Many people with their heads in the clouds anticipated that the Obama administration would finally swing US foreign policy towards advocating justice, rather than capitulation, for the Palestinians. In diplomatic circles, the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah has repeated ad nauseum its belief that President Obama would finally listen to both sides and take into consideration the huge imbalance in concessions demanded from Israel and the PA.
It was therefore hoped (admittedly not by many) that Abbasshole would present a forceful case for Palestinian rights in his meeting with Obama, particularly since both men continue to preach the two-state solution as the only viable solution for this conflict. The idea of a Palestinian state in the West Bank is no more than a pipe dream, of course, with unprecedented Israeli settlement construction making 40% of the land inaccessible to its residents and owners, and the system of checkpoints, walls, closures and Israeli-only highways bisecting the West Bank and dividing it into six distinct cantons.
The Obama administration’s stance on these settlements (“We believe settlement construction should stop, but we’re definitely not going to do shit to make sure it does”) seems to have hoodwinked Abbasshole into thinking that time is on his side. Rather than making a forceful case to a President who may be slightly more sympathetic than the previous one (not saying much), the illegal head of the PA and self proclaimed President of the Nonexistent State of Palestine has instead outlined his strategy-sheer and utter passivity.
From the Washington Post:
Abbas and his team fully expect that Netanyahu will never agree to the full settlement freeze — if he did, his center-right coalition would almost certainly collapse. So they plan to sit back and watch while U.S. pressure slowly squeezes the Israeli prime minister from office. “It will take a couple of years,” one official breezily predicted. Abbas rejects the notion that he should make any comparable concession — such as recognizing Israel as a Jewish state, which would imply renunciation of any large-scale resettlement of refugees.
Instead, he says, he will remain passive. “I will wait for Hamas to accept international commitments. I will wait for Israel to freeze settlements,” he said. “Until then, in the West Bank we have a good reality . . . the people are living a normal life.“
What the fuck? Let’s start with the first part-that Abbas predicts it will take two years for Obama to get Israel to stop settlement construction. Does he not realize that settlement construction means…settlement construction? That things on the ground will not stay the way they are? That he is giving Israel the green light to steal and plunder even more of the West Bank, even more of its resources, to wall in even more of its people? And what on earth guarantees that the settlements will cease in two years?
This man is either completely bonkers, or the dirtiest, slimiest form of collaborator. Take your pick, I’ve already made mine. But what galls me most is that last line, that people in the West Bank are living a normal life.
I have been trapped in the West Bank for four years now, unable to leave because of laws and arbitrary rules set by the illegal Israeli occupation. Life here is oppressive and insecure. The Israeli military steals land and steals lives as it pleases, Israeli settlers abuse and plunder and pillage without reprimand, and there is no way to guarantee your safety as a Palestinian. Trade is severely curtailed, unemployment is rife, poverty levels are high-all direct consequences of the Israeli occupation. Settlers set fire to fields, while the military closes more farms off behind walls and fences from their owners. Palestinians are arrested across the West Bank on a daily basis without due process, extra judicial killings are the modus operandi of the undercover Israeli death squads that roam the West Bank and over 600 road blocks and checkpoint choke the movement of average Palestinians between their own towns, villages and refugee camps.
But perhaps I’m being too harsh on the old Zionist. After all, he doesn’t actually spend much time in the West Bank, traveling abroad two thirds of each year. When he is here, he barely leaves the Green Zone of the West Bank, Ramallah, travelling in his heavily armed motorcade almost exclusively from his villa, yards away from the mokhabarat building where Hamas affiliates are routinely tortured and in at least one case killed, to the Moqata’a, five minutes away. So for him, life in the West Bank probably does seem good.
For the people he is so utterly out of touch with, life in the West Bank is a terrible existence. Because of that, it would be futile and ultimately dangerous to assume that Mahmoud Abbas can deliver anything for the Palestinian people, or that he can ever adequately represent their cause.
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I think the developments in Israel/Palestine since the Obama administration have shown the extent to which KabobFesters are living in fantasy-land.
