Israel-Palestine Analysis: Washington's New Push for an Agreement

Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas has said that he is ready for direct negotiations with Israel if specific conditions --- a total halt to settlement building in the West Bank and an acceptance of an independent Palestinian state based on pre-1967 borders --- are met. As a sign of "cooperation", his political advisor Nimar Hamad stated that the PA is not opposed to the deployment of a NATO force, including Israeli soldiers, along the borders of a Palestinian state under a peace agreement.

Meanwhile, Washington has sent special envoy George Mitchell back to the region. On Tuesday and Wednesday, Mitchell had separate talks with Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Mitchell brought a proposal based on a March statement of the Quartet (US, Britain, United Nations, Russia) and a “defined timeline” and agenda for talks.

The Quartet statement asserted that negotiations should lead to a settlement, negotiated between the parties within 24 months, ending the occupation that began in 1967 and resulting in an independent, democratic and viable Palestinian state living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel and its other neighbours. The Quartet urged Israel to freeze all settlement activity, including natural growth, and to dismantle West Bank outposts erected since March 2001, and it underlined that the international community does not recognize Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem.

In his meeting with Israel's Netanyahu, Mitchell said that Abbas was ready to enter direct talks immediately if Israel accepted this offer. (Haaretz reports that Washington had rejected two earlier proposals put forth by Abbas.)

Netanyahu's answer? A firm "No". An anonymous Israeli official said:

The Palestinians have been raising different preconditions. As time goes on they have talked about a settlement freeze, then about Jerusalem as a precondition, about continuing where [former prime minister Ehud] Olmert left off, about accepting the ‘67 borders and now they are talking about the Quartet statement. If they want to look for excuses, they can find them. Let us move to direct talks.

On Friday, Netanyahu's office also released a statement denying a report from London-based newspaper Al-Hayat, that said that Israel would evacuate 90% of the territory and 50,000 settlers in the West Bank. The Prime Minister's officials said the claim is a lie.

After Mitchell's failure, Washington increased its pressure. US State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said on Wednesday that the Quartet was likely to issue a statement of support for the talks in the coming day.

Israel: The "Demolition" of a Bedouin Village (Blumenthal)

Max Blumenthal writes:

“The Negev affords me the pleasure of watching a wasteland develop into the most fruitful portion of Israel by a totally Jewish act of creation.” –David Ben Gurion, Memoirs

In the middle of the night on August 10, residents of the unrecognized Bedouin village of al-Arakib sent a panicked text message to Israeli activists in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Israeli police helicopters were buzzing overhead, surveying the scene ahead of what was likely to be a new round of demolitions. Three activists staying in the village had been nabbed during a night raid. Having already witnessed the razing of their homes twice in the past two weeks, the residents of Al-Arakib expected the third round of demolitions to arrive tonight, on the eve of Ramadan. During Ramadan, when the villagers fasted all day, the police and Israeli Land Adminstration reasoned they would be too weakened to rebuild — it was prime time for destruction.

I arrived in Al-Arakib at 3 AM with a handful of Jerusalem-based activists. A local couple hauled out mattresses and blankets and poured us small cups of coffee. “I’ve had enough of sleeping,” the man grumbled as he reclined next to his wife. He seemed grateful to have company. I laid down and stared at the desert sky, listening to the man describe in a lulled tone the experience of watching his neighbors’ homes crumple under the teeth of bulldozers again and again. As he trailed off, I heard a low droning sound in the distance. Were they here already? I looked around at the others. No one to register the slightest sign of concern. Finally, I slipped into a light slumber.

Two hours later I was torn from my sleep. “They’re here!” someone shouted in Hebrew. I leapt from my mattress and scrambled up a dune until I reached the center of the village. A phalanx of one hundred riot cops were already there, bristling with assault weapons and centurion shields. Flanked by bulldozers, they quickly ringed the activists and journalists, who numbered about two dozen, and began forcibly pushing them away from the site of the demolitions. Their intention seemed to be to prevent any brave souls from standing between the bulldozers and the homes they sought to destroy. Dispatched by a faceless network of clerks and engineers in air-conditioned offices to do the dirty work of the state, the police performed their duty with cold efficiency.

