How Can Obama's Ineptness on Middle East Issues Be Explained, Especially When It Makes Him Look Foolish?

Barry Rubin
The Rubin Report
04 October '10

A friend who follows these issues closely wrote:

"How could Obama, who screwed up so badly before on the settlement issue, have convened a high-profile summit at the beginning of September only to possibly have it blow up in his face just weeks later because he failed to secure a deal on the moratorium [on construction] matter? How could he, and his staff, be so inept?....

"It's just hard to imagine that Obama didn't understand Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's constraints or Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas's weakness (and need to find an excuse to get out of a negotiating process he can't compromise on).

"It's just hard to imagine that Obama didn't understand Netanyahu's constraints or Abbas's weakness (and need to find an excuse to get out of a negotiating process he can't compromise on)....This is simply incomprehensible, is it not?"

Well, it's comprehensible if one understands that it is largely stupid. Let me state the issue in one sentence:

Knowing that it was unlikely he would get a full continuation of the freeze and that the Palestinian Authority was eager to get out of negotiations, why did Obama put so much of his prestige on success; give himself unnecessary self-imposed impossible deadlines; make a breakthrough seem relatively likely and easy (despite giving lip service to the difficulties); and magnify the issue's importance so that a failure seemed all the worse?

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