The Washington Post reported the other day that the United States is pushing Israel to stop all “settlement” activity. And that PM Netanyahu caught flack on the topic from an unexpected source: formerly pro-Israel Congressmen:
During meetings with congressional leaders this week, Netanyahu was stunned by the “harsh and unequivocal statements” with which lawmakers complained about the settlements, according to an account in the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. The newspaper said that although the prime minister tried to highlight the threat of Iran in his talks, lawmakers instead returned repeatedly to the issue of settlements, leading his entourage to conclude that the message had been coordinated with the Obama administration.
That’s a reasonable conclusion, though I’m surprised it wasn’t reported last week. Regardless, Israel was relying on assurances from the now no-longer-in-power Bush administration:
Netanyahu spokesman Mark Regev said there are no plans for a full settlement freeze. “The issue of settlements is a final status issue, and until there are final status arrangements, it would not be fair to kill normal life inside existing communities,” he said.
Regev said the Israeli government is relying on “understandings” between former president George W. Bush and former prime minister Ariel Sharon that some of the larger settlements in the occupied West Bank would ultimately become part of Israel, codified in a letter that Bush gave to Sharon in 2004. In an interview with The Washington Post last year, Sharon aide Dov Weissglas said that in 2005, when Sharon was poised to remove settlers from Gaza, the Bush administration arrived at a secret agreement — not disclosed to the Palestinians — that Israel could add homes in settlements it expected to keep, as long as the construction was dictated by market demand, not subsidies.
Elliott Abrams, a former deputy national security adviser who negotiated the arrangement with Weissglas, confirmed the deal in an interview last week. “At the time of the Gaza withdrawal, there were lengthy discussions about how settlement activity might be constrained, and in fact it was constrained in the later part of the Sharon years and the Olmert years in accordance with the ideas that were discussed,” he said. “There was something of an understanding realized on these questions, but it was never a written agreement.”
But according to the New York Times it would appear that the Obama administration has no interest in continuing an understanding – albeit and unwritten one – that was extended by the previous administration:
Speaking of President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said, “He wants to see a stop to settlements — not some settlements, not outposts, not ‘natural growth’ exceptions.” Talking to reporters after a meeting with the Egyptian foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, she said: “That is our position. That is what we have communicated very clearly.”
Mrs. Clinton’s remarks, the administration’s strongest to date on the matter, came as an Israeli official said Wednesday that the Israeli government wanted to reach an understanding with the Obama administration that would allow some new construction in West Bank settlements.
The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, is expected to focus on the issue of settlement expansion when he meets with Mr. Obama on Thursday in Washington. Mr. Abbas and other Palestinian leaders have said repeatedly that they see no point in resuming stalled peace negotiations without an absolute settlement freeze.
Does this leak of a plea by the Netanyahu government show that Jerusalem believes the Obama administration will actually unveil a new peace plan that will explicitly prohibit the construction of a house or add-on anywhere over the green line?
The question of settlement growth has been something of a red herring for years. Israel isn’t building new settlements and hasn’t since the 1990s. But unless the United States is going to adopt a position that every single one of these Jewish communities must be held in a choke hold — the better to ease them out of existence — natural growth must be allowed.
But here’s the rub:
George W. Bush’s June 2004 statement in which he explicitly supported the creation of an independent Palestinian state (albeit one that would not be ruled by supporters of terror and corrupt actors, something that pretty much renders such a state impossible under the existing circumstances) also said that any peace agreement must take into account the changes that have occurred on the ground since 1967. In other words, the large Jewish suburbs on the outskirts of Jerusalem and elsewhere close to the old border were not going to be handed over to the Palestinians under any circumstances. Then, as now, most Israelis would be willing to give up outlying settlements but now the clusters close to the old green line are where most of the “settlers” live. Ariel Sharon paid in hard diplomatic currency for this American statement but his successors soon discovered that the purchase was worthless.
Palestinian officials may claim that they won’t engage in peace talks without a complete “settlement” freeze, but that’s hardly the main obstacle to peace.
The Palestinian factions can’t even put on a unified front – and even if they can, there’s no guarantee that they’ll adopt a “moderate” position – and their moderate leader refuses to endorse a Jewish state (which would be a prerequisite for accepting a “two state solution.”)
And is the United States going to ignore the very real incitement that still comes from the Palestinians on a regular basis?
To see the perfect symbol of the problem with U.S. Middle East policy you need look no further. No one in the region takes America too seriously because it does not follow up and enforce its positions. The PA knows that it can do what it wants and pay no price. There is no–repeat no–real pressure on it to stop incitement, educate its people for peace, make any real compromise or concession. Instead, this “moderate” institution is continuing to teach its children that being a terrorist is the highest calling and due the greatest honor.
Just like Hamas does.
The Western media also has no interest in this issue either despite energetically seeking out any issue on which Israel can be criticized, even often when such things are made up and prove to have no basis in reality.
We have seen, and will see, the administration devote huge efforts to stopping settlers from adding a room onto an existing apartment. Will it devote any effort at all to turning the PA in the direction of peace or even enforcing U.S. law?
So with Iran about to develop nuclear weapons, Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah poised to gain power in Lebanon and North Korea threatening to abrogate its ceasefire with South Korea, the one area of foreign policy where President Obama has chosen to take a stand is where Israel can build. (Tobin pointed out that this would be an issue even if Tzippi Livni had been elected!) I guess I was wrong to dismiss reports of a clash coming between Obama and Netanyahu.
Netanyahu needs to be careful. He cannot allow himself to be bullied. He has a stronger base of support at home than he had thirteen years ago. He must make the case that ceding territory to hostiles is a recipe for disaster not peace and that the United States and the world has much bigger worries than where Jews live. It won’t be easy, but that’s his job.
Related please see I*Consult, Elder of Ziyon, Israel Matzav, Israelly Cool, Daled Amos, My Right Word and The Muqata.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
What I fail to understand is why 80% of American Jews voted for Obama, knowing
fully well what the outcome for Israel would be!
Actually, the settlement that they want to freeze is Tel Aviv. It is a settlement on the outskirts of Yafo that was built completely by the “Zionist settlers”
Because of the unwritten commandment: Thou shalt vote Democrat. They believe that because FDR seemed like a nice guy, they owe a permanent debt to his party, even though his policies were not all that great and his party is nothing at all like it was 60 years ago.
Like a flock of sheep, the majority of Jews remain in the democrat party!
Today’s anti-Israel “liberal agenda” is a reversal of everything I grew up with.
At my Jewish community center health club we have four large screen TV’s, most of the time
at least two are tuned to CNN or MSNBC! Typically, by the time I leave, most are now tuned
to FOXnews.
What really irritates me more then anything else are the self loathing neo-kapos that are
spewing their anti-Israel garbage as media examples of the Jewish community. The media just
loves them.
American Jews are the clinging battered spouse of the Left.
The Obama Administration has certainly hit the ground stumbling.
Putting pressure on Israel instead of the real obstacles to furthering peace, like the behavior and attitudes of the Palestinian Arabs, is of a piece with the rest of the Obama Administration’s feckless foreign policy. These spineless twits are going to get themselves into a hideous crisis sooner or later, probably sooner. Then they will panic. In their panic over a situation that might have easily been foreseen and perhaps circumvented by others they might even start throwing nukes around, for want of any other answer to the question of what to do.
Between the Obama Administration’s economic policies designed to ensure that we have another Great Depression, and their foreign polices intended to do a replay of the Carter Administration, there will soon be a large market for “Don’t blame me, I voted for Sarah” bumper stickers.