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Truthout has just published my latest piece on the Hamas-Fatah unity deal and the repercussions it has had for the ongoing peace process, including George Mitchell’s resignation, and leading up to the battling speeches by Bibi and Barack later this month.
Posts Tagged ‘george mitchell’
Mitchell Quits
Friday, May 13th, 2011
Mitchell and Netanyahu in happier times
Today, George Mitchell resigned as Obama administration special envoy for Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. It’s not exactly a day to “give thanks for what the Lord hath made,” to upend Scripture a bit. More like the proverbial chickens of an off-kilter U.S. policy coming home too roost.
Increasingly over the past few months and even moreso in the past few weeks, the Arab peoples, including the Palestinians, have taken matters into their own hands given Israeli obduracy and U.S. irrelevance.
Mitchell had to have seen the handwriting on the wall. Being an honorable man, he didn’t want to continue presiding over a sham policy. The wonder is that he remained in his position as long as he did.
Each party said nice things about the man and blamed the other for failure of his efforts. Israel’s attempt to blame the Palestinians for refusing to negotiate, while the former offered nothing over which to negotiate, was laughable.
I’d like to think (though I have no way of knowing) he lobbied for our joining the effort on behalf of Palestinian statehood which is gathering steam for the UN in September. Perhaps he couldn’t be heard within the administration. Likely, this will leave the hardcore pro-Israel figures like Dennis Ross increasingly in control of policy. That remains to be seen, though one might have reasonable fears this might be the outcome. Ross is a long-time policy infighter who often disagreed with Mitchell’s more balanced approach. When there is an institutional/policy vacuum it is people like Ross who rush to fill it.
Mitchell leaves, of course at an awkward time, just before a major Obama Middle East address and White House meeting with Netanyahu. The effect is as if to say the emperor, that is U.S. Mideast policy, has no clothes. One wonders just what Obama will say in this speech and whether the speech will be little more than a distraction from just how ineffectual our policy is and has been.
Besides the problems with a moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace track, the increasing murderousness of the Assad assault on his own Syrian citizens, which has left 600 dead at the hands of brutal security forces, and which the U.S. has observed from the sidelines, leave us increasingly out of reach and out of touch.
Dennis Ross Prepares U.S. Goodie Basket for Bibi in Return for Freeze Extension
Wednesday, October 6th, 2010
Ross: 'We'll give you Pollard. You give us 60 days and we
Just read an interesting piece by a N.Y. Times reporter who, when he writes about U.S. Israel-Palestine policy, doesn’t make me wince (as Ethan Bronner does). Among the points that Mark Landler’s featured experts make is the incredible giveaway that Obama is offering Israel as an inducement to serve up a mere 60-day extension of the settlement freeze:
…The United States is offering military hardware, support for a long-term Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley, help with enforcing a ban on the smuggling of weapons through a Palestinian state, a promise to veto Security Council resolutions critical of Israel during the talks and a pledge to forge a regional security agreement for the Middle East.
It’s really extraordinary. The U.S. is in effect foreclosing the option of a major portion of the West Bank being returned to the Palestinians (the Jordan Valley). Even more astonishingly it is promising to exercise its veto for ANY anti-Israel Security Council resolution. That means if Israel bombs Iran, we veto. If Israel invades Syria or Lebanon or Gaza, we veto. It’s not so much the veto itself, because it’s almost a given that we veto any resolutions critical of Israel. But it’s the idea that we’re promising an a priori veto even before we know what the issue might be. It would have to be tempting to Israel to dust off its military-adventure wish-list and fix its coördinates on targets that have previously been off-limits due to fear of an American “No.”
And one wonders, if this is what’s required to get a measly 60 day extension what will we have to give away to get a full peace agreement? It reminds me of that old Brando movie where, when asked what he was rebelling against, he replied:
“Whaddaya got?”
In other words, we’ll have to virtually give away the store later if we offer so much for such a paltry reward now.
Who devised this bounteous package? Hazard a guess?
The package of incentives for Israel was devised largely by Dennis B. Ross, a senior adviser on the Middle East at the National Security Council and a veteran peace negotiator. But the day-to-day negotiations are being handled by George J. Mitchell, the administration’s special envoy to the region who led the push on Israel to halt settlement construction.