Mahmoud Abbas’ approach is working. He’s established himself so effectively as a peace partner that Obama is able to go to unprecedented lengths to show Israel that he means business, he’s not going to back down on the settlements, and he’s not going to let issues with Iran distract from resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
If Abbas weren’t playing the game he’s playing, Obama wouldn’t be going out on the limb for him that he is.
Netanyahu will be punished handily at the polls for showing that he can’t handle Israel’s most important alliance.
The Palestinians are getting better press in America than they’ve EVER gotten.
Abbas may really pull this thing off… and earn himself the title, ‘The father of the future Palestinian nation’.
Of course, KabobFesters aren’t actually interested in a Palestinian nation… I believe it was QuiQui who posted an approving quote stating that “Once the Palestinians are a nation like any other nation, I will no longer support them”?
Those of us who are actually interested in Palestinian statehood right now see Abbas as the best man for the job.
He’s corrupt, he’s undemocratic, his reign is only quasi-legitimate at best… and he’s getting the fucking job done in ways everyone else has failed to.
Once the Palestinians have an actual *state*, then it’s time to see about pushing him out and finding less corrupt leadership.
Until then, chill the fuck out; he’s got this.
Posted by Joe | June 3, 2009, 12:09 pmHe's getting what job done exactly? Waiting for Israel to complete its settlement project in two years? Then what?
Posted by MohammadKF | June 4, 2009, 12:06 amGee, I don’t know, the job of RECRUITING THE MOST POWERFUL FUCKING COUNTRY IN THE WORLD ONTO HIS SIDE?
He’s got American support against the settlements, and for a Palestinian state, and for the American government directly butting heads with Israel, in a way that no other Palestinian leader has ever been able to manage.
Netanyahu is just beginning to get it; there are plenty of news articles around talking about how after meeting with Obama, he went around to the usual pro-Israel forces in DC, saying, “Listen, I know Obama has to say those things in public, but what’s the *real* US policy toward Israel?”
And for once, all he’s getting back is “That IS the policy”.
http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/05/28/netanyahu_what_the_hell_do_they_want_with_me
And now, Obama pointedly talks about Iran’s ‘legitimate desire for nuclear energy’, as a giant fuck-you to Netanyahu on his way out!
Palestine and Palestinian statehood is getting the best press it’s EVER gotten in America, and the most pressure on an Israeli government from an American administration.
Abbas’ strategy achieved this. You have him to thank. Get used to it. When his strategy pays off, you should be first in line to kiss his ass.
(And first in line to work on an opposition party to push his corrupt, inefficient self out of power… but that’s a matter to worry about *after* statehood is achieved.)
Posted by Joe | June 4, 2009, 12:19 amYou're nuts. Abbas has done nothing to get the US on his side…all this talk of pressuring Israel to 'freeze' (not remove) settlements is hot air. The United States has requested Israel freeze settlements for 20 years, with a minor pause during the Bush years.
Palestinians do not have two years to sit back and let Israel steal more of the little remaining land they have. That's why you, and he, are delusional.
Posted by MohammadKF | June 4, 2009, 9:14 pmWay to be completely blind to political reality.
“”The United States has requested Israel freeze settlements for 20 years, with a minor pause during the Bush years.”"
And Obama’s the first one to put real pressure on to make that happen, to the point that Netanyahu is flummoxed and put in an awful position with his domestic base. Being seen actively screwing up the Israeli-American relationship like this is going to cost him dearly politically.
Though considering how some on the Right is up in arms that Obama’s signed a death warrant for Israel in some imaginary Iranian nuclear holocaust, I get double comfort — he’s managed to unite the bloggers on both sides with an inadequate grasp of international politics against him.
Your strategy, if followed, would nearly inevitably be a failure, and result in the world turning its back on the Palestinians for essentially the last time. Abbas is the wisest strategist the Palestians have at the moment.
Posted by Joe | June 5, 2009, 1:38 amB8qKLn comment4 ,
Posted by Aulxoapb | June 27, 2009, 2:23 pm