[News] Palestine - Jailed PFLP leader comes out in favor of one-state solution

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Jailed leftist leader comes out in favor of one-state solution

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  Thursday May 06, 2010 13:22
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 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC News
http://www.imemc.org/article/58618

Ahmed Saadat, the jailed Palestinian leader of the leftist People's 
Front for the Liberation of Palestine, said in an interview with 
Reuters news agency Wednesday that the only way to end the 
Israel-Palestine conflict is through a one-state solution with equal 
rights for Jews and Palestinians.

In his answers to written questions submitted by Reuters through the 
Israeli prison authorities, Saadat said that a new round of 
negotiations with Israel will only deepen divisions between 
Palestinians, and will not resolve the problem.

US President Barack Obama has recently proposed a new round of talks, 
but many Palestinians remain skeptical, given the past 'peace talks' 
that resulted in further losses of their land and liberty.

"Negotiations will be nothing but a cover for the continuation of an 
Israeli policy built on the continuation of occupation", wrote Saadat 
in his statement, adding, "The continuation of negotiations, direct 
or indirect, will have consequences on the efforts to repair the 
Palestinian rift and achieve reconciliation."

The unelected Palestinian government of Mahmoud Abbas of the Fateh 
party has voiced its support for a new round of negotiations with 
Israel, and the Arab League also issued a statement of support for a 
potential four months of talks. But Saadat pointed out that the 
Israelis have already violated the preconditions for such talks by 
continuing to construct illegal settlements on Palestinian land 
despite agreeing to a temporary ban on such construction.

Saadat is in prison in Israel after Israeli forces siezed him in 2006 
from the Palestinian Authority prison in Jericho in a brutal and 
deadly raid. He was originally accused of involvement in the 
assassination of israeli tourism minister Rehavem Zeevi in 2001, but 
those charges were dropped due to a lack of evidence. However, 
Israeli authorities decided to issue Saadat a 30-year sentence, 
although the actual charges against him are unclear.

In his statement, Saadat said that US President Barack Obama is 
proposing the talks to make up for his 'impotence' at failing to make 
the significant change and 'new beginning' he promised in US 
relations with the Muslim world.

More and more Palestinian and Israeli leftists are turning to the one 
state solution as a potential end to the decades-old Israel-Palestine 
conflict. In the one-state solution, Palestinians and Israelis would 
have equal rights in a democratic state. Most Israeli Jews oppose the 
idea because it would make them equal with Palestinians, instead of 
retaining the privileged position they currently hold in Israel.




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