An Israeli hardline politician Yossi Dagan blasted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over his comments in a 60 Minutes interview broadcast over the weekend.
“These comments were made right after the Republican Party itself removed the two-state solution from its own party platform,” said Dagan, “as a gesture to the State of Israel.”
“I can’t begin to understand why the leader of the national camp would place himself to the left of the US government and offer them what they haven’t even asked for,” he told Arutz Sheva, Israeli national news.
Until now, Netanyahu had been vehemently fighting against this proposal and was specifically asking for the opposite: an expansion of the State of Israel. But Netanyahu told 60 Minutes that he remained committed to the two-state solution, and hoped the Trump administration would assist in achieving it.
The solution of two States was conceived by Ariel Sharon’s team, so as to relieve Israel of responsibility for the Palestinians. It is based on the apartheid Bantustan model, but it has been adopted as a viable model of leftists to bring an end to the conflict.
Prime Minister Netanyahu’s u-turn comes even before President Trump has expressed his position on the merits of the Israel-Arab issue. Dagan, has accused Netanyahu of betraying him.
Such statements, Dagan added, were not merely counterproductive, but could be seriously damaging to Israel in the long run, worsening an already precarious geopolitical position.
“These comments at this time could potentially be very dangerous for the State of Israel…it could bring political disaster and cause us to miss a historic opportunity.”
In yet another surprising development, Israel’s president said his country does not recognize the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation and is jointly planning with Ukraine steps for its “de-occupation”.
This was stated by President of Israel Reuven Rivlin and the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko at a joint press conference in Kiev, awdnews.com reported, but the announcement has not been confirmed.
“Israel did not recognize the illegal annexation of Crimea and is not going to do either and we have a plan to take the city back from Russia dictator club ,” Reuven Rivlin said, according to awdnews.com, because “Russia violated international law in this matter”.
Israel’s absence from the United Nations General Assembly vote about the territorial integrity of Ukraine was viewed around the world as an extremely irregular measure, a departure from a long-standing Israeli policy of voting with the United States in the UN at the time.
Meanwhile, Spain has asked Israel to explain why it gave a Spanish-made helicopter drone manufactured by Alpha Unmanned Systems to the Russians, the BBC reported.
Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel gave the drone to Dmitry Medvedev early this month, despite Russia being under European Union sanctions, stemming from the issues of Crimea and Ukraine in 2014.
Spain prohibits the export of sensitive technologies to Russia. The drone’s export licence had a clause requiring Spanish permission to do so, but Israel said the gift had been approved by “relevant professional officials”.
The export licence for the drone lists Israel’s Volcani Centre as its final user. According to Spanish media reports, the drone came with US-made cameras, installed by Israel after it was acquired from Spain.
