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Analysis: Olmert's Overture

Council on Foreign Relations

November 29, 2006
Prepared by: Eben Kaplan

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert grabbed headlines Monday by extending Palestinian political leaders an olive branch during a speech at the grave site of David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister. Olmert offered to release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, unfreeze desperately needed Palestinian funds, and hold “a real, open, genuine and serious dialogue” with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas about the evacuation of West Bank settlements and the creation of a Palestinian state. In exchange, Israel’s leader asked that the Palestinian government recognize Israel, renounce violence, secure the release of a captive Israeli soldier, and relinquish their “right of return” (Globalpolicy.org). Though none of the proposed incentives are new, they have been repackaged, and the new appeal met with cautious optimism (LAT) in some circles. In an interview with CFR.org’s Bernard Gwertzman, Mideast expert Henry Siegman praises Olmert’s “surprisingly radical change in tone,” but cautions that the Israeli prime minister stopped short of saying the “magic words”: a willingness “to accept the pre-1967 lines as the starting point of the negotiations.”

Others, however, likened the proposal to old wine in a new bottle (JPost), pointing out that Olmert’s plan is contingent on some rather unlikely moves on the part of the Palestinians. Both the Hamas-led Palestinian government and the coalition ruling Israel have been in disarray for months. Israeli public opinion soured after the summer’s inconclusive war in Lebanon, and since the abduction of an Israeli soldier in June, the steady rhythm of Israeli raids and air strikes in Gaza neither secured the captive’s release nor stemmed the volleys of rockets fired into Israel. Hamas has paid a price, of course, both in blood and through the isolation of a months-long embargo which has caused great hardship.

Read the rest of this article on the cfr.org website.

Copyright 2006 by the Council on Foreign Relations. This material is republished on GlobalSecurity.org with specific permission from the cfr.org. Reprint and republication queries for this article should be directed to cfr.org.