Obama’s Pie in the Sky

Ted Belman
Israpundit
13 April '10
(first published by American Thinker)

There is no solution to the final status issues of Jerusalem, borders and refugees that both sides will agree to. Nevertheless President Obama is committed to forcing an agreement.

Recently two top administration officials advised David Ignatius, Washington Post, to the effect that Pres Obama is “seriously considering” proposing an American peace plan which would be based on “agreements nearly reached” in the past. This is outrageous, as I will explain and it has no chance of succeeding.

Of course they repeated the mantra that “[e]veryone knows the basic outlines of a peace deal” but they omitted to say, that neither of the parties agrees to it.

This is the first time an administration official acknowledged the linkage between solving this problem with solving the problem of Iran. “It’s not either Iran or the Middle East peace process. You have to do both.” He went so far as to say,”[w]e want to get the debate away from settlements and East Jerusalem and take it to a 30,000-feet level that can involve Jordan, Syria and other countries in the region,”

Apparently, after spending a year on making settlement construction and Jerusalem the key issues, the Obama administration is finally admitting defeat and are moving on. Undaunted with their failure so far even with Syria and Iran, they are going to focus on a regional solution. “Incrementalism hasn’t worked” Effectively, the administration is opting for a grand design.

The administration believes that the formula for success requires them to “take on the absolute requirements of Israeli security and the requirements of Palestinian sovereignty in a way that makes sense.” Sorry, but Israel isn’t buying. Obama has been trying to frame the solution that way for a year but he ignores that Israel wants, and is entitled to, more than having its security needs met. She has very strong legal and historical claims to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. Obama has done his best to ignore them.

Israel will not accept a deal which forces her to give up on the settlement blocks including Ariel and Maaleh Adumin. Even if these blocks were offered to her, Israel would still have to uproot about 70,000 Jews at a cost of over $100 billion. Most, if not all of Jerusalem as annexed by Israel 40 years ago, would have to remain under Israel sovereignty. Israel would not agree to anything less. While Israel might accept a return of a token amount of refugees, Israel will be looking for redress for the Jewish refugees from Arab countries.

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