Ramallah: Arab members of the Israeli Knesset said on Tuesday the Palestinians have a good chance to bring their cause to the international arena once again, and score an ethical victory against Israel.

The Knesset members urged the Palestinian leadership to go ahead with their plan of seeking UN statehood recognition, which will put huge pressure on Israel, expose the Jewish state to embarrassment and criticism and make international boycott campaigns against it possible.

The Knesset members stressed that the Israeli threat to walk away from the Oslo Accords was simply rhetoric to scare Palestinians away from the project. Jamal Zahalkah, a member of the Israeli Knesset and Chairman of the National Democratic Assembly told Gulf News that the Oslo Accords fall in the vital Israeli national interests.

"Israel is not concerned in any way to walk away from the Oslo Accords and the security coordination with the Palestinian National Authority (PNA)," he said. Israel does not implement in any way tens of the articles of the Oslo Accords, and turns its back to the articles which directly affect the daily life of the Palestinians.

"Israel has buried the Oslo Accords along time back. What remains of Oslo Accords? Just nothing. It is not an Israeli interest to walk away from an agreement which it does not implement in the first place," he said.

Zahalkah said that the Palestinian plan of attaining UN statehood recognition should be implemented without a delay and regardless of the objection of some countries." However, the Palestinian plan of seeking UN statehood recognition should not be an alternative to the Palestinian struggle where the civil society institutions must be reactivated to give the Palestinian cause its earlier ethical superiority," he said.

Mohammad Barakah, a Knesset Member and Chairman of the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality told Gulf News that the Palestinian cause should be handled internationally. "The Palestinian should go on with their plans in attaining UN statehood recognition regardless of the peace talks which can also go side by side," he said. "The UN move and the peace talks do not contradict each other, but complement each other," he added.

 

"The least the Palestinian will gain at the UN is turning their 1967 lands from disputed lands to lands under occupation," he said.

 

"The Israeli government has been angry of the Palestinian move because it was planned and under implementation against the Israeli will," he said.

 

Barakah said that the coming meeting of the Central Council of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) (scheduled tomorrow Wednesday) will make the final decision on the Palestinian move, stressing that the council's decision will cut off the way for any deal or a formula for peace talks.

 

"From the Israeli perspective, negotiations are for only they sake of negotiations which is to them a goal not a tool to reach a goal," he said.

 

"It will be possible for the Palestinians once their plan is reviewed at the UN to make real and hard pressure on Israel. Boycott campaigns against Israel means a lot and that tool can be effectively used," he said.

 

"Success is not totally guaranteed with the Palestinian plan, but the Palestinians stand in urgent need to ask the countries around the world to announce a political and ethical position," he said.

 

Meanwhile, a high profile Israeli delegation are currently visiting the US at the invitation of Jewish Peace Movement, J Street on an educational tour from coast to coast trying to convince government officials and members of the Congress that as opposed to Netanyahu's claims, the 1967 borders are defensible in the framework of a peace agreement and agreed upon security arrangements.

 

The Israeli Daily Haaretz reported on Tuesday that the Israeli delegation are going to say that there is a Palestinian partner and that there is even a plan for a general agreement that includes the Arab world.