Obama's Speech: 'Dangerous'

From Ron Radosh:-

...What the president has said is essentially that rather than borders and boundaries being established as an end result of negotiations, the two states that will be created should be based on the 1967 lines, a conclusion that gives the Palestinian Authority its own desired boundaries — and takes away from Israel the necessary buffer zone it gained after the 1967 war, and from which it has been able to prevent attacks on its own people.


...the newly developed Hamas-Fatah “unity government” agreement has already made it clear that the Palestinian leadership will not honor the requirement that the existence of a Jewish state in the region must be accepted...In effect, the president is rewarding Abbas for his bad behavior, after the PA leader’s own recent op-ed in The New York Times in which he revealed his intransigence. Statehood, as he perceives it, is not an end in itself, but is put forth as the new means for waging a continuing war against Israel...

Jackson Diehl’s article...points out: “Desperate to jump-start an Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the Obama administration and its European allies are piling pressure [2] on Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu, demanding that he offer a plan, concessions — something — that will provide the basis for starting negotiations with Palestinians.”

Diehl notes that Netanyahu made it clear last week when he announced a willingness to cede much of the West Bank to a new Palestinian state, a major concession. Yet, in contrast, Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the “moderate” wing of the Palestinian movement, “is not only refusing to make any concessions of his own but is also turning his back on American diplomacy — and methodically setting the stage for another Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” His new agreement with Hamas will require him to do exactly the opposite of steps that could lead to peace...

...President Obama’s speech, despite its florid vision of two peoples living in peace, is so dangerous. The president spoke as if it is Israel, and not Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas, who is the obstacle to his desired two-state solution. Hence, if the Arab-Israeli conflict is not to “cast a shadow over the region” anymore, that means there should be a U.S. policy that puts pressure where it should be put — on the Palestinian Authority and not on Benjamin Netanyahu.

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