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In his first time at bat in the big Mideast diplomatic league, Obama struck out spectacularly — as Al-Jazeera’s trove of leaked documents makes amply clear.
American Thinker Blog
by Zoe Pollock
Blake Hounshell parses the Al Jazeera leaks, which hinted at major Palestinian concessions offered to Israel:
If [the Guardian's] speculation is right, the leakers intended to embarrass their former bosses. Mission accomplished.
So what now? Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has been ruling outside the law for some time now; there doesn't seem to be a legal means for his opponents to oust him. That means Palestinians who oppose the PA are going to need to take to the streets to voice their disapproval, Tunisia style.
And what of the two-state solution? It was probably already dead, and these documents will only reinforce the point. But I imagine the "peace process" will limp along, one way or another, until it becomes impossible to defend anymore.
Meanwhile Hounshell is keeping a close eye on Egypt, where "the Egyptian street got a taste of its power today."
This excerpt from Arlene Kushner’s post deals with the US insistence on pushing the narrative that has already been debunked-that the resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the key to Middle East peace.
The claim was refuted in Wikileaks, but elsewhere as well.
Bernard Lewis writes in The Crisis of Islam
:
In his pronouncements, bin Ladin makes frequent references to history One of the most dramatic was his mention, in his videotape of October 7, 2001, of the “humiliation and disgrace” that Islam has suffered for “more than eighty years.” Most American-and no doubt, European-observers of the Middle Eastern scene began an anxious search for something that had happened “more than eighty years” ago, and came up with various answers. We can be fairly sure that bin Ladin’s Muslims listeners-the people he was addressing-picked up the allusion immediately and appreciated its significance.
In 1918 the Ottoman sultanate, the last of the great Muslim empires, was finally defeated-its capital, Constantinople, occupied, its sovereign held captive, and much of its territroy partitioned between the victorious British and French Empires.
Lewis wrote this back in 2003. But the lesson that the West in general is the enemy is ignored.
January 23, 2011
“Fighting That Persistent Lie”
We might have expected WikiLeaks exposure to kill it: the Obama claim that cooperation with Arab states was dependent upon an Israeli-Palestinian negotiated peace.
But here we have it again, in somewhat different, and more outrageous, form:
A former CIA officer, Bruce Riedel, has just given a talk at a Middle East Policy Council event on Capitol Hill. The fact that legislators and their aides were privy to his “expert” words make them that much more damaging. What he said was that:
“American lives are being lost today because of the perpetuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” (Emphasis added)
Frank Anderson, also a former CIA official, and president of the Policy Council, reiterated this sentiment, saying “we are paying an increasing price in blood for their [Israeli and Palestinian] failure and refusal to reach an agreement.”
Riedel explained — if you can call what he said an explanation — that:
“The Arab-Israeli conflict is at the heart and center of Al-Qaeda’s ideology and its narrative.” (Emphasis added)
~~~~~~~~~~
This is so offensively distorted, so far removed from the reality of the situation, that it cannot be allowed to pass without rebuttal.
Al Qaeda’s — and Bin Laden’s — quarrel is with the US and the West. It is a clash of civilizations, within which Israel plays a decidedly minimal role. Were Israel and the PA to forge an agreement, it would not affect Bin Laden’s attitude towards American civilization.
~~~~~~~~~~
I cite here from a Congressional Research Service Report for Congress that was released by the US Navy Department of History:
“Osama Bin Laden’s experiences as a logistical coordinator and financier for…resistance to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan during the 1980s are thought to have provided the backdrop for his belief that Muslims could take effective military action inspired by select Islamic principles. His exposure to the teachings of conservative Islamist scholars in Saudi Arabia and his work with Arab militants in Afghanistan provided the theological and ideological basis for his belief in the desirability of puritanical Salafist Islamic reform in Muslim societies and the necessity of armed resistance in the face of perceived aggression — a concept Al Qaeda has since associated with a communally-binding Islamic principle known as ‘defensive jihad.’
