Avigdor Lieberman, who Thursday emerged as the most likely candidate to replace Tzipi Livni as Israel's foreign minister, intends to demand that Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu grants him "full autonomy" in the new post, Haaretz has learned. Lieberman, who heads the country's third largest party, Yisrael Beiteinu, met with prime minister-designate Netanyahu Thursday at the Knesset. Neither party leader divulged information about the meeting or the issues discussed. However, a source involved in talks between Yisrael Beiteinu and Likud said that "Lieberman wants to make sure that Netanyahu doesn't let another minister receive tasks that belong to the Foreign Ministry." The source indicated that Lieberman is interested in establishing sole and independent responsibility in Netanyahu's future government over Foreign Ministry-related affairs, and will strive to have a clause to that effect incorporated into the coalition agreement between Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu. "Lieberman wants to ensure that Netanyahu doesn't let Silvan Shalom handle negotiations with Syria in order to placate Shalom," the source said. Shalom, a former foreign minister for Likud, is rumored to be highly interested in returning to his old post. A laconic announcement released after the meeting said that the two strongest men in Israeli politics discussed "security and defense issues, and above all the need to pass the national budget for the years 2009 and 2010 in light of the financial crisis." According to the announcement, the allotment of government portfolios "will be discussed at a later time." The announcement also noted that "the two parties do not believe this issue will be an obstacle." Relations between Lieberman and Netanyahu have reportedly become tenser than usual following Netanyahu's talks with Labor chairman Ehud Barak over Barak's possible inclusion in a future government. Labor has a nucleus of prominent members who said they will not accept their party's entry into a coalition with Lieberman, whom they accuse of racism against Arab Israelis. Lieberman, for his part, was reportedly offended by Netanyahu's attempts to reach a deal with Barak. But prominent Labor members have harshly criticized Barak over the negotiations, saying Netanyahu's regional vision does not match Labor's. With Kadima heading for the opposition benches and Labor's hard core leaning in the same direction, Lieberman is a crucial partner for Netanyahu if he is to form a coalition, as he was instructed to do by President Shimon Peres following the February 10 elections. Peres entrusted Netanyahu with the task instead of Kadima's Livni, based on a recommendation by Lieberman, whose party clinched 15 seats in parliament.
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By: Amira Hass
Date: 27/05/2013
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Slain Bedouin girls' mother, a victim of Israeli-Palestinian bureaucracy
Abir Dandis, the mother of the two girls who were murdered in the Negev town of Al-Fura’a last week, couldn't find a police officer to listen to her warnings, neither in Arad nor in Ma’ale Adumim. Both police stations operate in areas where Israel wants to gather the Bedouin into permanent communities, against their will, in order to clear more land for Jewish communities. The dismissive treatment Dandis received shows how the Bedouin are considered simply to be lawbreakers by their very nature. But as a resident of the West Bank asking for help for her daughters, whose father was Israeli, Dandis faced the legal-bureaucratic maze created by the Oslo Accords. The Palestinian police is not allowed to arrest Israeli civilians. It must hand suspects over to the Israel Police. The Palestinian police complain that in cases of Israelis suspected of committing crimes against Palestinian residents, the Israel Police tend not to investigate or prosecute them. In addition, the town of Al-Azaria, where Dandis lives, is in Area B, under Palestinian civilian authority and Israeli security authority. According to the testimony of Palestinian residents, neither the IDF nor the Israel Police has any interest in internal Palestinian crime even though they have both the authority and the obligation to act in Area B. The Palestinian police are limited in what it can do in Area B. Bringing in reinforcements or carrying weapons in emergency situations requires coordination with, and obtaining permission from, the IDF. If Dandis fears that the man who murdered her daughters is going to attack her as well, she has plenty of reason to fear that she will not receive appropriate, immediate police protection from either the Israelis or the Palestinians. Dandis told Jack Khoury of Haaretz that the Ma’ale Adumim police referred her to the Palestinian Civil Affairs Coordination and Liaison Committee. Theoretically, this committee (which is subordinate to the Civil Affairs Ministry) is the logical place to go for such matters. Its parallel agency in Israel is the Civilian Liaison Committee (which is part of the Coordination and Liaison Administration - a part of the Civil Administration under the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories). In their meetings, they are supposed to discuss matters such as settlers’ complaints about the high volume of the loudspeakers at mosques or Palestinians’ complaints about attacks by settlers. But the Palestinians see the Liaison Committee as a place to submit requests for permission to travel to Israel, and get the impression that its clerks do not have much power when faced with their Israeli counterparts. In any case, the coordination process is cumbersome and long. The Palestinian police has a family welfare unit, and activists in Palestinian women’s organizations say that in recent years, its performance has improved. But, as stated, it has no authority over Israeli civilians and residents. Several non-governmental women’s groups also operate in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and women in similar situations approach them for help. The manager of one such organization told Haaretz that Dandis also fell victim to this confusing duplication of procedures and laws. Had Dandis approached her, she said, she would have referred her to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which has expertise in navigating Israel’s laws and authorities.
