Rattling the Cage: Obama, it's about time - Larry Derfner

[Donald Ian Rankin]

First, a little moral clarity on our crisis with Washington. If it were possible to build 1,600 apartments for Palestinians in the Jewish parts of Jerusalem, there would be no problem with Ramat Shlomo, the planned housing project that set off the Obama administration’s anger.
If you could build Palestinian housing in Jewish Jerusalem, then Israel’s capital would be a city with liberty, justice and equality for all, and Ramat Shlomo would just be another neighborhood.




I know, of course, that this is not why the Obama administration is raising such hell with our government. The larger reason is that the Ramat Shlomo announcement during Biden’s visit reminded the world of the disastrous weakness Barack Obama had shown by caving in to
Binyamin Netanyahu on the settlement freeze.

By failing to stand by his administration’s demand for an absolute freeze on new construction over the Green Line, including in east Jerusalem, Obama was letting himself in for one humiliation after another, one reminder of his gutlessness after another, one nail in the coffin of his Middle East policy after another – because everyone knows that this Israeli government is not about to stop building settlements.

And this Israeli prime minister is not about to start negotiating seriously with the Palestinians, either. Netanyahu has pushed the peace process back a decade. He’s pronounced the territorial offers made by his predecessors Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak to be null and
void. On Jerusalem, he’s revived the policy of not one inch, and on the West Bank, he has never to this day agreed to withdraw from any part of it or ask a single settler to leave.



As I’ve written before, I think the only way to preserve Israel as a Jewish, democratic state is for the West, led by the US, to tell this country: Either get off the Palestinians’ backs or find yourself some new allies.



http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=171247

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[gleaner]

1. This is a very thoughtful post, and I agree with you ...

Bush empowered the Israelis the whole time he was in office in a trade off for an ally in his "war against terrorism." It wasn't a good thing to do then, and Obama's actions have been like throwing gasoline on a fire. It wasn't a surprise given his unwillingness to take a stand on domestic issues, but this is very serious.

There has been conflict going on in this area for as long as I can remember, and it has never been adequately addressed. Now it will be that much harder and the bitterness and violence will intensify. This needs some effective mediation and that is not happening. How will the carnage ever stop if the aggression never stops?

I'm a Quaker and we do not believe that violence ever solves intractable problems. It only spirals and increases until there is no one left standing.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

2. N.B. I have not included the whole article and HTML has eaten my snips.

The two long breaks should have the word "snip" in them, but I put square brackets around the snips and HTML ate them and now I can't edit it.

Bloody HTML.