West Bank Settlements Resume

Settler leaders acknowledged construction activity would be minimal in the coming months, in part because banks and developers are reluctant to commit to new projects out of fear that building will be stopped again

Palestinians regard settlement as a major obstacle to peace because the construction is on land they claim for part of their future state. Some 300,000 Israeli settlers live in communities scattered across the West Bank, in addition to 180,000 Jewish Israelis living in east Jerusalem, the area of the holy city claimed by the Palestinians as their capital.

Immediately after the restrictions expired at midnight, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appealed to Abbas to keep negotiating.

Israeli defense officials said Defense Minister Ehud Barak has floated a proposal under which any future construction – even projects with all the necessary permits – would need his personal approval.

Under this scenario, Netanyahu would in effect be able to leave the building restrictions in place without openly declaring this. But it was not clear whether Netanyahu favors the idea. The defense officials spoke on condition of anonymity because no decision has been taken.

Under heavy U.S. pressure, Netanyahu persuaded his hard-line Cabinet to agree to the slowdown last November in a bid to bring the Palestinians back to the negotiating table after a breakdown of nearly two years.

The Palestinians initially dismissed the gesture because it did not halt construction on thousands of settlement apartments already under way. They also objected because it didn't officially apply to east Jerusalem – though there has been a de facto construction freeze there for months as well.

After U.S. mediated peace talks were launched earlier this month in Washington, the Palestinians demanded Israel maintain the curbs.

Netanyahu – a settlement champion who just last year grudgingly endorsed the notion of a Palestinian state – had faced heavy pressure within his pro-settler governing coalition to resume construction.

Any negotiations would be complicated by the rival Palestinian governments in the West Bank, which Abbas controls, and in the Gaza Strip, which is ruled by Islamic Hamas militants who overran the territory in June 2007.

On Monday, Hamas' top leader, Khaled Mashaal, said from his base in Syria that only minor issued remained for a full reconciliation with Abbas' Fatah movement. Mashaal did not elaborate, saying only that the two groups have taken "serious and real steps" toward reconciliation and would meet in early October in Cairo.

There was no immediate comment from Fatah.

Multiple efforts to reconcile the two sides have failed. Breakthroughs have been heralded before, only to fizzle. Reconciliation would likely require major concessions, including the integration of rival security forces, new elections and some sort of Hamas recognition of Israel's right to exist.

Hamas opposes peace talks with Israel and has threatened to spoil the latest round with violence.
HuffPO,AP
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Israel is Within Obama's Crosshairs

"The purpose of these talks is clear. These will be direct negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. These negotiations are intended to resolve all final status issues. The goal is a settlement, negotiated between the parties, that ends the occupation which began in 1967 and results in the emergence of an independent, democratic and viable Palestinian state, living side by side in peace and security with a Jewish state of Israel and its other neighbors. That’s the vision we are pursuing." Presdeint Obama, September 1, 2010

Spoken like a true antisemite. "Illegal" occupation? Yes, at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Yesterday, Obama laid out his vision for Middle East war:

Flanked by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former Sen. George Mitchell, special envoy to the Middle East, Obama said the U.S. would actively and aggressively seek a lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians and a comprehensive peace between Israel and all of its Arab neighbors.

The president spelled out the aim of the direct talks that will be led by Clinton. "Our goal is a two-state solution that ends the conflict and ensures the rights and security of both Israelis and Palestinians and despite the inevitable challenges we have never wavered in pursuit of this goal," he said, adding that both sides had taken "important steps" to build confidence over the last year.

There are two states: Israel and Jordan (Jordan represents over 88% of "Palestine").

The relaunch of direct talks after nearly two years comes amid news of the murder of four Israeli settlers by Hamas gunmen in the West Bank town of Hebron -- violence which Obama, Netanyahu, and Abbas condemned. Israeli settlement construction on occupied territory has remained a thorny matter between the two sides as they seek to reach an agreement on final status issues.

Jews in the Jewish homeland remain a point of contention to the Jew haters. Period.

"The goal is a settlement negotiated between the parties that ends the occupation, which began in 1967 and results in the emergence of an independent, democratic and viable Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with a Jewish state of Israel and its other neighbors," Obama said. "That's the vision we are pursuing."

Spoken like a true antisemite.

Ever since B. Hussein came into office, "every single Middle East policy the Obama administration has announced has been antithetical to Israel’s national security interests.” (Caroline Glick)

From President Barack Obama’s intense desire to appease Iran’s mullahs in open discussions; to his stated commitment to establish a Palestinian state as quickly as possible despite the Palestinians’ open rejection of Israel’s right to exist and support for terrorism; to his expressed support for the so-called Saudi peace plan, which would require Israel to commit national suicide by contracting to within indefensible borders and accepting millions of hostile, foreign-born Arabs as citizens and residents of the rump Jewish state; to his decision to end US sanctions against Syria and return the US ambassador to Damascus; to his plan to withdraw US forces from Iraq and so give Iran an arc of uninterrupted control extending from Iran to Lebanon, every single concrete policy Obama has enunciated harms Israel.

From my book: The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War on America (chapters: Obama and Jews, Obama and Israel)

Israel Refuses Obama's Auschwitz Borders

There's a new survey of Arab public opinion out. Among other things, it shows that Arabs are disappointed with President Obama. It also claims that 86% of Arabs would give up on going to war with Israel if only... we'd go back to those Auschwitz borders where they could have us where they want could get rid of us.

Andrew Sullivan - who claims to be pro-Israel - excoriates Prime Minister Netanyahu for refusing to do Obama's bidding.

The powerful logic of insisting on a freeze to settlement construction and a viable two-state solution - essential to turning the propaganda tide in the terror war - is based in Arab public opinion. The reason many of us supported Obama was his unique capacity to win over the Muslim middle and isolate the Jihadist fringe. Israel's government, and its most ferocious supporters in the US, have done a great deal to destroy that promise, and, in so doing, have weakened the United States in the war on Jihadist terror.

So Sullivan is suggesting that Israel should commit national suicide so that the Arab world will like President Obama? I don't think even most Americans expect us to do that. And I'd be deeply opposed to any Israeli government that took Sullivan's demand seriously.

And the whole notion of blaming Netanyahu for Obama's unpopularity is absurd.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem