Two secret documents obtained by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz purportedly show that the Obama administration was eagerly trying to sponsor a final agreement between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority that would end the five decades of conflict in the West Bank.
The documents were drafts of a “framework agreement” prepared in 2014 for then-Secretary of State John Kerry as outlines of what would eventually become the final peace agreement. Both drafts included language on disputes between the Israelis and the Palestinians, including what the borders of a Palestinian state would be, the status of Jerusalem, mutual diplomatic recognition, and refugees.
The first document, from mid-February 2014, was almost entirely approved by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The document stated that
In other words, the new Palestinian state would be roughly the same size as the West Bank and Gaza, but might not actually conform to the same borders. The Israelis would likely prefer land swaps to keep Israeli settlements in the West Bank—and the Israelis who live there—inside Israel. Netanyahu reportedly objected to the term “territorial contiguity,” but the State Department insisted on its inclusion.
The February draft also maintained that Jerusalem should remain an undivided city, but that both Israelis and Palestinians want their capitals in the city, but did not ensure that those goals would be realized. The conditions it set for mutual recognition included both states accepting that the other was a legitimate nation state – one for Jews, and another for Palestinians. Once those states had been established, according to the draft, the “right of return” would be waived, meaning Palestinians living in the West Bank or neighboring countries would not claim the right to return to ancestral homes inside Israel’s borders, most of which were vacated during the 1948 Israeli War of Independence.
When the first draft was presented to the head of the PA, Mahmoud Abbas, he rejected it, largely due to the language about Jerusalem, according to Haaretz.
The State Department developed a new draft in March 2014, which they hoped would be more pleasing to Abbas. At the top, the document included a new goal: “to end the occupation that began in 1967.”
The new document also took a stronger stance on Jerusalem, insisting that both countries would have their capitals there. The status of the Old City, Jewish neighborhoods, and other religious sites was left open to further negotiations.
The March document also required that both states accept the other as a legitimate nation-state, like the February document, but specified that diplomatic recognition would only come after the other provisions of the agreement were met. This would allow Abbas to withhold recognition until he was satisfied that the Israelis had maintained their end of the bargain.
Nonetheless, Abbas refused, likely because the political cost of reaching an agreement with the Israelis would be too high.
The agreement didn’t address significant concerns of the Israelis, including their wish to maintain a military presence on the Jordan River. Excluding the West Bank, Israel is less than 10 miles wide at its narrowest point, making it militarily vulnerable. A defensive position on the Jordan River would help to mitigate that weakness.
Also left out of the drafts were requirements that the Palestinian state institute reforms and renounce terrorism. Abbas was elected president of the PA for a four year term in 2005, and has never faced reelection. Fatah, the majority party of the PA, and Hamas, the terrorist organization in control of Gaza, signed an agreement in April 2014 to hold elections, but they have since been delayed indefinitely. Israel invaded Gaza in July 2014 to protect against aggression from Hamas, including escalating rocket attacks and the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers.
The last serious attempt at negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians was brokered by Bill Clinton in 2000. Then-prime minister Ehud Barak offered significant concessions to former PA leader Yasser Arafat, who rejected them at the last minute. The Second Intifada began two months after his return to the Middle East. It lasted five years and claimed more than 4000 lives.
When former prime minister Ehud Olmert offered a similar peace deal to Abbas in 2008, Abbas never replied.
