Friday, February 22, 2013
Palestinians Disqualify U.S. as Peace Broker
By Nicola Nasser**
The “unbreakable alliance,” which will be confirmed by the
upcoming visit of President Barak Obama to Israel ,
will disqualify the United States
as an honest broker of peace in the Arab – Israeli conflict in Palestine
This “unbreakable alliance” will doom whatever hopes
remain during Obama’s visit for the revival of the U.S. - sponsored deadlocked
“peace process,” on the resumption of which depends the very survival of
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ leadership, and explains as well the Palestinian
frustration, low expectations, unenthusiastic welcome and the absence of
celebrations for their most cherished among world celebrities, in a stark contrast
to the euphoria that is sweeping Israel in waiting for what the U.S. and
Israeli officials are describing as an “historic” visit.
On February 19,
the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office released the official blue, red and white logo that will be on all documents and signs during Obama’s visit
late in March. The logo shows the words "Unbreakable
Alliance" written in English and Hebrew under a combined Israeli and U.S.
During his visit, Obama will
become the first ever serving U.S. president to receive Israel’s presidential
medal to honor the fact that he has “established the closest working military
and intelligence relationship with Israel in the country's history: Joint
exercises and training, increased security assistance every year, unprecedented
advanced technology transfers, doubling of funding for Israel's missile defense
system, and assistance in funding for the Iron Dome system,” according to Steven L. Spiegel in Huffington
Post late
last year.
Speaking exclusively to RFI
Hanan Ashrawi, the Palestinian veteran peace negotiator and member of the
executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Israel’s
partner in signing the defunct Oslo peace accords, said the first – term Obama
administration “have just managed to buy more time for Israel” to “create facts
on the (Israeli – occupied Palestinian) ground.”
“Our experience has
been really tragic with this American administration,” which “started with such
high hopes and tremendous promises,” but “they backed down so quickly it was
incredible,” she added, to conclude: “The U.S.
Therefore, “there are no plans to celebrate” Obama’s visit to Ramallah, because
“they haven’t forgotten the part he played” in aborting the PLO’s efforts in
2011 to win the United Nations’ recognition of Palestine statehood as a full
member and in opposing its UN recognition as a non – member observer state the next
year, according to Shlomi Eldar in Al-Monitor on February 14. Still, to make a
bad situation worse, Obama will convey the same message to Abbas during his
upcoming visit, because “our position has not changed” neither to Palestinian
statehood nor to Palestinian national reconciliation according to U.S.
State Department spokeswoman Olivia Nuland on February 19.
Obama will visit on the backdrop of a two
–year old simmering Palestinian – U.S.
The U.S. subscription to the
UN recognition of Palestinian statehood would establish irrevocably the
prerequisite to make or break the only viable “two – state solution” for the
almost century – old conflict, because it would confirm the 1967 borders as the
basis for such a solution and, consequently, will for sure defuse the time bomb
of the Israeli illegal settlement enterprise in the Palestinian occupied
territories and pave the way for the resumption of negotiations. However
neither Obama nor the U.S.
Earlier this month, Israel in an unprecedented move boycotted the UN
Human Rights Council because a year – long investigation by the council
produced a report urging that “Israel
Recently, Yacov
Ben Efrat, the General Secretary of the Israeli DAAM Party, wrote in Challenge
Magazine that when Obama arrives in the Israel – occupied Palestinian
territories “he will see that his policy of appeasing the Israeli right has
nearly killed the Palestinian (self- ruled) Authority” economically as well as
politically, to conclude: “Having already
experienced the Oslo accords, the Palestinians have already seen how the
temporary becomes permanent, and there is no way they will accept this.”
“It’s plain and simple: Either the
settlements or peace ... even Obama won’t get us abandon this principle,” PLO
chief negotiator Saeb Erekat was quoted as saying on February 14.
Should Obama decide to act accordingly,
he may reinforce the “unbreakable
alliance” with Israel
On this February 19, author Marvin Kalb wrote (http://www.brookings.edu/blogs):
“Instead of opening his Mid-East diplomacy with a
cutting critique of Israel’s cantankerous settlements policy, often considered
the third rail of Israeli politics, … instead of allowing, even encouraging, a
discomfiting coolness in Israeli-American relations, … the Israelis and the Palestinians
might be engaging in serious, face-to-face negotiations on a peace treaty by
this time.”
Releasing a $ 700 million of U.S.
blocked Palestinian aid, using U.S.
good offices to make Arab donors honor their pledges to them or convincing Israel to release the tax and customs revenue it collects on their behalf are
not the kind of U.S.
* Nicola Nasser is a veteran Arab journalist based in Bir
Zeit, West Bank of the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories.
