Israeli radio last week conveyed statements from Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas underlining his oft-reiterated position that he will refuse any condition that requires the Palestinians to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, even and especially in the context of U.S.-backed final-status negotiations aimed at definitively resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said that the Palestinians will not recognize Israel as a Jewish state at a meeting with students in Ramallah, Israel Radio reported on Friday. There is “no way” that he will agree to recognition, Abbas was quoted as saying by Palestinian news agency WAFA.
Abbas also reiterated his position on Friday that the capital of a future Palestinian state will be east Jerusalem in its entirety, rather than just a portion. He added that if negotiations fail, he will encourage popular resistance as a pathway to peace, according to Israel Radio.
The Israeli position, which demands such recognition as a signal that the Palestinians are genuinely prepared to put aside future claims against the Jewish state, has been consistent across subsequent Israeli governments for more than a decade. A May 2009 press conference with President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saw both leaders gesturing toward the condition, while a series of leaks and reports in January 2014 described Secretary of State John Kerry as frustrated with Palestinian leaders over their refusal to accede to the request.
Palestinian leaders in recent days have in fact declared that they will not make any further concessions to the Israelis, after Obama launched a broadly criticized broadside against Netanyahu in a published Bloomberg interview. Remarking on Abbas’s reemphasized refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, Washington Post columnist Jackson Diehl on Friday tweeted that the dynamic seem to be the ‘same old story.’
While Obama leans on Netanyahu, it is Abbas who publicly rejects US framework. #sameoldstory http://t.co/1gjH3rViZd
— Jackson Diehl (@JacksonDiehl) March 7, 2014
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