Yair Lapid, co-leader of the Blue and White party, currently leading in the polls for the Israeli elections on April 9, told i24NEWS-Israel Hayom on Sunday that Israel should "have the patience to wait for a Palestinian leader that has the vision of [former Egyptian President] Anwar Sadat."
A former journalist and a savvy media personality, the politician opened the interview by addressing his condolences to Gal Keidan's family.
The 19-year-old staff sergeant from Beersheba, in southern Israel, was killed earlier on Sunday in a stabbing attack near Ariel.
Capitalizing on the military pedigree of his running mates in the Blue and White party, the former journalist said there was no precedent in having such "combined experience in dealing with the threats Israel is facing
"We constantly talk about the fact the IDF is the strongest army in the Middle East - these are the people who made it the strongest army in the Middle East," Lapid said.
Sticking to the party platform, he insisted that the solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians was a regional conference.
"I don't think water will come from this rock," he said, when asked whether he would break from PM Benjamin Netanyahu's policy of limiting contact with the Palestinian Authority.
"We should have the courage and vision of Menachem Begin, we should also have the patience to wait for a Palestinian leader that has the vision of Anwar Sadat. We don't have that right now," the Blue and White leader said, before enumerating the conditions his party would set for peace negotiations.
'We should have the patience for a #Palestinian leader like Anwar Sadat, but we don't have such a partner on the other side right now,' @BlueWhite2019 co-leader @yairlapid tells @NuritBen and @BismuthBoaz: #IsraElections2019 pic.twitter.com/9qtGlVRa6W
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) March 17, 2019
"I recognize the fact that the Palestinians are suffering, but they are not suffering because of Israel - they are suffering because of other Palestinians," Lapid said.
"We need to move forward in separating from them in a cautious manner, and we are going to do it with people who hate us. There is a mythology of 'let's kill the Jews' within Palestinian society that we need to face," Lapid added.
Highlighting his conditions for a peace plan, Lapid focused on security, the indivisibility of Jerusalem, and the impossibility of the right of return for Palestinians. "There's no such thing as Palestinian refugees," the politician said, calling the claim a "hoax."
'If there are two terrorists in Nablus, I want the @IDF, in the future, to be able to go there and kill them.'
'There will be no right of return. They're not even refugees, it's a hoax.'@yairlapid delivers his Israeli-#Palestinian separation plan: #IsraElections2019 pic.twitter.com/t6nuLzosKm
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) March 17, 2019
- 'Democracies must defend themselves' -
Quizzed on Sunday's Supreme Court decision to bar Kahanist politician Michael Ben Ari from running for parliament, Lapid said he respected the decision.
"Of course I accept the Supreme Court ruling, I'm unhappy because I wanted to disqualify Ofer Cassif as well. We voted for that in the election committee. I'm happy that Michael Ben Ari will not be in the next parliament, because I don't think this kind of blunt racism should be part of our political system."
"I think democracies must defend themselves, from non-democratic powers that work from within, using democracy against democracy," the centrist candidate said. "Now, it's a thin line. And the right place to discuss things and make those decisions is the Supreme Court."
'I think democracies must defend themselves from non-democratic powers from within. I think we should defend ourselves from certain views,' @yairlapid tells @NuritBen and @BismuthBoaz, on two #IsraElections2019 candidates being banned by #Israel's High Court: pic.twitter.com/0SQQNXqseg
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) March 17, 2019
Dismissing the phone hacking scandal that currently plagues fellow party leader Benny Gantz, he said that as long as there is no material compromising Israel's security on the phone, it was "nobody's business."
"Anyone who has anything to do with Israel's security knows knows he might be hacked. And therefore, we are all being very careful about what we have, or don't have, on our phones. So it's not a big deal," Lapid said.
"The only reason this story was published two days ago was because the same day there was a big story about the fact that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu got NIS 16 million from a company that was attached to Thyssenkrupp, the German company that supplied Israel with submarines. It's a painful story for him."
Lapid was referring to a report by Channel 13, suggesting a possible link between Netanyahu and Thyssenkrupp.
Watch the full broadcast below:
