Obama Using the Settlement Issue to Force Israel's Hand

Obama has the strong hand and the options. Netanyahu has the weak hand and fewer options. It is hard to see how he will solve the problem. And that’s what Obama wants. He wants Netanyahu struggling with the problem. In the end, he wants Netanyahu to fold on the settlements issue and keep on folding until he presides over a political settlement with the Palestinians. Obama wants Netanyahu and the right to be responsible for the agreement, as Menachem Begin was responsible for the treaty with Egypt and withdrawal from the Sinai.

We find it difficult to imagine how a two-state solution would work, but that concept is at the heart of U.S. policy and Obama wants the victory. He has put into motion processes to create that solution, first of all, by backing Netanyahu into a corner. Left out of Obama’s equation is the Palestinian interest, willingness and ability to reach a treaty with Israel, but from Obama’s point of view, if the Palestinians reject or undermine an agreement, he will still have leverage in the Islamic world. Right now, given Iraq and Afghanistan, that is where he wants leverage, and backing Netanyahu into a corner is more important than where it all leads in the end.

“Netanyahu has the weak hand and fewer options.”

No he doesn’t. Because of Israel’s superior Intel, he has to know all of Obama’s secrets.

Bibi can spill that in a nanosecond, and Obama will be walking out the White House door with suitcases in hand.

It is well past time for the US to reign in Israel and say no to the illegal settlements. It has long been clear that Israel’s agressive occupation of lands outside its 1948 borders was wrong and illegal. While it may have suited US interests to wink at the illegal occupation, settlements, and oppression of Arabs and Palestinians in the past, it is no longer the case. As much as I dislike Obama, it is likely he’ll get credit for stopping Israel, forcing an end to settlements, hopefully forcing their evacuation, and pushing Israel back into its 1948 borders. Long overdue. Too much blood has been spilled, including American blood at the hands of our so-called democratic ally Israel. They are just another thorn in our foreign policy challenges. Credit to Obama if he can solve it.

BTW, I am greatly offended by Americans going to Israel and bad mouthing the US. That they are Jewish and apparently hold dual-Israeli citizenship is no license to diss the US while overseas. We criticize others, especially liberals when they do it. Same to should apply to these folks. They should be scorned and marked for their near-treasonous behavior.

It has long been clear that Israel’s agressive occupation of lands outside its 1948 borders was wrong and illegal.

Uh, no it isn't. Israel was attacked in 1967 by Jordan, who at that time occupied the West Bank. In response, Israel responded and captured the West Bank in a war. Land occupied in repelling an enemy belongs to the victor. The land belongs to Israel. It is not occupying anything.

Here are comments by George Will at a dinner in his honor in Los Angeles on June 8th.

"In the 61 years since Israel was founded on one-sixth of one percent of land in that area described as land of the Arab world, there has not been a moment of peace for Israel, not as peace is properly understood. How many Americans understand that when Israel was founded in 1948, no Palestinian state was invaded, no Palestinian state was destroyed? There had not been a Palestinian geographic entity since between the departure of the Romans and the arrival of British rule.

How many know that the West Bank, referred to by the President as “occupied territory,” inferentially as occupied Palestinian territory, is under international law unallocated portion of the Palestine Mandate rightfully occupied by Israel, because it occupied it in repelling aggression that came from that territory in 1967.

How the President believes that if we return to the 1967 borders, the antipathy to Israel, which predated the 1967 borders, will disappear, I do not know."

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