Intervening in the country’s general election campaign, Israel’s elder statesman warned of the perils of his country isolating itself from America.
President Barack Obama was “not convinced” that Israel’s current leaders truly wanted peace, he said.
“If there is no diplomatic decision, the Palestinians will go back to terror. Knives, mines, suicide attacks,” Mr Peres said in an extensive interview with the New York Times Magazine.
“The silence that Israel has been enjoying over the last few years will not continue, because even if the local inhabitants do not want to resume the violence, they will be under the pressure of the Arab world. Money will be transferred to them, and weapons will be smuggled to them, and there will be no one who will stop this flow.”
Most of the world would then blame Israel for the violence and brand it a “racist state”, warned Mr Peres. » | Robert Tait, in Jerusalem | Thursday, January 10, 2013
