http://pjmedia.com/barryrubin/2013/10/09/ovadia-yosef-was-ready-for-compromise-peace-but-concluded-correctly-it-wasnt-possible/In 2003 Rabbi Yosef wrote:
“I want to clarify my position with regard to Yesha [the West Bank settlements]. Not once have I thought that the Halachic [Jewish religious law] ruling which I issued at the time regarding ‘territories in exchange for peace’ is not valid and does not apply to the current situation. I had intended only a true peace, one in which Jerusalem and its surrounding neighborhoods would rest secure, in peace and harmony. But now we see that on the contrary, handing over territory from our holy land endangers lives. We never intended such a peace. Therefore the Oslo agreement is null and void. For I am for peace and they are for war [Quote from Psalm 120] and we have no one to rely on but our Father in Heaven….”“With much love, and one who seeks your well being with all my heart and soul; Ovadia Yosef.”That is the obvious experience that changed millions of Israeli minds, making them sure that peace isn’t going to happen: the realization that handing over territory will not bring peace, that Arab states (and Iran or Turkey) will not accept Israel. The concept of ‘territories in exchange for peace’ is not valid and does not apply to the current situation; or at least it can and will be reversed by Islamists.
http://www.israellycool.com/2010/08/29/the-day-in-israel-sunday-aug-29th-2010/Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat on Sunday slammed remarks by the spiritual leader of Israel’s leading ultra-Orthodox party, who said the Palestinians should “perish”, saying that it was paramount to incitement to genocide.
Erekat called on the Israeli government to denounce the remarks by Israel’s former chief rabbi Ovadia Yosef, and to take action against racist remarks by other elected officials. He also criticized Israel for allowing the incident to pass without condemnation.
Yosef had said during his weekly Shabbat sermon that the Palestinians, namely Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, should perish from the world. Yosef, a founder of the Shas Party, also described Palestinians as evil, bitter enemies of Israel.“All these evil people should perish from this world … God should strike them with a plague, them and these Palestinians,” Yosef had said.The 89-year-old is a respected religious scholar but is also known for vitriolic comments about Arabs, secular Jews, liberals, women and gays, among others.
“Is this how the Israeli government prepares its public for a peace agreement?” Erekat said, days before Israeli and Palestinian leaders were scheduled to meet in Washington for the launch of renewed direct peace negotiations.
“While the PLO is ready to resume negotiations in seriousness and good faith, a member of the Israeli government is calling for our destruction,” Erekat said. “It is an insult to all our efforts to advance the negotiations process.”
Erekat called on Israel “do more about peace and stop spreading hatred” and said Yosef’s comments could be placed within the larger context of Israel’s “policy against a Palestinian state” such as settlement expansion, home demolitions, among other things.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday distanced himself from Yosef’s remarks, but stopped short of a condemnation. “Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s remarks do not reflect Netanyahu’s views, nor do they reflect the stance of the Israeli government,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
“Israel plans to take part in peace negotiations out of a desire to advance toward a peace agreement with the Palestinians that will end the conflict and ensure peace, security and good neighborly relations between the two peoples,” the statement continued.
http://rabbipruzansky.com/Most infamously, Chacham Ovadia issued an opinion in the 1990s in support of surrendering parts of the land of Israel for the sake of peace, and the Oslo debacle could not have occurred without the support of Shas, either implicitly or explicitly. From this vantage point, his political instincts were not always keen. But two points must be underscored that are widely overlooked: his decision was in favor of real peace, not the piecemeal destruction of Israel. (And few authorities would argue that maintaining every inch in the land of Israel in the face of national suicide is a plausible halachic approach; if it were, then even a tactical retreat in the heat of battle would be prohibited.)
The second point is even more telling: he publicly retracted his decision in 2003, writing that “the Oslo Accords are null and void” and that the peace of Oslo –the death and maiming of thousands of Jews – is not what he meant by “peace.” But the left has largely ignored the retraction. Two truths must be recognized: if another surrender agreement is tabled, Chacham Ovadia’s psak will be trotted out again, whether warranted or not (one can always argue that the coming peace will be the glorious peace anticipated by the psak, whether true or not – always the weakest link in the decision itself); and his support of Oslo was utilized disingenuously by Oslo-ites. They would have paid no attention to him had he opposed it like more than 90% of the Rabbis in Israel, to whom they paid no attention. (His late son, Rav Yaakov Yosef, notably disagreed with his father on this issue.)
Topic: Rav Ovadia Yosef the spiritual leaders of shas is dead (Read 70057 times)