Mideast proximity peace talks to start up again
By Ira Sharkansky
JERUSALEM–Here we go again. Maybe.
The stage is set for the beginning of indirect talks between Israel and the abbreviated Palestine National Authority (West Bank without Gaza). The Arab League has provided its endorsement. Palestinian leaders carried that decision on the basis of “assurances” received from the Americans. They are warning that the building of one new apartment for Jews in East Jerusalem or the destruction of one Arab’s apartment can derail the process. The Arab League is insisting on its authority to monitor the talks, and to judge their progress before agreeing to a shift from indirect to direct talks.
Like other things we are hearing about these negotiations, the appropriate posture is, “Who knows?”
Israelis are participating in the doublespeak. The Prime Minister asserts there has been no concession with respect to building in Jerusalem, but the working people who actually do the planning and issue the permits indicate that things haven’t been moving. The Prime Minister may have given assurances to Americans that he will cool things, but the Interior Minister (SHAS) has ordered his underlings to do their work.
It’s way too early to celebrate a breakthrough, or to decide that essential Israeli or Palestinian interests will be preserved, bargained away, or compromised for the sake of peace.
The big picture includes these ingredients:
Palestinians at the top of their heap in the West Bank appear to be the most pragmatic and least inclined to violence that we have ever seen. Below them, however, are religious extremists and nationalist ideologues inclined to upset any hint of sacrificing their wildest dreams. Those people control Gaza, are well represented in the West Bank population, and can make trouble via their allies in Iran, Syria, and Lebanon.
The American President is more concerned than any of his predecessors. He continues to push despite the problems that he recognizes. He, and people claiming to speak for him, mention even greater involvement if the parties do not show signs of progress according to an American timetable.
As we saw in the health reform he wrung from Congress, President Obama gives higher priority to reaching an achievement than to the quality of its details. Israeli pessimists may be reading the headlines and hoping that reports of an old romance will turn into something real and embarrassing, that Greek, Portuguese, Spanish, or Irish finance, problems in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, or Somalia, or oil in the Gulf of Mexico will cause the White House to invest less energy in Israel-Palestine. Yet the President’s energy seems as expansive as his rhetoric. It is best to assume his continued involvement.
The Israeli government may be the most conservative with respect to issues of Palestine since the 1980s, and perhaps before then. Its composition features a Prime Minister who seems genetically right wing, major partners from the assertive segment of right wing Russian immigrants and religious parties holding the sensitive positions of Foreign Minister and Interior Minister, along with a Defense Minister from the right side of the Labor Party. Their power reflects the virtual disappearance of the Israeli left, which itself comes from frustration with Palestinian violence and rejectionism.
The violence that began in 2000, and that which came out of Gaza after the Israeli withdrawal, as well as the bluster of Hizbollah and the madness of Iran may cause Israel to dig in its heels against whatever may be the readiness of Palestinian moderates and the passions of the American White House.
Against this, however, we should remember that it was Menachem Begin, an iconic father of the Israeli right, who agreed to the complete withdrawal from the Sinai for the sake of agreement with Egypt.
It ain’t over until it’s over.
*
Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University
Recent Posts
- Please go to www.sdjewishworld.com
- Now we’re at www.sdjewishworld.com — come and see!