By: Phoebe Greenwood
Date: 27/05/2013
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John Kerry unveils plan to boost Palestinian economy
John Kerry revealed his long-awaited plan for peace in the Middle East on Sunday, hinging on a $4bn (£2.6bn) investment in the Palestinian private sector. The US secretary of state, speaking at the World Economic Forum on the Jordanian shores of the Dead Sea, told an audience including Israeli president Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas that an independent Palestinian economy is essential to achieving a sustainable peace. Speaking under the conference banner "Breaking the Impasse", Kerry announced a plan that he promised would be "bigger, bolder and more ambitious" than anything since the Oslo accords, more than 20 years ago. Tony Blair is to lead a group of private sector leaders in devising a plan to release the Palestinian economy from its dependence on international donors. The initial findings of Blair's taskforce, Kerry boasted, were "stunning", predicting a 50% increase in Palestinian GDP over three years, a cut of two-thirds in unemployment rates and almost double the Palestinian median wage. Currently, 40% of the Palestinian economy is supplied by donor aid. Kerry assured Abbas that the economic plan was not a substitute for a political solution, which remains the US's "top priority". Peres, who had taken the stage just minutes before, also issued a personal plea to his Palestinian counterpart to return to the negotiations. "Let me say to my dear friend President Abbas," Peres said, "Should we really dance around the table? Lets sit together. You'll be surprised how much can be achieved in open, direct and organised meetings."
By: Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
Date: 27/05/2013
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Isolation Devastates East Jerusalem Economy
Thick locks hug the front gates of shuttered shops, now covered in graffiti and dust from lack of use. Only a handful of customers pass along the dimly lit road, sometimes stopping to check the ripeness of fruits and vegetables, or ordering meat in near-empty butcher shops. “All the shops are closed. I’m the only one open. This used to be the best place,” said 64-year-old Mustafa Sunocret, selling vegetables out of a small storefront in the marketplace near his family’s home in the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City. Amidst the brightly coloured scarves, clothes and carpets, ceramic pottery and religious souvenirs filling the shops of Jerusalem’s historic Old City, Palestinian merchants are struggling to keep their businesses alive. Faced with worsening health problems, Sunocret told IPS that he cannot work outside of the Old City, even as the cost of maintaining his shop, with high electricity, water and municipal tax bills to pay, weighs on him. “I only have this shop,” he said. “There is no other work. I’m tired.” Abed Ajloni, the owner of an antiques shop in the Old City, owes the Jerusalem municipality 250,000 Israeli shekels (68,300 U.S. dollars) in taxes. He told IPS that almost every day, the city’s tax collectors come into the Old City, accompanied by Israeli police and soldiers, to pressure people there to pay. “It feels like they’re coming again to occupy the city, with the soldiers and police,” Ajloni, who has owned the same shop for 35 years, told IPS. “But where can I go? What can I do? All my life I was in this place.” He added, “Does Jerusalem belong to us, or to someone else? Who’s responsible for Jerusalem? Who?” Illegal annexation Israel occupied East Jerusalem, including the Old City, in 1967. In July 1980, it passed a law stating that “Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel”. But Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem and subsequent application of Israeli laws over the entire city remain unrecognised by the international community. Under international law, East Jerusalem is considered occupied territory – along with the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Syrian Golan Heights – and Palestinian residents of the city are protected under the Fourth Geneva Convention. Jerusalem has historically been the economic, political and cultural centre of life for the entire Palestinian population. But after decades languishing under destructive Israeli policies meant to isolate the city from the rest of the Occupied Territories and a lack of municipal services and investment, East Jerusalem has slipped into a state of poverty and neglect. “After some 