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Minimize Palestinians' Sense of Victory - Interview with Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu

(Jerusalem Post) David Horovitz and Gil Hoffman - The greatest impetus to terror is the terrorists' sense of impending victory. The greatest discouragement to terror is the sense of failure and hopelessness. It is very important that we do everything in our power even with this disengagement decision to minimize the sense of victory. Anything that persuades the Palestinians that we are being pushed by their superior will and their acts of terror to vacate one position after another emboldens terror and pushes peace further away. The terrorists are controlling themselves. They are rationing their acts of murder with the hope that once we leave they can then proceed, and the intelligence people are saying that they will probably proceed from Judea and Samaria. The Palestinians have moderate and sensible people but they are weak and they do not stand before the combined force of the radicals who are pushing toward a gradual elimination of Israel. We should keep the Philadelphi corridor [on the Gaza-Egypt border] in our hands. I don't expect the Egyptians to fight and die for us. I think it would be a mistake to ask them. The entry into the Sinai and right up to our border of a large Egyptian contingent could actually endanger the peace. We should create a counterbalance to our withdrawals by including the main settlement blocs in the main fence - that is, they should be part of the territorial contiguity of Israel. in addition to the main settlement blocs, there are vast unpopulated areas in the Jordan Valley and the Judean Desert which...are replete with security, strategic, and historical significance for us. So it would be possible to also fence around them.
2005-05-13 00:00:00
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