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Peace Process

Peres: Olmert and I will set Israel's borders

Sharon's 'legacy' to be pursued even if the prime minister is no more


By Stan Goodenough
January 15, 2006

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon?s succumbing to a massive stroke earlier this month will not prevent the implementation of his plan to further ?disengage? from the Palestinian Arabs, abandon more of Israel?s historic homeland, and set Israel?s final borders.

This according to Knesset Member and former Labor Party leader Shimon Peres, who told a gathering in Tel Aviv Friday evening he and acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had agreed to work together to see the realization of what has suddenly become known as ?Sharon?s legacy.?

Ynetnews quoted Peres as saying that he and Olmert were in union on the need to move ahead with this policy should Kadima win the general elections on March 28.

Successful implementation of the plan would finally ?put an end to the double conflict with the Palestinians on the one hand and with terrorism on the other hand,? Peres said.

Known in some circles as Israel?s ?elder statesman,? Peres has for years been pushing policies which, he repeatedly says, will help bring an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict, but all of which have failed.

Peres was the mastermind behind the ?Oslo? agreements and, despite the fact that they disintegrated into bloodshed unlike anything experienced by Israel since the state?s rebirth in 1948, he has unfalteringly refused to acknowledge their failure and the responsibility he bears for their collapse.

Espousing his view of reality ? a view that many see as totally out of touch with reality ? Peres told the business convention where he was being hosted he believed the Middle East was ?approaching a fork in the road [which would see this region] either becoming fanatical-Shiite-terrorist or modern and sane.?

To achieve sanity and modernity for the Middle East, Peres prescribes a smaller Israel that will relinquish forever any claims it has to its heartland ? the cradle of the Jewish nation and burial places of its forefathers, founders, prophets and kings.

The former Laborite appears to be set on achieving this goal while he still has some political life left in him.

After his humiliating defeat in the Labor Party leadership race late last year, Peres saw new hope in the newly established Kadima Party and abandoned his political home of more than three decades, aligning himself with Sharon.

The latter?s political demise has apparently been seized by Peres as an opportunity to ensure that Kadima becomes the channel through which his leftist ?peace? goals can be achieved.

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