“In the early 1990s, Bin Laden emphasized his desire to secure the withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign troops from Saudi Arabia at all costs…Bin Laden was expelled from Saudi Arabia and his ire increasingly focused on the United States. Following a period of exile in Sudan and Afghanistan in which his radical views sharpened, Bin Laden issued a declaration of jihad against the United States in 1996 that signaled his emergence as an internationally recognizable figure…
“Following his declaration of jihad on the United States, Bin Laden released a series of statements that expanded the vision and scope of his self-declared conflict with the United States…Echoing U.S. academic Samuel Huntington’s theory on the impending clash of civilizations, Bin Laden repeated his characterization of a so-called ‘new crusade led by America against the Islamic nations,’ and emphasized his belief that an emerging conflict between Islam and the West would be fought ‘between the Islamic world and the Americans and their allies.’”
http://www.history.navy.mil/library/online/al-queda%20evolve.htm
The report mentions two audiotapes released in 2005, which identify the bases of Al Qaeda’s political ideology:
An Islamic state governed solely by sharia law is primary. Secular government is unacceptable and deemed contrary to Islamic faith. Muslims must resist and overthrow rulers who violate Islamic law and principles.
Then there must be a liberation of Muslim lands “from every aggressor.” Israel is mentioned in this context, of course, but not only Israel: included are all Western forces, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan or elsewhere. And where Israel is concerned, the goal is most certainly not an Arab-Israeli peace, but the eradication of a Jewish presence on the land.
~~~~~~~~~~
And where is all of this going? Why, the US government has to lean harder on Israel, of course. Israeli positions should be more in concert with American efforts to forge a deal.
Riedel suggested that a positive approach might be most effective: “Israelis need that hug. Implicit in the hug can also be, you’ll get a cold shoulder if we’re not moving in the right direction.”
With “friends” like these…
© Arlene Kushner. This material is produced by Arlene Kushner, functioning as an independent journalist. Permission is granted for it to be reproduced only with proper attribution
see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info
Technorati Tag: Middle East.
Middle Eastern Muslims are not stupid. They target the weakest infidels living amongst them. Since Israel for the time being is strong, that leaves the defenseless Christian presence in Muslim lands which must – and can - be eliminated first. This puts certain anti-Zionist Christian hierarchies in a bind. If they speak up too loudly to defend their own against the Muslim onslaught, the anti-Zionist narratives they peddle in the West will collapse as it dawns on the laity that the problem isn’t the Jewish state, the problem is the Muslim state of mind.
A few illustrative examples taken from recent news reports follow.
Experts say Christian communities in Middle East will ‘die out’ unless urgent action taken
By Caroline May - The Daily Caller, January 18, 2011
With attacks against Christians on the rise in majority-Muslim nations in the Middle East, experts say the future of Christianity in the region is gravely threatened.
###
Christian ‘Genocide’ In The Mideast
By Greg Burke, Fox News, January 18, 2011
Christians have been getting pushed out of the Middle East for some time now, but the attacks on them have recently become particularly ferocious.
It’s enough to look at the bombing at a Coptic church in Alexandria, Egypt, on New Year’s Day that left 23 dead, or the brutal siege on St. George Chaldean Church, a Catholic church in Baghdad that killed more than 50.
“If you look at the technical definition of what genocide is, it is the attempt to annihilate a particular group because of their ethnicity or their religion,” says David Alton a Catholic member of Britain’s House of Lords. “And certainly that is what is happening to many of the ancient churches of the Middle East.”
###
By Manfred Gerstenfeld, ynetnews.com, January 18, 2011
Several Western Protestant organizations have, over the past years, relentlessly criticized Israel’s attitude toward Palestinian Christians, while remaining silent about incomparably bigger problems caused them by Palestinian Muslims. The same bodies have also long ignored the harassment of Christians by Muslims in a large number of countries, including Egypt.
