Abbas with Obama, Netanyahu
Abbas with Obama, NetanyahuIsrael news photo: Flash 90

Israel National News spoke with people on “both sides of the street" and discovered almost everyone thinks direct talks will start in a blind alley and end up in a dead end. 

There already are strong doubts from both Israeli and Palestinian Authority leaders whether the direct talks, announced on Friday by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, will even take place as scheduled next week in Washington.

The single voice of optimism was expressed by Arad resident Yaniv Adar, a computer technician who identifies strongly with the left-wing. "It is important to talk," he said. "I do not know if anything will come out of it, but if they do not talk, nothing will come out of it. Talking is better than fighting.”

No one else interviewed agrees. Kibbutz Ein Gedi date tree farmer Yehuda Cohen, who said he always has voted for the Labor party, told Israel National News, “They [the PA] will not talk—they always find another reason not to speak with us."

He explained that Arab leaders know that if they wait long enough, the combination of a growing Arab population in Judea and Samaria along with the number of foreign workers in Israel will reduce Jews to a minority, which he said is the ultimate aim of the Arab world.

Chief PA negotiator Saeb Erekat bore out Cohen’s statement Sunday, insisting that the PA will not recognize Israel as being a Jewish state, a minimum requirement demanded by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

Kibbutz Ein Gedi is located within the 1949 borders that were changed in 1967 during the Six-Day War. Cohen, who has decidedly leftist views concerning Judea and Samaria, is adamant about retaining the JordanValley. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has demanded control over the area, which was occupied by Jordan and cut off the southern Dead Sea area from the northern part of the valley until 1967.

Like everyone else interviewed, except for Adar, he said, “I don't believe there is chance” that the talks will succeed.

Hevron Hills Regional Council Chairman Tzviki Bar-Chai commented, “I am not a prophet” but nevertheless believes the negotiations will turn out fruitless. “It is more important for Israeli leaders to examine how to proceed in any talks only after they examine what will come out of any discussions, which could lead to more expulsions and a false peace.”

A southern Israel auto mechanic who formerly worked for several years in Gaza for the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and insisted on anonymity, asserted that the talks “won’t succeed as they always did not succeed.”  He added, “Someone who does not want peace will not get peace, and whoever does not want peace always blames someone else.”

Reserve IDF Colonel Moshe Hagar (pictured), who is on Sabbatical as head of the BeitYatirPre-ArmyTorahAcademy, observed that “Hamas won’t accept any agreement; therefore, there is no meaning to the talks.” He added that the Israeli government must understand the security dangers involved in any agreement with the Palestinian Authority.

Ginot Shomron resident “Fruma” echoed a frequent sound of frustration with the “political process.”  She told Israel National News, “I have lost interest in what goes on. I cannot see any talks with any of them doing any good. It is going to blow up in everyone’s face anyway. I think it is stupid.

And what about the opinion of Yaniv Adar of Arad, who thinks it is better to talk than fight? To that Fruma replies, “It could help—but it could hurt, and I am not willing to take those kind of risks."

The Arab side is no more optimistic. Reuters surveyed “the man on the street” and concluded there is “little hope among Palestinians who say the prospect of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel seems no more than a dream.”



"Peace process? What peace process? That's so nineties. After 18 years, don't they feel silly?" Ahmad Aweidah, head of the Palestinian stock exchange, told the news agency. "There are only two scenarios. The optimistic one is more of the same. The pessimistic one is it's going to get worse."

The Arab population in Judea and Samaria is enjoying a renewed economic prosperity that first began after Israel regained sovereignty over the area after the Six-Day War in 1967. Then a long and deep recession set in due to more than three decades of Intifadas starting in the last 1980s and is now ended. While many if not most, Arabs do not want Israeli rule, they despair of Palestinian Authority corruption. On the other hand, an entire generation has been educated under a regime that encourages incitement to kill Jews and teaches that all of Israel is Palestine.

Reuters quoted 30-year old Luay Kabbah, who was still at school when PA and Israeli leaders first began talking peace in 1991, "There has been a lot of talk of peace, but we have seen no results. We no longer have hope.”