The plan, drafted in part by ex-military and
intelligence officials, includes land swaps and no right of return.

A group of prominent Israelis, including former high-ranking
military and intelligence officials, has unveiled an “Israeli peace
initiative” which it hopes will prod their government towards a deal with
the Palestinian Authority — but few of the group’s proposals are new, and
several have been rejected in the past by Israeli and Palestinian leaders.

The plan, unveiled on Wednesday, calls for Israel to
withdraw to 1967 borders, with a series of swaps allowing it to annex major
Jewish settlements in the West Bank. It would not provide a right of return for
Palestinian refugees, though they would receive financial compensation; and it
calls for normalized relations between Israel and Arab states.

“The key principle of all regional peace agreements
shall be Israeli withdrawals, guaranteed security, normal relations, and an end
to all conflicts,” the proposal states.

A group of about 40 people worked on the project, including
former army chief Amnon Lipkin-Shahak; former Mossad chief Danny Yatom; Yaakov
Perry and Ami Ayalon, both former heads of Shin Bet; and Amram Mitzna, a former
leader of the Labour party.

“We looked around at what was happening in neighboring
countries and we said to ourselves, ‘It is about time that the Israeli public
raised its voice as well,'” Yatom told the New York Times.

The current Israeli government has yet to comment on the
proposal. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s office says he has received a
copy, but will not comment on the substance of the proposal. Deputy Prime
Minister Dan Meridor said on Tuesday that he had not seen the document.

The plan’s authors hope it will serve as a reference point
for negotiations, an Israeli counterpart to the Arab peace initiative announced
in 2002.

Key points of the Israeli plan

Territory: Israel would withdraw to 1967 borders, but would
swap land in the West Bank (up to seven per cent of its total area) on a 1:1
ratio.

Jerusalem: Israel would control Jewish neighborhoods,
Palestine would control Arab neighborhoods; Israel would control the Jewish
Quarter and the Western Wall; the Haram al-Sharif would be under nobody’s
control.

Refugees: On Palestinian refugees, the plan suggests
financial compensation and return to the state of Palestine, not Israel, with
“mutually agreed-upon symbolic exceptions” allowed to return to
Israel.

Syria: Israel would withdraw from the Golan Heights over
five years, except for “agreed minor modifications and land swaps.”

Under the proposal, for example, Israel would be allowed to
permanently annex parts of the West Bank, in exchange for equal amounts of
Israeli territory ceded to the Palestinian state.

The Arab peace initiative does not mention these “land
swaps” — it calls for a complete withdrawal to 1967 borders — but they
have been a central feature of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations for years.

The plan would allow Israel to swap up to seven per cent of
the West Bank’s area, less than the 10.6 per cent that former prime minister
Ehud Olmert proposed in a private meeting with Palestinian president Mahmoud
Abbas in 2008.

It would explicitly allow Israel to keep illegal settlements
in East Jerusalem — “Jewish neighborhoods shall be under Israeli
sovereignty,” the plan states — and while it does not specify which West
Bank land would be swapped, Israel would certainly use that provision to annex
major settlement blocs like Ma’ale Adumim and Ariel.

Many other parts of the plan appear to be immediate
political non-starters, either in Israel or in the Arab world.

One likely problem is the proposal’s wording on refugees.
The Arab peace initiative calls for a “just solution” to the refugee
problem, based on United Nations Resolution 194, which enshrines a Palestinian
right of return.

But the Israeli proposal states that refugees will only be
allowed to return to the Palestinian state, save for a few “symbolic
exceptions” who will return to Israel.

The Palestine Papers revealed that the PA’s leadership was
willing to make substantial compromises on refugee rights, but these
concessions would be hugely unpopular in the Arab world.

The plan also calls for Israel to return the Golan Heights,
the strategic plateau it seized from Syria at the end of the 1967 war. Syria
insists that the return of the Golan is a precondition for talks with Israel.
But Netanyahu has promised never to return it, and polls find that a majority
of Israelis want to keep the land.

And the proposal would carve up Jerusalem’s Old City: Israel
would control the Jewish Quarter and the Western Wall, with the Haram al-Sharif
under “no sovereignty”. Palestinian negotiators rejected this same
formula during the 2000 Camp David Summit, when Yasser Arafat refused to budge
on Palestinian sovereignty over the Haram.

Something to talk about

Palestinian officials have not commented on the plan;
reactions from Israeli and pro-Israel groups has mostly been positive, but they
have avoided commenting on specifics. J Street, the U..S-based pro-Israel
lobby, was quick to praise the plan as a “bold move.”

“[It] sets forth a clear vision for two states and, in
conjunction with the Arab peace initiative, provides a strong basis to
negotiate a regional, comprehensive peace agreement,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami,
the group’s president.

And the Israeli group Peace Now said the proposal was part
of a “public battle against the current government.”

“It is clear that as time passes more and more Israelis
are realizing that we need to immediately return to a real political process,
with the Palestinians, and begin to make brave and dramatic steps,” the
group said in a statement.

The proposal will at least provide a conversation piece
later this spring, when Netanyahu is expected to visit Washington for a series
of meetings and public appearances. Its release comes a day after U.S.
President Barack Obama met in Washington with Israeli president Shimon Peres.

“With the winds of change blowing through the Arab
world, it’s more urgent than ever that we try to seize the opportunity to
create a peaceful solution between the Palestinians and the Israelis,”
Obama said.

But the Obama administration, which spent much of last year
trying to broker direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian
Authority, has yet to present its own vision for an Israeli-Palestinian settlement.

Israel’s current right-wing government has shown little
interest in permanent status talks with the PA; Netanyahu has hinted recently
at wanting to pursue an “interim” agreement, rather than a final
deal.

Meanwhile, while talks stagnate, Israel continues to build
illegally across those 1967 lines to which it is eventually supposed to
withdraw. The Jerusalem planning committee on Monday gave initial approval for
942 new homes in the Gilo settlement in southern Jerusalem.