A new administration has taken over Washington with talk of justice, respect and diversity. However, when it comes to Israel-Palestine the news isn’t so encouraging.
Joe Biden’s foreign policy team says it wants to return to the Iran deal, but reassures the Israel lobby that that won’t happen any time soon, and when it comes to actual Palestinian rights or freedom (the “peace process”), it clearly wants as little friction with the Israeli government and Israel’s friends in Washington as possible. I watched all 4-1/2 hours of Tony Blinken’s testimony to Senate Foreign Relations (help!), and he never mentioned occupation, Palestinian human rights, or even settlements.
And Blinken spent a lot of time affirming Donald Trump’s policies in Israel! Notably in his very respectful exchanges with Senator Ted Cruz, who you’d think Blinken might treat with some crust because he tried to deny Biden’s victory.
Cruz: A final question because my time has expired, Do you agree that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and do you commit that the United States will keep our embassy there?
Blinken: Yes and Yes.
Normalization and the peace process
Blinken repeatedly praised Trump policy on normalizing relations between Israel and the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and the Sudan as opening a pathway to Palestinian peace.
“I think there are a number of things from where I sat that the Trump administration did beyond our borders that I would applaud…. The Abraham Accords, absolutely… [T]he work that was done to push forward on normalization with Israel, I applaud. It makes Israel safer, it makes the region safer, it’s a good thing. I would hope we can build on that.“
No wonder South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham called Blinken an “outstanding choice.” No wonder Blinken played ball with Graham:
Graham: Do you still consider Iran the largest state sponsor of terrorism?
Blinken: I do.
Graham: Do you consider Israel a racist nation?
Blinken: I do not.
Graham: Good start!
The two men were responding indirectly to Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who said that morning on Democracy Now! that Israel is an “apartheid state” and a “racist state” because it had refused to give coronavirus vaccine to occupied Palestinians even as it inoculated the largely-Jewish population in Israel.
Tlaib is of course echoing a couple of new human rights reports labeling Israel an apartheid nation, but Jonathan Greenblatt of the ADL and the rest of the Israel lobby are in denial:
describing Israel as “apartheid” is false and hateful, and shuts down constructive engagement. One can be critical of Israel without attacking the Jewish State with incendiary accusations.
Jeremy Slevin of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s staff had a pointed response.
Human rights advocates—from B’Tselem to the UN Human Rights Council to Jimmy fucking Carter—have all used the term apartheid to describe the illegal occupation of Palestinian land. Yet somehow the ADL only calls it “incendiary” when it comes from a Muslim woman.
Again, Blinken had nothing to say about Palestinian human rights. He used questions about the peace process to gush about the Jewish democratic state, and say two states is a pipe dream– “however distant it may appear” — but it’s our pipe dream.
Our commitment to Israel’s security is sacrosanct, and this is something that the President elect feels very strongly…
The president-elect believes and I share this conviction, that the best way, and maybe the only way, to ensure Israel’s future as a Jewish democratic state and to give the Palestinians the state to which they are entitled is through the so-called two-state solution, obviously a solution that is very challenged at this moment. I think realistically its hard to see near term prospects for moving forward on that.
Blinken said that it was “important to make sure that neither party takes steps” or “unilateral actions” that make the prospect of two states even “more challenging.”
But bear in mind that Israel has announced even more illegal settlements in recent days, and Blinken was careful not to say a word about that. Though he went on and on about Biden’s “resolute” opposition to Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions. “It unfairly and inappropriately singles out Israel, it creates a double standard, and a standard that we don’t apply to other countries.” (As if the U.S. accords other countries the “special relationship” it has with Israel.)
I continue to hope that Biden is going to take Netanyahu on. The fact that Biden has named three Israel-supporting Jews to top positions at State (Blinken, Wendy Sherman, Victoria Nuland) indicates to me that he wants the liberal Zionist lobby on his side in doing so.
All the same, Blinken’s rhetoric seems a step back from the last Democratic secretary of state, John Kerry, who blamed Israel for making the peace process vanish in 2014 — “Poof” — and in 2016 warned that the U.S. couldn’t continue to give Israel diplomatic cover if it destroyed the prospect of a Palestinian state and blocked a Palestinian capital in Jerusalem. Well Tony Blinken is prepared to give Israel that cover. The clear signal from his hearing is that Biden doesn’t want to tangle with Netanyahu.
