Etgar Lefkovits , THE JERUSALEM POST Feb. 18, 2009
www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1233304815871&pagename=JPArticle%2FShowFull

President Shimon Peres said Wednesday that he had erred in supporting
Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza.

The revealing remarks come three years after Israel's evacuation of the
volatile coastal strip which has since been seized by Hamas.

"Whatever will happen in the future, we shall not repeat the mistakes we
made in leaving Gaza," Peres said in a question and answer session with a
group of American Jewish leaders. "It should have been done otherwise. I was
for leaving Gaza. I consider myself as one of the persons mistaken."

The dovish leader, who has long been a champion of Israeli territorial
withdrawals, said that although "lessons must be drawn" from the 2005
unilateral Gaza pullout, demographic and democratic considerations still
necessitate the creation of a Palestinian state.

"It doesn't change the fact that there is a [demographic] reality," he told
the annual Israel meeting of the Conference of Presidents of Major American
Jewish Organizations. "I want to make sure that the state we have remains
Jewish."