For the first time Olmert reveals a map of 2008 on Abbas for a two -state solution

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert revealed for the first time a map of its presentation in 2008 to the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, which includes a two -state solution.

It seemed clear, through the map, that it gives the Palestinians 95.1% of the West Bank and Gaza, with the exchange of lands in Israel.

The details of the show were known for a long time, but to a large extent of a hand -drawn version of the map that Abbas re -drew it after the meeting.

“This is the first time that I present this map to the media,” says Olmert in a documentary entitled “Israel and the Palestinians: The Road to the 7th of October,” which is broadcast on BBC today.

Olmert recalls that Abbas said: “During the next fifty years, you will not find one Israeli leader who suggests what I suggest to you now. Sign it! It signed it and change the history! ” According to the newspaper “The Times of Israel”.

In September 2008, Olmert submitted to Abbas a large official map showing his proposal for the regional settlement in connection with the borders of the Palestinian state as part of a permanent peace agreement, and Abbas called for the signing of the first letters on the proposal before returning it to Ramallah to consider it by the Palestinians. But Abbas refused this.

The map shows that Olmert was somewhat prepared to return to the pre -1967 lines, while preserving the Gosh Etzion settlement bloc south Salfit in the West Bank. In exchange for expanding Israeli sovereignty over these areas, Israel was to give up some of its lands for the new Palestinian state.
Olmert also supported a tunnel road linking Gaza and the West Bank.

Olmert was also ready to divide Jerusalem into neighborhoods controlled by Israel and others controlled by the Palestinian Authority, and to abandon Israeli sovereignty over the Temple Mount and the entire old city.

Olmert said that he suggested that he be supervised by the “holy basin” instead, an international guardianship of 5 members, consisting of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Jordan, the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

In the documentary, the head of the Palestinian Presidential Bureau, Rafik Al -Husseini, says that the Palestinians did not take the show seriously because Olmert was involved in a corruption scandal and was about to resign.

Al -Husseini adds: “It is unfortunate that Olmert, regardless of his kindness, was a lame duck, and therefore, we will not reach anywhere in this.” (Sky News)