Gideon Sa'ar, Likud's most fluent spokesman, believes that after Hamas took over Gaza, Israel should have understood the trap it had fallen into and "run for its life" instead of getting into another round of talks in Annapolis.
The question is, of course, where does Likud want Israel to run to. Likud has no solution to the conflict with the Palestinians and has made do for 40 years with taking the wind out of the sails of every agreement.
From this point of view there is an unsurprising similarity between statements by Sa'ar and Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal. Each sees concessions to the other side as a trap.
Each prefers the status quo to a historic compromise.
Likud never drew the borders of the country as it imagines them. The settlements were intended to blur the previous border and disrupt the placement of a new border. Instead of dividing the land into two states for two peoples, the right proposes waiting for the messiah.
The concern is that the day is not far off when the world will demand that Israel grant civil rights to the residents of the territories it occupies, if Israel is unwilling to withdraw from those territories. The possible solution of one state for two peoples has already been voiced by the European and American left. Those who do not want two states for two peoples may hasten the end of the Jewish state.
At Annapolis, Israel has a partner. It may be weak, it may represent only part of the Palestinian people, but finally there is another side that sees eye to eye with most of the people in Israel, a side that opposes using terror to achieve political goals and is willing to give up some of its original aspirations to reach an agreement.
The refusal to negotiate with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and his prime minister, Salam Fayad, is like spitting in the faces of the moderates.
If there is any chance to strengthen the moderates in the Palestinian street, it is only by presenting achievements.
Those who do not make do with Fatah will get more Hamas, and according to the U.S. secretary of state, they will in the end get Al-Qaida in the West Bank.
The claim that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has "changed his skin" because in the past he was in favor of unilateral withdrawal is not an insult, but a compliment. A statesman must suit his actions to a changing reality.
Unilateral withdrawal was never an ideology but an ad hoc solution, an attempt to limit the occupation as much as possible as long as there was no partner to an agreement. Now the Palestinian political reality has changed, partly for the better and partly for the worse.
The Annapolis conference is an opportunity to forge an agreement with people who are willing to sign it, while hoping that the entire Palestinian people follows suit.
The concessions that are called painful are known to all. To create a border, Israel will have to withdraw from settlements scattered through the heart of the Palestinian population which never had justification or purpose.
There is no agreement other than the one signed at Camp David seven years ago, and the question is whether there is someone who will be able to implement it.
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