Blue and White head Benny Gantz warns in NYT op-ed that recognizing a Palestinian state now risks Israel’s security and rewards PA failure.
The recognition of a Palestinian state by many Western leaders is not "a rejection of Netanyahu, but a rejection of Israel’s bipartisan security consensus," Blue and White Party head Benny Gantz said in an opinion piece he penned in The New York Times on Wednesday.
Gantz, addressing Western leaders, elaborates by saying that Israel's actions and policies during the Gaza war are being viewed through the prism of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and not through the lens of national security.
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“There are deep political divisions and disagreements in Israel. I myself have been a vocal critic of Mr. Netanyahu. But the nation’s core security interests are not partisan property.” Gantz arguements.
According to Gantz, any path forward for broader Palestinian civil autonomy must first “incorporate a proven long-term track record of accountable governance, comprehensive de-radicalization reforms and a successful crackdown on terror elements targeting Israelis.”
Gantz also stated that a recognition of a Palestinian state “as it stands today” would only mean to give the Palestinian Authority a reward even if it failed to “thwart terror originating in its territory against Israel.”
Leader of the National Unity Party MK Benny Gantz leads a faction meeting at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, on May 26, 2025. (credit: NOAM REVKIN FENTON/FLASH90)
“The PA has incited violence and glorified terrorism in school textbooks, and waged unilateral campaigns to isolate and delegitimize Israel in international forums,” he wrote.
Gantz says Palestinian Authority was a failure
Gantz explained how, after Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, the PA was entrusted with the territory’s control. He explained, “The next year, Hamas won a shocking plurality of seats in the PA’s legislative elections, eclipsing its rival faction, Fatah.”
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Hamas violently overthrew Fatah in Gaza the next year, and with help from Iran, Hamas dramatically expanded its military capabilities within Gaza, and ultimately launched the October 7 massacre.”
He then concludes that, “That collapse was not an anomaly; it was the consequence of a Palestinian Authority with little legitimacy among its people and a painful lesson that Israel cannot risk suffering from again in the foreseeable future.”
Western conceptual lack of understanding for Israel
Gantz also described a meeting he had with Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez as something that left him with “sheer astonishment at the conceptual lack of understanding.”
“Sanchez remarked that his country also contends with terrorism; but there is no symmetry between defending one’s country against sporadically active terror cells in Europe and a terror pseudo-state backed by a country like Iran,” Gantz explained.
“Israel’s enemies do not care who governs in Jerusalem,” he added and the finished by asking the international community to “adopt the same clarity,” and understand that the Israelis don’t see the recognition of a Palestinian state as “a matter of personal politics.”
[SRC] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/gantz-palestinian-recognition-not-against-050513853.html
