This article discusses various Palestinian views of the peace process with Israel, aimed at resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Some high-level officials in the Palestinian Authority (PA) have said that their peace process is intended to achieve a permanent peace with the State of Israel.
Acceptance of Israel's right to exist in peace is the first of the PLO's obligations in the Oslo accords. In Yasir Arafat's September 9, 1993 letter to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, as part of Oslo I, Arafat stated that "The PLO recognizes the right of the State of Israel to exist in peace and security."
However, the Palestine Liberation Organization's main policy statement, the Palestinian National Covenant was never amended so that it would recognize Israel's right to exist.
The stated goal of Hamas is to overthrow Israel and replace it with an Islamic theocracy. Hamas undertook a three month ceasefire in support of the "Road map for peace" at the urging of then Palestinian prime minister Mahmoud Abbas. For more details, see Hamas.
The stated goal of Palestinian Islamic Jihad is to overthrow Israel and replace it with an Islamist state. Islamic Jihad also undertook a three month ceasefire in support of the "Road map for peace". For more details, see Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Danny Naveh, a member of Israel's Likud party, claimed in April 2002 that Yasser Arafat was not a "partner for peace". In this view, Arafat is merely using the peace process to extract short-term concessions, and views it as a stepping stone on the road to the complete destruction of the state of Israel.
On the other end of the spectrum, Electronic Intifada argues that Arafat has made several calls for an end to violence and lasting peace, in both Arabic and English [1]. In this view, Arafat is promoting peace as best he can, while the Israeli government keeps him "quarantined" and threatens to kill him.
For more details, see Yasser Arafat
Faisal Husseini, former Palestinian Authority Minister for Jerusalem, was well known in Israeli circles as a Palestinian dove and moderate. He was an extremely high-ranking official who represented the most liberal faction of the Palestinian Authority. At one point he stated that "Palestinians believe that Jerusalem should be a shared, open city; two capitals for two states."
Circa 2000, Sari Nusseibeh was the representative of the Palestinian Authority in Jerusalem, he called for historic compromises by both Palestinian and Israelis, in order to secure a permanent and lasting peace. For example, he states that Palestinians must give up the right to return, with this concession, he argues, a true and lasting peace can emerge.
"Palestinians are no strangers to compromise. In the 1993 Oslo Accords, we agreed to recognize Israeli sovereignty over 78 percent of historic Palestine and to establish a Palestinian state on only 22 percent." -- Saeb Erakat, Chief Palestinian negotiatior, August 5, 2000
Rashid Abu Shbak, a senior PA security official declared: "The light which has shone over Gaza and Jericho [when the PA assumed control over those areas] will also reach the Negev and the Galilee [which constitute a large portion of pre-1967 Israel]." (Yediot Ahronot, May 29, 1994)
The PA's Voice of Palestine radio broadcast a Friday prayer sermon by Yusuf Abu Sneineh, official preacher at Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque, in which he asserted: "The struggle we are waging is an ideological struggle and the question is: where has the Islamic land of Palestine gone? Where is Haifa and Jaffa, Lod and Ramle, Acre, Safed and Tiberias? Where is Hebron and Jerusalem?" (Voice of Palestine, May 23, 1997)
PA cabinet minister Abdul Aziz Shaheen told the official PA newspaper Al-Havat Al-Jadida (January 4, 1998): "The Oslo accord was a preface for the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian Authority will be a preface for the Palestinian state which, in its turn, will be a preface for the liberation of the entire Palestinian land."
A number of Palestinian maps are alleged to label all of the State of Israel, as well as the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as "Palestine". Such maps appear on PA Television; in the offices of PA officials; in textbooks used in PA schools; and on the shoulder-patches of PA police officers. In 1988, when the PLO applied for admission to the World Health Organization, and used the map of all of Palestine in its application papers.
Those allegations have been partially opposed, in a study by Professor Nathan Brown of George Washington University in November 2001: On they other hand, they are supported by a report of the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace.
In Israel, some maps show the West Bank and Gaza Strip as part of Israel. These include maps on Israeli govenment sites. [1] [1]Oslo accords
Views of the Palestinian people
to be writtenViews of Hamas
Views of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad
Views of Yasser Arafat
Other prominent Palestinians
Maps and textbooks