45 years of occupation, Arab Jerusalemites suffer from political and cultural schizophrenia, simultaneously connected with and isolated from their two hinterlands: Ramallah and the West Bank to their east, West Jerusalem and Israel to the west,” the International Crisis Group recently wrote. Israeli restrictions on planning and building, home demolitions, lack of investment in education and jobs, construction of an eight-foot-high separation barrier between and around Palestinian neighbourhoods and the creation of a permit system to enter Jerusalem have all contributed to the city’s isolation. Formal Palestinian political groups have also been banned from the city, and between 2001-2009, Israel closed an estimated 26 organisations, including the former Palestinian Liberation Organisation headquarters in Jerusalem, the Orient House and the Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce. Extreme poverty Israel’s policies have also led to higher prices for basic goods and services and forced many Palestinian business owners to close shop and move to Ramallah or other Palestinian neighbourhoods on the other side of the wall. Many Palestinian Jerusalemites also prefer to do their shopping in the West Bank, or in West Jerusalem, where prices are lower. While Palestinians constitute 39 percent of the city’s population today, almost 80 percent of East Jerusalem residents, including 85 percent of children, live below the poverty line. “How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t control your resources? How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t have any control of your borders?” said Zakaria Odeh, director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, of “this kind of fragmentation, checkpoints, closure”. “Without freedom of movement of goods and human beings, how could you develop an economy?” he asked. “You can’t talk about independent economy in Jerusalem or the West Bank or in all of Palestine without a political solution. We don’t have a Palestinian economy; we have economic activities. That’s all we have,” Odeh told IPS. Israel’s separation barrier alone, according to a new report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTD), has caused a direct loss of over one billion dollars to Palestinians in Jerusalem, and continues to incur 200 million dollars per year in lost opportunities. Israel’s severing and control over the Jerusalem-Jericho road – the historical trade route that connected Jerusalem to the rest of the West Bank and Middle East – has also contributed to the city’s economic downturn. Separation of Jerusalem from West Bank Before the First Intifada (Arabic for “uprising”) began in the late 1980s, East Jerusalem contributed approximately 14 to 15 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the Occupied Palestinian territories (OPT). By 2000, that number had dropped to less than eight percent; in 2010, the East Jerusalem economy, compared to the rest of the OPT, was estimated at only seven percent. “Economic separation resulted in the contraction in the relative size of the East Jerusalem economy, its detachment from the remaining OPT and the gradual redirection of East Jerusalem employment towards the Israeli labour market,” the U.N. report found. Decades ago, Israel adopted a policy to maintain a so-called “demographic balance” in Jerusalem and attempt to limit Palestinian residents of the city to 26.5 percent or less of the total population. To maintain this composition, Israel built numerous Jewish-Israeli settlements inside and in a ring around Jerusalem and changed the municipal boundaries to encompass Jewish neighbourhoods while excluding Palestinian ones. It is now estimated that 90,000 Palestinians holding Jerusalem residency rights live on the other side of the separation barrier and must cross through Israeli checkpoints in order to reach Jerusalem for school, medical treatment, work, and other services. “Israel is using all kinds of tools to push the Palestinians to leave; sometimes they are visible, and sometimes invisible tools,” explained Ziad al-Hammouri, director of the Jerusalem Centre for Social and Economic Rights (JCSER). Al-Hammouri told IPS that at least 25 percent of the 1,000 Palestinian shops in the Old City were closed in recent years as a result of high municipal taxes and a lack of customers. “Taxation is an invisible tool…as dangerous as revoking ID cards and demolishing houses,” he said. “Israel will use this as pressure and as a tool in the future to confiscate these shops and properties.”