This motif of ignoring Muslim aggression and focusing on Jews is an ancient one. In 2005, historian Rivka Fishman published an article showing that from the Seventh Century, the Byzantines were threatened by Muslims. The Christian leaders, however, largely ignored this and instead focused their attention on hate mongering against the Jews.
###
Press Release
For Immediate Release
January 12, 2011
Contact: Jason Edelstein, +972-52-861-2129HRW in 2010: Less Credibility, More BDSOrganization Again Devotes More Resources
to Israel than Other MidEast CountriesJERUSALEM – As part of its annual analysis of Human Rights Watch (HRW), NGO Monitor today released the 2010 report on the activities of HRW’s Middle East and North Africa (MENA) division. In 2010, HRW demonstrated a lack of credibility in allegations involving Israel, extended its support of boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS), ignored the criticism of its founder Robert Bernstein, saw a significant drop in donor funding, and replaced the chairman of its board.
“Our analysis proves that in 2010 HRW continued to be driven by anti-Israel bias and a lack of focus on real human rights issues in the Middle East,” says Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based research institution that tracks NGOs in the region. “In examining the number of reports issued, the types of documents published for each country, the weak statements on totalitarian regimes, and a lack of credible sources in their reports, the conclusion is clear – the MENA division has an obsessive focus on Israel.”
NGO Monitor’s analysis shows that MENA issued 51 total documents related to “Israel and the Occupied Territories” in 2010, the highest for any country in the region. The December 166-page report on Israel, Separate and Unequal, was the longest one issued by the division in the past two years. In 2010, HRW’s three reports Israel total 344 pages – far more than any other country in the region.
In addition, using NGO Monitor’s weighted methodology for different types of activities, Israel accounted for 14 percent of HRW’s regional involvement. Iran was only 12 percent, despite the daily assault on human rights, followed by closed societies such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia, at around 9 percent, which is one-third less than Israel. [See Tables 1 and 2]
“Of all the countries in the region, Israel, a democratic society, received the most attention,” Steinberg adds. “This is indicative of what HRW founder Robert Bernstein repeatedly condemned – HRW has abandoned its mission to pry open closed societies, to help individuals in those societies who lack the infrastructure to fight for their rights. Instead, HRW is a central player in exploiting human rights to isolate Israel.”
MENA’s bias against Israel was also reflected in publications on the Middle East that continue to be based on sources without credibility.
“The publication headlined Separate and Unequal demonstrates HRW’s severe lack of credibility and proper methodology,” says Steinberg. “The allegations were based on secondary sources that HRW did not independently verify. Instead of conducting its own research, HRW relied on politicized advocacy groups such as Who Profits (Coalition of Women for Peace), Al Haq, Badil, B’Tselem, Yesh Din, and Ir Amin. These organizations pursue their own agendas; they do not provide reliable information.”
In preparing the report, HRW also relied on anecdotal interviews with 66 Palestinians and eight Israelis.
“This is not just counting pages,” says Steinberg. “These methodology problems reflect major biases at HRW that impact their reporting.”
As these failures are recognized, HRW continues to lose impact and support – funding from traditional donors decreased by $ 6 million (15%) from 2009, after a similar decline the previous year. (This was offset by the 10-year, $ 100 million donation from George Soros.)
Along with its questionable credibility, HRW promotes the BDS campaign based on the 2001 Durban conference, in which the organization was a major participant. In May, MENA director Sarah Leah Whitson renewed calls for a boycott of Caterpillar because of the use of its bulldozers in Israel. Separate and Unequal repeated calls on the US to withhold security cooperation, and called on corporations to sever ties with projects or companies in Israeli settlements. HRW MENA researcher Bill Van Esveld acknowledged HRW’s role in the campaign to delegitimize Israel: “It would be disingenuous for us to say it [“Separate and Unequal” report] has no similarities to BDS. This is kind of an S report” (referring to the S in BDS).
