- AUGUST 10, 2010
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HEZBOLLAH
Nasrallah's Big Speech
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JUSTICE
The Iraqi Who Knew Too Much
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ISRAEL
Why Avigdor Lieberman Is Wrong About Gaza
Posted By Daniel Levy
Wednesday, April 7, 2010 - 8:14 PM
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A new round of speculation regarding the U.S. administration's Middle East peace efforts has been set off by this David Ignatius op-ed in Thursday's Washington Post and this report by Helene Cooper in the New York Times, both revealing a meeting hosted by current National Security Advisor Gen. James L. Jones with his predecessors and a presidential drop-in that became the occasion for a pow-wow on a prospective U.S. peace plan.
Elliot Abrams -- previously a senior advisor at the National Security Council and now resident dog-whistle for the neoconservative attack machine at the Weekly Standard, was first out of the traps describing talk of a plan being borne of "frustration" and ultimately "dangerous." Others have suggested that this might be a trial balloon or a head fake whose real purpose is to extract Israeli gestures on East Jerusalem settlement expansion by hinting at something more dramatic being in the works. In general, the tone of commentary on the Israel-U.S. spat of recent weeks has tended to depict U.S. moves as whimsical and anger-driven. So what are we to make of this news?
These leaks imply something different is at play -- a premeditated strategy leading to an American peace plan, an idea that it seems has been kicked around for some months, notably by General Jones. Recent developments may have accelerated the potential timetable and won new converts to the strategy, possibly tipping the balance in favor of this approach among administration principals.
To understand the genesis of this story, one needs to cast one's mind back to before Barack Obama was in office, to the final year of President George W. Bush. In November 2007, the Bush administration re-launched peace efforts at Annapolis. The main impetus was a belated recognition of the centrality of advancing Israeli-Palestinian peace for the broader missions and challenges the United States was pursuing in the region. British Prime Minister Tony Blair had raised the need to advance Palestinian statehood as he got on board in selling and then mounting the Iraq war effort in 2003, the U.S. secretary of state at the time, Gen. Colin Powell, was similarly inclined. Nothing was doing then.
It is a theme that was taken up by Gen. David Petraeus in his much-commented-upon testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee last month in which he argued that the unresolved conflict impaired America's ability to achieve its goals throughout the region. Despite the headlines his testimony generated, Petraeus was doing nothing more than paraphrasing his own testimony of a year earlier, and repeating what all other Centcom commanders since 9/11 -- Gen. Tommy Franks, Gen. John Abizaid, and Adm. William "Fox" Fallon -- had recognized.
The Bush administration had not been convinced, even when the Iraq Study Group report of December 2006, led by James Baker and Lee Hamilton, took this call to a new level by drawing an explicit linkage between enlisting Iraq's neighbors for a successful outcome there and re-engaging in Israeli-Arab peace efforts. Finally the president and his Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice got on board with great fanfare in hosting the Annapolis gathering. The new converts ambitiously defined their goal as a peace deal within 12 months and Bush subsequently made his first presidential visit to Israel, this in his eighth year in office (making it somewhat amusing to read Elliot Abrams, who served in that administration, attacking President Obama for not having visited Israel yet after all of 15 months on the job, and for Obama having the nerve to suggest a peace deal can be reached in a more leisurely 24 months).
This sunset period of the Bush administration established not only the intellectual but also the practical foundations of an emerging U.S. strategy. The content of the Annapolis negotiations will no doubt feature prominently if there is a future peace plan, and the then-departing National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley is reported to have left a note detailing progress made across a range of issues. But more significant perhaps was the participation of General Jones himself in that Annapolis effort -- brought on board by Secretary Rice to devise the security components of a two-state deal. Jones is now reported to be leading the peace charge, and his involvement then, his familiarly with the terrain, and exposure to Israeli-Palestinian realities will be a precious asset for the president if and when a peace plan strategy moves forward.
The evidence that a possible Obama peace plan was born of strategy rather than caprice rests on more than fin-de-siècle Bush administration precedent. Even during the campaign, in a departure from the standard operating procedure, then Senator Obama committed himself to an assertive peace effort, embedding that commitment in a reading of both U.S. and Israeli interests. In May 2008, in a campaign stopover in Amman while traveling from Iraq to Israel, Obama asserted that he would "be actively engaged with the peace process" and that his goal was "to make sure that we work, starting from the minute I'm sworn into office, to try to find some breakthroughs." Indeed on day two of his administration, former Sen. George Mitchell was appointed U.S. special envoy for the Middle East and later President Obama rededicated himself to "act now" and "personally pursue" a two-state solution in his ground-breaking Cairo speech.
Having established an Israeli-Palestinian two-state deal as a priority and strategic interest, the question was always going to be how the new administration would go about it. It came as something of a surprise when the kind of policy review undertaken on other issues was avoided on Mideast peace. The approach that appeared to be adopted went along something like the following lines:
Let's rebuild some confidence between the parties with steps on the ground, including gestures by Arab states. Off the back of that we'll re-launch negotiations without any terms of reference, have the U.S. and the new special envoy actively involved in those talks, and if, as is perhaps likely, they reach an impasse, then we'll introduce U.S. bridging proposals.
Aspects of this approach were inherited and deeply flawed -- having failed to gain traction for well over a decade. As former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel C. Kurtzer described in powerful testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month:
We have known for years that interim, incremental, or step-by-step approaches will no longer work. We know that confidence-building measures, in a vacuum, do not work and instead inspire lack of confidence ... combined with a determined leadership role by the United States, strong terms of reference can make the difference between negotiations that simply get started and negotiations that have a chance to end with success.
There is an irony to this story.
It is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who has, inadvertently, confronted the administration with Kurtzer's truisms and helped create a learning curve of what one might call "policy review by painful experience." Netanyahu helped provide a moment of clarity, demonstrating that confidence cannot be built incrementally, that settlements will not be frozen, and that East Jerusalem cannot be ignored. If one is to ascribe strategic foresight to the Obama administration (and that may be merited), then what they have done is to walk the Israeli prime minister down a corridor in which, in part due to his own actions, the exit routes are being sealed and a moment of real choice is approaching.
