A "Moment of Real Opportunity"

JINSA Report
#970
09 March '10

So said Vice President Biden as he arrived in Israel. Why? What about this moment-when Palestinians are once again throwing rocks down on Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall; when the Palestinian Authority (PA) negates Jewish historic and religious attachment to the Cave of Machpela and Rachel's Tomb; when Salaam Fayyad and Abu Mazen travel around Europe demanding that countries recognize an independent Palestine when they decide unilaterally to declare one (the Kosovo option); when PA officials are trying to keep Palestinians from working in West Bank industrial zones; when the United States has been asked to demand that Israel scale back its "hot pursuit" of terrorists-what exactly about this moment makes it one of "opportunity"?

And opportunity for what? Not for negotiations, surely. But apparently ripe, according to Sen. Mitchell in The Washington Post, for preliminary proximity talks about the "structure and scope" of the actual proximity talks that in four months (according to the American plan) may yield talks about face-to-face talks. We find ourselves in odd agreement with Yossi Alpher, a very left-of-center Israeli academic, who told The Post, "It's hardly a cause for celebration that after 17 years of direct official talks we are regressing to proximity talks."

Well, said the Vice President, "The interests of both the Palestinians and the Israeli people, if everyone would just step back and take a deep breath, are actually very much more in line than they are in opposition." What interests would those be?

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