The Iran deal
Blinken affirmed that the U.S. will return to the Iran deal, that’s only if Iran goes “back into compliance” with a deal that Donald Trump broke nearly three years ago. “I don’t think that’s anything that’s happening tomorrow or the next day,” he assured hawkish senators on both sides of the aisle.
The same message came yesterday from Biden’s press secretary, Jen Psaki, who read directly from a script in answering the Iran question, saying that though Biden wants to reenter the deal, he wants to toughen it to “address other issues of concern”, meaning Iran’s sponsorship of resistance organizations.
Iran’s president Hassan Rouhani has been way more positive. “Trump’s political life ended today. Trump died but JCPOA lives,” Rouhani crowed yesterday, per Farnaz Fassihi of the NYT.
Rouhani says it will be quid pro quo with Biden: If US signs, so will Iran. If US issues order, so will Iran. If US returns to commitments, so will Iran.
Sadly, the political environment in D.C. is not entirely hospitable. Some of the harshest comments on Iran came from Democratic senators, with Ed Markey calling Iran “the single greatest existential threat in the region,” whatever that means. And Markey was supposed to be the great progressive hope in MA . . .
Kudos to B’Tselem!! Israel runs from the obvious truth:
Israel to Ban Human Rights Groups from School Visits over Use of ‘Apartheid State’ – Palestine Chronicle
“Israel to Ban Human Rights Groups from School Visits over Use of ‘Apartheid State’” The Palestine Chronicle, Jan. 19/21
EXCERPT:
“Israel’s education minister is banning groups that call the country an ‘apartheid state’ from making school visits to present information to students, CBS News has reported. Yoav Galant tweeted yesterday that he had instructed the ministry’s director-general to ‘prevent the entry of organizations calling Israel ‘an apartheid state’ or demeaning Israeli soldiers from lecturing at schools.’
“The move follows the publication of a report last week by the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem. The organization branded Israel an ‘apartheid’ state that ‘promotes and perpetuates Jewish supremacy between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River.’
“Echoing the UN’s 2017 report which concluded that Israel was practicing apartheid, B’Tselem dismissed the popular misconception that it is a democracy within the Green (1949 Armistice) Line.
“It argued that after more than half a century of occupation, the state should be treated as a single entity guided by the core racist organizing principle of ‘advancing and perpetuating the supremacy of one group – Jews – over another – Palestinians.’
“B’Tselem said that it will not be deterred by the minister’s announcement. Director-General Hagai El-Ad spoke at a school in Haifa earlier today.
“’For many years we’ve exposed our students to a broad variety of opinions from across Israel’s political spectrum,’ said the Hebrew Reali School. ‘We respect the students’ right to express their opinion and are proud of their involvement in issues at the heart of Israeli society. We hold respectful dialogues and intend to continue this tradition.’
“Established in 1989 during the first intifada, B’Tselem documents human rights abuses in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip. ‘B’Tselem is determined to keep with its mission of documenting reality, analyzing it, and making our findings known to the Israeli public and worldwide,’ it insisted.”
That sinking feeling when it comes to our leaders, members of any administration, and when you hope their policies might be different, and the predictable disappointment. Making Israel Great Again one president after another.
Well, these remarks by Blinken on behalf of Biden are everything that we on Mondoweiss expected. It’s still a bit shocking to see them in cold reality, though.
A week or two ago B’tselem came out with a report explaining why ‘apartheid’ is an appropriate label for Israel. Well, now they have a short animated/cartoon exposition that explains why the term is appropriate – perfect for your Zionist uncle who doesn’t want to wade through page after page of dense prose:
https://thisisapartheid.btselem.org/eng/#1
“Over 14 million people live between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, roughly half of them Jews and half Palestinians. It is commonly held that the area is divided into two separate regimes: Within the sovereign borders of Israel – a permanent democratic regime governing about 9 million people, all Israeli citizens. Within the territories Israel occupied in 1967 – a temporary military regime ruling over some 5 million Palestinian subjects. Is that really the case?”
‘Critical without incendiary allegations’ – people here have asked before what those who say this sort of thing would consider to be acceptably critical – and might well ask again. How would they define such a thing? What example would they give? I suppose that a sort of fastidious shudder at Netanyahu is widely acceptable but that by itself is rather deeply hypocritical.