“The BDS movement – which calls for the end of Israel as a Jewish state, and is led by individuals that compare the IDF to Nazis – represents the antithesis of human rights,” Steinberg notes.
HRW’s continuing decline was highlighted by Bernstein during his November Goldstein Lecture on Human Rights at the University of Nebraska, which expanded on themes included in his October 2009 New York Times op-ed. Bernstein decried the trend of HRW and others, such as the UN Human Rights Council, in focusing on democracies, and falsely painting Israel as one of the “principal offenders” of human rights.
In the media, Ben Birnbaum in The New Republic (April 27, 2010) published a detailed report on HRW that highlighted the deeply-rooted bias among senior officials, in contradistinction to human rights principles. Similarly, Jonathan Foreman’s “Nazi Scandal engulfs Human Rights Watch” in the Sunday Times [UK], (March 28, 2010) illustrated how the revelation of HRW “senior military analyst” Marc Garlasco’s Nazi memorabilia obsession was indicative of far deeper problems at the organization.
Steinberg adds: “Hopefully the public scrutiny and pressure from Mr. Bernstein and others will lead to changes among the HRW officials that lead the exploitation of human rights. The new chairman, James Hoge, Jr., has the opportunity to implement the much delayed revamping of the MENA division in order to end the inherent bias and lack of credibility.”
Read NGO Monitor’s full report on HRW: http://www.ngo-monitor.org/article/hrw_in_more_bias_even_less_credibility
Technorati Tag: HRW and Human Rights Watch.
Our national media elite reviewed 2010 with great sorrow for how America has besmirched itself in the eyes of the world with its “seething hatred” of Muslims. CBS anchor Katie Couric announced on her Internet show that there wasn't enough evaluation of“this bigotry toward 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide” which was “so misdirected, and so wrong — and so disappointing.”
Couric even embarrassed herself by suggesting "Maybe we need a Muslim version of The Cosby Show." A ridiculous idea – unless it were to run every night instead of Couric’s lame half-hour “news” report.
While Katie crinkles her face that anyone could march peacefully to oppose a mega-mosque two blocks from Ground Zero, here’s what does not upset Couric or her colleagues: Christians getting slaughtered and maimed in the Middle East by radical Islamists during the Christmas season. That story rates barely a media eyebrow lift.
Our national media elite reviewed 2010 with great sorrow for how America has besmirched itself in the eyes of the world with its “seething hatred” of Muslims. CBS anchor Katie Couric announced on her Internet show that there wasn't enough evaluation of“this bigotry toward 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide” which was “so misdirected, and so wrong — and so disappointing.”
Couric even embarrassed herself by suggesting "Maybe we need a Muslim version of The Cosby Show." A ridiculous idea – unless it were to run every night instead of Couric’s lame half-hour “news” report.
While Katie crinkles her face that anyone could march peacefully to oppose a mega-mosque two blocks from Ground Zero, here’s what does not upset Couric or her colleagues: Christians getting slaughtered and maimed in the Middle East by radical Islamists during the Christmas season. That story rates barely a media eyebrow lift.
Our national media elite reviewed 2010 with great sorrow for how America has besmirched itself in the eyes of the world with its “seething hatred” of Muslims. CBS anchor Katie Couric announced on her Internet show that there wasn't enough evaluation of“this bigotry toward 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide” which was “so misdirected, and so wrong — and so disappointing.”
Couric even embarrassed herself by suggesting "Maybe we need a Muslim version of The Cosby Show." A ridiculous idea – unless it were to run every night instead of Couric’s lame half-hour “news” report.
While Katie crinkles her face that anyone could march peacefully to oppose a mega-mosque two blocks from Ground Zero, here’s what does not upset Couric or her colleagues: Christians getting slaughtered and maimed in the Middle East by radical Islamists during the Christmas season. That story rates barely a media eyebrow lift.
