Prime minister Yitzhak Rabin remained opposed to the creation of a Palestinian State more than a year after his historic handshake
on the White House lawn with PLO leader Yasser Arafat in September 1993, a new letter obtained by Times of Israel reveals.
The brief response letter to a private Israeli Citizen, dated December 25, 1994, and signed by Rabin’s adviser and
bureau chief Eitan Haber, states: “Concerning
your letter to the prime minister with regard to a Palestinian state I
am replying: The prime minister is of the opinion that there is no room
for a Palestinian state.”
Fischer told the Times of Israel that he also received, in 1994, a letter from Uri
Savir, a former aide to then-foreign minister Shimon Peres, in which
Savir states that it was the current government’s policy to “reject the
creation of a Palestinian state.”
Fischer, a writer living in Petah Tikva, told
The Times of Israel that he had written the letter to Rabin “simply to
inquire what the government’s intentions were vis-à-vis a Palestinian
state — yes or no.”
Haber,
said Monday he did not remember sending the letter to Fischer in Rabin’s
name. “But at that time there were days on which we wrote 400 letters a
day… It’s really possible that we sent such a letter, but I don’t
remember. How could I remember?..It was difficult for me to believe
that in ’94 we wrote this. But it’s possible. I really don’t [know]. I
don’t want to tell you yes or no.”
According to the Oslo accords’ the
primary aim was “to establish a Palestinian Interim Self-Government
Authority… for the Palestinian people in the West Bank and the Gaza
Strip, for a transitional period not exceeding five years, leading to a
permanent settlement.”
