Jewish Home Minister Naftali Bennett stated that the very idea of a Palestinian state in Eretz Israel has reached a dead end.
“Our biggest problem is the unwillingness of Israeli leaders to state clearly that Eretz Israel belongs to the nation of Israel,” Bennett said at a conference inJerusalem of the Yesha Council (Yesha is an acronym for Judea and Samaria).
He added that the only real solution is “to build, to build, to build” in Judea and Samaria. In his opinion, the Palestinian problem does not require a solution, it requires getting used to living with it.
Bennett gave an example of a friend of his from the Army, who took a shrapnel in his lower body, and continued to suffer intermittent pain attacks as a result. The doctors told him they could remove the shrapnel, but there was a 50 percent chance that he would become paralyzed as a result.
Bennett challenged his audience, to see how many of them would have opted for the surgery and a chance of paralysis, compared to learning to live with the pain. The answer was obvious: the Palestinian shrapnel will continue to cause Israel pain, but a final solution could cripple the Jewish state for good.
Bennett advocated imposing Israeli rule in the C area of the disputed territories, and there to invest a great deal in improving the lives of both Israelis and Palestinians.
Likud MK Ze’ev Elkin who spoke at the same conference said this was strictly Bennett’s view and it did not represent the opinion of Prime Minister Netanyahu or the government.
Elkin said that despite his own general approval for Bennett’s view, he also recognizes that the coalition government includes partners like Tzipi Rivlin, whose views on the same issue are diametrically opposed to Bennett’s.
