CARTER SUPPORTS PALESTINE

Former US President Jimmy Carter said that Israel will face a “catastrophe” unless it revives the West Asia peace process and allows the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. Carter pointed out in an interview that Arabs will outnumber Jews in the Holy Land in the foreseeable future. “If we look toward a one-state solution, which seems to be the trend, I hope not inexorable, it would be a catastrophe for Israel, because there would be only three options in that case,” he said. Those would be to expel large numbers of Palestinians, deprive the Palestinians of equal voting rights, or to give them equal voting rights and therefore the majority, he said. “And you would no longer have a Jewish state,” Mr Carter predicted. “The basic decisions would be made by the Palestinians, who would almost very likely vote in a bloc, whereas you would have some sharp divisions among the Israelis, because the Israelis always have different points of view,” Jimmy Carter said. On the other hand, the other two options would amount to “ethnic cleansing” in the first case, or “apartheid” in the second.