JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office denied reports on Sunday he has backed away from a 2009 commitment to seek a two-state peaceful solution with the Palestinians. A statement by Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party widely reported by Israeli media said he had said that a speech he gave six years ago agreeing for the first time to Palestinian statehood as a solution to decades of conflict was now 'irrelevant.' Netanyahu 'never said such a thing,' his office said in a statement responding to the reports. Likud had apparently issued the remarks to debunk earlier Israeli media reports suggesting Netanyahu had in a previous term of office negotiated a broad withdrawal from land Israel captured in the Six Day War.
(photo credit: The Jerusalem Post)