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Source: http://www.inss.org.il/uploadImages/systemFiles/adkan18_4ENG3%20(5)_Even.pdf
Do Israel and the Palestinians Share a Political Horizon?
(Strategic Assessment-Institute for National Security Studies) Shmuel Even - During negotiations with the Barak and Olmert governments (1999-2001 and 2006-2009, respectively), it became clear that the Palestinians do not recognize Israel as a Jewish state in principle. Moreover, Mahmoud Abbas' negotiators insist on the return of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to Israel, first and foremost those in Lebanon. These positions reinforce the impression that Palestinians view negotiations as a strategy to wrest concessions from Israel without making any of their own. Experience has shown that Israeli initiatives did not advance the negotiations, and therefore there is little purpose in new Israeli initiatives that will not satisfy Palestinian demands and instead are apt to weaken Israel's position in the negotiations. The Palestinian claim that Egypt and Jordan were not required to recognize Israel as a Jewish state in their peace agreements is beside the point, because between these states and Israel there was no dispute over the territory comprising the Land of Israel, whereas with the Palestinians there must be an agreement not only between two states but also between two peoples. There is at present no common political horizon for a permanent agreement. A permanent agreement is contingent on waiting for the rise of a new local Palestinian leadership that will see the establishment of a Palestinian state in the territories as a priority that serves the welfare of its population, over the unrealistic demands that seek to undermine the Jewish identity of the State of Israel. The writer, a senior research fellow at INSS, retired from the IDF with the rank of colonel, following a long career in the IDF's Intelligence Branch.