said Monday: “We won’t hold negotiations on our existence as a Jewish state, this is a launching point for all negotiations … We won’t have an argument with anyone in the world over the fact that Israel is a state of the Jewish people. Whoever does not accept this cannot hold any negotiations with me. This has been made clear to the Palestinians and the Americans. I have no doubt that Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas] and [PA premier Salam] Fayad are committed to prior agreements and want to make peace with Israel as a Jewish state,” Olmert continued … Olmert told the gathering that immediately at the start of negotiations following the summit, Israel will set a precondition that the Palestinians recognize Israel as ‘a Jewish state’. ‘I do not intend to compromise in any way over the issue of the Jewish state’, Olmert said, thereby accepting the position of Livni and Barak. ‘This will be a condition for our recognition of a Palestinian state’. Olmert said he raised the importance of this issue during his talks with European and American officials, and their response had been positive. However, during talks in recent weeks between the Israeli and Palestinian negotiating teams, the Palestinians refused to include the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state in the shared declaration the teams are preparing, which will be made at Annapolis. Erekat’s statement to Israel Radio on Monday did not seem to imply that refusal would waver ahead of the summit…” The Haaretz account of Erekat’s and Olmert’s remarks on recognition of Israel as a Jewish state are here.

There are already 557 comments on Erekat’s remarks posted on the Haaretz website.

The GPO summary reports that Maariv argues, in its editorial today, that: “The heart of the problem is that the Arab countries and the Palestinians (as well as some Israeli Jews) are not – in any way – prepared to recognize the State of Israel as a Jewish state, as the State of the Jewish People” … for three reasons: “The first is ideological-psychological – the unwillingness to countenance the existence of a Jewish state within the Arab-Islamic world … The second reason has to do with the Palestinian refugees of 1948 – recognizing the Jewish state basically means conceding the right of these refugees to return to Israel … The third reason is the Israeli Arabs…whose leaders openly declare that they absolutely do not recognize Israel as a Jewish state.”

According to the summary translation, Maariv states in its editorial that “The Annapolis conference must be a test for the Palestinians and the Arab countries: Are they prepared for a simple call for the vision of two states – for the Jewish people and for the Palestinian people or do they oppose this? This is the elementary basis for any structure of peace, for any future discussion.”