"If we don't reach an agreement, the Palestinians will never feel the pride and respect that come with their own state. The Israelis will never feel the security that they deserve with sovereign and stable neighbors committed to co-existence. They will have the upper hand in the demographic facts. More blood will be shed."

US President Barack Obama said these sentences at the United Nations General Assembly this week. They may sound nice, but it must have been hard to write such a long line of mistakes, a paragraph made up of sentences that show a total misunderstanding of the Middle East.

If an agreement is reached, will Israel have "sovereign and stable neighbors committed to co-existence?" Does anyone really think a Palestinian State will be stable? Does anyone seriously think how the Palestinian State will give Israeli Arabs "pride and respect?" What will they be proud of? Of being in a smaller, demilitarized state, that depends on the Zionist entity?

Will blood be shed if an agreement isn't reached? The reality so far has shown the opposite: Blood is shed when we try to reach agreements. What are the "demographic facts" the Obama is afraid will give the Palestinian the upper hand? A clear Jewish majority between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea?

"Those of us that are Israel's friends need to understand that for true security, the Jewish State needs an independent Palestine." There is no doubt that this sentence proves how brainwashed those who believe in a two-state solution are.

In light of these words, those who really fear for the Middle East's future should fear the fact that Obama's staff is secretly conducting the direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

We constantly hear about the talks in the media, but officials have mostly been quiet. Has there been any progress? Is there any agreement? And most importantly, how far is Netanyahu ready to go with "necessary compromises?"

Just like in a military operation, and maybe even more so, the top politicians are not leaking anything about the talks. Everything is secret. Not even cabinet members seem to know what is going on. They don't know whether to attack or be protective, to support or oppose, and their various comments in the media only further prove this.

If an agreement with the Palestinians is going to be historically significant for the State of Israel, the current reality, in which everything is run without public discourse or even minimal transparency, is dangerous and intolerable.

At least something has come out from these talks. The Arab networks report that the refugee issue has been central in negotiations, to the extent that the talks depend on this issue. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has threatened to leave talks if his demands are not met on the refugees. In addition, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said that Palestinian refugees will get $50 billion in reparations.

It's important to remember the other side of the refugee equation. Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon published an article at the beginning of September titled "I too am a refugee." Ayalon says Jewish refugees who were expelled from Arab countries do not receive the attention they deserve. The world ignores the fact that these people were thrown out of their homes at the time of the War of Independence, and their property was "nationalized."

The facts that Ayalon presents are well known. The world's treatment of Palestinian refugees and that of Jewish refugees is completely imbalanced. However, it is important to know that in the last few years, this topic has been revived. There is recent research on the matter, with details of property belonging to Jewish refugees in Arab countries. Israeli politicians and those around the world have begun to realize that this is an important matter in any agreement.

Already in 2007, at the end of the Annapolis talks, this topic arose in former foreign minister Tzipi Livni's speech. In January 2010, the Aliyah Committee in the Knesset proposed a bill by MK Nissim Zeev (Shas) that would require a discussion of Jewish refugees' property in any possible agreement between Israel and the Palestinians that would include Palestinian refugees. The bill passed a month later.

The topic has also been recognized outside of Israel. Congress officially recognized that Jewish refugees should be repaid in any possible peace treaty, and according to Ayalon, former president Bill Clinton supported such a measure in the 2000 Camp David talks.

If indeed the rumors are true, and the refugee issue is being discussed, Netanyahu should not forget the refugees in his government – those that escaped or were exiled from Arab countries after the War of Independence, left behind all of their belongings, and were never repaid.

Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon's article:
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-EdContributors/Article.aspx?id=186742

At a conference about the Geneva Initiative, former prime minister Ehud Olmert gave a speech in which he revealed details from a book he plans to publish about his political career. He mentioned that during his peace talks with the Palestinians, the American government, under George W. Bush was ready to accept 100,000 refugees as American citizens if an agreement was signed. In addition, Olmert revealed that all of the world leaders he spoke to agreed that refugee problem should be solved outside of Israel's borders. Not one disagreed, he said.

These statements are no small incentive for the Israeli Initiative to continue working towards a solution to the refugee problem outside of Israel's borders. However, slowly, we see the world's mistaken impression, which the US shares, about this issue. If the world is ready to adopt the poor refugees, and end a humanitarian crisis that has lasted decades, why haven't they done it yet? Why does everything depend on an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians?

The answer is clear. The Arab world succeeded in convincing the whole world that the refugee problem is an essential component in the "Palestinian problem." Everyone wants a solution for the refugees, everyone wants to donate and fund organizations like UNRWA in order to aid the refugees, but no one has thought of the possibility that they can be rehabilitated even now, with no agreement.

The Israeli Initiative has made it its mission to convince the Israeli public that the refugee problem can be solved before a peace treaty is reached, because it is a humanitarian problem that has been ignored for over 60 years, without the world realizing that rehabilitating refugees can neutralize a lot of the problems of the conflict and bring it closer to an end.

This idea is so simple and realistic that it's hard to even call it "thinking outside of the box." So why haven't Israel and the world adopted it? The answer is, of course, the Arab countries' efforts. Even after over 60 years, the Arab world refuses to accept the existence of Israel as a sovereign and independent state, and eternalizes the refugee problem in order to express this denial.

Beyond that, it seems that there are those in Israel, such as Yossi Beilin, who so identify with the Palestinians that they refuse to pull the rug from under Palestinian national ambitions and adopt the easy solution that the Initiative offers. In fact, Beilin, one of the writers of the Geneva Initiative, said those exact words to describe the Israeli Initiative.

We attach to this letter a new publication which we will be happy that you will send your friends: The article "The Big Mistake", which was published in Hebrew in the Israeli weekly Makor Rishon on Rosh Hashana. This is a great way to explain the biggest misconception of all – the Two States solution.

Pass it over!


As always, we'd like to hear your questions and comments.

Yoav Sorek
Manager, The Israeli Initiative
www.Israelinitiative.com