Palestinians Refuse Offer of State Larger than Gaza & West Bank!

Yet it is getting almost no press coverage!!!  How is that possible??!!!

Arutz Sheva is a right wing media outlet in Israel that has a small but loyal following of mostly right wing readers.  As a result, it is largely marginalized by the rest of the Israeli media community and considered by many to be a mouthpiece for a lunatic fringe.

But occasionally, Arutz Sheva reports on stories that are not only of no interest to the rest of the media community, but which those media outlets want to actively bury or ignore.  That's one of the main reasons I stop by there to peruse the headlines during my daily slog through the interwebs.

This morning a story on Arutz Sheva caught my eye. It caught my eye for the simple reason that it is a story that should be plastered across the headlines of every major news outlet in the world, yet inexplicably isn't.  This story is IMHO, quite simply, the most ground breaking story to hit the Middle East in the last 40 years!

For years I've been saying that 'the occupation' that the world has been laying at Israel's feet, is a result of a war that was forced on Israel by several of her neighbors.  How is it that none of these same neighbors - especially the neighbors with whom we have peace treaties - are being asked to help create a solution?

Well, Egypt just stepped up and offered to solve the Palestinian problem in one grand move... and nobody but little right wing lunatic fringe Arutz Sheva is reporting it!

According to the story, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi offered up a huge chunk of the Sinai peninsula adjacent to Gaza in which the Palestinians could establish a state that would be five times larger than Gaza and provide them with more land than if they created a state in the entire West Bank!

Palestinian communities in the West Bank would remain (no transfer of population!!!) and would retain their current autonomy and would be administered by the Palestinian Government of their their new state.

In return for receiving this Gaza-Sinai Palestinian state, the Palestinians would have to give up the so-called 'Right of Return' of refugees to Israel, as well as the demand that Israel return to the 1947 ceasefire lines, and agree to be demilitarized.

If such a plan were to be brought to fruition, the Palestinians would end up with the ample land, ports and location to be able to create a Levant Riviera boasting world class beach resorts, prime cruise destinations and some of the best fishing and scuba diving in the world, not to mention enough space to become a key agricultural supplier to southern Europe!  

Not only that, but given the existence of natural gas and other fossil / mineral reserves in Sinai, there is a good chance that some of this could be exploited by the new Palestinian state.

Both the US and Israeli governments were made aware of the Egyptian offer, and both gave the plan their go-ahead.  Yet Palestinian Authority head Mahmoud Abbas rejected the offer out of hand.  

But aside from a little blurb in Arutz Sheva, nobody is talking about it!

How is it that such a historic offer and such a historic refusal have not gotten any meaningful media coverage?

Could it be that the perpetuation of the problem and the resulting vilification of Israel is preferable to creating a regional solution to a problem that has been festering for 70 years?!