- Oren pleads for Jewish support for peace
- Maybe not ‘anti-Semitic,’ perhaps Time is ‘anti-semantic’
- Despite flaws, ‘Prodigal Sons’ well worth reading
- Ending settlement freeze teaches Palestinians they can’t get something for nothing
- Possible spy deal and computer malware add intrigue to international scene
- What’s green and rocks? The Shabbat planned by Beth Am
- On Stephen Hawking, genius and music
- Palestinians should realize Israel willing to withdraw for peace, settlements or none
- For Mideast plants, it’s dew or die
- New software may help physicians repair your RNA’s
- However well meaning, Obama has blundered in Middle East
- New bill introduced to penalize bias against students from religious ethnic groups
- The Jews Down Under~Roundup of Australian Jewish News
- La Jolla Playhouse basks in Chaplin’s ‘Limelight’
- J Street leader responds to financing disclosures in Washington Times
- Dissecting President Obama’s U.N. speech
- Actor Richard Dreyfuss headlines Oct. 9 county library book festival
- Jewish community well represented in local ‘Star’ awards
- Tense times on front lines of Jerusalem neighborhoods
- Two IDF soldiers to tour San Diego schools Oct. 6
- ‘MiXtape’ and ‘The Full Monty’ enliven local theatre scene
- Commentary: USC campus police abet anti-Israel propagandists
- Obama to U.N.: Israel’s existence not a matter for debate
Archives
Pages
Categories
- 1954~Rosh Hashanah
- Aaron Elias
- Abbe Wolfsheimer Stutz
- Abu Dhabi
- Adam Schiff
- Adventures in SD History
- Afghanistan
- Airlines
- Albania
- Alex Liff
- Algeria
- Allyson Schwartz
- Antartica
- Anthony Weiner
- Anti-Semitism
- Arab League
- Argentina
- Arlen Specter
- Armenia
- Arnold Flick
- Australia
- Austria
- Azerbaijan
- Bahrain
- Bangladeh
- Barbados
- Barbara Boxer
- Barbara Kay
- Barney Frank
- Barry Rubin
- Baseball
- basketball
- Belarus
- Belgium
- Benjamin Cardin
- Bermuda
- Biking
- Bob Filner
- Bodybuilding
- Bolivia
- Bonnie Dumanis
- Books
- Bosnia and Herzegovina
- Botswana
- Boxing
- Brad Sherman
- Brazil
- Britain
- Bruce F. Lowitt
- Bruce Kesler
- Bruce S. Ticker
- Bulgaria
- Burma
- Cambodia
- Cameroon
- Canada
- Canary Islands
- Carine Chitayat
- Carl Levin
- Carol Ann Goldstein
- Carol Davis
- Cayman Islands
- Central African Republic
- Chad
- Chanukah
- Charles Schumer
- Chile
- China
- Claire Gold
- Colombia
- comedy
- Community Greetings
- Congo
- Costa Rica
- Countries
- cricket
- Croatia
- Cruise Lines
- Cuba
- Curacao
- Cynthia Citron
- Cynthia Weisfield
- Cyprus
- Czech Republic
- Czecheslovakia (historical)
- Dan Schaffer
- Dance
- Danny Bloom
- Darrell Steinberg
- David Amos
- David Strom
- Delta
- Denmark
- Dianne Feinstein
- Donald H. Harrison
- Dorothea Shefer-Vanson
- Dubai
- Ecuador
- Ed Koch
- Eddie Rosenberg
- Egypt
- Eileen Wingard
- El Al
- Equatorial Guinea
- Eric Cantor
- Eritrea
- Estonia
- Ethiopia
- European Union
- Finland
- First Amendment~Religion
- Football
- France
- Frank Lautenberg
- Franklin Gaylis
- Fred Reiss
- G8
- Gail Feinstein Forman
- Gail Umeham
- Garry Fabian
- Gary Ackerman
- Gary Rotto
- Gaza
- Georgia {Gruziya}
- Germany
- Gerry Greber
- Gert Thaler
- Ghana
- golf
- Greece
- Guatemala
- Haiti
- Hal Wingard
- Henry Waxman
- historic places
- Hockey
- Holland America
- Holocaust~Shoah
- Honduras
- Hong Kong
- Howard Berman
- Howard Wayne
- Hungary
- Iceland
- India
- Indonesia
