Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has offered the Palestinians a peace plan giving them 93 percent of the occupied West Bank, the Haaretz newspaper reported on Tuesday. The proposed border is at the heart of a broader plan that would compensate the Palestinians with the equivalent of 5.5 percent of the West Bank adjacent to the Gaza Strip and a route connecting Gaza to the West Bank itself.
The proposal has been offered in the context of US-backed peace talks relaunched in November with the goal of resolving the decades-old conflict by the end of the year. The proposed agreement however would be a "shelf agreement" to be implemented in the coming months and years, and would not immediately include the thorny issue of the future status of Jerusalem, Haaretz said.
The centerpiece of Olmert's proposal is the suggested permanent border, which would be based on an Israeli withdrawal from most of the West Bank. In return for the land retained by Israel in the West Bank, the Palestinians would receive alternative land in the Negev, adjacent to the Gaza Strip. The Palestinians would also enjoy free passage between Gaza Strip and the West Bank without any security checks, the proposal says.
A senior Israeli official said the Palestinians were given preliminary maps of the proposed borders.
Olmert's spokesman Mark Regev declined to comment on the report but told AFP the "negotiations with the Palestinians are making progress on a number of subjects, particularly borders. "These negotiations are serious and are aimed at a common objective," he added.