As the bulldozers trundled around the village, tearing tarps from plywood pylons, crushing tin roofs, and dragging the shattered structures into hulking piles, the villagers watched with resignation. Seated on her bed in the naked desert, a girl wiped a few tears from her eyes, grimacing at the sight before her. On a nearby hill, a man quizzed his daughter on surahs from the Quran before sending her to collect mattresses from beneath the dusty waste of what used to be their sleeping quarters. An old woman stood impassively by a flock of birds perched on the collapsed remains of her house. Dispossession and homelessness have become nearly mundane in Al-Arakib.

The villagers remain devoted to the nomadic Bedouin tradition. (Why else would they resist with such tenacity the Israeli government’s plan to resettle them in one of the Indian reservation-style “development communities” the state has created for them?) However, they have established a permanent presence in the areas around their village that pre-dates the foundation of Israel. Al-Arakib’s cemetery, for example, contains the graves dating back to the end of the 19th century. Yet the Bedouins’ historical claim to the Negev has not convinced the state that they deserve legal recognition. Nor have their attempts to demonstrate their loyalty by serving as front-line combat soldiers in the Israeli Army. In the eyes of the state, the Arabs of the Negev are at best quasi-human.

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Iran-Israel-US: Goldberg Journalism "If You Build This War, It Will Come"

I have read the "analysis" that may well dominate US-based chatter today: Jeffrey Goldberg's lengthy projection of high-level Israeli opinion on a aerial attack on Iran.

Here's Goldberg's hook-line:

What is [most] likely...is that one day next spring, the Israeli national-security adviser, Uzi Arad, and the Israeli defense minister, Ehud Barak, will simultaneously telephone their counterparts at the White House and the Pentagon, to inform them that their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has just ordered roughly one hundred F-15Es, F-16Is, F-16Cs, and other aircraft of the Israeli air force to fly east toward Iran --- possibly by crossing Saudi Arabia, possibly by threading the border between Syria and Turkey, and possibly by traveling directly through Iraq’s airspace, though it is crowded with American aircraft.

Let's call this for what it is. Jeffrey Goldberg is not functioning as an analyst here. He is not even carrying out the fundamental task of a reporter. He is serving as a spokesman for the Israeli Government in its attempt to put psychological pressure on Iran, to block any resumption of talks on uranium enrichment, and possibly to push Washington into acceptance of, if not support for, Israel's military action.

Goldberg's piece has no substance as a critique of the political, diplomatic, and military situation, for it is void of any information of --- as opposed to rhetoric about --- the state of Iran's nuclear programme and its international strategy. It is void of any information about Washington's perspective and approach, including the option --- very much "on the table", to use the cliche invoked for military action --- of discussions with Tehran.

"The Arabs" do appear for a couple of sentences, but only to have their perspectives simplified and twisted into support of an Israeli attack.



Goldberg's sole attention is to pass on and elevate the rhetoric of the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his advisors. (The author claims authority from 40+ interviews with Israelis inside and outside the government, but they are merely murmurs amidst the loud declarations of Netanyahu and equally loud projection by Goldberg.)

It may well be that Israel has decided on military action by next spring, but we don't know that and neither does Goldberg. All we really know --- and I hope, for the sake of some integrity, so does he --- is that the Israeli leadership want him to think that.

And they want him to write that --- in an "intellectual" US periodical, where the New York-Washington political corridor will pick this us as received wisdom, rather than a slick propaganda operation.

I don't write this note as a rejection of the military option. However, if a writer is going to advocate that option, it should be done so openly and honestly, not disguised as "reportage". It should be done so on the basis of information from a range of sources, locations, and perspectives, not as a conduit for the manoeuvres of one actor in the political drama.

If Goldberg's piece receives undeserved attention as a considered definition of the state of the Iran-Israel-US relationship, then I will post a detailed dissection of its artifices and distortions.

But not now. Because for me, if one is concerned with news and, indeed, issues of justice and humanity, there are matters far more important --- yes, more important than boys-and-toys posturing on aerial warfare --- to attend to today, tomorrow, and the day after that.

Gaza Latest (11 August): Barak v. the PM, Turkey's Response to Netanyahu, Israel's "No" to the UN and More

Barak v. Netanyahu: On Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met the Turkel Committee, investigating the bloodshed following the incident on 31 May. However, Netanyahu refused to give answers and suggested talking behind closed doors on several occasions. When he was asked who conducted talks with Turkish officials, whether there were alternatives to the military option or the situation could have been resolved with Cairo's assistance, and about the claims that Israel had broken international law, Netanyahu showed the committee the door.

