Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has proved that he cannot be trusted as a partner for peace with Israel and that he may pose a larger threat to Israel than Hamas, according to former Israeli ambassador to the United States Michael Oren.
After hearing remarks made by Abbas at the United Nations, Oren concluded in a Ynetnews article that "Abbas poses a danger which may be revealed as strategically more serious than the tactical dangers posed by Hamas."
The fact that Israel doesn't have a partner for peace has been accepted by the Israeli public a long time ago. But now we are forced to acknowledge a new fact: That Abbas poses a danger which may be revealed as strategically more serious than the tactical dangers posed by Hamas.
His remarks at the UN on Friday mark the opening shot of a political Palestinian initiative aimed at isolating Israel in the international arena, delegitimizing it and imposing sanctions on it.
Abbas' plan basically sets an impossible ultimatum for Israel: He has asked the UN Security Council to impose a nine-month period of negotiations, during which the core issues will be discussed based on the 1967 borders, without security arrangements and with a solution to the refugee problem.
If Israel refuses to accept these conditions – and there is not a single Israeli government, even a left-wing one, which will be prepared to accept them – Abbas will turn to the International Criminal Court in order to impose sanctions on Israel as an occupying force of a UN member state.