You remember when so many of us held our breath at the beginning of this administration regarding what role Ross would play. Well, now the chickens come home to roost. While Mitchell has to butt heads with the Israelis and Palestinians, Dennis whips out the U.S. strategic asset menu and figures out what goes on the plate for Israel. Why do you think Dennis has been serving as a consultant and senior fellow for WINEP, Aipac and other pro-Israel think tanks for all these years? For just such an eventuality. One even wonders how hard Dennis has been pitching Jonathan Pollard’s freedom to Obama as well. I bet Ross is literally Pollard’s “get out of jail” card. It’s times like this when I wish the common citizen could vote on whether Dennis Ross should be able to wield such power.
You know the U.S. package is a dubious deal when even a pro-Obama, liberal Zionist like Dan Kurtzer rails against it:
“It’s an extraordinary package for essentially nothing,” said Daniel C. Kurtzer, who also served as American ambassador to Israel and was a negotiator in the Clinton administration. “Given what’s already happened, who thinks that a two-month extension is enough?”
What surprises me is that otherwise intelligent people like Daniel Levy seem to have somehow drunk the Obama Kool-Aid:
“If we can get these 60 days, and get past the midterm elections, we can create a moment of choice for both sides,” said Daniel Levy, a former negotiator who is now at the New America Foundation.
I can remember sitting in a room towards the beginning of the Obama administration and hearing Levy tell the assembled group what a brilliant wedge issue the settlements would be. It would be like the scalpel with which you open the entire soft shell that is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Settlements would be the perfect way to open the longer-term campaign for peace. Once Obama hammered that home and deftly outmaneuvered Bibi, getting to peace would follow naturally. How naïve all of us were to wonder then at the seeming wisdom of those words. That’s why such Pollyanism doesn’t move me now either.
Fitting to close with this mock letter, published on my Facebook page by Israeli reader Ed Mad X:
Dear Mr. Criminal:
In return for stopping your rampant bank robbing spree, our government is willing to give you all its gold and silver, and we’ll even release your former accomplices.
Yours truely,
Mr. Sucker (aka U.S Government)
Memo to Ethan Bronner: Peace Talks are Dead
Friday, October 1st, 2010
Bibi: 'Eeveryone knows measured and restrained' settlement-building 'will have no influence on the peace map.' C'mon what's a settlement here and a settlement there? Nothing in the overall scheme of things
Ever one to put a high gloss on news unfavorable to Israel, Ethan Bronner’s latest report on the Israel-Palestine peace negotiations avoids the obvious–that they’re dead.
Saeed Barnoura of the International Middle East Media Center wrote after today’s failure of George Mitchell’s latest round of talks:
United States Middle East Peace Envoy, George Mitchell, left the Middle East on Friday without achieving any breakthrough in the troubled direct Palestinian-Israeli peace talks.
Mitchell could not convince Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to extend the freeze on settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories.
He said that direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority are on hold, but reiterated the commitment of the U.S. Administration to support indirect talks between the two sides.
Contrast that with Bronner happy-talk:
The Obama administration’s Middle East envoy left Jerusalem empty-handed on Friday after intensive efforts to save Palestinian-Israeli peace talks that have run aground on Israel’s decision to allow a freeze on West Bank Jewish settlement construction to expire.
After two meetings each with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, the envoy, George J. Mitchell, said all sides would keep talking.
If the talks are on hold then the sides aren’t talking. You can’t have it both ways. And if you read further in Bronner’s report you see that Mitchell didn’t say quite what Bronner has him say. He really said:
“Despite that [failure] we will continue with determination.”
That just means that the U.S. isn’t giving up and hopes neither side will give up. It doesn’t mean they’ll continue talking, at least not at the negotiating table. Nowhere in Bronner’s article does he use the term “suspended,” “failed” or anything remotely like that to describe the current status. I thought a good reporter is supposed to tell you the news clearly and succinctly. I guess for Bronner that doesn’t include news that isn’t so good for Israel. For such news you can obfuscate and shilly-shally around the obvious.
What he does do is provide Israel’s brief for why settlement-building isn’t such a big deal for the Palestinians to get so hot and bothered about:
The built-up areas make up only 2 percent to 3 percent of the West Bank, and Mr. Netanyahu is arguing that the 2,000 or so housing units that might be built in the coming year while a final agreement was being negotiated would matter little in the end. If the talks stop, the building would be likely to increase.