Clinton’s “Plan B” just as flawed as the previous strategy.
American Thinker Blog
Back to the Future was a great movie.
Forward into the Past is just the continuation of failed US policy in the Middle East.
Last night at the Saban Forum, Hillary Clinton made it clear that the US will continue to make Israeli construction an issue:
The United States will not shy from criticizing the sides in Israeli-Palestinian talks when they take unilateral actions, including when Israel builds in eastern Jerusalem, Hillary Rodham Clinton said…”Provocative announcements on East Jerusalem are counterproductive. And the United States will not shy away from saying so.”
Of course, “unilateral actions” are only a problem when they are no unilateral concessions by Israel-but that is not the point of this post.
The point here is that Hillary went further than merely reiterating the issue that directly led to the derailing of his Mideast peace talk initiative.
Clinton went one step further, reviving the Saudi plan:
Clinton also offered the most pronounced to date U.S. endorsement of the Arab League Initiative, which proposes a blanket peace deal with all Arab countries in exchange for Israel’s proximate return to the 1967 borders.
“This landmark proposal rests on the basic bargain that peace between Israel and her neighbors will bring recognition and normalization from all the Arab states,” she said. “It is time to advance this vision with actions, as well as words. And Israel should seize the opportunity presented by this initiative while it is still available.”
Clinton’s wording, echoing Arab leaders’ claim that the offer is time-sensitive and suggesting that it is Israel’s responsibility to “seize” it, goes beyond previous U.S. statements that have merely praised the initiative as one of several positive proposals.
The Arab League Initiative is just another name for the Saudi plan-which Obama has not been pushing publicly for a while. I suppose that’s because he was too busy making an issue of Israeli settlements.
Remember the Saudi plan?
Barack Obama links Israel peace plan to 1967 borders deal
Barack Obama is to pursue an ambitious peace plan in the Middle East involving the recognition of Israel by the Arab world in exchange for its withdrawal to pre-1967 borders, according to sources close to America’s president-elect.
Obama intends to throw his support behind a 2002 Saudi peace initiative endorsed by the Arab League and backed by Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister and leader of the ruling Kadima party.
The proposal gives Israel an effective veto on the return of Arab refugees expelled in 1948 while requiring it to restore the Golan Heights to Syria and allow the Palestinians to establish a state capital in east Jerusalem.
On a visit to the Middle East last July, the president-elect said privately it would be “crazy” for Israel to refuse a deal that could “give them peace with the Muslim world”, according to a senior Obama adviser.
You should know that, contrary to the article, the claim that Israel gets an “effective veto” on Arab refugees is not true. The actual text of the Saudi plan does not give Israel a veto on Arab refugees who want to return:
2b. Achievement of a just solution to the Palestinian Refugee problem to be agreed upon in accordance with UN General Assembly Resolution 194.
More to the point, the Obama administration was quick to deny the claim they wanted to pursue the Saudi plan:
A senior adviser to Barack Obama on Sunday denied reports that the U.S. president-elect plans to throw his weight behind the 2002 Arab peace plan, which calls for Israel to withdraw from all territories captured during the 1967 Six-Day War in exchange for normalized ties with the Arab world.
But ever since that denial, Obama has been inching back towards the plan. By January 2009, Obama was publicly endorsing the Saudi plan that he denied endorsing just a few months earlier:
He [Obama] called on Arab governments to “act on” the promise of a Saudi-led 2002 Arab peace initiative by supporting the Palestinian Authority headed by President Mahmoud Abbas “taking steps towards normalising relations with Israel, and by standing up to extremism that threatens us all.”
