Anything But "Natural"

Here's the letter of Lior Ben Dor, a Israel diplomat, in The Guardian:

I read with great interest your suggestion that President-elect Obama should "tear up" the 2004 letter from President Bush to Ariel Sharon regarding Israel's major settlement blocs within the West Bank (Leaders, November 24). The future borders of the state of Israel will not be determined on the pages of this newspaper. Instead, they will be determined by negotiations between Israel and the legitimate leadership of the Palestinians.

Israel has demonstrated that it is willing and able to evacuate settlements in an attempt to make progress towards peace. In 1979 Israel removed every one of its citizens and settlements from the Sinai, as part of a comprehensive peace deal with Egypt that stands to this day.

In 2005 Israel took the initiative as regards peace with the Palestinians by evacuating nearly 30 settlements, including every Jewish settlement in Gaza and more in the northern part of the West Bank. This process required 45,000 Israeli police, cost the Israeli taxpayer $2.5bn and risked heightening tensions within Israeli society. The government believed this was a price worth paying to gain momentum towards peace. Instead, however, Gaza became a launch pad for rocket attacks against Israeli citizens and terrorist action at our borders. This reality worsened still further after Hamas seized total control of Gaza in a bloody coup in 2007.

The Israeli public overwhelmingly supports the concept of land for peace, if it brings the reward of greater security with a pragmatic, peaceful neighbour. Evacuation of settlements would be less popular, however, if the consequences are likely to be increased violence against Israel's citizens and the creation of a vacuum to be filled with extremist terror. The precedent of Gaza has increased the scepticism of the Israeli public towards similar arrangements in the West Bank.

Thus while the 1967 borders are the natural starting point for negotiations, the demographic realities of Israel's population, and the understandable security concerns of the Israeli public, will need to be taken into account. These issues are on the agenda for any negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

Lior Ben Dor
Spokesperson, Embassy of Israel

But this line,

the 1967 borders are the natural starting point for negotiations

is problematic.

1. Those "border" weren't borders. They were armistice lines. They were temporary. There was no recognition of them as anything but cease-fire lines.

2. Even Ben Dor's official web site states such.

3. Why not start at the original borders, that of Mandate Palestine, even the post 1923 partition borders? Why get stuck on the Green Line?

4. Natural as in topography, as in geography, as in history, as in legality, as in religion, as in security?

5. And practically and even diplomatically, if you start at those borders, that's where where you will end. That's the Arab demand - return all the territory - but Israel suggest a compromise ("territories for peace"). Why not peace for peace and territories for territories?

Poor Israel if this is its normative representative.

He's not a natural.