Mitt Romney said that the Palestinians are not interested in peace with Israel and that a settlement is not possible at a fundraiser in Boca Raton, Florida in May, according to video of the event published by Mother Jones Tuesday morning. The remarks were made at the same fundraiser where Romney said that 47 percent of Americans believe they are “victims” who deserve to live off of government checks and were contained in a new excerpt of the video taken surreptitiously at the fundraiser.
“I look at the Palestinians not wanting to see peace anyway, for political purposes, committed to the destruction and elimination of Israel, and these thorny issues, and I say there’s just no way,” Romney said, responding to a donor who asked about the possibility of peace between Israel and Palestine.
Romney said that peace is not attainable and there’s nothing to do now: “[S]o what you do is, you say, you move things along the best way you can. You hope for some degree of stability, but you recognize that this is going to remain an unsolved problem … and we kick the ball down the field and hope that ultimately, somehow, something will happen and resolve it.”
Romney said that pressuring Israel toward a settlement is a bad idea. “The idea of pushing on the Israelis to give something up to get the Palestinians to act is the worst idea in the world,” Romney said.