This Saudi plan, which Obama apparently is going back to after his recent failed attempt at the peace talks, is about what you would expect from an Arab peace plan: make concrete demands from Israel, while offering vague assurances in return:
According to the text of Saudi peace plan, Israeli concessions would include:
o Full Israeli withdrawal from all the territories occupied since 1967, including the Syrian Golan Heights to the lines of June 4, 1967 as well as the remaining occupied Lebanese territories in the south of Lebanon.
o Achievement of a just solution to the Palestinian Refugee problem to be agreed upon in accordance with UN General Assembly Resolution 194.
o The acceptance of the establishment of a Sovereign Independent Palestinian State on the Palestinian territories occupied since the 4th of June 1967 in the West Bank and Gaza strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital.
And what would the Arab world offer in return? Assurances:
o Consider the Arab-Israeli conflict ended, and enter into a peace agreement with Israel, and provide security for all the states of the region.
o Establish normal relations with Israel in the context of this comprehensive peace.
But don’t think that this would come easily to the Arabs! Turki al-Faisal, King Faisal Center for Research & Islamic Studies in Riyadh, wrote in 2008 that the Arab world is making a big sacrifice in making peace with Israel:
The Arab world is willing to pay a high price for peace, not only recognizing Israel as a legitimate state but also normalizing relations and putting a permanent end to the state of hostilities that has existed since 1948.
Shmuel Rosner noted the twisted priorities of the Saudi idea of peace with Israel:
A “high price”? That’s an odd way to put it. Ending hostilities is not a price the Arabs will be paying - it’s the reward they will be getting, that we will all be getting, if an Israeli-Arab agreement is achieved.
In other words, the Saudi plan is the perfect plan for Abbas-once again demanding unilateral concessions from Israel, but nothing concrete from the Arabs. That is what Israel was faced with when dealing with Abbas, and now once again with the Saudi plan.
Remember that article from the Times that I quoted above?
On a visit to the Middle East last July, the president-elect said privately it would be “crazy” for Israel to refuse a deal that could “give them peace with the Muslim world”, according to a senior Obama adviser.
So not only will construction continue to be an issue, but now Obama is going to bring out the Saudi plan, the one that he once claimed would give Israel “peace with the Muslim world”
Back then, Obama apparently thought that Israel was crazy.
The question is whether Obama really thinks Israel is crazy now.
Technorati Tag: Obama and Saudi Plan and Arab League Initiative .
Jackson Diehl writes about how the US will proceed after the collapse of the Mideast peace talks:
U.S. officials are saying that they will continue to talk to the two sides separately, beginning with meetings next week in Washington with aides to Netanyahu and Abbas. They say they will set the settlement issue aside, and — as Arab leaders have been urging both in public and private — focus on the more fundamental issues of a final settlement.
Yet Obama will not meet his goal of an agreement on Palestinian statehood by next August through indirect talks. So this impasse presents him with a choice: He can slow the pace and ambition of his Mideast diplomacy, bowing to the reality that, as former Secretary of State James Baker famously put it, the United States cannot want peace more than the parties themselves. That would give U.S. and Israeli officials time to quietly continue working with Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad, who is trying to build the tangible institutions and security forces needed for statehood.
Or Obama could do what Abbas, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan’s King Abdullah have wanted all along: prepare a U.S. or international plan for Palestinian statehood and try to impose it on both sides. History — including that of the last two years — suggests that double-or-nothing bet would produce a diplomatic fiasco for Obama and maybe a new war in the Middle East. But given Obama’s personal fascination with Middle East diplomacy, there’s a reasonable chance he’ll try it.
The fact that the US is first going to take a step back and settle for indirect talks is an admission of failure that many pundits saw coming and predicted from the start. The question is how deeply Obama is invested on bringing about some kind of peace agreement in the next 2 years.
Considering that in recent months Obama has reassured the Muslim world that the US is not at war with them and made a point of criticizing Israel’s refusal to extend the settlement moratorium, it is likely that Obama will feel impelled to push Israel further.
Obviously, Obama will push for different unilateral concessions from Israel, while assuring us that Abbas and the Palestinian Authority really want peace-even though they are unwillingly to do anything to achieve it.
