Jackson Diehl in the Washington Post says that John Kerry was delusional in thinking he could make peace in the Middle East when he’s up against a bunch of hard cases. Diehl’s series of bad guys goes from the massacring general in Egypt to the massacring president of Syria to… Netanyahu! But hold on.
It might be argued that none of this is Kerry’s fault. It was Gen. Abdel Fatah al-Sissi who hijacked Egypt’s promised political transition. It was the Assad regime that refused to negotiate its departure . It was Benjamin Netanyahu who kept building Jewish settlements in the West Bank. It was Mahmoud Abbas who refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
Did you see which walnut shell the pea ended up under? Yep– Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president who “refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.”
In fact, Diehl singles out Abbas for more blame than Netanyahu: “Abbas has been strident in publicly rejecting terms Kerry tried to include in a proposed peace ‘framework.’”
But Kerry has said that the Israeli demand Abbas has rejected is “a mistake.” Diehl is siding with Netanyahu. And once again, the Washington Post is valorizing a poison-pill that the Israelis stuck into the peace process, that wasn’t part of any earlier negotiations, so as to blame the Palestinians. As if this Jewish-state recognition, which even the most old and moderate Palestinians are not willing to provide, is equivalent to building 1000s of colonies in occupied territory.
Why does Jackson Diehl feel such a passionate attachment to Israel and Zionism? Does anyone know? How about Fred Hiatt?
Their views on Israel have radically alienated most Washington Post readers who take the trouble to comment on Mideast politics on the Washington Post website.
I use the word “radically” carefully — many of the comments express loathing for and outrage at the Washington Post’s neoconservative editorial line on Israel and issues connected to Israel.
Certainly Diehl and Hiatt have noticed what’s going on — how do they feel about it? Are they anxious? Defiant? Digging in their heels? In Alamo/Masada mode?
Diehl could have added that Sisi possibly would not have succeeded without Netanhyu
. Abbas ‘s refusal to recognize Israel as Jewish state is not the barrier but a figment of Natahyu to scuttle any fair deal. It is Natanhyu who is moving the goalpost and he is not the first Israeli PM to engage to these tactics.
They’re so ^&*&^%$ stupid!
It was Benjamin Netanyahu who kept building Jewish settlements in the West Bank.”
= Illegal under International Law, the UN Charter, the laws of war and relevant International Conventions!
” It was Mahmoud Abbas who refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state”
= Not illegal and the demand has no basis in any law, any UN Charter Chapter or in any International Convention!
There’s no pea, there’s no walnut shell. There’s only bullsh*t!
>> It was Mahmoud Abbas who refused to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
Good for him. No-one – not even the Palestinians – should be expected or required to recognize or accept Israel as a supremacist “Jewish State”.
No-one should be expected or required to recognize or accept any state as a supremacist state.
No state has a right to exist as a supremacist state.
Bull Connor should have demanded MLK recognize Alabama as a white state. Then a productive discussion on civil rights would have been possible, but MLK was so intransigent.
Is there any other case where alleged liberals demanded that the oppressed group give their seal of approval to their own oppression before discussing substantive issues?