“If there is no peace, this is what I suggest Israel should do,” Bronfman told some 800 WJC delegates gathered for the plenary’s opening session at the Jerusalem Theater. He said that settlements in the territories should be given to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for other land, and a new boundary should be drawn.
Palestinians who cross that fence should be jailed, he said, and if the Palestinians persist in sending suicide bombers, “we will devastate the enemy. We have to put the high moral ground back where it belongs.”
Bronfman’s plan was criticized immediately by Israeli President Moshe Katsav.
Katsav said the 13-month-old intifada began not because of settlements, but because of conflicts over the Temple Mount and the “right” of Palestinian refugees to return to Israel.
Bronfman did acknowledge the oddity of his position, as an American visiting Israel, to offer such sweeping suggestions to the Jewish state.