Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir accused the nine member states of the European Economic Community (EEC) yesterday of challenging the “national consensus” in Israel against any dealings with the Palestine Liberation Organization. He was referring to the declaration by the EEC Prime Ministers at their recent summit meeting in Venice which stated that the PLO and other Palestinian groups must be “associated with” the Middle East peace process.
Addressing the Likud caucus at the Zionist General Council meeting here, Shamir said “most of the principles” of the Venice declaration are “absurd.” He noted that the EEC called for Palestinian self-determination. There is “a very big difference” between self-determination for the Palestinians and “participation in the determination of their own future,” which is the formula agreed to at Camp David, Shamir said. If the Palestinians were to determine their future alone — the meaning of “self-determination” — they would thereby “be determining our fate as well, ” he said. He warned that any effort to drive a wedge into Israel’s national consensus would founder. (By David Landau)
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