Several related items, reported in the Jerusalem Post and elsewhere:

‘We need to give up deeply held desires’

Like what? The desire to survive?

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the Knesset at the opening of its Winter Session on Monday that the current Palestinian leadership wants to move forward toward peace with Israel and that he would not use excuses to stall peace talks.

Whay expect any evidences of negotiations truly in good faith ? Those would just be an obstructive excuses.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert addresses the Knesset during the opening of its Winter Session, Monday. Laying out his agenda for the coming year, Olmert said he planned to make every effort to pursue peace with the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

A worthy sentiment. Worthy of Neville Chamberlain in 1938.

“The current Palestinian leadership is not a terrorist leadership. President Abbas and Prime Minister Salaam Fayad are committed to all the agreements signed with Israel, and I believe that they want to move ahead together with us on a route that will bring about a change in the reality of relations between us and them,” he said.

If you believe that, PLEASE e-mail me immediately. I have a GREAT deal for you on some tropical beach-front property here in Moody County, South Dakota!

Further comments indicate that Olmert is willing to give up more than “desires”:

Israel Signals Shift on Jerusalem Split

Two senior Israeli politicians, including the prime minister’s closest ally, talked openly Monday about dividing Jerusalem, signaling a possible shift in Israeli opinion about one of the Mideast’s most contentious issues. The dispute over Jerusalem has derailed negotiations in the past, and the latest comments come at a time when Israeli and Palestinian teams are trying to agree on principles guiding future peace talks…. Earlier Monday, Olmert’s closest ally, Ramon, raised the idea of a possible division of Jerusalem in interviews on the two main radio stations…. The proposals of Ramon and Lieberman would fall far short of a Palestinian demand to set up their future capital in all of the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of the city. The eastern part contains the Old City, home to major Jewish, Muslim and Christian shrines….Ramon said that under his plan, Israel would not hand over the Old City and neighboring areas—known as the “holy basin”—but he spoke of a special arrangement in the Old City. He did not elaborate, but the term would suggest less than full Israeli sovereignty there.

This would go far towards cementing Olmert’s legacy as the true heir to Chamberlain in the 21st Century (to date).

These pans seem, however, to please neither side in the dispute:

From the Paleswinians (predictably enough):

‘A Palestine without all of east J’lem as capital won’t work’

A solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict necessarily requires the establishment of a Palestinian State with its capital in all of east Jerusalem and any accord short of that will not work, the Palestinian Minister for Jerusalem Affairs said Monday. The comments by Adnan Husseini, who previously served as director of the Islamic Wakf which administers the Temple Mount, only served to highlight the immense gaps that exist between the two parties regarding Jerusalem, and cast doubt on whether Prime Minster Ehud Olmert’s longstanding proposal to cede Arab neighborhoods on the periphery of the city as part of a final peace agreement could serve as basis for such an accord.

Realize, this transfer of east Jerusalem to the Paleswinians would include the West (Wailing) Wall of the Temple back out of Israeli hands. Also, the security situation would not be improved either.

‘Olmert will place Hamas on Jerusalemem walls’

Just what we need.

At the opening of the Knesset Winter Session, Likud Chairman Binyamin Netanyahu lashed out at the government’s policy, claiming that its strategy would eventually lead to an Iranian terrorist presence in Jerusalem and the rest of Israel.

The unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon created an Iranian outpost – from which Israel is being attacked – in the North, and the unilateral pullout from Gaza created a second Iranian base in Gaza, ‘Hamastan,'” Netanyahu said. “And now the government is planning a third withdrawal – from Judea and Samaria – that will lead to a third Iranian outpost.”

Netanyahu quoted statements made by Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert before the withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza, respectively, saying the two had promised security, while Israel was in actuality served with aggression and terror.

As Olmert seeks to become the latter-day Chamberlain, Netanyahu has taken the role of Churchill, crying in the political wilderness against the Dr. Feel-good emotions and policies of appeasement.