As I argued here back in September, the Obama settlement-freeze strategy took Netanyahu out of his comfort zone (of interim measures and economic peace). In rejecting the freeze, Netanyahu found himself not only facing but embracing the thing he most abhors -- endgame peace negotiations. The latest round has taken this a step further, now making a discussion of Jerusalem inescapable. The more Netanyahu demands recognition of Israeli neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, the more obvious and unavoidable the flip side becomes -- namely, that Palestinian East Jerusalem and Palestinian neighborhoods will need to be recognized as part of the Palestinian capital and state. He continues to be walked down that corridor.
If, as reported, the administration is working toward a peace-plan script and not shooting from the hip, then the focus is turning to when to present a plan, what is in it, and how it might succeed.
The when (and by extension the if) will be as much about domestic political considerations as it is about developments in the region. On the latter, a word of caution is in order. Anyone feeling threatened by such a peace plan might seek to create a distraction, with violence being a predictable default option. So there is a need to monitor and prevent any escalation in violence and some urgency to pushing forward. It will be argued that the long-awaited proximity talks and even direct talks first need to be given a chance and only their failure can legitimize the United States presenting its own ideas. That would be a mistake; it creates a dependency on the very actors who may be comfortable with paralysis and ignores the opportunity to pivot that has already been created.
In a way, everything the Obama administration has done on the issue to date could be retroactively explained as preparation for this great moment of pivoting to a plan - "we sincerely tried to do everything to build confidence, especially on settlements, but it is clear that the only answer is to know where Israel ends and where Palestine begins, and therefore to delineate a border."
The political calendar would seem to dictate something either rather soon (before midterm elections become an all-absorbing focus) or post-November. And while the politics won't be a cakewalk, they may not be all that daunting, either. Polling amongst Americans in general (and also amongst American Jews) suggests broad support, the zeitgeist is visibly shifting, especially if the president wraps this up in U.S. national interests while articulating a strong pro-Israel narrative for such an initiative -- and of course if he is flanked by the uniformed military. Despite the neocon apoplexy that would be generated and predictable GOP attempts at political point-scoring, there will still be no shortage of responsible, adult Republicans who can step forward to give the plan bipartisan support. The key congressional Democrats, including from the Jewish caucus, would prefer that the issue just go away, but if the chips are down they are most likely to support their president, even if they come under pressure not to do so.
The Times' Cooper goes into some detail on what a plan might look like regarding borders, security, refugees, and Jerusalem, and in truth most of the details are already known. Ignatius drops a tantalizing hint that the plan may go further in his reference to Syria and the broader Arab world.
The spectrum of a plan's possible content essentially looks like this: At one end, a comprehensive regional peace plan including an Israel-Syria deal, and implementation of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative's offer of comprehensive normal relations with Israel; in the middle, a comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement addressing all the core issues and with some regional add-ons; and at the minimalist end (yet not to be sneezed at), a deal that fixes two states, an Israeli-Palestinian border delineation, and security arrangements, but defers closure on all details of, for instance, refugees, Jerusalem's Old City, and an end of claims. Even a one-sentence frame of reference might move the ball forward dramatically. It could read like this:
Establish a border based on the 1967 lines with an agreed, minimal and equal one-to-one land swap taking into account new realities on the ground (settlements close to the Green Line), whereby the Palestinian state is on 100 percent of the '67 territory and is demilitarized with security arrangements overseen by a multinational deployment.
If it is to happen, then a key component of the sales pitch, particularly for Israel and the pro-Israel community, will be the effect of resolving the Palestinian issue on regional dynamics and notably in dramatically reducing Iran's capacity to mobilize hostility to Israel and to avoid further isolation and pressure on itself.
Moving forward with any of the above may ultimately depend on whether a compelling case can be made that any of this can succeed. As General Powell is quoted in the Times piece as saying, what do we do in "acts two, three and four" if someone says no?
It requires a longer answer, but the central premise of a "yes, we can" approach is that the Israeli and Palestinian systems are capable of making the right choice (even if it takes a little time) if they are consistently and insistently asked the right question -- and that has to be about the endgame. In fact, they are only likely to produce the right answer if asked the right question -- yes or no to a specific peace plan -- and one that comes with an attendant set of incentives and disincentives.
Daniel Levy directs the Middle East Task Force at the New America Foundation and is editor of the Middle East Channel.
AFP/Getty Images
How's anything Zbignev Brzezinski is involved in can be good for Israel? Here's the cold fact - the total majority of Israeli Jews oppose any borders drawn in proximity to "Auschwitz borders" of 1967. Throw in the fact that, according to Obama's scheme, Palestinians will get the land, the state and the destruction of settlements and will give away exactly NOTHING, and the fact that Obama has zero credibility with Israeli Jews right now, and the smallest of facts that the future of Jerusalem is at stake, and you're making it very easy for Netanyahu to say no.Moreover, you're making it very easy for all American supporters of Israel, Jews or not, to say no. And then what? Then, Daniel, you're left with several options, not one of them good. Either you'll quietly wipe an egg off your superpower face and say "oh, never mind, just a thought", and anybody will know you're just a pussy, and your precious street cred with Arabs will plummet, or you're going to a cold war with Israel and see what it pays you, or you're trying to amend your original proposal in favor of the Jews and run into a wall with Palestinians (and maybe Europeans, who are, as we know, quite ambiguous on the whole Jewish state business). This isn't your lobbying effort, Daniel. Over the lunch table in DC you can engage in wishful thinking. Not in real life. President Obama's chance of success lies only in bringing Jews and Arabs together in one room under the Great Seal of USA, locking them there and helping to bridge over the differences. There are no damn shortcuts in this business.
No vassal can say no to the master holding it's yoke. Confronting a superpower always end in catastrophic way for the weaker link. But still can not digest that this whole issue is not a charade or a tactic to shake Nethenyahu and then go back to business as usual. If it is strategy, then either America accepted a nuclear Iran, or has decided to bomb it.
I am an American -- I don't care what is "good for Israel" I ONLY care what is good for the US.
Bye and return my tax $$$$$$$$$$$$$
SIR_MIXXALOT has a point. The peace Obama and co. are entertaining would require $billions to pay off the Palestinians to give up the right of return, the likely stationing of American troops to keep the rocket fire from the West Bank to a minimum (another few millions), bribing Syria from invading through Jordan, bribing Jordan from turning to Iran for protection and who is going to pay for all this: the American taxpayer. Oh yeah, I can see that citizenry jumping for joy about that. And, meanwhile, the first ball toward proximity talks between Israel and the Palestinians hasn't even been pitched yet and Obama has changed the game from chess to skipping rope using the rules of cricket.
