SOURCE http://www.meretzusa.org/actions/statements/statementonyisraelbeiteinu1006.html

Meretz USA Statement of October 24, 2006

Meretz USA Alarmed That Yisrael Beiteinu May Join the Israeli Government

On October 24, 2006, Meretz USA President Lilly Rivlin made the following statement.
"Meretz USA expresses deep concern and alarm regarding the decision of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to incorporate MK Avigdor Lieberman and his Yisrael Beiteinu party into the government coalition. Because we support an Israel that pursues both peace and equal rights, Meretz USA regards Lieberman’s impending entry as a potentially catastrophic step backward on both counts.

"This summer’s wars in Lebanon and Gaza demonstrated (yet again) that there is no military solution to the Israeli-Arab conflict. But it also showed that the majority of the Arab League, including Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and even Syria, support peace and normalization with Israel based on the 2002 Saudi plan. In recent weeks, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has begun demonstrating leadership, insisting that any Palestinian government recognize Israel. A small diplomatic opening exists, and Israel should be making every effort to utilize it.

"Avigdor Lieberman has consistently supported an aggressive militarism as an alternative to diplomacy. A ‘loose cannon’, he has publicly contemplated bombing Egypt’s Aswan Dam. Lieberman has implicitly endorsed the idea of ethnic cleansing, and his ‘diplomatic plan’ for Israeli-Palestinian territorial exchanges is a thinly disguised effort to revoke the citizenship of hundreds of thousands of Israel’s Arab citizens.

"Meretz USA applauds the leaders of Israel’s Meretz party for speaking out against Prime Minister Olmert’s decision, and expresses hope that the leaders of the Labor Party will take a similar stand against Yisrael Beiteinu and act vigorously to prevent that party’s incorporation into Israel’s government."

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Meretz USA letter to the editor of The New York Times in response to the NY Times editorial on Avigdor Lieberman:

To the Editor:
We agree sadly and completely with your assessment (“The Wrong Partner in Israel”) of faltering Israeli and Palestinian leadership, but we think your editorial should also have highlighted the dismal failure of the Bush administration to pick up the many favorable diplomatic pieces clearly evident after the summer’s wars in Lebanon and Gaza. With Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia actively pushing the Saudi peace plan; with the failure of unilateral Israeli withdrawals clearly establishing the need for direct negotiations; with the positive involvement of Europeans and Israel’s acceptance of a multinational force, an American-led peace initiative might have (and might yet) impact the attitudes of the Israeli (and Palestinian) leadership and electorate. But it appears that we are entering yet another long and cold night of despair, reinforced by a failed and inept American Middle East policy.
Lilly Rivlin
President

Charney V. Bromberg
Executive Director