Bottom line, the pressure and demands on Israel are likely to become only stronger.
Technorati Tag: Mideast Peace Talks.
The Mideast peace process has collapsed after a stark admission of failure by the Obama administration, abandoning its strategy for reaching a Mideast peace agreement, according to VOA.
Mahmoud Abbas
The Obama administration will no longer try to persuade Israel to renew the moratorium on building West Bank settlements. The previous moratorium ended on September 26, and the Obama administration has been applying enormous pressure to the Israelis to extend it. At one point, the administration offered to provide Israel with a squadron of fighter planes if only Israel would agree to a further 90-day moratorium. However, it’s been clear that Israel’s government would collapse if Prime Minister Benjaamin Netanyahu tried to impose a new moratorium under any circumstances.
The administration claims that it’s now going to try other approaches to reaching a peace treaty, but it’s hard to see where they’re going to go next after this complete failure.
Egypt’s Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit says that the discussions should now shift to an “end game for a Palestinian settlement,” according to Haaretz. “The Americans have been informing all of us that their efforts did not succeed,” he said. “They wanted to reach a moratorium on settlement activities with Israel. That came to an end now.”
In recent months, the 75 year old Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas has repeatedly said that he would like to resign and retire. Abbas renewed that threat late last week, according to VOA.
Abbas has said that his retirement would have dramatic consequences, as it would cause the dissolution of the Palestinian Authority, with the result that either Israel or the United Nations would be forced to police the West Bank.
However, that claim appears to be in doubt in view of recent challenges to Abbas by the younger Mohamed Dahlan, a hardline member of Fatah’s Central Committee. Relations between Abbas and Dahlan have been deteriorating for some time, according to Ahram, and it would be expected that Dahlan would attempt to take over if Abbas resigned.
Abbas plans to meet with Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in Cairo on Thursday, and then go to an emergency meeting of the Arab League next week, according to the Jerusalem Post.
The main purpose of these meetings will be to decide whether to ask the United Nations Security Council for an international mandate to create a Palestinian state along the pre-1967 borders of Israel.
This option has been gathering support in recent weeks, according to The National (UAE). Several Latin American states, including Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, Costa Rica, Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, have all recognized a Palestinian state based on the pre-1967 borders.
It’s hard to know how far this proposal will go. It’s been pretty obvious for months that neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis want any sort of “peace process” to go forward, but simply want to avoid being blamed for any failure. But this proposal for a unilateral declaration could take on a life of its own, just as worldwide condemnation of Israel took on a life of its own after the “Gaza flotilla incident” last spring.
From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, nothing has changed in the Mideast since I made my first major prediction on this subject in 2003. (See “Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace?”) The Arabs and the Jews will be re-fighting the bloody war that took place after the partitioning of Palestine in 1948 and the creation of the state of Israel — by United Nations mandate. Any unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state on pre-1967 borders would create extremely tense stalemate that could lead quickly to war.
Why?
The term “peace process” is one I have come to despise. (I hate it even more than “exit strategy”.) This idea that American can find, or impose, some sort of peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians is a fantasy. Jennifer Rubin says, If there has been a less competent Middle East negotiating team, I [...]
It could be a comedy Broadway play if the consequences weren’t so serious, but it’s increasingly obvious that everybody involved in the so-called Mideast “peace process” — with the possible exception of the Obama administration — does not really want to change the status quo.
Hillary Rodham Clinton and Benjamin Netanyahu (AP)
The comedy began in September with a laugh line by former Sen. George Mitchell, who is President Obama’s envoy to the Mideast, who told reporters that new negotiations were starting with the goal to end the Middle East conflict “for all time.”
The background to this hilarity was that Israel’s 10 month moratorium on new West Bank settlements was about to expire on September 26. So the Administration rushed together a meeting of the parties in Washington on September 2, to get the ball rolling on ending the Mideast conflict for all time.
Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas said that the peace talks would cease unless Israel agreed to extend the moratorium, but by mid-September Abbas was playing the straight man to groups of Jewish settlers who promised to “declare war” on Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he tried to extend the moratorium, according to the Jerusalem Post. Next thing you know, Haaretz was saying that U.S. diplomats were “concerned” that the Mideast peace talks were about to collapse.
In the next scene, Abbas took center stage, as September 26 came and went, with Netanyahu saying that the moratorium would not be extended. As the Americans were frantically running around to compromise, Abbas said, “I cannot go on ruling, and I need to rest; I’m at the age where I can’t continue to lead.” On a plane trip, he said to a reporter, “This is the last time you are traveling with me,” implying that he was about to resign.
And then Abbas said that he will “make historic decisions” during the meeting of the Arab League that would come on the following Monday, a week after the moratorium ended.
Well, then Monday came, and the Arab League meeting was postponed two days until Wednesday at Egypt’s request, to give the US Administration a chance to work a compromise.
Then the Arab League meeting was postponed until Friday.
Then Friday came, and everyone waited for Abbas’ announcement of a historic decision and … nothing! There was no news of any announcement by Abbas. In fact, there was almost no news at all. There were just a few leaks that some Arab leaders wanted the peace talks to continue and others wanted the peace talks to fail.
One could barely recover from the laughter, when a whole new scene began.
Abbas warned that there would be a rise of extremism if the peace talks collapse. Then the Palestinian leadership threatened to request from the United Nations an international mandate to create a Palestinian state, based on Israel’s pre-1967 borders. Then the Palestinians’ lead negotiator, Saeb Erekat, said that the Palestinians had not abandoned the peace process, and would give the Obama administration time to bring about a compromise solution.
This weekend, a whole new act in this comedy began, as Obama has made what Haaretz calls an offer that Netanyahu cannot refuse.
The Administration has offered Israel a whole list of goodies, in exchange for resuming the settlement moratorium for just three months.
One set of goodies was a delight to the top officers in Israel’s military: A free squadron of 20 F-35 stealth fighter jets worth $ 2.75 billion, according to the Jerusalem Post.
The second set of goodies is a promise to veto anti-Israel proposals raised in the U.N. Security Council during the next year, including the above mentioned proposal to seek an international mandate for a Palestinian state.
However, the proposal may be dead already. The LA Times reports that Netanyahu presented the proposal to his cabinet on Sunday without taking a vote, for fear that the proposal would be rejected.
The objections may be even stronger on the Palestinian side. There’s a 90-day settlement moratorium included within the proposal, and the moratorium would apply to the West Bank. But it turns out that the moratorium would not apply to East Jerusalem, a particular demand of the Palestinians.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat reacted harshly to this. According to Haaretz, Erekat told Al-Jazeera tv that the moratorium must be extended to East Jerusalem, and he repeated his threat to ask the United Nations for a mandate. However, a final decision won’t be made until — wait for it! — the next Arab League meeting.
We’ll have to wait until tomorrow or the next day to see the next scene of this comedy, but it’s all quite remarkable. We live in a time where the world goes to extraordinary lengths to keep things from changing. Whether it’s a proposal for hundreds of billions of dollars in quantitative easing, or a proposal to continue meaningless peace talks, today’s politicians have a remarkable ability to “kick the can down the road,” to apply a palliative to problems that will only allow them to get worse.
From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, nothing has changed in the Mideast since I made my first major prediction on this subject in 2003. (See “”Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace?””) There is no chance of a lasting peace deal because Arabs and Jews will be re-fighting the genocidal war that they fought in 1948, after the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel.
It’s really hard to believe that there’s anyone left who thinks that a peace agreement leading to a two-state Mideast solution is conceivable at all, let alone in 90 days. What’s most likely is that all the parties to the Mideast negotiations are fully aware that the Mideast is headed inexorably for war, and each one wants to position himself so he can’t be blamed.
