As I wrote in my article Israel must continue to build east of the greenline.:
Were Israel to agree to stop building for ever, she would be put at a disadvantage for ever. The Arabs, with the support of the EU and the US, would continue building in violation of Oslo and would avoid making painful concessions forever. On the other hand, were Israel to offer to cease constructions for one year to give negotiations a chance, on the condition that if no agreement is consummated in that time frame, then Israel would be fully within her rights to build in Area C, no one would agree to this deal. What’s really at stake here, is to get Israel to give up any of her rights to Judea and Samaria before a deal has been negotiated.
When Obama endorsed the ’67 lines plus swaps, he was denying Israel’s the right to build. Put another way, he can’t concede Israel’s right to build because it would conflict with the TSS. Ted Belman
In Blaming Israel to Preserve a Theory, Jonathan Tobin put it this way:
The reason for this obfuscation is not a mystery. Acknowledging the truth about the collapse of the talks would force Kerry and his State Department minions to admit that their theory about how to achieve peace has been wrong all along. It was primarily the Palestinians’ refusal to make the symbolic step of recognizing that Israel is the nation state of the Jewish people that would live in peace alongside a nation state of the Palestinian people that sunk the talks. But acknowledging that would mean they understood that the political culture of the Palestinians — in which national identity is inextricably tied to rejection of Israel’s existence — must change before peace is possible. Israel, which has already made large-scale territorial withdrawals in the hope of peace, has already dismantled settlements and would uproot more if real peace were to be had. Moreover, since most of the building that Kerry and company were blamed for the lack of peace, are located in areas that would be kept by Israel, the obsession with them is as illogical as it is mean spirited.
A senior Obama administration official told The New York Times on Thursday, however, that the assessment (Indyk to Barnea) may as well have been provided by the US president himself. The official claimed that the White House had “cleared the interview” with Yedioth Ahronoth’s Nahum Barnea, and that “the critical remarks faithfully reflect the president’s own views.”
The unnamed senior official said that Obama believes, more than any other factor, that Israeli announcements of construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem throughout the nine months of talks led to the negotiations’ collapse.
“At every juncture, there was a settlement announcement,” said the official. “It was the thing that kept throwing a wrench in the gears.”
According to the Times report, “it is unlikely that Mr. Obama will lay down principles for resolving the conflict, as he did in May 2011 after his last major effort to forge a peace agreement deal foundered. At that time, he proposed a formula for negotiating the borders of a new Palestinian state.”
According to the official, the US president believes that there is still time for another peace push before he leaves office, but Obama is determined to wait for the Israelis and Palestinians to approach Washington with ideas of their own for reviving the process.
In their anonymous comments to Yedioth Ahronoth’s Barnea, US officials indicated that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had completely given up on the prospect of a negotiated solution, and they warned Israel that the Palestinians would achieve statehood come what may — either via international organizations or through violence.
The Americans said they had intended to begin the nine-month negotiating period with an Israeli announcement of a settlement freeze. But this proved impossible, an American official was quoted saying, “because of the current makeup of the Israeli government, so we gave up… We didn’t realize [that] continuing construction allowed ministers in [Netanyahu’s] government to very effectively sabotage the success of the talks. There are a lot of reasons for the peace effort’s failure, but people in Israel shouldn’t ignore the bitter truth: the primary sabotage came from the settlements. The Palestinians don’t believe that Israel really intends to let them found a state when, at the same time, it is building settlements on the territory meant for that state. We’re talking about the announcement of 14,000 housing units, no less. Only now, after talks blew up, did we learn that this is also about expropriating land on a large scale. That does not reconcile with the agreement.
“At this point, it’s very hard to see how the negotiations could be renewed, let alone lead to an agreement,” the Americans continued. “Towards the end, Abbas demanded a three-month freeze on settlement construction. His working assumption was that if an accord is reached, Israel could build along the new border as it pleases. But the Israelis said no.”
The New York Times report on Thursday indicated that Obama realized the degree of the impasse in negotiations after a March meeting with Abbas in Washington.
In that meeting, the US president attempted to convince the Palestinian leader to agree to principles in Secretary of State John Kerry’s unpublished framework agreement. Abbas did not respond, and instead chose to reiterate his rejection of Israel’s demand to be recognized by the Palestinians as a Jewish state.
“The president was skeptical about a deal after that meeting,” the senior official said. “Abbas was more comfortable pivoting to public grievance than focusing on a private negotiation.”
Kerry has yet to decide whether to make public the principles he incorporated into his framework accord.
yamit82 Said:
Pickled in vodka ?????????????
You all miss the obvious. Obama is looking for a way to walk away from Israel militarily, politically and economically, and blame it on Israel. Things will be no different when he is out of office if he actually relinquishes the presidency and I have my doubts about that.
Israeli Men Have World’s Fourth-Highest Life Expectancy
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Israeli men have the fourth-highest life expectancy of any nationality, according to a new analysis by the World Health Organization.
Israeli males born in 2012 can expect, on average, to live slightly longer than 80 years, according to the WHO’s World Health Statistics 2014. That figure ranks behind only Iceland, Switzerland and Australia.
