Soccer Dad

Madeleine Korbel Rice

In Obstacles to Peace, Elder of Ziyon demonstrates that it isn't anything Israel (or Jews) do or doesn't do that prevents peace in the Middle East and concludes:

There is only one obstacle to peace - the fact that the Palestinian Arabs, and the Arab and Muslim world at large, cannot accept the idea of Jews living in the Middle East in positions of power, even if Israel was the size of a tablecloth.

Solving that problem will not bring peace, but it is a necessary precondition of peace. Making more concessions to people who ultimately want you dead or dhimmified is the worst sort of wishful thinking.

And yet the administration sent Frances Fragos Townsend to the International Institute for Strategic Studies conference in Bahrain. According to Jim Hoagland, the administration now is doing its best Clinton administration imitation and explaining to the Arab world - from whom the 9/11 attacks originated - that their priorities are our priorities. From "The Mideast's Battle of Ideas":

When Arabs spoke, most of them focused instead on what America should do: Help jail or eliminate the violent extremists of the al Qaeda network. Grant more visas for their citizens to study in the United States. Pressure Israel to grant concessions to the Palestinians. "American ears are not open to what we are saying," a Saudi general protested.

These complaints triggered the brisk articulation and the dramatically earnest entreaties that have won Townsend the respect and the ear of President Bush, whom she briefs almost daily.

Bush recognizes that a post-Sept. 11 drop in visas for Arab students and others is "a national security problem" that requires increased resources, Townsend said. Homeland Security Department staffers are being posted to Saudi Arabia to speed visa processing, she offered.

And she noted that the audience had missed the emphasis she placed on Palestine -- including her view that Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority is "the best hope for peace" in upcoming Palestinian elections. "This is not typical" of a U.S. speech on terrorism, she accurately added. Her listeners agreed. For them, she had just inadvertently blurted out the heart of the problem.

(And what about that "... best hope for peace?")

Refreshingly, earlier in the Bush administration there was a willingness to confront the rejectionism of the Arab world. To demand that it would change. To a large degree on the Iraqi front President Bush has not retreated from that goal. But in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is increasingly clear, that Bush has abandoned his principles.

In practical matters - not just theoretical ones - the administration demands Israeli actions irrespective of what the other side does:

Israel has insisted on reducing the size and frequency of the bus convoys, and restricting who could travel and how long Gazans could stay in the West Bank.

On Wednesday, the Israeli government notified US negotiators that the convoys would be allowed to begin next week, Israeli officials said.

However, the officials said the route through the 40km (25 miles) of Israeli territory had not been finalised.

The US remains hopeful of brokering a compromise.

Assistant Secretary of State David Welch told a conference in London that he expected the convoys to start on Thursday.

This isn't about a compromise then. It's about demanding that Israel give in to Palestinian demands.

Meryl Yourish has it right:

Tell me why, again, I should vote Republican in the next election? Truly, I’m not seeing a difference between Bush’s Israel policy and Clinton’s.

Neither am I. And though I don't think that there's any Democratic politician who would defend Israel as Bush has done in the past, perhaps it's necessary to show that supporters of Israel have no friends, only interests.

UPDATE: The failing of most administrations when it comes to Mideast peace is that they put a premium on its success. This makes the cost of peace more expensive. The Palestinians loving the attention make sure that their demands are sacrosanct and Israel thus must bend to those to those demands or be obstructionist. In addition to Elder of Ziyon's observation that the Arab world (and Palestinians in particular) must change for there to be peace in the Middle East, the United States must make it clear that all Palestinian claims are negotiable and that there is a price for duplicity.

Daniel Pipes is skeptical that Garth of Israel or any other leader will make peace by trying to.

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