WHATEVER your political preference, there is no denying that peace efforts in the Middle East are not going well. People will differ why, but the facts are clear. No negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are underway; no plan, at least made public, exists to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
One person perhaps uniquely perched to analyze these facts is Herb Keinon, diplomatic correspondent of the Jerusalem Post. Last week he visited family in Denver and addressed EDOS.
This is what he said.
PRESIDENT Obama has made five mistakes in the Middle East. Four of these mistakes are misreadings.
First, Obama misread the Israeli public. He thought that if he pushed Israel, and if this caused a strain in the US-Israel relationship which it did then Israel would rebel against its current leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, and vote him out of office. (Remember, elections can be held any time in a parliamentary democracy.)
But the Israeli public is not turning against Netanyahu. His government is more stable than any in recent Israeli history. Obama is stuck with Netanyahu, for better or worse. Obama did not plan on that. This misreading is his first mistake.
Second, Obama misread the Israeli attitude toward settlements. He thought that Israel hated settlements, and that if he pushed Israel to stop the expansion of settlements, or to dismantle them, the Israeli public would be sympathetic.
This has not happened because not all settlements are the same. Only a few are ideological settlements. Most Israelis see the post-1967 neighborhoods in Jerusalem and such settlements as Maaleh Adumim as mere land points to capture additional Israeli population.
So even if most of Israel does oppose ideological settlements, they are the minority of settlements. Most of Israel is not willing to halt the expansion of most settlements, let alone to dismantle them.
Again, a major strategic misreading by Obama. This is his second mistake.
Third, upon taking office, Obama denied that there were agreements that had been reached between the Bush administration and Israel on how Israel could expand existing settlements.
However, there were such agreements, reached between Dov Weisglass of then Prime Minister Ariel Sharons office, and Elliot Abrams, then of the State Department.
By denying the existence of these agreements, Obama, in the Israeli perspective, came off as untrustworthy.
The US now acknowledges the existence of these agreements, but on the trust issue, the damage was done. This is Obamas third mistake.
Fourth, in his outreach speech to the Arab world in June, 2009, Obama did not acknowledge the existence, let alone the legitimacy, of Zionism. He chastised the Arab world for not acknowledging the link between Israel and the Holocaust the tremendous number of Holocaust survivors who came to Israel.
But Obama himself did not acknowledge the Jewish roots of Israel in antiquity, the Jewish connection to Israel throughout the long Diaspora, or the Jewish return to Israel long before the Holocaust.
As such, Obama affirmed the Arab narrative of Israel, and denied the essence of the Jewish narrative of Israel.
This is more than a matter of taking sides. The Arabs say: Why should we have to pay for the sins of the Europeans who committed the Holocaust? This rhetorical questions translates into: the Jews have no rights to Israel.
Irans Ahmadinejad takes the logic still further, with this syllogism: If the only right the Jews have to Israel is the Holocaust, and if the Holocaust did not happen, then it becomes our right to wipe out Israel.
This misreading of Israeli history is Obamas fourth mistake.
Fifth, in that same outreach speech to the Arab world, Obama made demands of Israel concerning settlements, and asked the Arab world to make friendly gestures to Israel.
No such friendly gestures have been forthcoming. Obama misread the Arab worlds willingness to welcome Israel, however tentatively, into the world of nations. This is his fifth mistake.
I might add that with the exception of acknowledging the agreements between the Bush administration and Israel on settlement building, Obama has made a sixth mistake: He has not acknowledged the others.
HERB Keinon offered other observations:
One: The Clinton administration had a direct, effective channel of communication with Israels prime minister. Ditto, the Bush administration. But no such channel exists between the White House and Benjamin Netanyahu. This is the root of many problems.
Two: Obama is committed to the land for peace paradigm, begun with the Oslo peace process in 1993. That paradigm sees a final resolution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
Israel believes that this paradigm failed. For the Oslo process, which entailed Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank in the 1990s, Israel got terrorism.
For the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, Israel got rockets from Hezbollah. For the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, Israel got rockets from Hamas.
Israel did not get peace for withdrawing from land. Israel sees no workable paradigm for the resolution of the conflict. Rather, the conflict is to be managed.
Three: One way to manage the conflict is to improve the Palestinian economy. Netanyahu has made it a priority to do this.
Recently, calls for a third intifada by Palestinian leaders fell on deaf ears. Netanyahu believes that this is because the Palestinians of the West Bank now have something to lose, and dont want a new wave of violence against Israel, which would provoke Israeli retaliation and take away their economic gains.
Four: Obama believes that if there were a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it would greatly facilitate the prevention of Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
If there were Israeli-Palestinian peace, it would transform the Middle East and other Arab nations would join the US in stopping Iran. This is Obamas logic.
The Israeli logic differs. It believes that the Arab nations already oppose Irans nuclear aspirations, but will not work to stop them because this could make matters very bad for them if they fail to stop Iran. An Israeli-Palestinian peace will not change that.
The Israeli logic says that the US must act directly to stop Iran because the Arab nations never will, although they are indeed frightened of a nuclear Iran.
KEINON said that Obamas misreadings, mistakes and differences with Israel notwith- standing, his record on Israel is hardly all negative. People lose sight of the big positive contributions of Obama to Israel.
One: The US is supplying Israel with $3 billion in economic aid. And though Keinon did not mention it, the administration has requested an increase in this figure for the next fiscal year.
Two: The US has been rock solid in rejecting the Goldstone Report, which ignored Hamas record of war against Israel, denied Israels right to defend itself, blamed Israel for human rights violations during the Gaza war (Dec., 2008-Jan., 2009), and ignored Hamas tactics of using civilians as human shields.
Three: The US pulled out of the second UN Durban conference in 2009, which, like the first conference, featured blatant anti-Semitism, including Iranian calls for Israel destruction.
Four: The US is committed to maintaining Israels qualitative military edge.