By the Same Author
Date: 07/03/2009
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Lieberman Demanding 'Full Autonomy' as Foreign Minister
Avigdor Lieberman, who Thursday emerged as the most likely candidate to replace Tzipi Livni as Israel's foreign minister, intends to demand that Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu grants him "full autonomy" in the new post, Haaretz has learned. Lieberman, who heads the country's third largest party, Yisrael Beiteinu, met with prime minister-designate Netanyahu Thursday at the Knesset. Neither party leader divulged information about the meeting or the issues discussed. However, a source involved in talks between Yisrael Beiteinu and Likud said that "Lieberman wants to make sure that Netanyahu doesn't let another minister receive tasks that belong to the Foreign Ministry." The source indicated that Lieberman is interested in establishing sole and independent responsibility in Netanyahu's future government over Foreign Ministry-related affairs, and will strive to have a clause to that effect incorporated into the coalition agreement between Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu. "Lieberman wants to ensure that Netanyahu doesn't let Silvan Shalom handle negotiations with Syria in order to placate Shalom," the source said. Shalom, a former foreign minister for Likud, is rumored to be highly interested in returning to his old post. A laconic announcement released after the meeting said that the two strongest men in Israeli politics discussed "security and defense issues, and above all the need to pass the national budget for the years 2009 and 2010 in light of the financial crisis." According to the announcement, the allotment of government portfolios "will be discussed at a later time." The announcement also noted that "the two parties do not believe this issue will be an obstacle." Relations between Lieberman and Netanyahu have reportedly become tenser than usual following Netanyahu's talks with Labor chairman Ehud Barak over Barak's possible inclusion in a future government. Labor has a nucleus of prominent members who said they will not accept their party's entry into a coalition with Lieberman, whom they accuse of racism against Arab Israelis. Lieberman, for his part, was reportedly offended by Netanyahu's attempts to reach a deal with Barak. But prominent Labor members have harshly criticized Barak over the negotiations, saying Netanyahu's regional vision does not match Labor's. With Kadima heading for the opposition benches and Labor's hard core leaning in the same direction, Lieberman is a crucial partner for Netanyahu if he is to form a coalition, as he was instructed to do by President Shimon Peres following the February 10 elections. Peres entrusted Netanyahu with the task instead of Kadima's Livni, based on a recommendation by Lieberman, whose party clinched 15 seats in parliament.
