Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will tell the United Nations that a Palestinian Authority state must recognize Israel as the Jewish national home, his spokesman Mark Regev told Arutz Sheva Monday. Regev denied reports of a compromise on this issue.
The Prime Minister is not changing his stand, according to Regev, denying a report in Haaretz that Prime Minister Netanyahu told the Quartet he would compromise and “allow the statement to speak of... two national states, without mentioning a ‘Jewish state.’” The report did not cite any sources for the supposed compromise.
Regev, asked if the term “Jewish state” would be dropped,” said that Prime Minister Netanyahu “will state in his speech that Israel is the Jewish national state.”
The issue has been the most prominent obstacle in PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ insistence to bypass direct talks with Israel and to appeal directly to the United Nations for recognition, a direct violation of the Oslo Accords.
Other obstacles include Israel’s refusal to institute another and more extensive “building freeze” that would stop all construction for Jews in Judea and Samaria and in areas of Jerusalem that Abbas considers as part of a future PA state.