In an interview with the Guardian the Israeli vice Premier Shimon Peres questions the prospect of peace: “To make peace and to have war is not a great attraction”.

Peres belittles the conflict by arguing: “The only thing is can they control Hamas?” Hamas were democratically elected by the Palestinians as a majority feel that they represent them!

He calls Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist groups and that Arab countries ought to put pressure on Iran to ‘control’ them. For someone who is heavily involved in arming the Israeli defence industry and was influential in establishing the first nuclear reactor, he can hardly call Iran the problem.

Israel has launched a series of military operations which to date have claimed more than 200 lives of which most are civilians and dozens of children.

In the West bank Israel has over 240,000 Jewish settlers, the justification for which is that if these settlements were not built or indeed to be dismantled then this (in the eyes of the Israelis) would have created the basis for firing missiles into Israel. Of course, we know this isn’t the case as Israel hopes to cleanse the Palestinian land of its rightful inhabitants and not only behave like a large country but act as one.

Arab governments offered to end the conflict and recognise Israel's existence in return for the Palestinian state according to the pre-1967 borders, but Israel showed no intention to meet them at this agreement. Checkpoints in the West Bank remain in place to drive its residents out for Israel to then build more colonies, expanding its territory.

This is hardly talk of peace, but propaganda produced by the Israeli state in attempt to get their argument across. In the meantime, they buy time from us, allowing them to stretch their brutal occupation while we continue to be content with their fanciful words.

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