If Obama Said It....

There is something wrong with American foreign policy and the domestic opinion that shapes it when the “Israeli vice prime minister, career military man Shaul Mofaz” can be more bold in his prescription for peace in the Middle East than the United States President. Imagine the reaction from the Christian Zionists and their “yes men” in Congress if Obama were the subject of this report, not Mofaz.

What keeps him awake at night is Israel’s drawn-out conflict with the Palestinians and the prospect that it could cause the demise of the Jewish state if Arabs eventually outnumber Jews in Israel. “Time is not in favor of the state of Israel…The generation of the leaders today should decide. This year, next year — we have to decide.”…He said he will pitch…a peace plan that he unveiled in 2009 and that is his alone — not one endorsed by the Netanyahu-led government. It envisions an interim Palestinian state with temporary borders on 60 percent of the West Bank and continued negotiations. It would end with Israel keeping the main Jewish settlement blocks, the evacuation of almost 100,000 Israeli settlers outside those and land swaps giving Palestinians 100 percent of the territory they demand…he also echoes several former security officials who have deemed the push by Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak for military action as reckless or, in the words of one, “messianic.”

Mofaz has been quoted as calling the idea of an Israeli attack on Iran “disastrous.”…As turmoil and uncertainty pulsate through the Middle East, Israel’s strategy has been to hunker down and wait. Mofaz, however, said he believes “tectonic change” in the region is the precise reason to make peace with the Palestinians.

“If we are able to achieve these two issues,” Mofaz said, referring to a temporary deal on borders and security, “I am certain that the relationship with the Palestinians and with other Arab states, including the Arab League, will be changed. The atmosphere will be changed.”