Jerusalem – Over a seven-decade career in politics, Shimon Peres has helped guide Israel through wars and existential threats. But now, with the country embroiled in a new wave of violence, the 92-year-old elder statesman worries that if its leaders do not get serious about pursuing peace with the Palestinians, it will be in an eternal state of war and risk losing its Jewish majority.
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In an interview with The Associated Press on Monday, the former president stopped short of directly criticizing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But he also made no secret that the values he and the assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin inherited from Israel’s founding father, David Ben-Gurion, were in jeopardy.
“Better to have a Jewish state on part of the land than have the whole land without the Jewish state,” he said. “Israel should implement the two-state solution for her own sake because if we should lose our majority, and today we are almost equal, we cannot remain a Jewish state or a democratic state.
“That’s the main issue, and to my regret they (the government) do the opposite.”
Peres negotiated the first interim peace accord with the Palestinians in 1993, known as the Oslo Accords, which set into motion a partition plan that gave the Palestinians limited self-rule. But after a fateful six-month period in 1995-96 that included Rabin’s assassination, a spate of Palestinian suicide bombings and Peres’ own election loss to Netanyahu, the prospects for peace began to evaporate.
Today, senior members of Netanyahu’s hard-line government have declared Oslo dead, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas irrelevant and a Palestinian state nothing but a dangerous fantasy.
Netanyahu only begrudgingly accepted the concept of a Palestinian state in 2009. But he never appeared to fully embrace it and has since distanced himself from the comments.
Netanyahu accuses Abbas of inciting a current six-week wave of Palestinian attacks and just recently said Israel had to accept that peace is unlikely and continue living “by the sword.”
Those comments clearly rankled Peres, who had previously negotiated on Netanyahu’s behalf with Abbas and still considers the Palestinian leader Israel’s best potential partner for peace.
“The alternative to two states is a continued war and nobody can maintain a war forever. If you say we should live on our sword don’t forget that there are other swords as well,” he said.
Peres said that Netanyahu’s peace overtures have never “escaped the domain of talking.”
“A politician and a government should be judged by one way only, on the record of what you do or did, not on what you say,” he said.
Peres has filled nearly every position in Israeli public life since he became the director general of the Defense Ministry at the age of 25 and spearheaded the development of Israel’s nuclear program. A protégé of Ben-Gurion, Peres was first elected to parliament in 1959.
He has since held every major Cabinet post — including defense, finance and foreign affairs — and served three brief stints as prime minister. His key role in the first Israeli-Palestinian peace accord earned him a Nobel Peace Prize — along with Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat — and stature abroad as a revered statesman.
Since finishing his seven-year term as president last summer, Peres has continued promoting peace and development in the Middle East through his non-governmental Peres Peace Center.
A self-described eternal optimist, Peres says he doesn’t like to think of the past, calling it a “waste of time.”
But on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Rabin’s killing by an ultra-nationalist Jewish extremist opposed to his peace efforts, he candidly recalled the night that many see as a turning point in Israeli history.
He said the massive peace rally in Tel Aviv on Nov. 4, 1995 was the happiest day in Rabin’s life and the best moment in their decades-long tortured rivalry. “We were in a total agreement and really we were encouraged,” he said.
He said moments before they were set to leave the stage together in a show of unity, Israel’s Shin Bet security agency informed them of a threat to both their lives — from an Arab, not a Jew. Peres descended the stairs ahead of Rabin and stood in front of the open door of his car when the three deadly shots rang out. His security guards shoved him into the vehicle and whisked him away.
At the hospital, doctors informed Peres that Rabin had died and he broke the news to Rabin’s widow, Leah. Then they both saw the body and he kissed Rabin on the forehead.
“His face was happy, like a man who finally got complete rest,” he said. “I am sure that if he were alive he would have made peace with the Palestinians as well.”
As an armchair politician, I cannot compare my credentials with his. But I have been observing the Muslim nations and clans. The entire idea of a two state solution sounds great on paper, and certainly qualifies as politically correct. However, it is an impossibility. The Muslims here are savages, uncivilized, bloodthirsty, and completely disorganized. There is no limit to the concessions they can be given. They will never, ever stop their mission of terror. It is in their genes. The greatest diplomats cannot overcome that. The only way to limit the bloody terror they are so addicted to is to deprive them of the means. No weapons, no traffic through Jewish areas, no land they can use to launch their violence and mayhem. To H*** with the UN, the EU, the WH, and anyone else who wishes to grant legitimacy to cast a label of humanity on these animals. Now, this statement is not popular, and would be banned by all these entities. But it is true. The world has tried to legitimize these predator animals, but it has never resulted in civility, only more violence, terror, and blood. I won’t get sucked into the political correctness. That would be fatal.
A self-described eternal optimist, Peres says he doesn’t like to think of the past, calling it a “waste of time.”
Those who fail to learn from past mistakes are doomed to repeat them.
Peres is lucky the Liberal European clan that has ruled the state since it was founded, still has a tight grip on its “Justice” and media system, Under a different scenario, he and his henchmen, would face a firing squad , for their callousness in negotiating a volatile agreement with career terrorists, They have plunged Israel into a dreadful terror stricken country, while installing politcal entities in Gaza and the West Bank, that are bent on eradicating Israel alltogether,
The solution to the problem is not one Peres likes. As a matter of fact, he will fight it tooth and nail if he was able.
As soon as the religious dati population is able to elect a prime minister who is willing to say openly to the Arabs “We own this land as a G-d given gift. All of it! Har Habayis included!” and say it as a religious conviction, then the Arabs will know they have not a chance and will fade away to other destinations. Religious fervor is something they understand. As long as the ruling parties are secular, they feel they have a chance.
This is why they are so upset with the dati visits to Har Habayis, and forbid prayer. They know we will daven for the return of the Bais Hamikdash. They know that Jews have the power of prayer. They know that G-d listens to our prayers. And they are afraid of that. So is Peres.
The solution is therefore to make their worst nightmares come true.
Thank Gd this shoteh is out of office. He’s responsible for much weakness, confusion and disrespect to the Jewish state.
Peres needs to be quiet already. It’s past time. He and Rabin are the reason the Palis have gotten such big eyes to take the entire land of israel!
There is so much shmad (and lies) in this one article that it’s hard to know where to start.
What’s interesting, however, is that Mr. Perski (Peres) has finally admitted that having a State of Israel means war without end, which individual Zionists still can’t bring themselves to admit.
BH all the followers of DBG are fading away
Their ideas are socialist/leftist/liberal ” wishful” thinking in a prehistoric world,but not in today’s reality where the Arabs only want death-to- Israel and want to take over even though they lost 3 wars.