Palestinians to walk away from central parts of Oslo Accords

Ramallah: The Palestinian leadership has decided to withdraw from central aspects of the Oslo Accords following the example of Israelis who abused the deal and implemented the parts of accord that suited them, said a senior Palestinian official.

According to Dr Nabeel Shaath, a member of Fatah Central Committee and a key aid to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, this Palestinian new direction will be announced by the Palestinian president at the UN General Assembly this month. He told Maan News Agency that the Palestinians will not use the Oslo Accords to their full extent.

“The Palestinians will be relieved from implementing central parts of the Oslo Accords which Israel violated,” said Shaath who declined, however, to define those parts of the 1994 deal that was originally supposed to last for five years followed by the creation of a Palestinian state. One of the key parts of the Oslo Accords is the security cooperation between Israel the Palestinian National Authority (PNA); Palestinian withdrawal from the security cooperation with Israel in implementation of an earlier decision taken by the Palestinian Central Council would lead to a problematic vacuum that need to be filled.

“President Abbas will give a clear message to the international community that Israel had not implemented anything of the 22-year-old Oslo Accords and that Palestine will just do the same thing,” said Shaath.

After finalising the Iranian nuclear deal, the US Administration plans to relaunch the Mideast Quartet which is scheduled to hold a fresh meeting by the end of the ongoing month. Arab states like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan will be attending the meeting.

“It is all about founding and agreeing on a new international framework to auspice a fresh round of peace talks. There is nothing about it in writing,” said Shaath, urging renewed regional and international efforts. “The Americans believe that things are going on the wrong direction and the Palestinian territories will plunge into a new cycle of violence,” he said.

He stressed that the Mideast Quartet should be amended to look like the P5+1 (six world powers) which sponsored the talks with the Iranians.

“The current Quartet set up is just a mere failure that should be turned into a real international framework to sponsor genuine talks,” he said. “Unless genuinely amended to be similar to that which sponsored the Iranian nuclear deal, the Quartet coming meeting will lead to nothing and become just a waste of time and effort.”

On the other hand, former Israeli foreign and justice minister and a current opposition leader Tzipi Livni called for deep change in Israeli policy. “We need dramatic change, a totally different direction,” said Livni, former chief Israeli negotiator. “Israel needs to take immediate steps to restart a credible peace process,” Livni told the Israeli news site, the Times of Israel.

She said a comprehensive final-status agreement with the Palestinians might be out of reach for now. “The world no longer suffices with the mere existence of peace talks. Rather, they need to be accompanied by immediate steps that Israel would take. Israel can and must take steps as long as they do not harm our security,” she said.

There are many areas in which Israel could be forthcoming to demonstrate its seriousness in reaching an agreement, she suggested. Such steps would not entail major concessions on the core issues at the heart of the conflict. Rather, she is talking about halting or slowing colony construction or easing freedom of movement in the West Bank — moves that “only people who do not want to reach an agreement under any circumstances would oppose.”

“Israel needs to change direction, and this is not just political,” she said. “We are becoming more closed-in, more isolated, more scared. Those who talks tough are making the state of Israel very weak, very isolated — very Jewish, in the Diaspora-sense, in that ‘everyone is against us.’ We need to get out this.”

“It became clear that whoever thinks differently is an enemy: not Jewish enough, damaging the Jewish state,” she said.