The conflict is to be settled on the premises of international law. This means that the political administration of Israel has to give up its settlements on the West Bank, withdraw to the pre 1967 borders, and recognize east Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state. In other words, the occupant needs to abide by the conditions set out by the international community. There is nothing such as "Auschwitz lines". This is poor propaganda to make excuses for a status quo situation that Israel has been committed to ever since 1967 and to try to legitimize illegal Israeli annexations of Palestinian territory. The only question the Palestinians will probably have to make concessions is the solution of the refugee problem.
Here is the play....
First, a U.N. joint declaration is adopted to implement resolutions forcing Israel back to the 1967 borders, creating a sovereign Palestinian state with east Jerusalem as their capital, etc.
Second, U.S. either abstains or approves U.N. resolutions because a nuclear free ME is more important than nuclear proliferation in the region due to Israeli non-compliance to sign the NPT and remove existing nuclear weapons.
Third, Israel rejects the U.N. resolutions and impedes the nuclear free ME policies mandated by the world community by crying antisemitism, setting off a pogrom against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza and denounces the whole world community including JStreet as antisemitic.
Fourth, the world community brands Israel an apartheid state with economic sanctions and U.N. resolutions forcing Israel to comply with world opinion on Palestinian statehood based on U.N. resolutions and removal of all nuclear material from Israel.
Fifth, U.S. citizens form grassroots to boycott Israeli products and pressure their congressman to view Israel as a rogue state, U.S. corporations divest from Israel, and finally U.S. Congress pass and impose economic sanctions on Israel because strategic and tactical national security interests are undermined due to Israeli non-compliance with U.N. and U.S. laws. All military aid and grants to Israel are suspended until further review. The world follows U.S. lead and impose their own sanctions.
Sixth, Israeli society finally gets a backbone and implements concrete efforts to join the world community by removing settlers and politicians that impede progress for the implementation of the U.N. resolutions and removal of all nuclear weapons in return for the guarantee of Israeli security.
Seven, the world, measurably, accepts Israel as a true partner for world peace.
Personally, I think the two-state solution will ultimately lead to more conflict, that only a one-state solution will resolve matters, but , putting that aside - - -
an American plan would represent the first time an American president has drawn a clear line detailing its interests, as it sees them, in the region. It would clearly define Israel as a client state, and let characters like Netanyahu define themselves as Hamid Karzai ingrates.
I suspect the Pentagon has been itching for decades for a confrontation like this, where be-medaled soldiers recreate the visual impact Ollie North used to such effect -- contrasting his trim, Marine Corps. image with fat-ass sweating politicos like Arthur Liman.
There are also certainly members of Congress who have long chafed under "Israeli occupation" who would find their voices if public opinion started turning toward protecting America's interests and soldiers as a priority over the interests of a foreign power that depends on our aid for its minute-by-minute existence.
And Obamas has the wit to pull this off with exquisite skill. I'll confess that I've underestimated him -- his initial backdown over settlements was a strategic retreat rather than a cave-in. And his healthcare win shows a president with both the toughness and political smarts to be effective.
American realism on Israel is going to massively boost our image in the world. The contemptible spectacle of "the world's lone superpower" being manipulated by a tiny minority, fashioning foreign policy in terms of domestic politics, will be wiped away.
Osama's picture of a Crusader-Zionist alliance to colonize the islamic world will suffer a vital blow, as the US puts an end to the ambitions of israel's own fanatics, lusting after their own Jewish regional caliphate.
It will mark the end of a 60-year nightmare, our most serious foreign policy error, where we committed a mistake that makes our funding of the Taliban look like peanuts. True, Osama has roused many against us, but he never had access to the US Treasury to the tune of $3 billion per year.
So you think Israel should just go away?
Israel should never have been created in the first place.
The best outcome would be a single, democratic, secular state embracing both Muslims and Jews. So the Zionist state of Israel would "go away." The Jewish population would stay, the exiled Palestinians would come back. Like South Africa, many complicated things would have to be worked out, the infamous settlements would be suddenly ok, because they are in the common nation. A major reconciliation effort would be required.
Absent that, I think a two-state solution will be unstable, because many of those exiled Palestinians will start to return to the Palestinian state and they will want land still under Jewish control. Many flash points for hostilities to break out.
Transtrist, under what is described here the Palestinians would be giving up something. They would be giving up areas of Jerusalem and others over the green line for exchanges land, they would be giving up the full trappings of state (note the 'demilitarized' reference), and presumably they would be giving up the so-called right of return. If these are the parameters, then if Netanyahu plays his cards right I don't see that he would have to oppose it. The Palestinians would. It is basically the same thing they were offered at Annapolis.
If it was truly and end of conflict agreement, it sounds very good for Israel. The other side of the coin is that history shows that concessions by Israel always bring fleeting goodwill, but that evaporates quickly when they act to defend themselves from Palestinian terrorism. And it is a very safe bet that Palestinians would not stop their terror attacks just because a few of them signed a piece of paper.
Finally, the agreement would have to be framed in such a way that Israel had complete control of its own security. There is no reason for Israel to trust Obama. Objective evidence shows he can't be taken at his word or be expected to live up to past agreements between the US and Israeli governments. And putting Israel's security in the hands of European or international guarantors would be folly.
See, that's where the problem is.
I don't want to see this stupid dog-and-pony show again - we say yes, Palestinians say no, back to the stones and bullets (or worse), and the next Rob Malley or Mark Perry writes a book to explain that, actually, it was all Israel's fault. I want an agreement. I want Palestinian state. Mind you, I don't believe that it will bring peace, but until it trips over itself, we in Israel must have a time-out to address our internal problems - political reform, economic inequality, religion and state, Arabs' place in our society, ecology - you name it, we got it. In a democracy, all those could be addressed only through a political system, and ours is paralyzed by the "Palestinian question". So I want an agreement - preferably, one in which US is very deeply invested, just like with Egypt. But this idiocy is a surefire way to bury any hope for an agreement for a very long time.
Oh, and arway - Netanyahu is not a Karzai. Israel is not Afghanistan. Jews are not ...well, the rest of folks you meet in this part of the globe. Let's hope no one with real power will listen to you.
Let's hope no one with real power will listen to you.
Well, you'll be happy to hear there's no danger of that in the near future :-).
Certain stuff coming out of the White House nowadays suggests they really DO think of Israel as of banana republic and of Israeli Jews as people with no dignity or pride. Not a good frame of mind at all.
American Jewish Zionists ran US policy and screwed it.
Ever since the late Lyndon Johnson and for the most part since then, Jewish American Zionists ran US policy in the Middle East from Goldberg, to Rostow to Ross, Indyke, Abrams, Kissinger , Feith, Perle, Wolfowitz among others. Also for the most part US counselors in East Jerusalem have been for the most part American Jews, not sure if they are Zionists, but most likely. All without exception supported “incremental” approach which contrary to its declared intent was to allow Israel to make changes, permanent changes on the ground that will make peace more difficult to achieve. To this extent they succeed very well. Israel has created and continues to create more and more permanent changes on the ground, from expanding settlements to the Apartheid Wall, which is never a “security fence” to stealing water resources not to mention the more than 650 security check points. These American Jewish Zionists thought they are doing Israel a big favor and in fact I go further and I say they were and are Israeli advocates and never seriously bother to even consider the interests of the US. So they got Israel in a mess, approving and justifying the settlement issue and they got the US in trouble with the rest of the Arab and Muslim world as architects of US policy toward the Arabs and Muslim world. Every one expect those people knew that peace in the end will be “land for peace” and not “peace for the hell of it”. That Israel has to give up its occupation of Gaza and the West Bank including East Jerusalem, Only the idiot, the fraud, the lie Arafat and his stupid partners in the PLO thought that they can turn Oslo into a first step toward peace. Arafat & Company lied to themselves, lied to their people and they knew they were concluding a “management contract with Israel to manage the Jewish Occupation”. The American, or should I say, the Jewish American Zionist officials knew this , they knew well what Israel wants, they knew well Arafat was an absolute corrupt idiot who could never be trusted, and they created a situation where it is too late for a two state solution. They also should have known well that leaving the two parties to negotiate will never succeed. One party is so powerful it simply does what it wants and gets away with it, and the Palestinians are a bunch of corrupt, stupid, reckless idiots who are interested in what they personally can get out of the occupation than truly go for serious negations. Why in the hell did Arafat, Abbas, Qurai and Saeb continue to negotiate while Israel was doing every thing to leave as little of the land as possible. Because Israel knew well that the Palestinian leadership sold out long time ago.
Now the only way forward is for the US to propose to the UN and submit to the Security Council draft resolution that simply brings to and end the 67 Occupation to include East Jerusalem, the entire West Bank and of course all of Gaza., place the entire Occupied Territories and the people under a UN Trusteeship, hire international competent negotiators for and on behalf of the Palestinians ( since the PLO leadership proved to be unfit in not criminally negligence and not trust worthy, self serving) and ordering the two parties to begin discussions to implement the resolution but not negotiate it. Since one team is expert at negotiations, having successfully negotiated the best deal for themselves with G-d, while the Palestinians at best can be criminally negligent as negotiators and should be brought to trial for being imbeciles and stupid. We have no choice but to leave it to President Obama since we trust that he has the interest of the US in mind, and all American Zionist Jews in the administration should RECUESE themselves from the discussions, since they are a party to the conflict and could not represent the US.
Elliot Abrams -- previously a senior advisor at the National Security Council and now resident dog-whistle for the neoconservative attack machine at the Weekly Standard...
It does not reflect positively on this blog that one of the editors has a compulsion to make silly ad hominem attacks on those with whom he has policy disagreements.
It also shows that the fears I and others voiced at the blog's inception about the slant it would take were not altogether unfounded.
In fact, I think from here on out, your reactions to the plan (and the articulations of it by various people here at foreign policy) can act as a very accurate inversely related measure of how good the plan actually is.
OK, but from the details I've seen I like the plan.
And my point wasn't that I was offended (I wasn't) or that Levy's personal attack on Abrams was unfair. If an editor of this blog stoops to the level of trying to dismiss everything another pundit says via an ad hominem attack, rather than addressing his specific arguments, it's not unreasonable to think that same bias and poor judgement permeates all of his editorial decisions here.
Personally, I view Abrams as a self serving sleezy politician, but I agree with the continuous stigmatizising of anybody who disagrees with a leftist point of view.
New plan, just like the old plans, is still only half a plan
There have been no shortages of peace plans offered, declared, studied, tabled, re-invented, revised, renewed, whatever from a host of authors. In fact, the peace plan business is probably almost as contineous a gig as providing opinion and punditry about the Arab / Israeli conflict.
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The problem, however, lies in the execution of the plan, or more specifically, how to actually push the Arab world into normal and peaceful relations with the independent Jewish state of Israel.
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To date, we've seen Israel hand over land to Egypt, Lebanon, and the Palestinians. We have also seen it solidify and demark its border with Jordan. Two of these agreements have ended with so-called "peace treaties". And yet, up through today, Egypt considers Israel an enemy state, Jordanians considers Israel and enemy state, the Palestinian Authority continue to reject the idea of an independent Jewish state, and both Hizballah and HAMAS, proxy armies of Iran, hold to the central idea of the extermination of Israel.
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Going forward, Syria's dictator, Bashir Assad, is publically on record that even if Israel hands over all of the Golan, he's not going to create normalized peaceful relations with Isreal. Indeed, he has outright stated that he refuses to break his alliance with either Iran or Hizballah.
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Several months ago, Foreign Affairs published an article, how to handle HAMAS, noting that after four years after the groups ascendency in Gaza, its leadership has yet to offer any sort of moderation of its extremist and violent docterine and clings to its rejectionist ideals.
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Several months before that, Saudi Arabian leaders published an op-ed in the NY Times reiterating how they couldn't possibly even contemplate the barest of recognitions of Israel, until every last Arab demand is conceded.
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Meanwhile, The last several hundred Yemenite Jews were forced to flee for their lives, from threats of and actual violence; completing the ethnic cleansing of that nation's religious minority.
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Given both the prior track record and current actions of its neighbors someone needs to come up with something more than "Israel just needs to make more 'grand gestures', concessions, give up more disputed territory, and all will be well as the be all and end all of negotiations.
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The unfortunate reality is that the words and deeds of the Arab world have shown the bankruptcy of the idea of land for peace behind UN 242 and 338.
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Really, why bother with actual peace when you can get all that you want by actual threat or having others threaten for you.
Israel never gave up anything. It kept every thing and more!
Contrary to what the Israeli apologists wants to tell us, Israel never gave up anything. It continues to have total control over Sinai, with Egypt there merely as a border unarmed guard. As for Jordan, most Israelis never gave up on the idea that Jordan is Palestine and that Jordan is the destination of the next exile, or expulsion. Like Bibi always proposed, “peace for peace”. Meaning the Palestinians simply go away, give up their claims to their land, and Israel will give up on its wars and let them live in peace.
As for the “invisible” peace plan, any proposal that does not address the right of Palestinians to return homes and the full recovery of their property will be short of the land mark
The American Jewish and Zionist policy makers made sure there will be no peace based on a two state solution and now there should be one thing on the table… a One State Solution…
Right, Sami. You keep telling yourself that. The rest of us will continue to live in the real world.
When criminals demand a reward for their crimes
Jacob,
The Sinia is Egypian. It was never Israel's in the first place. You had to give it back cause it wasn't yours - not because of Israeli generousity, Einstein!
That's the problem with the hasbara bingo brigade around here today - fools and amteur re-writers of history.
The article is clearly and methodically concluding that Aipac's days of infleunce are coming to a close.
This naturally is very distressing to Israeli Firsters living in our country.
I'm sorry Taxi, but if Egypt didn't want to lose the Sinai
Then it shouldn't have continued to go to war with it.
Ever HEARD of the Geneva Conventions?
You know the ones, Jacob? That set of rules that the world community devised after the Nazi atrocities against the European jews were committed so as to halt any criminal territorial ambitions that future fascist states might want to practice?
Clearly the Geneva Conventions state that it is AGAINST INTERNATIONAL LAW to annex occupied territory. Israel signed accepting to adhere to these laws. It is also an international crime to displace or abuse occuied natives. Israel is guilty of breaking both laws as well as 123 other UN violations - far far more than Saddam's pitiful 17.
Get a clue buddy and stop yourself being an Israeli firster.
We live in the 21st century, not in your mind-warp stuck in 1942.
Actually, I’m still searching for the GC complaint against what Israel has done. Realize this, the West Bank, is not occupied territory, but territory that remains in dispute. The reality is, there was no nation in the West Bank. Jordan, never claimed it as its own. If it had, the easy thing would be to give the West Bank to Jordan. The legal reality is, there was no state in 1967. Therefore, there is no “occupation” of foreign territory. Indeed, the reality is that following the 1948 war, only armistice lines were set up, not international borders between Israel and Jordan.
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As for displacement of natives, the reality is the Palestinians have not been displaced. As for abuse, well, one only need compare the lives of the Palestinians with their brothers and sisters in the rest of the Arab world. Personally, from a political standpoint, you’re hardly looking at abuse.
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And please, don’t get me started on the moral and ethical bankruptcy of the United Nations. Getting the Muslim world to use the UN as another battlefield against Israel hardly makes it more moral than the suicide bombers that they wrote poetry about.
From Wikipedia: "The 'road map' for peace is a plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict proposed by a "quartet" of international entities: the United States, the European Union, Russia, and the United Nations. The principles of the plan, originally drafted by U.S. Foreign Service Officer Donald Bloome, were first outlined by U.S. President George W. Bush in a speech on June 24, 2002, in which he called for an independent Palestinian state living side by side with Israel in peace."
The US, a dysfunctional federation of states, the KGB, and an organization comprised of mostly dictatorships. Good luck with that.
Road Map to NO Where, Jewish Only Roads.
Any one should know that Zionists like Bloome and Abrams when they draw something, it can only serve Israel. While the Palestinians have met the conditions of having their security forces defend themselves against the Israeli army when they shoot at them or defend themselves against armed Jewish thugs roaming all over the place, and under Dayton even disappear and hide, go underground when the Israeli army carry s out one of its too many operation, the Israeli continued to steal, rob, confiscate and exile, creating more and more facts on the grounds. The poor Palestinian idiots in Ramallah truly believed that the Road Map as designed and supervised by American Jewish Zionists will save them what is left. It did not. The Road Map provided security for Israel while robbing the Palestinians of every thing, exactly as envisioned by the Jewish NeoCons. 16 years of negotiations got Palestinians nothing, not Zero but they lost half of the land. Even Mr. Negotiation himself, non other than Saeb Eurikat (I am sure he got compensated very well for all of his failures) admits it was a waste of time. The Road Map was dead on arrival; it created a job for that war criminal Evangelical Zionists Tony Blair. Abrams and Bloome knew the Road Map was specifically what Israel wanted… a litmus and threshold that the Palestinians could never ever, ever meet, even if they lock up the entire population, Israel will always find an excuse, perhaps, a stray dog on the street that will create a danger to Israel. The Palestinian leadership is the only one who believed in the American Jewish Zionist tailored made plan called the “Road Map”. It seems the only roads within the map are the “Jewish Only” roads. Never ever trust any thing that comes out of someone like Abrams or a Ross or an Indyke.
I will know Obama is serious when he threatens to not write any more checks to Israel with my tax dollars.
Zionists: Americans want their $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ back in the US of A.
You've screwed us for too long.
Who says that they are just your tax dollars Mixx
Sorry, but I'm an American citizen and taxpayer too. And if we're going to get funds back, there are plenty of other foreign nations that are getting off cheap on my work.
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Let's debate our aid to Israel at the next election
I doubt most Americans will be supporting aid to Israel when the facts are presented to them in the next election.
That's fine Taxi, but just as long as we're willing to debate
about all aid.
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Personally, I'm not sure why my tax dollars need to subsidize the sugar and corn industry.
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So too, I'm not sure why US tax dollars are subsidizing the Japanese and Korean economies.
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So too with Europe.
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Might as well toss in the Egyptian dictatorship as well.
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And a whole host of other expenditures.
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Palestinian Refugees will get screwed again!
If the past is an indication of the future, this is the scenario. The PLO/Fatah leadership will agree to a land swap. Prime real estate in the West Bank and East Jerusalem for a toxic waste dump. Hundreds of billions worth of real estate where Israeli settlements sits on, which Israel will keep and Israel will give the Palestinian some land in the Negev… most likely a toxic waste dump and for sure the PLO/Fatah will collect billions as is the case always which will end up in private banks.
As fore the refugees, Israel will offer compensation paid by Arab, US and European money to the Palestinian leadership… Jordan will get $15 billions to settle permanently and offer citizenship to those Palestinians living in Jordan. Lebanon will get $20 Billions to settle the Palestinians there. But not offer full citizenship since this will off set the Sectarian politics and as such they will be given a Lebanese (Green Card). Of the total amount offer by Israel and paid for by someone else, Israel will decide to deduct compensations claims filed by “Jews” from Arab countries. Once Israel collect the money for compensating the Arab Jews, then it will file claims against Arab countries such as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Syria, Yemen seeking again full compensations for the its Arab Jews… As such Israel will get compensated twice for its Arab Jews, will pay nothing for compensating the Palestinians since someone else will end up coming with the compensation. The refugees themselves will get ZERO, and the PLO/Fatah leadership (Ali Baba and the 3,000 thieves) will end up again with tens of billions in their bank accounts. That is way I see it. Every one gets a good deal and the refugees will get screwed again.
Then perhaps Sami, the problem doesn't lie with Israel
But with the Arab treatment of the Palestinians and its former Jewish minorities.
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Maybe someday the Arab world will wake up and realize just how caustic and costly their actions towards Israel and the Jews have been.
What is happening, whether anyone wants to admit or not, is the U.S. is distancing itself from israel. We will continue to arm ME country's and allow Iran to acquire the bomb. isarel offers nothing to the US and it's friendship is not worth it. We realize now that it is better to have real friends rather then an illegal, racist apartheid state. israel is a stain on the fabric of society that must be cleansed. Although we will not cleanse it our self, we will provide the means and opportunity's to allow other to. israel will either tow the line we draw or suffer a horrible future. israel should have paid more attention to the CIA report 6 months ago that specifically said that israel had another 20 to 50 years TOPS of existence and there was nothing that could be done to stop it. It is this technological age that will be key to the demise of this racist state. When a state is hated by so many others and at the rate of advancement of technology, it is just a matter of time. In this case, not much. whether it's in a year or 20 years, israel is doomed, and all the free state provided gas masks to it's citizens will be of no help. If your smart and live in the zionist state, get out while you still can.
Transtrist is a Jewish Chauvinist
"Oh, and arway - Netanyahu is not a Karzai. Israel is not Afghanistan. Jews are not ...well, the rest of folks you meet in this part of the globe. Let's hope no one with real power will listen to you."
I like this. "Jews are better than gentiles, so support Israel." And Israelis cannot suffer "Auchwitz borders", whereas a besieged Gaza has to make do with a tiny sliver of land which Israel can bully no problem.
Deal with it, anti-semitism is a wrong and evil ideology, and it is sad and pathetic that some Palestinians are attracted to it. But that's no pretext to run around presuming that Jews are somehow better or more deserving of land rights, civil rights, and national rights than Gentiles.
No, stupid. Just better then some.
There are some sorts of religion and political structure which tend to turn people into craven morons, whatever their racial or genetic makeup. On the other hand, there are some forms of social organization and spiritual life that can give an average man a lift to the stars. It's not a fate, actually, it's a choice.
As for Gaza - do you know that Singapore has twice as much land (much less arable land BTW), but three times more people and somehow manages without firing rockets at civilians over the border? Population density in Hong Kong is bigger then in Gaza. I have no doubt that in their present condition the subjects of Hamas in Gaza will turn any amount of land into that much more crap. Very known Third World phenomenon.
You know Islam is basically just Judaism for Arabs, right? I mean, back 2,500 years ago, Jews behaved no differently. The fundamental structure and commandments of the religion are the same, the Jews merely were better at burying the ancient nonsense with modern reworking. I'm pretty sure Leviticus discusses stoning gays and slaughtering idolaters. While Rabbis have spent the past 2,000 years reforming that, your Settler buddies in the West Bank have proven more than happy to try to resurrect those negative aspects of Judaism.
Perhaps instead of negatively judging gentiles for having an inferior worldview, how about you critically consider some aspects of your own?
Also, I would like to point out that Jewish Ghettoes in Europe, like Gaza, were often poverty-stricken cesspits. That was rarely the fault of the Jews, more the fault of the Europeans who pinned them in and did not allow them to trade. A little like Gaza, where they have their flower factories bombed and their children's faces burned off by white phosphorous (of course, their lives are not as important to Israelis as the lives of the few people killed by inaccurate Gazan rockets).
Now, theres a big difference between Singapore and Gaza. Singapore wanted independence from Malaysia, but Malaysia, a far more civilized state than Israel, allowed its extremity to gain independence. Gaza has been denied this, while the people starve. The only people with working hospitals are Hamas, and you seriously wonder why they voted for them? Perhaps let Gaza actually develop and perhaps the rockets would stop???
In your world, maybe. In real world, there are basic, conceptual differences between Judaism and Islam (that's why Judaism had managed to develop, and Islam hadn't). Also, in real world, Israel left Gaza, demolished settlements, and left the greenhouses, water wells, roads etc intact per agreement with the World Bank, but the rockets never stopped, as well as attacks on Israeli soldiers on the border. Your tasteful comparison between Jewish Ghettoes, where people just wanted to go on with their lives and be as unoffensive as possible to the surrounding Gentiles (not very successfully) with an enclave ruled by a bunch of armed religious fascists committed to the annihilation of their Jewish neighbors is frankly beyond my comprehension. Oh, and by the way, there are no "Hamas hospitals" in Gaza. Whatever medical facilities are there were developed during "brutal" Israeli occupation - with donor money, private money and Israeli money.
This is the new and improved Obama paradigm via its ever-ready 24/7 watchdog, the MSM: all Obama's random ADD ramblings from this to that to the other subject with little to no hands-on effort are now being reframed as part of a brilliant holistic solution to every problem the world currently experiences, but, unfortunately only the enlightened liberals can see the clear patterns behind his apparent madness. What crap!
There will be no peace in the middle east until there is an Islamic reformation. If Israel were to approve any of the many plans that require it to give up something for nothing that get thrown its way on a daily basis, and were they to do it tomorrow, adjacent Arab countries would push for yet another set of appeasements until there was so little left of Israel their enemies could push the remaining Israelis easily into the sea. Solving the Israeli/Palestinian kerfuffle before mideastern Muslims reform their still-stuck-in-the-7th century religion would only result in catastrophe. In the process, there would be a bloodbath of unprecendented brutality and genocidal totality. Pundits, such as the clueless Levy (who's too busy insulting conservatives and their few media outlets to really care about this issue), have it exactly backwards. Reformation first, then two state solution.
"Elliot Abrams -- previously a senior advisor at the National Security Council and now resident dog-whistle for the neoconservative attack machine"
You are one class act Mr. Levy.
I recommend every other article Daniel Levy has written in the past 5 years for the same exact content framed around events at the time.
Seems from Daniel's article that Obama has all the answers, what happens if the approach is wrong?
Here is Obama's theme:
Israelis are so stupid about their country, situation, and region on life-and-death issues which they deal with daily that they must be saved in spite of themselves by people who have no knowledge or experience on any of these things. No other country in the world is so frequently told this kind of thing.
Is it so hard to comprehend that Israeli views and behavior are based on years of experience and study? That Israelis know best how to save themselves and have been doing a far better job of it, against tremendous odds and unhelpful kibbitzers,than many others? That heeding their prescriptions would be disastrous, in fact have already proven so?
After all, the tragic history of the last 20 years has largely resulted from listening to the same advice people that are in charge of the State Department.
THE INCONVENIENT TRUTH IS, of course, that nothing more can be done on the part of Israel. Unintentionally, Olmert took the veil of moderation off the face of the PLO. When the claim is raised that the PLO would actually suffice itself with a symbolic gesture concerning the thorny refugee issue, its refusal to accept Olmert's proposals proves that the PLO truly intends to apply the "right of return" of refugees to their original homes in Haifa and in Jaffa, in Lod and Beersheba. PLO leader Ahmed Qureia (Abu Ala) explained lately to Haaretz that "it's not fair to demand that we recognize you [Israel] as the state of the Jewish people because that means... a predetermination of the refugees' future, before the negotiations are over. Our refusal is adamant." To prevent misunderstanding, Mahmoud Abbas, in his Washington Post interview, rejected the possibility that the PLO recognizes Israel as a Jewish state because it would imply renunciation of any large-scale resettlement of refugees.
The real dispute does not concern the natural growth of Ariel but the natural right of the Jewish people to sovereignty in Carmiel (in the Galilee).
THIS IS not a futile theological debate but a practical and vital issue. Its severe significance was proven 2 years ago, when in the course of talks PLO negotiators were explicitly asked whether, after an agreement is reached to their satisfaction, they would agree to include in it a specific article stating that this puts an end to the dispute and terminates all further claims. The Israeli government did not bring to the public's attention the fact that to this simple question, the PLO leadership ominously answered in the negative. The necessary conclusion therefore is that the moderate organization for the liberation of Palestine from Jewish sovereignty is not interested in the "two- state solution" but rather in a "two-stage solution." In the first stage, an Arab state is to be established alongside Israel and in the second stage, following the resettlement of refugees within Israel, one Arab state is to be established, stretching from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean Sea. In an attempt to test this conclusion to the utmost and to refute it, Israeli governments have resorted to all possible political experiments.
All excuses have by now been used up. In other words, as a mechanism for establishing permanent peace west of the Jordan River, the "two-state solution" cannot be realized. There will be no end to this dismal hundred-years dispute so long as the position of the Palestinian leadership does not fundamentally change.
I am even not addressing Hamas which view is even more radical than the Fatah or the PLO. Fayyad confirmed that what PLO and Hamas wants is not Palestine adjacent to Israel but Palestine instead Israel.
As you probably know, there is a complete consensus in Israel about the right of return... Israelis will not commit national harakiri. Why would they?
Natanyahu and the Crazed settlers
Are most certainly not smarter than Obama.
Their method has been wrong for 64 years.
Wow, that puts Israel's founding at 1946. Of course, given such a stand, we see how you view the idea of any vision of Israel as an independent state.
Negotiations? Schmegotiations!
To begin with a cliche: The line separating genius from lunacy is very thin indeed. It may sometimes be difficult to tell which side of the line you're on.
I can imagine Zionist strategists congratulating one another, chortling at their brilliant achievement of corralling hapless Palestinians in disconnected Bantustans surrounded by Israeli settlements, Jew-only roads and life-strangling check-points--making a viable Palestinian state not only impossible, but inconceivable. Zionists have lopped off the branch they were sitting on.
Cliche #2: To every brilliant strategy, there is blowback. If there cannot be a viable, sovereign Palestine, what are the alternatives? Ethnic cleansing? The world is too far gone for that. One-state solution? Seems like the only possible outcome. We have to start thinking of a post-Israel Middle East.
Israel has shed so much blood, and inflicted so much humiliation and dehumanization, that many Palestinians would want to drive Europeans away from the new unified Palestine. To Palestinians I say, do not drive them away. They are your cash cows. They have the capital, know-how, ability. Yeah, even brilliance. They can keep the new Palestine humming with business activity, and keep it affluent. Don't take the Zimbabwe route. Be like South Africa.
But how do we get there? Some coercion will be required, and I see it coming. 2012 should be a defining year. No, this has nothing to do with the Mayan prophecy. It's more like the bells of the Persian calendar are tolling.
Geniuses of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose but your state.
Keep dreaming Khalid, keep dreaming
I'm sure your visions of HAMAS suicide bombers keeps you warm at night. Suffice to say the Palestinians have a better shot at gaining a state in Lebanon than they do Israel.
Proof that not all Jews are smart " Mr Levy " is a good example
There are so many falase assumptions in this article that it is hard to look at it without thinking we have another Obama worshiper that doesn't know what he is talking about.
It is like being a little kid and wanting something now without caring about anything else or how to get there.
America CANNOT force peace on people and that is a fact, it has never happened in the history of the world people need to make peace between each other.
