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Israeli sovereignty over the Western Wall of the ancient temple. Nor would he agree to any compromise on the “right of return.”

For me, that was the final answer. As one Palestinian leader remarked to me amid the still-escalating terror attacks a couple of years later, the Palestinians had “needed a Ben-Gurion, but we got an Arafat.” He didn’t mean Ben-Gurion the Zionist, but the statesman who at crucial moments like the partition vote in 1947, could give up his maximalist hopes and dreams in order to secure a better future for his people. Arafat felt much more comfortable, more secure, when the suicide bombers were calling the tune. Then he could whip up the crowds with promises of “marching on Jerusalem” or jet around the world telling everyone that Israel was denying his right to a state.

* * *

Though I now knew an agreement was impossible, for many on the Israeli left, my ostensible allies in the forthcoming election campaign against Arik, that was hard to accept. Particularly for Yossi Sarid of Meretz, and to a certain extent Yossi Beilin too, the only explanation for our failure to get a deal had to be that we hadn’t negotiated well or creatively enough. The idea that Arafat simply didn’t want a two-state peace was anathema to them. So was the political platform I said that I hoped to implement if I was re-elected as Prime Minister. Maybe, at some point in the future, a negotiated peace might be possible. We had accomplished something of importance at Camp David. We’d made clear our red lines. We knew where Arafat stood. But for now, I believed we had to move on, both in order to keep the situation on the ground from getting worse and to act in Israel’s own long-term political and security interests. I said we should unilaterally disengage from the West Bank and Gaza.

The idea was straightforward. The Palestinians’ unwillingness to accept even the final Clinton parameters, driven home with murderous ferocity by the explosion of violence since Camp David, should not be allowed to paralyze Israel politically. I proposed that we map out the area we required to retain and secure the major settlement blocs, as well as the outer East Jerusalem suburbs; a further security strip along the Jordan River; and several other strategically important

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