JNS
How Arafat saved Israel from Ehud Barak
Kenneth Levin
July 19, 2023

On June 19, the Israel State Archives released material showing that during Dec. 2000 negotiations, then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak was prepared to give up Israeli sovereignty over parts of the Old City of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. At the Camp David talks five months earlier, Barak had already offered the Palestinian Authority control over territories that went far beyond what most Israeli military strategists believed the nation could give up and still retain defensible borders. U.S. envoy Dennis Ross, who was involved in all the relevant discussions, later stated, “Barak’s government … formally accepted ideas that would effectively divide East Jerusalem, end the IDF’s presence in the Jordan Valley, and produce a Palestinian state in roughly 97 percent of the West Bank [as well as all of Gaza].” Ross added that Barak agreed to give up the Temple Mount as well. READ MORE