The snippet below was written and published by by Reuters and Jerusalem Post staff.
Israel has agreed to a long-standing Palestinian demand to release Palestinian prisoners in order to resume peace talks, but will not yield on other central issues, International Relations Minister Yuval Steinitz said on Saturday.I don't know about you, but I find myself just a tad skeptical about all this. First off, Israel should not be releasing Jihadis with blood on their hands. What does it say about the local Arabs that they demand the release of murderers before they are willing to negotiate peace? What does it say about the actual prospect for peace? Not much, I am afraid.
US Secretary of State John Kerry announced Friday that Israel and the Palestinians have laid the groundwork for renewed direct peace talks, some three years after the previous attempt at negotiations fell apart.
"There will be some release of prisoners," Steinitz told Israel Radio. "I don't want to give numbers but there will be heavyweight prisoners who have been in jail for dozens of years," he said. The release would be carried out in phases, he added.
Palestinians have long demanded that Israel free prisoners held since before 1993, when the two sides signed the Oslo Accords - a interim deal intended to lead to an independent state the Palestinians seek in east Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile over at Y-Net Yitzhak Benhorin is absolutely crowing.
They said he was boring, they called him a diplomatic Don Quixote and advised him to forsake a lost cause and turn his attention to Syria, Egypt and Iran. But John Kerry's persistence paid off and proved all the cynics wrong.The only thing wrong with Benhorin's rather smug analysis is that he may very well be dead wrong.
While President Barack Obama questioned Benjamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas's true willingness to make peace, Kerry was determined to end the Israel-Palestinian stalemate. Washington dared him to try.
Critics remarked that anyone who failed to beat George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election could hardly be expected to make any real progress in the Middle East peace process.
But the man who wanted to be president had spent years at the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee which prepared him for his grueling shuttle diplomacy that on Friday resulted in the announcement of the resumption of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.
In the Jerusalem Post we read this:
Senior PLO official Wasel Abu Youssef said of Kerry's initiative, "The announcement today did not mean the return to negotiations. It meant efforts would continue to secure the achievement of Palestinian demands ... Israel must recognize the 1967 borders."Furthermore, of course, even if Netanyahu and Abbas can come to some reasonable compromise, Hamas will certainly not be on-board.
I wouldn't get my hopes up if I were you.