Israeli women did not make the World Health Statistics top 10 list, but a separate WHO data set shows Israeli women born in 2012 with a life expectancy of 84, equal to Portugal, which placed 10th on the list. Japanese women placed first, with an average life expectancy of 87. Israel is the only Middle Eastern country on either top 10 list. Most of the countries on both lists were European. The United States did not make either list.
Netanyahu to Livni – You Don’t Represent Israeli Government
Justice Minister Tzipi Livni can’t seem to get enough of PA president Mahmoud Abbas, even as he is set to preside over a unity government with Hamas, a recognized terror organization.
On Thursday, while in London, Livni met with Abbas in a private meeting, according to an Israel Channel 2 report.
Both Prime Minister Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Liberman said Livni is free to meet who she wants, but that Livni does not represent the Israeli government in her meeting with Abbas.
The Prime Minister’s office said, Netanyahu told Livni before the meeting that she, “would only be representing herself in the talks, not the government of Israel.”
The cabinet, including Livni, voted against continuing the talks with the Palestinian Authority, once the PA decided to form a unity government with Hamas.
honeybee Said:
My what?
@ honeybee:
Clever them Indians. Who would have thought that would and bark could float?———————————–
@ yamit82:
Indian warships ??? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjy2Tlk3k1k
@ yamit82:
You show me yours
honeybee Said:
Almost don’t count.
@ yamit82:
Is this the Indian Warship you speaking of ??: Opps almost gave you my E-mail
@ BethesdaDog:
Indian Navy Warships Conclude Israeli Visit 😛 😛 😛 😛
Russian Amphibious Support Ship Arrive at Haifa for a First Visit in an Israeli Port😛 😛 😛 😛
@ BethesdaDog:
I agree with some of your analysis and disagree with others..
I agree they are far more sinister and clever than their enemies and opponents give them credit for. And that he can do more harm to Israel (Jews???) than he can to Putin and Russia.
I disagree with all the rest.
How so? Israel knows more than America about what’s going on in Iran…Our problem is not Obama on this Issue it’s BB and other political and security Heads.
America can take out almost all of Iran’s project quickly and with conventional weapons. Israel can do it with a bit more kick but then the fallout our your stupid American heads…. How about a Nuke winter for christmas????
Now understand one thing once Israel decides to act there is no force in the world that can prevent or stop us.
Israel is not dependent upon America or anyone else for our survival.. BB may be a corrupt cowardly incompetent little politician but the time is approaching where he will either act or be tossed out on his stinking ass and the masses will have a go at him.
Obama is more your headache than ours and between us the best thing he could do for us is to cut us off.
I will say it and while I have my criticism of Glick re: her conclusions her analysis is usually impeccable, unlike yours.
See my comment Here https://www.israpundit.org/archives/63596555/comment-page-1#comment-63356000129130
I would rather be a KOOK and WEIRD than a FOOL!!
the phoenix Said:
Sounds like BB???
Obama, that stalwart gentleman of multiple failures, will always blame all his disasters on others. It’s the nature of the beast. Ist’s the nature of Islam.
@ Bill Levinson:
It was Bush’s fault which happens to be largely true.
Don’t underestimate them. They are far more sinister and shrewd than you give them credit for. They might have been snookered by Putin, but it’s far from over. Obama is like the angry guy who comes home and kicks the dog (Israel). He can do far more to harm Israel and the Jews than he can do to Putin and the Russians. We still have almost three years, dangerous years, to deal with this guy. I do think his pack of rats are far smarter and far more dangerous than you believe. He’s in the process of outsmarting Israel on Iran, and now he’s essentially compromised one important source, perhaps the only important source, of certain military equipment by raising the price on naval hardware necessary for self-defense and defense of its gas production. Yes, Israel can get the boats, but now the price is much higher. And please don’t say Israel can go to the South Koreans or to eastern Europe or Russia, I doubt it’s that easy. He still has Israel by the balls, no matter what posters here say, or what Carolyn Glick says. She’s smart, but doesn’t mean she’s right.
@ bernard ross:
I would add a whole lot more…but this would be a good start… 🙂
If only!
Of course indyk was speaking for Obama just like the spying blood libel campaign against the Jews came from Obama. that fool and his college fraternity are so obvious and transparent. No wonder Vlad eats them up, b@tch slaps them around and sends them home whining. Lets hope they continue to be the idiots, failures, naiive fools, arrogant dunces which they so obviously are.
watching the idiots and fools of the obama admin is like watching 3rd graders at show and tell. this is the most incompetent set of cartoon characters to date. fools in the top postions with hardly any experience are required to be patronized like little kids tryng hard to do something. A batch of kids looking fresh out of college along with a set of loser holdovers from past failed endeavors. How can anyone take any of them seriously. this is what happens when a bull is let into the china shop.
I marvel and wonder how it is possible for anyone to have a career and be so incompetent and so lacking in Judgement.
Israel should do what everyone else does “piss on them” and send them home without lunch.
Hopefully, this set of screwups will be heavily engaged by Putin, China, Iran etc because all we can hope for is their distraction or exit.
This husein guy (the black bastard) is the poster boy for all that is phony, cowardly, despicable, no honor, no shame, lying as a way of life…. SPIT!!’
In other words, a musloid, that does not even have the courage to admit that he is one…
He only gives innuendos…. Double entendres…
What a P.O.S. ‘!!!!