An earlier NY Times report listed all the goodies which the U.S. was offering Bibi to extend the freeze. Guns, butter, the list was sickening; just about everything except what Bibi seems to covet above all else: Jonathan Pollard. I’m astonished that weeks before a crucial U.S. mid-term election Bibi is so politically tone-deaf as to demand freedom for America’s worst post-war spy. In fact, the very thought of this is an insult not just to Obama, but the American people. But it would only be an insult to them if Obama actually capitulated and freed Pollard. There would be howls of protest. Imagine freeing this man in return for the equivalent of a mess of porridge: a four-week extension of the freeze. The very thought of it is preposterous.
What I’ve written about this before is: sure, I’d trade Pollard in return for something. But not a measly four weeks. I’d trade him for a final peace agreement involving an Israeli return to 1967 borders and sharing Jerusalem as the capital of Palestinian and Jewish states. I’d give up Pollard in a heartbeat for that.
Pollard for Mossad Chief
I can just see it now: Pollard returns to Israel to a heroes welcome with Bibi and his ex-Mossad handler, Rafi Eitan, meeting him at Ben Gurion. Afterward, Rafi announces that he’s reviving his failed political party, the Pensioners’ movement so that he and Pollard can run on the same ticket for Knesset. And then when Israel rallies to their cause, they can join a new government with Pollard serving as the new Mossad chief or Defense Minister.
After all, the current chief, Meir Dagan is being sacked for the Dubai assassination fiasco and Bibi’s looking for a new top spook. The timing would be perfect and it would seem only fitting to name Pollard to the role since he’s performed such extraordinary service on Mossad’s behalf. My only regret is that Meyer Lansky’s passed. If he were still alive he’d make a perfect Justice minister. And while we’re at it, why not Irving Moskowitz for settlements minister?
All Smiles at Sharm
Tuesday, September 14th, 2010
Hillary, Bibi and Mahmoud yuk it up at Sharm peace talks (Khaled El Fiqi/EPA)
Hillary Clinton and Bibi Netanyahu are shown all smiles today at the Sharm el Sheikh dog and pony show, in which Israel and the PA are attempting, with the intercession of various powers and allies like the U.S. Egypt, and Jordan, not to completely torpedo the chances of peace for the next five or ten years. Yes, you can tell from my tone that I’m extremely skeptical.
First, you have the settlement freeze issue. Bibi’s not going to extend it and Abbas claims he’ll walk out if he doesn’t. But even if they overcome this biggie looming in the next two weeks (the deadline is September 26th), they’ve got to get down to tachliss sometime. And man, that won’t be easy.
But the really egregious passage in today’s N.Y. Times report on the talks revealed just how clueless the American negotiators are:
Mrs. Clinton said she believed the two sides could find a creative solution to the impasse – steps that would allow the Palestinians to accept less than a full extension of the moratorium or could enable Mr. Netanyahu to sell an extension to his domestic constituency.
Among the options, American officials said, would be Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish homeland..
Why, sure…the Palestinians will agree to this in a heartbeat. Something not even all Jews agree with by the way. And while we’re at it why don’t we demand that Israel recognize Palestine as a Muslim nation as well?
Yes, they’ll fudge things by using the term “Jewish homeland” rather than “Jewish nation,” assuming the Palestinians can agree to the vaguer term homeland. But really, I have a much more fair formulation: let the Palestinians and Israeli agree together that Israel is a homeland for its Jewish AND Arab citizens. First, it clearly IS. Second, you simply cannot demand of the PA that it recognize Israel as a Jewish homeland while asking that it ignore the fact that there are 1-million Israeli Arab citizens for whom this state is their homeland. The families of many of them predate the settlement of most Israeli Jews in this land. So what does that make them? Chopped-liver?
There is an air of delusion in these talks. Granted that George Mitchell and perhaps even Hillary have the best of intentions and perhaps even the skill to pull this off. But when you begin with premises like the one outlined above, it does make you wonder what they could be thinking. Further, when they can be seen grasping at straws like this one, it makes you realize just how far apart both sides are and how impossible it will likely be to bridge those differences.
As far as I’m concerned, the ethnic definition of Israel or Palestine is something that is besides the point. Why should recognizing Israel as Jewish even be part of the negotiations? Yes, perhaps you reassure Israeli Jews to an extent if you get Palestinians to concede on this point. But are the Americans even thinking about the unease with which this will be greeted by Israeli Palestinians AND those in the PA negotiating this deal? The fact that they are grasping at irrelevancies is not a good sign.
