Israel Wants Peace
Since the founding of the state, Jews have yearned to live in peace with their Arab neighbors. In 1947, the UN partitioned Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. The Jews accepted it, and the Arabs rejected it. Still, Israel pursued peace.
On May 14, 1948, David Ben-Gurion read Israel's Declaration of Independence:
We appeal in the very midst of the onslaught launched against us now for months to the Arab inhabitants of the state of Israel, to preserve peace and participate in the up-building of the state on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions.
We extend our hand to all neighboring states and their peoples in an offer of peace and good neighborliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation and mutual help with the sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in a common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.
In 1979, Israel responded to the overtures of a brave Arab leader, Anwar Sadat.
Israel responded by trading land for peace - a huge area of land, with settlements, oil drilling rigs, and strong historical ties - for a true peace that has held to this day.
In 2000, Israel offered the Palestinians nearly everything they demanded... and the offer was met not with a counteroffer, but with Jihad.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and President Clinton offered:
97% of the West Bank (with the remaining 3% to be made up from Israeli territory)
The entire Gaza Strip
Military control over East Jerusalem
Many Palestinian refugees to return to Israel proper, with the rest being settled in the new state of Palestine. There would be a $30 Billion fund to compensate refugees.
According to chief US negotiator Dennis
Ross, Yasser Arafat rejected it all, did not offer new ideas of his own, and, as you see below, continued to incite his population:
Both Israelis and Palestinians should be able to live in peace, side by side in their own states.