by David M. Weinberg
Here is the emerging
hard-left line on U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's peace process:
It's not good enough; not accommodating enough to the Palestinians. It's
even dangerous, because Kerry is "caving" to Netanyahu and demanding
"unjust" concessions from Abbas that were never raised in previous
rounds of negotiations.
The American Jewish
bête noire Peter Beinart, darling of the J Street crowd and Obama
administration circles, has now taken up this line. Beinart is savaging
Kerry for -- get this -- "slavishly ginning up" an "unworkable and
unjust" peace plan that just doesn't meet "rightful" Palestinian
expectations.
Beinart bemoans the
fact that Kerry is "pulling back from the principles established by both
Bill Clinton and Ehud Olmert," whereby Israel would pull out
permanently from the Jordan Valley and almost all of the West Bank, make
all of east Jerusalem the Palestinian capital, allow tens of thousands
of Palestinian refugees to return to Israel, and not demand recognition
as a Jewish state from the Palestinians.
Beinart accuses Kerry
of "violating" the apparently sacrosanct Clinton "parameters" of 2000
and Olmert-Abbas "understandings" of 2008. Beinart pronounces these to
be the holy "axioms" that guided Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in the
past and must be implemented in future. Anybody who doesn't hew to this
orthodoxy of the past, decides Beinart, is running a "self-defeating,"
"unbalanced" (meaning too pro-Israeli), and "immoral" peace process.
Consequently, Beinart
calls on J Street and all good "liberal Zionists" to "raise a stink" and
defiantly "declare their support for the Clinton parameters and Olmert
understandings." Any framework that "gives Palestinians less than they
were offered by Clinton and Olmert" doesn't meet Beinart's muster.
So here is some news
for the high and mighty Mr. Beinart: There are no holy American-set
parameters of the past that Israel must abide by, nor do the dangerous
and unauthorized concessions thrown last minute at Abbas by a desperate
and corrupt Olmert bind the State of Israel today. These are
unrealistic, illegitimate and irrelevant diplomatic standards.
Beinart and his
imperious "liberal Zionist" friends may not have noticed, but Israeli
democracy has decided to move in a different direction. The people of
Israel have twice elected a prime minister who explicitly considers the
Clinton/Olmert "axioms" as anachronistic and misguided, and for good
reason.
Take the division of
Jerusalem: Both the Barak and Olmert governments fell partly because
they were perceived as being willing to partition Israel's capital city.
Or consider the Jordan Valley: In today's situation, no credible
Israeli leader can forgo long-term Israeli control over the eastern
border of a Palestinian state.
Let's not forget that
Abbas rejected the Clinton and Olmert deals, and there is no diplomatic
principle that says that years later Israel should nevertheless offer
the Palestinians even more. The opposite is true. Given apparent
Palestinian radicalism (see Gaza), Israel now has updated and tougher
red lines. And this will require meaningful and painful concessions from
the Palestinians. Alas, it's clearly difficult for Beinart and his J
Street buddies to accept that.
Beinart's harangue
follows a well-worn and mistaken pattern of the Left. Instead of
promoting real peace in the Middle East by pressing the Palestinians
into adopting moderate and realistic positions, the Left emboldens
Palestinian leaders into uncompromising and rejectionist positions by
attacking Israel, and in this case, by slamming Kerry as Israel's shill.
But Beinart knows best: Abbas extremist demands are just and must be met; otherwise the process is a sell-out and a failure.
Beinart is just not
prepared to accept that perhaps Kerry has done serious homework; that
after delving deep into the nitty-gritty details of the
Palestinian-Israel dispute for six months, Kerry has perhaps come to
conclusions that tilt more towards Netanyahu's positions than those of
Abbas; that maybe Netanyahu's "axioms" are more valid than Olmert's.
(I'm not sure this accurate, but let's just say).
Might this be
legitimately possible? Could Netanyahu's red lines be reasonable? Could
Abbas be the unreasonable party? In Beinart's book -- of course not.
Impossible!
Many observers strongly
suspect that Beinart's views reflect those of U.S. President Barack
Obama, and this explains the lambasting that Obama dished out to
Netanyahu through the Bloomberg News interview he gave to Jeffrey
Goldberg two weeks ago. In fact, it's rumored in Washington that Obama
is upset with Kerry for drawing "too close" to Netanyahu, and that Obama
has said that if he were leading the negotiations, far more concessions
could have been wrung out of his "good friend, Bibi."
It is not at all clear
that Kerry has indeed drawn close to Netanyahu, but Beinart is right
that Kerry's failure might spell the end of the two-state solution. This
scares Beinart to despair.
But hey, what was he
thinking? Sane, centrist voices warned in advance that impatiently
pushing a diplomatic process with a weak and recalcitrant Palestinian
leader like Abbas, on a background of false Palestinian expectations
(raised irresponsibly Clinton and Olmert), at a time of regional
upheavals and great uncertainties for Israel -- was unwise and likely to
fail.
Having ignored that
advice and cheerleaded for Kerry, assuming that Kerry would rule in
favor of the Palestinians and batter Israel into the madcap concessions
of yesteryear, the Left is left adrift at sea. It can only revert to
default mode: dumping on Kerry as an extension of Netanyahu. Too bad the
Left can't expend its energies on bringing Abbas to his senses.
David M. Weinberg
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=7695
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
No comments:
Post a Comment