You must be naive to think that Iraq's neighboors will all of a sudden decide to make a democratic peacefull Iraq if there will be peace in Israel. The Iraqis are killing each other beacuse of Shia and Sunna and it has been going on for centuries. Iran wants power and it could care less about the palestinians and the Syrians care only to keep the allawis in power we saw what assad sr did in the city Hama, and we see how they treat palestinians in their country.
"we sincerely tried to do everything to build confidence, especially on settlements, but it is clear that the only answer is to know where Israel ends and where Palestine begins, and therefore to delineate a border."
Let me remind the writer that boarders are not the main issue. Israel withdrew from lebanon, it withdrew from Gaza and all it did was embold the terrorists more.
The only reason we don't have negotiations is Obama and now he is going to make peace it makes no sense ,he can't even get the parties to talk after 17 years of direct talks because of his foolish demands the palestinians cannot demand less ask abu mazen. The Obama administration is not helping by talking to hamas representatipes in Jordan, how would America feel if Israel decided to talk with Al Qaeda.
This article is just a bunch of nice words on papaer just like the agreement the palestinians will be able to sign and not really deliver. Israel can really deliver , can we say the same about Hamas, we are ignoring that there are 2 palestinian entities, one in Gaza and one in the west bank and everyone seems to either forget or ignore the fact that in this tribal society these feuds are rarely ever solved, the palestinians can't even make peace with each other how are they supposed to do so with Israel.
I think maybe instead of Israel being the problem to solve Iraq and Iran and Syria. Maybe it is the other way around maybe if the Iranian regime will not be in power we will have a better chance for peace, who will sponsor hizbullah and Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and call on proxies to attck when there is any progress in the peace process. Iran knows that once there is peace they cannot export the revolution anymore, they can but it will be harder to sell, now Sadam is gone and no one sends money to Suicide bombers, if the syrian regime will change maybe no one will supply weapond to hizbullah and take over Lebanon, and host all the terror organizations in the world, and kill americans in Iraq same with Iran. How can Israel be the problem here.
Only an idiot would believe that the Israelis have any intention other than playing Nazis to their Jews, the Palestinians, and slowly strangling them to death in their concentration camps.
Of course Politbureau, which is why there are daily shipments
of food, water, fuel, and medicine into Gaza. Which is why Palestinians who need medical care are received inside Israeli hospitals, where both Jew and Arab work side by side for both with equal care to Jewish, Muslim, and Christian patients.
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Which is why Israel, despite facing an enemy with real genocidal intent, HAMAS, provides electricity to the Gaza strip.
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Which is why the only thing keeping the blockade in place is HAMAS extremism. Remember the requirements for lifting the blockade? Here they are:
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1. HAMAS needs to end its campaign of violence. No more suicide bombers or rocket attacks.
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2. HAMAS needs to end its campaign of incitement. No more Farfur the mouse
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3. Release hostage Gilad Shalit. Now held for four years, incommunicado. A breach of the ICRC agreements that the PA signed.
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4. Accept all previous negotiations signed by the Palestinian Authority and Israel.
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Let's contrast that with the Nazi's that dragged off people to the death camps for just who they were. Who's ideas of medicine were led by Dr. Jospeh Mengele.
Sometimes you can look at one issue that trumps everything else,and know that the others don't matter because of the trump. I see that here.
Consider the Israeli demand that any palestinian nation must be disarmed. This has far-reaching consequences.
What happens if Israel and sovereign Palestine get into a dispute -- say, for example, about how much water Israel can pump out of Palestine for free. Israel can say "OK, if you don't give us water we won't sell you electricity and your water pumps won't work." "We'll make our own generators." "We won't let you import fuel." Israel will have the absolute upper hand in any negotiation. Perhaps all negotiations between Israel and Palestine can be arbitrated by the World Court or something?
To enforce Palestinian disarmament, Israel must keep control of Palestine's borders. Nothing goes in or out without Israel's permission. This gives Israel another stranglehold. And at any time Israel can accuse Palestine of trying to smuggle weapons, an infringement of the agreement which requires Israel to invade and search for weapons. Hasn't this already happened? An incremental expansion of Palestine's borders got stopped with an Israeli invasion, close to a billion dollars in european investment in Palestine destroyed, etc? It could happen again at any time.
A disarmed Palestine would be less a nation than the French Vichy regime. Unlikely this would lead to any real peace. But how can we expect Israel to accept a palestine that had weapons which could be used to defend against an Israeli attack, or even to unwisely attack Israel? They can never agree to that.
So no two-state solution is possible. But creating a one-state apartheid regime is only kicking the can a few years into the future. How could a jewish/arab Israel get EU approval etc? They would have all the problems that South Africa had with bad publicity, boycotts, sanctions, etc.
Would UN observers to a two-state solution help? No, they would only generate reports that would inflame the situation. Israel would feel isolated which would encourage more of the behaviors that got them isolated in the first place.
The best solution I can imagine at the moment, is that Palestine declare independence claiming the UN-assigned borders. And then they apply to become a US Commonwealth, and the USA accepts.
The USA then requires that Palestine operate under US law. Human rights for Israelis in Palestine must be respected. The USA claims all of the West Bank and Gaza, and Israeli residents remain, paying taxes comparable to what resident aliens pay in the USA. They are not allowed to do atrocities in Palestine. Palestinians can gradually make them less welcome if they want to lose the revenues they bring.
Land titles would be judged in US courts. Presumably land condemned by the Israeli government etc would be restored to its previous owners, though of course the outcome of a bona fide fair trial is always something of a tossup.
Israel would not attack the USA. The USA could guarantee that Israel is not attacked by or through Palestine, unless of course US/Israeli relations somehow got dramatically worse.
Right of Return for Palestinians into Palestine would give each Palestinian a US passport, just like Samoans and Puerto Ricans. They could each go anywhere and still return. Currently Israel lets them leave but their right to come back is subject to arbitrary regulation. It wouldn't matter as much that there wouldn't be nearly room enough in Palestine for all of them if they could go anywhere and come back. They could go anywhere there was work and send money home and not worry about being permanently exiled.
A Palestine that has no protection from Israel is not sovereign. Israel cannot accept an armed Palestine. UN observers would be useless. And the only protector for Palestine that Israel could accept is the USA.
This may not be possible, but I'm mostly convinced that no other solution is possible.
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