One thing that is a good sign is that Mitchell flies afterward to Syria in an effort to sound out the parties about advancing Israel-Syria peace talks. Given the saber-rattling on the northern border in the past few weeks, any such meetings can only be for the good. The key is whether Israel is serious about peace with Syria. Assad has already signalled his willingness to sue for peace as long as Israel returns the Golan. It is Israel that has dithered, commenced a few wars in the interim, etc. It’s up to Bibi and his far-right coalition. As I wrote above, I’m dubious that he either can or wants to pull this off. But who knows, if Obama pushes hard enough (unlikely I realize), a miracle might happen.
Netanyahu Rejects Return to 1967 Borders, Proximity Talks’ Latest Failure
Wednesday, August 11th, 2010Israeli rightists and those echoing their formulations are fond of saying about the Palestinians: “There is no partner for peace.” Well, now the Palestinians can legitimately say the same about the current Israeli government. Haaretz today reveals that Bibi Netanyahu, in George Mitchell’s latest round of proximity talks, rejected a framework for direct negotiations that would have Israel affirm that 1967 borders would be the basis for such talks:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday rejected a Palestinian demand that direct negotiations be based on a statement by the Quartet confirming its position that the future Palestinian state will be based on the 1967 borders.
Meeting in Jerusalem with U.S. envoy George Mitchell, Netanyahu repeated his demand for the renewal of direct talks without preconditions.
…Senior officials in Jerusalem who are involved in the efforts to renew direct peace talks said yesterday that Abbas’ latest formula was unacceptable to Netanyahu because it sought to impose preconditions that the Israeli public would oppose.
…After Netanyahu’s rejection, it appears that Mitchell’s latest visit to the region has ended in failure.
Affirming 1967 borders would be little more than a reformulation of every major peace proposal going back ten years from the Clinton and Taba talks to the Arab League proposal to the Quartet. Bibi’s rejection sends Israel-Palestine relations into total disarray and renders Mitchell’s work moot. And there certainly is now no Israeli partner.
It’s laughable that only 24 hours ago the N.Y. Times editorial board hectored Mahmoud Abbas about his refusal to enter into such talks with Israel. The Grey Lady warned Abbas that Obama was the best president for the Palestinians’ purposes he was every likely to get, and that Obama’s patience would wear thin. All empty threats and rhetoric. The fact of the matter is that Israel’s position, as evidenced by Bibi’s “No” less than a day later, renders negotiations moot. No serious Palestinian leader should or would be able to risk their position for the empty chalice offered by Israel and the U.S. It would make them a laughingstock in the Palestinian street, and rightly so.
But let’s make no mistake: failure of peace talks does not bring a maintenance of the status quo as Bibi assumes. It gives freedom of movement to all the gremlins who wish to work their mischief including radical settlers, Al Qaeda, radical Palestinian militant groups, Hezbollah, etc. There are elements too within the IDF and Israeli political echelon who’d nothing more than a good war to occupy themselves and take the world’s eye off the Occupation and Palestinian suffering. There are any rumblings above and below the surface that an imminent attack on Iran may be such a diversion.
So yes, there will be another war, and sooner rather than later. And during that war or sometime after, Barack Obama and his advisors will scramble to try to pick up the pieces and get things back to status quo ante. But that won’t work either since Obama is an incrementalist in a region where radical reform is needed to shake up people and nations who’ve been far too complacent for far too long.
So here’s my formula put in the most graphic terms possible: status quo=death. Any person or party who maneuvers to maintain the status quo and stands in the way of progress as Bibi has done, will sow the seeds of despair and reap death as their harvest.
Did George Mitchell Torpedo Shalit Deal?
Sunday, June 27th, 2010Ali Abunimah blogs that a diplomatic source has told him that George Mitchell directed the Israelis not to make a deal for Gilad Shalit’s freedom, as it would only strengthen Hamas. In addition, this report from Yediot Achronot (Hebrew) notes that Shalit’s freedom would come at the expense of freeing Marwan Barghouti on the Palestinian side. The latter would become the defacto popular leader of Fatah and thus displace the U.S. crony Abbas, which this administration wishes to avoid.
If this is true (and I should make clear that I can’t vouch for reliability of this information), it would be shocking. It’s one thing for an ideologically right-wing president like George Bush to plot against Hamas in such a fashion. But for the Obama administration to intercede in such a matter is reprehensible. First, this is a matter between Israel and Hamas. Second, it would indicate that Obama’s policies toward Hamas and the Palestinians are just as feeble as his predecessor. Third, whether Shalit is freed or remains captive, Hamas remains strong in Gaza. Fourth, it is a shande for the U.S. government play a role Gilad Shalit’s continued imprisonment.