The next day, Defense Minister Ehud Barak appeared in front of the committee. Barak's testimony not only contradicted Netanyahu but said he was taking full responsibility for Israel's deadly raid, pointing out "operational mistakes" if not "failures": "The decision making process at the political level was not the reason for the reality that emerged at the end of the operation."

Barak said that an intelligence assessment and a range of potential outcomes, including the possibility of 'extreme scenarios' were discussed in the inner Cabinet, known as the 'Forum of Seven'. In contrast, Netanyahu had said discussions before the raid focused largely on the likely impact on public relations and the chance of violent confrontation had been mentioned only in passing.

Haaretz reports that Barak --- unlike Netanyahu --- answered all the committee's questions, albeit with some political tactics of his own:

Barak bombarded the panel with names, dates and facts before launching an evasive maneuver in the form of a pompous oration on the dangers of global terror and a nuclear Iran, helpfully informing the committee that Israel was not North America, or indeed Western Europe.

Turkey's Response to Netanyahu: After Netanyahu said Turkey had ignored repeated warnings and appeals "at the highest level" to halt the flotilla, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu responded on Tuesday:

No one else can take the blame for killing civilians in international waters. Israel has killed civilians, and should take the responsibility for having done so.Turkey has no responsibility in the attack on the flotilla.

Israel's "No" to the UN: The international probe led by former New Zealand Prime Minister Geoffrey Palmer might have caused a problem for Israel even if this “complementary” commission has no scope beyond "investigating" internal reports on the deadly incident on 31 May.

The problem lies in UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's answer when he had agreed to keep Israel's military forces off limits in the inquiry. He said that "there was no such agreement behind the scenes."

In response, Haaretz reports, from a government source, that Israel will not allow the UN to question Israeli soldiers. Though the commission has no right to issue sanctions but just can give suggestions, Israel's position is firm.

One can only speculate that an investigation finding an Israeli soldier's conduct "inaccurate" could lead to further political consequences in the international arena, especially when arrest warrants for former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and some senior military officials have been discussed in Europe?

Pressure to Dismantle the UNHRC's Probe?: Since the UN Human Rights Committee started its work on Tuesday, it has been reported that "key international players" are trying to persuade the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva to dismantle the flotilla probe. The justification is simple: If the Council does not stop as another UN-sponsored probe is in progress, it reinforces the HRC's image as one-sided and arbitrary.

Any guess whom these "key international players" might be?

US-Iran: Strikes, Sanctions and Scapegoats (Sick)

Gary Sick, a former official in the Carter and Reagan Administrations and a leading analyst of contemporary US-Iran relations, assesses the current state of play:

For the pundits, there are only two questions about U.S.-Iran relations that are of any importance: (1) Will Israel and/or the United States attack Iran? and (2) will the new sanctions have enough bite to persuade Iran to change its nuclear policy? Despite all the printers ink spilled on these two issues, the answers are an easy no and no.

Neither the United States nor Israel will take the military option off the table, thereby giving the pundits (and the crowd that is dying to repeat Iraq) latitude to keep the distant prospect of military action on the front pages, where it has been for years. As a lede, it sells columns and newspapers, so it will not go away. But as analysis it is either blinded by the momentary hype or else is simple wish fulfillment.

Uber-neocon John Bolton had it right. If any such attack were to occur, it would have been at the end of the Bush administration when there was nothing left to lose. Bolton thought it was so inevitable that he predicted it unequivocally in a Wall Street Journal column in 2008. Dick Cheney apparently agreed, judging from his subsequent statements of regret. So it is fair to say that George W. Bush, after looking the potential consequences, resisted the advice of his neocon advisers, his previously dominant vice president, and the reported direct request from the government of Israel — and rejected a strike. What is the likelihood that Barack Obama, with the same catastrophic scenario before him, will approve? Forget it.

Sanctions do not persuade dictatorial regimes to abandon projects that they think are central to their security and survival or even their self-image. Just look at Saddam Hussein. The international sanctions imposed on Iraq in the 1980s make the current Iran sanctions appear anemic in comparison. Every item that went in and out of Iraq was subject to approval by a UN committee dominated by a vindictive United States. Yet, although Iraq had abandoned its nuclear weapons program years earlier, Saddam could not bring himself to let his own people and his enemies know that. Instead he was prepared to gamble that the United States would not attack him.

