Page "Likud" Paragraph 27

Likud has espoused opposition to Palestinian statehood and support of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

However, it has also been the party which carried out the first peace agreements with Arab states.

For instance, in 1979, Likud Prime Minister, Menachem Begin, signed the Camp David Accords with Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat, which returned the Sinai Peninsula ( occupied by Israel in the Six-Day War of 1967 ) to Egypt in return for peace between the two countries.

Yitzhak Shamir was the first Israeli Prime Minister to meet Palestinian leaders at the Madrid Conference following the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

However, Shamir refused to concede the idea of a Palestinian state, and as a result was blamed by some ( including United States Secretary of State James Baker ) for the failure of the summit.

Later, as Prime Minister, Netanyahu restated Likud's position of opposing Palestinian statehood, which after the Oslo Accords was largely accepted by the opposition Labor Party, even though the shape of any such state was not clear.