I’ve read reports in the Israeli media blaming the Netanyahu government for refusing to release the requisite number of Palestinian captives to satisfy Hamas. Der Spiegel also reports the Merkel government is angry at Bibi for turning down the deal paintstakingly drafted by their German mediator. And of course the Israeli government blames Hamas for their unwillingness to be “reasonable.” But this is the first time I’ve heard our own country blamed.
There is something so disturbing about this report that I’d like to believe it’s not true. But I have to report it because if it is true, then Obama has fallen a notch from the already low regard with which I held his Israel-Palestine policies.
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U.S. Veto of UN Security Council Resolution on East Jerusalem: Will It or Won’t It?
Wednesday, March 31st, 2010The Kabuki drama continues over a BBC report alleging that a U.S. representative (the story implies it was George Mitchell) told the Qatari prime minister that the former “would seriously consider abstaining” if a Security Council resolution condemning Israeli building in East Jerusalem was put forward. Reports out of Israel claim that a different State Department official denied this account. Though the denial is almost a non-denial:
The official told Ynet on Tuesday, “There is no such initiative before the (Security) Council, and we are not pursuing or encouraging any such action.”
None of this really contradicts the BBC report since it acknowledges too that there is no such resolution before the body currently. And a statement that the U.S. would consider abstaining in such a vote could be construed as “not encouraging” such a resolution.
Clearly, this is part of the ongoing battle between the Obama and Netanyahu forces to see who will blink first regarding Jerusalem and the issue of peace negotiations. Mitchell hopes that his statement will put added pressure on Bibi to accede to U.S. demands. My view is that the only way Obama can prove his bona fides is by actually abstaining, rather than just talking about doing so. As I’ve written before here, talk is cheap. Israel has heard enough talk from U.S. administrations to last several lifetimes. Only action gets Israel’s attention.
Laura Rozen reports on an ongoing battle within the U.S. administration on just this subject. Mitchell wants to be tough and Dennis Ross leads the faction that wants us to back off Bibi:
White House Middle East strategist Dennis Ross is staking out a position that Washington needs to be sensitive to Netanyahu’s domestic political constraints including over the issue of building in East Jerusalem in order to not raise new Arab demands, while other officials including some aligned with Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell are arguing Washington needs to hold firm in pressing Netanyahu for written commitments to avoid provocations that imperil Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and to preserve the Obama administration’s credibility.
This comment is especially telling and will make Ross and the Israel lobby howl:
“He [Ross] seems to be far more sensitive to Netanyahu’s coalition politics than to U.S. interests,” one U.S. official told POLITICO Saturday. “And he doesn’t seem to understand that this has become bigger than Jerusalem but is rather about the credibility of this administration.”
Dennis uses the minutiae to blur the big picture … And no one asks the question: Why, since his approach in the Oslo years was such an abysmal failure, is he back, peddling the same snake oil?”
I essentially agree with this formulation though I’m sure Ross isn’t knowingly advancing Israel’s interests at the expense of our own. He, like so many in the Israel lobby doesn’t see a great difference between the two. And that’s precisely the problem. Ross can’t imagine a showdown between Israel and the U.S. because he’s spent his entire life essentially articulating U.S policy through a pro-Israel prism. Now is the time when independence is called for and Ross can’t muster any.
There are reports from Israel that the U.S. is asking Israel for a four-month freeze on construction in all Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem during which time the U.S. would lobby for direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians. The report of Israel’s response is liable to please or fool no one:
In discussions of the forum of seven senior cabinet ministers, the general view is that it will be impossible to publicly announce a freeze of construction in East Jerusalem. However, one possibility is that it will be possible to reach a tacit agreement with the U.S. administration on construction in East Jerusalem.
According to this idea, Israel would make it clear to the United States that during the coming four months no massive construction in East Jerusalem neighborhoods would be planned or carried out, enabling Israel to be seen as meeting the American and Palestinian demands.
This is clearly going to be a non-starter. Imagine the death by a thousand paper cuts announcements of a few new units here and a few units there over the course of that four months. It simply won’t wash. The negotiations will be poisoned if there is any construction. It will be interesting to see whether Obama can swallow this. To me, it’s like the so-called compromise over the settlement freeze which essentially involved Bibi throwing up a smokescreen (a 10 month freeze excluding East Jerusalem) and the U.S. president saying he’d be happy with half a loaf. You can see how well that worked out.
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