- Interfaith
- Ira Ruskin
- Ira Sharkansky
- Iran
- Iraq
- Ireland
- Irv Justman
- Isaac Yetiv
- Israel
- Italy
- Ivory Coast
- J. Zel Lurie
- Jack Forman
- Jack Markell
- Jamaica
- Jan Schakowsky
- Janis Colton
- Japan
- Jared Polis
- Jay N. Jacobson
- Jay Tell
- Jeanette Friedman
- Jeanette Katzir
- Jerrold Nadler
- Jewish license plates
- Jewish Public Officials
- Joel A. Moskowitz
- Joellyn Zollman
- Joey Seymour
- John Adler
- John Yarmuth
- Jordan
- Joseph Lieberman
- Judaism
- Judy Lash Balint
- Kashif Shahzada
- Kathi Diamant
- Kazakhstan
- Kenya
- kick boxing
- Kuwait
- Kyrgystan
- Lag B'Omer
- Latvia
- Laurel Corona
- Lebanon
- Liberia
- Libya
- Lifestyles
- Linda Capeloto Sendowski
- Lithuania
- Lloyd Levy
- Lorne Mallin
- Luxembourg
- Lynne Thrope
- Macedonia
- Malaysia
- Maldives
- Mali
- Marc Yaffe
- Marissa Palin
- Marquesas Islands
- Marshall Islands
- Marti Emerald
- Marty Block
- Mauritania
- Mauritius
- Mexico
- Michael Bloomberg
- Micronesia
- Moldova
- Mongolia
- Morocco
- Morris Casuto
- Movies
- Music
- Myanmar/Burma
- Natasha Josefowitz
- Nauru
- Netherlands
- New Zealand
- Nicaragua
- Nigeria
- Nita Lowey
- Norman Greene
- Norman Manson
- North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
- North Korea
- Norway
- obituaries
- Oman
- Opera
- Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
- Organization of American States (OAS)
- Our Writers
- Pakistan
- Palau
- Palestinian Authority
- Panama
- Paul Greenberg
- Peru
- Pesach
- Peter Eisner
- Philippines
- Poetry
- Poland
- Portugal
- Puerto Rico (US territory)
- Purim
- Qatar
- Quartet (for Mideast Peace)
- R-e-s-p-e-c-t
- Rabbi Baruch Lederman
- Rabbi Ben Kamin
- Rabbi Dow Marmur
- Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal
- Rabbi Philip Graubart
- Rabbi Simcha Weinstein
- Rabbi William N. Kramer
- Randy Fadem
- Recipes
- Recommended reading and viewing
- Rhodesia-historical
- Richard C. Holbrooke
- Robert Wilson
- Romania
- Ron Wyden
- Rosh Hashanah
- Roz Rothstein
- Rugby
- Running
- Russell Feingold
- Russia
- Rwanda
- Sammy Samuels
- San Diego
- San Diego history
- Sander Levin
- Sara Appel-Lennon
- Saudi Arabia
- Science
- Senegal
- Serbia
- Shavuot
- Sheila Orysiek
- Sheldon Silver
- Shelley Berkley
- Shonda file
- Shoshana Bryen
- Singapore
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Soccer
- Solomon Islands
- Somalia
- South Africa
- South Korea
- Soviet Union (historical)
- Spain
- Sports
- Sri Lanka
- Steve Cohen
- Steve Hofstetter
- Steve Israel
- Steve Kagen
- Steve Poizner
- Steve Rothman
- Sudan
- Sukkot
- Surfing
- Susan Davis
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- Syria
- Taiwan
- Tajikstan
- Tanzania
- Tashlich (part of Rosh Hashanah)
- Ted Parker
- television
- Tennis
- terror
- Thailand
- The Arts
- Theatre
- Tibet
- Tisha B'Av
- Toby Klein Greenwald
- Tonga
- Travel
- Tu B'Shevat
- Tunisia
- Turkey
- Turkmenistan
- Tuvulu
- Uganda
- Ukraine
- Ulla Hadar
- Uncategorized
- United Arab Emirates
- United Kingdom
- United Nations
- United States of America
- Uruguay
- Uzbekistan
- Vanuatu
- Vatican City
- Venezuela
- Vietnam
- Virgin Islands (U.S. territory)
- Visual Arts
- water polo
- West Bank
- Yachting
- Yemen
- Yiftach Levy
- Yom Ha'atzma'ut
- Yom HaShoah
- Yom HaZikaron
- Yom Kippur
- Yom Yerushalayim
- Yonatan Peres
- Yosef Rabin
- Yugoslavia (historic)
- Yvonne Greenberg
- Zambia
- Zimbabwe