His Majesty King Abdullah II
Jordan's King Warns
Palestinian Statehood at Risk
His Majesty King Abdullah's Interview with Reuters
11 October 2006
By Suleiman al-Khalidi
AMMAN, Oct 11 (Reuters) – Jordan's
King Abdullah warned feuding Palestinians on Wednesday that their hopes of
statehood could be permanently wrecked within months unless they step back from
the brink of civil war.
Palestinians had to put aside internal differences and face other challenges, he
said, citing what he described as a growing right-wing camp in Israel pursuing
an uncompromising "fortress Israel" mindset rather than "integration in the
region".
A power struggle between Hamas and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah
faction that triggered the worst internal fighting in a decade last week could
be exploited by Israel and worsen the Palestinians' plight, the monarch said.
"All of us have to work to reach out to our Palestinian brothers and get them to
take a step back and see that this is not the time for infighting," King
Abdullah told Reuters in an interview at the royal palace in Amman.
"A lot is at stake today and if we fail now, we risk pushing Palestinian
aspirations so far behind that it will take a long time to bring us back to
where we want to be, and in the process, risk the future of Palestine," the
monarch added.
King Abdullah said time was fast running out to forge an Arab-Israel peace based
on two states, Israel and Palestine.
"I really think that by the first half of 2007 we might wake up to the reality
and realize that the two-state solution is no longer attainable, and then
what?," he said.
Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2000, helping
trigger a Palestinian uprising. Prospects of new talks dwindled after the
militant Hamas group beat Fatah in Palestinian parliamentary elections earlier
this year.
In the meantime, Israel had seized the upper hand, he said.
"My view of a two state solution is a viable Palestinian state, and this is
becoming more and more blurred for me. It was much more concrete, recently," the
monarch said.
WEST BANK BORDERS
Jordan, which hosts the largest number of Palestinians outside the West Bank and
Gaza, is worried Jewish settlement and expropriation of land will leave Israel
with substantial parts of the territory it seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
"I think we are really running out of time. Physically on the ground and
geographically, I think there is less and less of a West Bank and Jerusalem to
talk about," said Abdullah.
"...We want to go back to the 1967 borders. We are talking about that today. Are
we going to talk about that tomorrow though? This is the danger," he said.
Rising Iranian influence and the spread of Islamic fundamentalism had also
brought more regional instability that dimmed peace prospects even further, he
said.
"A few years back one could reasonably predict what was happening. Now it's much
more difficult to read the map. There are so many more players," he said.
Abdullah said a peace plan drawn by Arab states including Jordan, Saudi Arabia
and Egypt, envisaged speeding up a 2003 U.S.-sponsored road map for peace and
offered a "window of opportunity to resolve the core Middle East conflict".
"If we don't engage the Israelis today what will the landscape be two years from
now?" he said.
The Arab peace plan also envisages Arab moderates for the first time assisting
in the negotiating process and helping the Palestinians seek better terms from
Israel, the monarch said.
"The Arabs have to step in. They need to be close to the negotiating table when
the Israelis and Palestinians sit," he said. "There is a great opportunity (in
the plan) but there is a great danger of missing it ... especially if civil war
happens."