(Reuters) - Palestinians will not be pushed into accepting the "Mickey Mouse" state which Israel has in mind for them as part of a peace deal, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad warned Wednesday. If such a state is what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu foresees, then the Middle East peace process will remain suspended, he told a news conference.
"By all indications they have a Mickey Mouse state in mind," Fayyad said, using the Disney character's name as slang for unimportant or trivial. "It looks like it would not come close to what we have in mind." Palestinians have not lost faith in the mediation of U.S. President Barack Obama, the prime minister said in response to questions about reports that they are deeply disappointed. But Israel's leaders "should be asked" a fundamental question about exactly what kind of state they are ready to agree to before Palestinians are pressed to relaunch talks, he stressed. Palestinians must know "what are we getting into here," Fayyad said.
They should reject a peace process conducted merely "for the sake of it." Obama began his mediation campaign in January insisting that Israel freeze all settlement building in the occupied West Bank but has retreated in the face of Netanyahu's resistance and now urges the Jewish state to "restrain" settlement building.
