Pressure mounts for Netanyahu peace plan

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is under mounting pressure to present his own peace plan rather than be faced with an imposed solution or the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state.

President Shimon Peres, Israel’s elder statesman and a Nobel peace laureate, was the latest to add his voice to the growing chorus, urging Netanyahu to act before events overtake him.

“If we don’t want foreign plans, the best way would be a plan of our own, and if we do that, others won’t go ahead with theirs,” Peres said last Friday.

Peres was responding to reports indicating that US President Barak Obama was preparing to lay out his own vision for a peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.

First reported in the New York Times, it said the vision “could include four principles, or terms of reference ... (which) could call for Israel to accept a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders” of before that year’s Middle East war. It also suggested the Palestinians could have to forgo the right of return to land inside Israel, that Jerusalem would be the capital of both states, and would also include principles safeguarding Israel’s security.

Netanyahu has said he will deliver a policy speech to the US Congress in late May, where he is expected to present his plan.

Following the breakdown of direct talks last September, the Palestinians have adopted a diplomatic strategy aimed at securing UN recognition of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders.