President Obama is in a hurry again.
“Simply put, it is past time to talk about starting negotiations. It is time to move forward,” Obama told reporters before a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Um. I do believe that it has been the Palestinians who have refused to sit down and talk with the Israelis, but let’s move on.
Obama told Abbas and Netanyahu that, “The only reason to hold public office is to get things done,” and that everyone “must take risks for peace,” Mitchell said.
Everyone must take risks for peace? What risks, pray tell, will the Palestinians be taking? What risks will America be taking? The only risk for the Obama administration is that once again, peace will not break out in the Middle East, and The Anointed One will not win his coveted Nobel Prize. (I think perhaps he wants to be the first sitting President to win one. Maybe that’s his hurry.)
The risks for the Palestinians? Hm, let’s think. Wait, give me a minute. Um.
Nope. I can’t think of any.
The risks for Israel? Let’s see. Terror attacks, rockets in every town and city in Israel, chemical weapons dropped on her citizens, sniping from the Palestinian side of the border—Israelis will risk life and limb if the peace process does work, but the Palestinians refuse to stop fighting. So you see, it isn’t “everyone” that must take risks for peace. It’s only Israel that will be taking the risks. Funny how it always works out that way.
And there have been pretty much no moves by the Palestinians to hold up their end of the Road Map, although that doesn’t stop the president from pretending the Palestinians are actually doing something.
“Palestinians have strengthened their efforts on security, but they need to do more to stop incitement and to move forward with negotiations,†Mr. Obama said on Tuesday. “Israelis have facilitated greater freedom of movement for the Palestinians and have discussed important steps to restrain settlement activity. But they need to translate these discussions into real action on this and other issues.â€
End incitement? You mean like amending the Fatah Charter, or not accusing the Israelis of poisoning Yasser Arafat? Or maybe even not calling for the “return” of third- and fourth-generation “refugees” to their ancestral homes?
Obama needs to do more in order to move forward with negotiations. He needs to actually read what the Palestinians are saying. But that would totally screw up the narrative. And the potential Nobel Peace Prize.
Will Obama ask that the Arab countries that expelled Jews in 1948 and confiscated their property return it, too, and revoke the stamp in their passports that says “Never to return”? What — he won’t? Oh, but I thought he was into fairness and even-handedness and all that sort of thing….
Strange how “incitement” in the US results in a bunch of people waving signs, while “incitement” in Palestine results in rockets being fired into schools. The Palestinians need to replace their social systems with ones that do not descend into murderous fury the instant anyone accuses a Jew of drinking blood, rather than ending all incitement (which will not be accomplished without eliminating all dissent as well).
But what are the odds that we’ll ever actually suggest they change their culture, let alone do anything to bring it about? None at all, sadly.
Well ending incitement might mean stopping the official bodies of the government from putting out incendiary, Nazi-style antisemitic propaganda. Of course Egypt does that too, so even if an Arab country has a peace treaty with Israel incitement continues. That is one thing that convinces me that if Israel ever looks too weak, Egypt will resume attacking Israel without the slightest advance notice.