Looks like even Tom Friedman has discovered that the secret to Middle East peacemaking isn’t the Obama Way:
This peace process movie is not going to end differently just because we keep playing the same reel. It is time for a radically new approach. And I mean radical. I mean something no U.S. administration has ever dared to do: Take down our “Peace-Processing-Is-Us†sign and just go home.
[…] Let’s just get out of the picture. Let all these leaders stand in front of their own people and tell them the truth: “My fellow citizens: Nothing is happening; nothing is going to happen. It’s just you and me and the problem we own.â€
Indeed, it’s time for us to dust off James Baker’s line: “When you’re serious, give us a call: 202-456-1414. Ask for Barack. Otherwise, stay out of our lives. We have our own country to fix.â€
That sounds to me like an endorsement of George W. Bush’s refusal to repeat the Clinton administration’s mistakes. And coming from the guy who threw the Saudi peace plan on the world and pushed it for years as the only real move forward in negotiations—well, let’s just say I’m having a major schadenfreude moment.
Sorry, but I simply have to laugh at this guy. How many times did he swear that the Palestinians really, truly, utterly wanted peace, and that all Israel had to do was give up a lot of land and figure out some way to resettle the “refugees” in order for that to happen? And now? Well, the stardust appears to have fallen from his eyes.
It is obvious that this Israeli government believes it can have peace with the Palestinians and keep the West Bank, this Palestinian Authority still can’t decide whether to reconcile with the Jewish state or criminalize it and this Hamas leadership would rather let Palestinians live forever in the hellish squalor that is Gaza than give up its crazy fantasy of an Islamic Republic in Palestine.
He’s wrong on Israel keeping the West Bank. Israel will give back nearly all of the land to the Palestinians in return for a true peace and recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. But he’s right on the others.
Tom Friedman, a realist at last. And not in the political sense of the word—in the dictionary sense.
Just to emphasize Meryl’s (implicit) point about Friedman’s hypocrisy, here’s a Freidman column from March 2007, Many Plans, No News:
Yes, Yasir Arafat rejected it at the time, and even the Israelis never fully embraced the plan as it was, but everyone knew then and knows now that the Clinton plan is the only realistic framework for peace. The Bush team took the view that since Arafat wouldn’t accept it, the Clinton plan was a dead letter and therefore could be and should be forever sidelined. They also put themselves on the sidelines of Arab-Israeli diplomacy for six years, rather than sell anything with the name “Clinton†on it.
When the Palestinians rejected the “only realistic formula for peace” and President Bush realized (for six years) that there was no point in getting involved in fruitless diplomacy, Friedman mocked President Bush. Now after a mere nine months of pandering to the Palestinians and having them demonstrate no interest in the “only realistic formula for peace,” Friedman says “enough, this isn’t working.” (Of course, he directs gratuitous criticisms towards Israel.)
Let’s try something radically new and logical like the idea that when God gives somebody something, one shouldn’t try to take it away without being willing to face the consequences.
So Friedman finally woke up, did he? About effing time.
Let the Palis stew in their own juice of poverty and oppression for a few years, hitting them very hard every time they make attacks on Israel. Tell them that is what they wanted and earned for not being willing to make a compromise peace with Israel. Tell them they will get nothing until they wise up and make peace. Such a peace will not include Jerusalen and will not include any return of “refugees”. And cut off all the money they get from the West. If the have to work or starve they will have no time for terrorism if they must earn their bread by working. Of course, the Iranians and the Palis’ “Brother Arabs” might chip in to the Pali welfare state, but they are all notoriously skinflint and their Brother Arabs despise and hate the Palis more than the Israelis do. I doubt the Palis will get much from them, certainly not enough to provide the graft for the bigshots and still have enough left for taking care of the people. Gotta get those priorities straight, you know.