One of the reasons for this bad bet was that he and his cronies were doing so well under the sanctions that there was no immediate necessity to come clean. They, after all, controlled the smuggling routes. And their henchmen managed the thriving and enormously lucrative black market. As for concern with their own people, a rotund Tariq Aziz, sitting with a fine Scotch and a Cuban cigar, informed a worried UN representative that it would be good for the Iraqi people to lose some weight. An Iraqi friend of mine told me at the time that the sanctions had made criminals of the entire Iraqi middle class, which had to resort to illegal behavior in order to survive. The biggest – and most successful – of this new criminal class was the privileged group immediately around Saddam Hussein.

Which brings us to Iran. The sanctions are more effective than many anticipated. They have built a web of financial restrictions and limitations around the already weak Iranian economy that is certain to cause significant problems for the leadership. Iran’s critical energy sector is particularly vulnerable. It is in a pincer. Because of cheap energy prices inside the country, artificially propped up by massive subsidies, energy demand is soaring. This siphons off a lot of Iran’s oil production, which would otherwise be sold on the world market for hard currency.

At the same time, because Iran’s oil fields are old and complex, they require modern technology to maintain production. That technology – and the capital investment that can only be provided by the major international oil companies – has been absent for many years. It was driven away partly by the sanctions, ironically assisted by Iran’s own short-sighted negotiating tactics that offered only the most meager profit margins to outside investors. As a result, Iran’s oil production is in decline at the same time that more and more of it is being soaked up by domestic consumption. In a period of relatively low oil prices, this means that Iran’s hard currency earnings are drying up at an alarming rate.

This unenviable economic situation is compounded by what has to be described as perhaps the least competent economic management team of any major country in the world. Ayatollah Khamene`i, the Supreme Leader, seems totally preoccupied with bolstering his own shaky political legitimacy by pandering to the Revolutionary Guards who surround and protect him. The result is corruption on a scale beyond anything the shah’s regime could have imagined.

President Ahmadinejad, also a creature of the Revolutionary Guards, is free to indulge his taste for outlandish and irresponsible rhetoric. His words keep the international and domestic spotlight glued to him; but the effect drives away prospective investors and facilitates the U.S. drive to enlist international support for sanctions against Iran. An American Jewish leader once joked with me that he suspected Ahmadinejad was a Mossad agent: no one, he observed, had been more helpful in promoting donations to Israel and Israeli causes. At the same time, under his leadership Iran has inflation and unemployment that are both in double digits.

But to be fair, Ahmadinejad is the first politician in modern Iranian history willing to address the “third rail” of Iranian politics – the immensely costly subsidies on food and energy. His initial efforts to reduce the amount of subsidized gasoline that Iranians could use met with outbursts of indignation, including torching filling stations. But these rules now seem to be grudgingly accepted and have eased slightly Iran’s energy dilemma. He is now addressing the low tax rates assessed against merchants. This has also resulted in outrage, including closing the bazaars in Iran and other major cities. But his campaign seems to be making progress.

These are needed reforms that would be recommended by any responsible economic overseer, including the International Monetary Fund. Ahmadinejad attempts to balance his daring assaults on the entrenched economic interests by his belligerent rhetoric, always casting himself as the champion of the little guy. In that he resembles his populist predecessors, from Juan Peron to Huey Long to Hugo Chavez. Ahmadinejad takes on America and Israel the way Governor Long took on Standard Oil. But like other populists, Ahmadinejad is the prisoner of his own eccentric view of the world and his loyalty to lieutenants who may or may not be worthy of his faith in them.

The key question about Iran today is not whether it will be attacked or collapse under sanctions. It is whether Iran is capable under its present leadership to take a sober decision about how to deal with the outside world. The Revolutionary Guards have established a dominant position in Iran’s military, its economy, and its politics. Iran increasingly comes to resemble the corporatist states of southern and eastern Europe in the 1920s and ‘30s that we call fascist. Iran is conducting an interior battle with its own demons, from the millenarians on the far right who choose to believe that Khamene`i is the personal representative of God on earth, to the pragmatic conservatives who simply want a more responsible leadership, to the reformists of the Green movement whose objective is to put the “republic” back into the Islamic Republic by giving the people a greater voice.

This is a yeasty and unpredictable mix. No one knows what is going to happen next.

And this is the reality that the Obama administration must deal with. The danger is not that the administration will back the wrong horse in Iran. The real danger is that the Obama administration will be so preoccupied with domestic American politics and its constant demand to look tough when dealing with Iran that it will inadvertently rescue this cruel but hapless regime from its own ineptitude by providing a convenient scapegoat for everything that goes wrong in Iran.