“All Israelis, including Gantz, should not forget that Abbas is not a friend, but the enemy,” “He is a Holocaust denier, pays salaries to terrorists and refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state …
JNS: As details emerged from Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s Dec. 28 meeting at his private residence in Rosh Ha’ayin with Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, many Israelis were left in shock.
According to various reports, Gantz had offered Abbas a series of “confidence-building measures” as described by the Israeli Defense Ministry, which included economic benefits to the P.A. with regard to VAT, import taxes and excise duties; a NIS 100 million ($32.2 million) loan; 1,100 entry permits for Palestinian businessmen; and dozens of VIP permits for senior P.A. officials. Gantz’s other concession to the Palestinians includes the legalization of the status of 9,500 undocumented Palestinians and foreigners living in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
““Will I not in that day,” says the Lord,
“Even destroy the wise men from Edom,
And understanding from the mountains of Esau? Obadiah 1;8
The question many Israelis are asking themselves is, what confidence-building measures did Israel receive from the Palestinians in return? And why is Israel offering so many significant concessions to the Palestinians in the first place?
Efraim Inbar, president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, told JNS that the meeting had “a façade of intimacy that is inappropriate.”