Date: 27/09/2007
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Talk to him
"Marwan Barghouti is, in my opinion, the next leader of the Palestinians. I say there is no need to be alarmed, and that it is possible to talk about the possibility of releasing him. I would consider it. In my opinion, this move is legitimate, even though this person has been convicted of charges that are very grave and I don't make light of them." This surprising opinion is expressed in an interview with Haaretz by none other than Minister of National Infrastructure Benjamin Ben-Eliezer: the man whose worldview is planted deep in the concept of security; who as defense minister at the height of the Al Aqsa intifada promoted the doctrine of targeted assassinations. Although he has not yet called Barghouti "the Palestinian Nelson Mandela," as Uri Avneri has, he does single him out as a relevant partner for a breakthrough in the peace process. Of all people, Barghouti, who has been imprisoned in Israel since April 2002, and is serving five life sentences on charges of murdering Israelis in a series of terror attacks he ordered in his capacity as head of the Tanzim in the West Bank. "There is a kind of psychological repugnance among us when it comes to talking about Barghouti," says Ben-Eliezer. "I don't have any psychological repugnance of that sort. What I find repugnant is the future we are creating for our children. It is necessary to talk about everything and to examine everything, and to see what is good for the state of Israel. I'm looking above all for security. And if talking with Barghouti results in him leading the Palestinians in the direction of making Hamas knuckle under, then that is what counts." Despite - or perhaps even because of - the timing (ahead of the peace conference in Washington, when Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is declaring that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) is a partner, Ben-Eliezer is trying to offer a different look at the Palestinian leadership. From his cell in Hadarim Prison, Barghouti influences everything that goes on in the PA, including the Washington summit, he says. "In my opinion, there is a triangle here, whether or not we like to talk about it, that includes Abu Mazen, Salam Fayyad and Marwan Barghouti. This is a triangle as far as we are concerned. No one should think that anything can happen without Barghouti." When Ben-Eliezer, a senior member of the innermost foreign policy/security cabinet (which includes right-wingers Avigdor Lieberman and Eli Yishai) expresses an opinion that until now was heard only from the extreme left of the political system, his statements merit special attention. "Barghouti, in my best estimation, is in fact the tough side of the triangle that wins a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of respect, not only because of the fact that he is in prison, but rather because of, as jargon has it, 'he is the cleanest of them all.' But you have to remember that we are also talking about a leader, who, even when he is a prisoner, should not be not be scorned and should be listened to. He is also the only leader for whom Hamas maintains a great deal of respect and I daresay there is even some awe of him in Hamas." So Barghouti is our hope? "I know that it is very hard to say these things. But precisely as a security person, I am saying that we must look 10 years ahead. We must make an accounting of how much longer we will continue to keep our children in a situation of 50 days of reserve duty a year, and until when we will be investing everything we have in the issue of security. If we spoke to Yasser Arafat, who is considered the greatest murderer of Israel, we have to look at Barghouti attentively, even when he is a prisoner. And we have to see how we hold a dialogue with him and how we find the opening through which the peace process will also occur. We aren't dismissing anything." Reckoning of conscience This past year, which was marked by Lebanon War II and the Qassams from Gaza, Ben- Eliezer sees as a formative one - a year of reckoning of conscience, in the context of which he has no hesitation about admitting that the disengagement, which he supported as a minister in Ariel Sharon's government, "failed totally. There is no cause here to prettify the reality. I pinned hopes on it and I said, now they will start to build some model of coexistence together and from here on we will be able to continue to disengage. But what is going on there is a civil war between Fatah and Hamas. There is no government, and if there is any government, it is a totalitarian government that is led by a band of murderers, no less and no more. These are clearly terrorists. People who stop at nothing, people whose every good morning is, 'Good morning, Israel,' with a few Qassams." Does Israel also have a part in the failure of the disengagement? "Yes. In the disengagement there was one element that was lacking: that the other side agree. That is to say, that you had someone to whom to hand over this thing, and that there be an international guarantee. The unilateral conception not only did not prove itself, it is also something that must not be repeated. This was an experiment, I was one of the people who supported it and it has turned out to have been a mistake. "We are a people who with our own hands destroyed dozens of settlements. We took thousands of people out of there, we looked