Tel Aviv (AsiaNews) - The new leader of Israel's Labour Party, Amir Peretz, called for an end to Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories. He was speaking Saturday evening, in Tel Aviv's "Rabin Square", at a public assembly to commemorate Israel's Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, ten years after Rabin was assassinated in the same square by a right wing extremist who intended to frustrate Rabin's policy of seeking peace with the Palestinian nation.
Tens of thousands of Israelis (at least 70,000, but other estimates go much higher, up to 200,000) were present in the Square and its environs to hear Peretz, but also former President Bill Clinton of the U.S. and other speakers who recalled the person and sacrifice of Rabin.
Staking out his position in such a clear and decisive manner - an act of great political and personal courage - Peretz has responded to the great hopes that his election as Labour Party leader has aroused on the left, but also in the centre, and perhaps even in circles of the more moderate right, of Israeli politics. In difference from the present Israeli Government, which does not agree to negotiate now a definitive peace treaty with the Palestinians (because it does not believe it possible) and insists on limiting any progress to interim steps, Peretz has made his call for such a peace agreement a major goal. It appears now that at the next general election, Israeli voters will truly have a far clearer choice between wholly distinct political programmes. On Thursday Peretz will meets with Prime Minister Sharon to try to agree on a date for new national elections.
