Netanyahu planning a national referendum on US peace plan to extend negotiations for another year?

Netanyahu planning a national referendum on US peace plan to extend negotiations for another year?(Debka).

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is planning to conjduct the first popular referendum in Israel’s history to ratify the amended peace framework proposal which US Secretary of State John Kerry is drafting for presentation in the coming weeks, debkafile reveals.

The prime minister has been quoted as saying that he needs the referendum to push back “domestic pressures from the right”, but in any case he believes it will be politically advantageous. 

He has confided to his closest circle that for the first time that he is in favor of the Kerry proposals and, although they don’t see eye to eye on many of the issues, he thinks the gaps between them can be bridged.

Netanyahu is counting on the the framework accord gaining an overwhelming popular majority in referendum. Although it is not yet a final-status agreement, the document will lay out principles for solutions of the core issues at dispute between Israel and the Palestinians.

After Netanyahu and Abu Mazen affirm this paper, it will be possible to extend the negotiating time frame for a final accord by at least another year and so get past the original nine-month deadline which expires at the end of April.

Our sources add that the prime minister regards the Obama administration’s acceptance of Israel as the Jewish national state to be an historic achievement of unparalleled importance. He believes he can find common ground with Secretary Kerry on Jerusalem as well.

He was encouraged to learn that Kerry is working on a formula that avoids citing E. Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state, only as a goal for their national aspirations.

Netanyahu does not expect the right-of-center Jewish Home to actually quit the government coalition over the US initiative, even though its leader, the Economy Minister Naftali Bennet, declared Tuesday that his party would not stay in a government that withdraws to the pre-1967 borders or repartitions Jerusalem.Hmmm........."Israel's staunchest ally'.Read the full story here.