Netanyahu offered vague terms for West Bank withdrawal: former U.S. negotiator

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the United States five years ago that Israel could withdraw from most of the West Bank if his country’s security needs were met, former U.S. Middle East peace negotiator Dennis Ross recounts in a book to be published next week. Prodded by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2010 to say what he could do to advance peace talks and citing Israeli security needs, “he said that Israel could withdraw from most of the territory,” Ross writes in “Doomed to Succeed: the U.S.-Israel Relationship from Truman to Obama.” “He did not want to give percentages, but he understood what the Palestinians wanted, and if the Israeli security needs were accepted by us and met, he could be generally responsive.” Ross has advised Republican and Democratic presidents, including Democratic President Barack Obama.

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