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Netanyahu at a meeting of Likud members
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| By Israel Insider staff October 8, 2007 |
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| Netanyahu, nearing Knesset pop shakes Olmert's hand |
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In his response to the speech of Olmert to the opening of the Knesset's winter session, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu warned that giving away parts of Judea and Samaria to the Palestinians would enable Hamas to fire rockets at Tel Aviv, and giving the Palestinians control over the eastern part of Jerusalem will make the western portion unbearable.
"Olmert will place Hamas men on the walls of Jerusalem," he warned. "Jerusalem will fast become a pilgrimage site for terrorists from all over the world."
"Handing over half of Jerusalem to the Palestinians would render the other half uninhabitable? the town's square will once again stand empty. This is not the way to make peace. How many times can the same diplomatic loss of sight be repeated?"
"The government's policy is afflicted with total blindness," he added. "A vision must be rooted in the ground -- not suspended in the clouds."
Netanyahu pointed out that "the government's plan" would have Israel withdrawing to the '67 border, an "exact replica" of the failed Camp David negotiations led by current Defense Minister Ehud Barak in 2000. Their failure led directly to the violent uprising that cost the lives of more than 1500 Israeli and left many more thousands injured.
"Conceding Judea and Samaria would transfer control over the areas overlooking the coastal planes to Hamas and the radical Islam. They would be able to fire rockets directly from there at Gush Dan, the Ben Gurion Airport and Tel Aviv."
The opposition leader described a continuing pattern of strategic blindness in unilateral withdrawals by left-wing Israeli leaders. "The unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon created an Iranian outpost - from which Israel is being attacked - in the North, and the unilateral pullout from Gaza created a second Iranian base in Gaza, 'Hamastan,'" Netanyahu said. "And now the government is planning a third withdrawal -- from Judea and Samaria -- that will lead to a third Iranian outpost."
Netanyahu stressed that Israel's top priority must be preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. "We must make sure that the Iranian threat does not materialize. On this crucial issue," he said, "there is no opposition and coalition."
But the opposition leader turned on the heat in directing a questions to Olmert's right-leaning coalition partners: "What are you doing in this government?" MK Netanyahu asked representatives of Shas and Yisrael Beiteinu. "Do you really agree to let Hamas rule neighborhoods in Jerusalem?"
He first sharpened the point: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's plan to give the Palestinian Authority a state in Judea, Samaria, Gaza and much of Jerusalem is a danger to Israel, he said, "and you are not preventing the danger by sitting in the government. To the contrary -- you are giving it legitimacy and allowing it to happen."
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