at our children, who asked very hard questions, and we told them that this was for the sake of preventing bloodshed and for the sake of ensuring quiet and for the sake of ensuring coexistence and for the sake of choosing other alternatives, instead of the killing and the blood. And here we are in fact waking up into a far more bitter reality. Now it isn't exactly helping me that the Gaza Strip is cut off from Abu Mazen. It exists; it hasn't vanished from the map. It is adjacent to us here and I have to relate to it. I have to react. I have to do something." Maybe that something is a military action? "I am opposed to that. That has to be the very last alternative there is. When you go into the Gaza Strip you know how you are going in but you don't know how you will be coming out. You are entering a quagmire, and it is a painful quagmire. You pay a price for it and you have no certainty that they won't continue to fire from there on Sderot." So what do you suggest? "We have to go ahead and stop this thing. To touch more on issues that concern the civilian population itself. We have no alternative. There isn't a country in the world that would agree that the power station that provides electricity is also a bombarded target. There is no way that you shoot at the water pipe through which I am supplying you with water. They will not put an entire region under the threat of Qassams day and night, as we continue to sit quietly." Facing reality Ben-Eliezer regards Olmert's current diplomatic move without excessive enthusiasm. "Even though I am in favor of the diplomatic move and the dialogue, it is necessary to be cautious," he warns. "We must not blur the reality for ourselves, so that we won't suddenly find ourselves one fine day in a situation in which the Qassams are landing on our airport." Nonetheless, his political forecast is quite calm: He does not expect elections in the near future and he thinks that despite the final Winograd committee report, there will not be elections before 2009. In any case, he sees no justification for dismantling the government as long as we are facing fateful security issues at our doorstep. Of Lebanon War II, Ben-Eliezer says that "there isn't the shadow of a doubt that the results of the war have led Syria to raise its head and have strengthened the Iranians. I am glad that Gabi Ashkenazi is the Chief of Staff and that Ehud Barak is at the Defense Ministry. Today the way the security cabinet is being run is different. "When Ehud Barak is Defense Minister, he makes things difficult and asks questions and raises things in ways we didn't see during the past two or three years. I don't remember a quantity of security cabinet meetings like we've been having recently and this is by and large because of the fact that Soldier Number 1 is at the head of the security system. They haven't got a politician who asks questions and thinks about what is good for him in a photograph. Instead, there is a statesman who is knowledgeable in security doctrine, and therefore it is impossible to evade his questions. I think that even Ehud himself would not admit to the depth of the quagmire he has entered. At the moment Ehud Barak is doing sacred work." Ben-Eliezer is wary of making explicit statements, but it is clear that these remarks are directed at a comparison between the top leadership in Lebanon War II and the current period when Barak has the role of "responsible adult." So in fact Amir Peretz caused damage to the country's security? "I'm not coming with complaints to anyone. I think that if Amir Peretz had chosen a social portfolio, he might still proudly be the chairman of the Labor Party today. But he chose what he chose. I can't complain, because both the prime minister and the defense minister at that time had no security background. It's as though now they would tell me to be the commander of the navy when I don't even know how to swim." With respect to proximate and remote threats, Ben-Eliezer believes that "Israel must go ahead and look after itself. It has to continue to maintain the strategic dialogue with the United States, but it also has to be completely independent, because we are now facing a reality we have never known in the past. "Anyone who imagines that our next war will be against planes or tanks simply isn't reading the map correctly. Our future war, is going to be a war of ground-to-ground missiles and mega-terror and commandos. We are talking about two fronts in parallel, and they are coordinated with each other. We are aware of the crazy acquisitions in Syria. A huge purchasing deal has now been completed, funded entirely by Iran. According to statements from Nasrallah, whom I believe, on the order of magnitude of 20,000-21,000 missiles. Let no one harbor any illusions - in fact we are talking about a system that in its range covers the whole area of the state of Israel." Do you think a war is likely this year? "We are doing everything we can to prevent the next war. But we are dealing with disciplines that do not always communicate with one another. The home front has become a battlefront. This is perhaps the most significant change. We have always said that we deploy along the borders. We are now playing with different pieces. And this is without my touching on the Iranian threat, which requires different treatment. Iran is not only a threat to Israel but also to the moderate Arab world. "There is no doubt that [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad is intending the nuclear bomb not only for Israel. Although every morning he declares that his missiles and his bombs are aimed at Israel, there is no doubt that Europe is also included. But wonder of wonders, Europe is continuing to play its dual game. On the one hand it makes statements against Ahmadinejad and on the other continues to maintain trade, the deliveries to Iran, as though nothing has happened. And the most astonishing thing is that in fact Ahmadinejad has already recognized Europe's weakness. Apart from verbiage, there really isn't anything. Therefore it is important that we be independent in matters of our security." This complex security situation sketched by Ben-Eliezer leads him to the conclusion that the government must not be toppled at this time. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert can relax. Ben-Eliezer also does not sound keen on keeping Barak's promise to dismantle the Olmert government after the final Winograd committee report is submitted. "That would be national irresponsibility, to get up and leave the government today. I was chairman of the party and defense minister and I left over a budget. And what happened with the public? Did it applaud me? Precisely the opposite." But Barak has promised that he will act to bring the elections forward after the final report. "We'll hear and we'll see what Winograd has to say. If you ask my opinion, this Winograd story is going to take many more months. Once it has been decided to send warning letters, it will take a lot more time. At the moment I don't see this government falling. Not during the course of this year. In my estimation, anyone who is talking about elections should start talking in terms of 2009. The strength is in in the weakness of the coaltion's elements. I don't see Lieberman or Shas leaving. I am certain that Bibi [MK Benjamin Netanyahu of the Likud] would die to get into the government. Do you support his entrance? "I don't see him as an addition. As chairman of the opposition, he is very strange. On the one hand, I am certain that he is dying to get in and on the other hand, he comes along with complaints all day long. What is clear is that without the Labor Party there is no government, and anyone who thinks that Bibi will come in if we leave is mistaken - he will rush into elections. Nor will Agudat Yisrael come in either." Ben-Eliezer sees Ami Ayalon's entry into the government as a sign of its continuity. There is no great love between him and Ayalon. Ben-Eliezer does not forget that Ayalon accused him of all the ills in the Labor Party, but in the meantime he prefers to leave these things aside." "I am very happy about Ami's joining the government. I think that this is an important addition, when a person who has fought against the government comes to the realization that at this particular time it is right that he join the government." Have you forgiven him? "I'm not angry. In politics I have learned two things. First of all, I hold no grudge against anyone. However, I do have a long memory. I don't forget." And Amir Peretz? "I think he made a very big mistake. Ehud Barak held out a hand to him. I think that if Amir Peretz connects with his inner truth, he won't be able to register any complaints about Barak. I know that Amir Peretz and Ami Ayalon had very big plans if Ami had been elected [chairman of the Labor Party]: cleaning out the territory and throwing us out of the ministries."
Date: 26/09/2007
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Ben-Eliezer: Israel Should Free Barghouti, he is Next PA Leader
Imprisoned Fatah boss Marwan Barghouti will become the Palestinians' next leader, Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer recently told Haaretz. In a holiday interview with Haaretz - which will appear Tuesday - Ben-Eliezer said that he believed that "there is no reason to become alarmed" by the possibility that Barghouti will be released from the Israeli prison system, where he is serving five consecutive life sentences for terrorist activities. "I would consider releasing him. I think it's a legitimate move, though I believe that his actions were sinister, and I don't take them lightly at all," Ben-Eliezer said. Barghouti has been in prison since April 2002, when he was convicted for a succession of terrorist activities against Israeli civilians in his capacity as the West Bank head of the Fatah-affiliated Tanzim militia. Ben-Eliezer says over the past months he had realized Barghouti is probably the best partner Israel has with whom it can hope to achieve a breakthrough in negotiations with the Palestinians. According to Ben-Eliezer, Barghouti enjoys considerable sway over the situation in Palestinian Authority from within the Hadarim prison facility. The minister says Barghouti's pull extends to the preparations for the U.S.-sponsored regional peace summit Washington intends to hold in November. "We have to find a suitable opportunity to release Barghouti, and we have to link it to the release of Gilad Shalit," the minister said. Ben-Eliezer was referring to the Israel Defense Forces soldier Hamas had abducted more than a year ago from the southern Gaza Strip. "I know this hard to cope with. But we have to look 10 years down the line, and ask ourselves where we want to go," the minister, who has known Barghouti for many years, said.
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