The Washington Post, today, faults the Obama administration for its early forays into Middle East peacemaking.
The administration also concluded, wrongly, that obtaining an unconditional Israeli settlement freeze was an essential first step. In fact settlements are no longer a strategic obstacle to peace; as a practical matter, most of the construction is in areas that will not be part of a Palestinian state. The administration’s inflexible stance, unwisely spelled out in public by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, led to an unwinnable confrontation with Mr. Netanyahu, turned Israeli public opinion against Mr. Obama and prompted Palestinians to harden their own position. The compromise now being discussed between Washington and Jerusalem will differ little from past deals.
While I don’t agree with everything in the editorial it’s a far cry from what I’m used to.
Related: check out Steven Rosen’s take, by itself or with commentary by Barry Rubin and Meryl.
Israel Matzav adds (via memeorandum):
It should be obvious to anyone with a passing awareness of the history of the last 16 years that Netanyahu is highly unlikely to offer Abu Mazen any more than Olmert offered Abu Mazen or than Ehud Barak offered Arafat.
And even if he did, there’s little chance that Abu Mazen would accept either. It’s easier to be the wronged party than it is to govern.
UPDATE: The end of the editorial annoyed me.
Officials say the president pressed the Israeli and Palestinian leaders hard to move forward during bilateral meetings Tuesday. That’s good, but Mr. Obama must also do more to convince average Israelis as well as Arab leaders that his diplomacy is worth investing in. We’re told the president reminded Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Abbas Tuesday of an old diplomatic verity: that the United States cannot want peace more than the parties themselves. That’s a reality that this president, like a few before him, will have to live by.
Israel has to show that it wants peace? What’s been happening for the past 16 years as Israel has ceded territory and received terror in return. I think that Yaacov Lozowick is on target here:
On the contrary: us locals, we’ve long since covered all the options that seem so obvious to the novices, and we understand fully why they’re not real. It’s our lives, and we’re not novices.
The cliche about how we’ve forgotten more about the matter than the newcomers may ever know is reality, not platitude.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
