Olmert: A Hard-Liner's Call for Peace

Via IHT (Opinion by Uri Dromi) -

In a farewell interview he gave to the Yediot Aharonot newspaper on the eve of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert dropped a bombshell. "What I'm telling you now," he said to his interviewers, "no Israeli leader ever said before me: We have to pull out from almost all the territories [in the West Bank], including in East Jerusalem, including in the Golan Heights."

But for those of us who have been advocating these actions for years, his words were not really a bombshell; they simply reveal a coming to grips with reality. In order for Israel to survive as a Jewish and democratic state, the government should not rule millions of Palestinians. It is in Israel's best interests that a viable Palestinian state emerge, a state whose citizens, though forced to give up their dreams of returning to their homes in Jaffa and Haifa, will nevertheless feel that, given the historical circumstances, this was a deal they could live with.

But what was remarkable about this cold, realistic assessment is that it came from the mouth of Ehud Olmert himself.

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It's a pity that Israeli leaders can express themselves candidly about the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict only when they are out of office. Maybe Olmert's likely successor, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who is known for her courage, could prove to be the exception.

Instead of trying to form an unstable government, which will be easily paralyzed by its own members, she should call for new elections. Her campaign should be based on Olmert's parting words.

Anyone who wants Israel to be a democracy, predominantly Jewish, should vote for her, realizing that this will mean giving away most of the West Bank and compromising in Jerusalem.

On the other hand, those who vote for the Likud leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, should bear in mind that by not compromising with the Palestinians they will bring about the creation of one, binational state. Then the Arabs, with their higher birthrate, will sooner or later become a majority, thus putting Israel on the horns of the dilemma: Either it loses its Jewish identity in order to remain a democracy, or it remains Jewish, but becomes an apartheid state.