Palestinian officials on Sunday criticized the United States for what one called “backpedaling” on demands that Israel stop settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, saying the Obama administration’s change of approach on the issue damaged the likelihood of a peace agreement.

“If America cannot get Israel to implement a settlement freeze, what chance do the Palestinians have of reaching agreement” on the even more complex set of issues involved in final peace talks, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in a written statement.

The thing I like best about all this is that they’re actually correct. It is Obama’s fault, and you can trace it to these exact words from the Cairo speech:

The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. (Applause.) This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop. (Applause.)

There’s a lesson in unintended consequences there. Barry Rubin says that Netanyahu has given Hillary Clinton more than Israel has ever offered regarding the cessation of settlements, but it’s still not enough for the Palestinians—and now Egypt and Jordan have climbed aboard the “absolutely no building, anywhere!” wagon and declared that the Palestinians are right not to negotiate without a complete freeze. But, as Barry Rubin points out:

In fact, at the time it signed the original peace process agreement—often called the Oslo accord—in 1993, that’s 16 years ago—Israel put forward its interpretation of the agreement. It said that there would be no new Jewish settlements and no geographical expansion of existing settlements. But Israel made it clear that it would continue to build apartments on existing settlements. That position was not challenged by the Palestinians at the time and it has never held up talks before now.

In effect, then, Obama has totally effed up the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, by giving the Palestinians a demand that they could latch onto and use as an excuse to refuse so much as talking with Israel. Even the WaPo has noticed:

The comments represent what has been a shift in the dynamics since President Obama took office, with initial pressure on Israel giving way to apparent impatience over the refusal of Palestinian officials to resume peace talks in the absence of a settlement freeze.

The first months of Obama’s administration were marked by sharply worded demands that Israel stop building in both the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinians consider the areas part of a future Palestinian state and say that a halt to settlements on Israel’s part would simply be fulfilling promises already made under previous international agreements.

You know, I think I may start taking back all the bad things I thought about Obama and the Cairo speech. Because clearly, it has shown the Palestinians’ duplicity to all and sundry, and exposed the so-called “moderate” states of Egypt and Jordan for the enablers of the rejectionist philosophy of Fatah and the PA. Even Barack Obama can’t keep ignoring who is truly at fault for lack of progress in the Middle East. Well, okay, he can—but people are going to start laughing at him when he blames Bush for the current impasse.

Update: And on cue, Clinton moderates her statement to please the outraged Palestinians and Arabs.

The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. (Applause.) This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop. (Applause.)

I love the little added applause parentheticals. But you should really listen to the speech to hear the harshness in Obama’s tone when he mentions the settlements. (There is no equivalent harshness when he mentioned the Palestinian obligations for peace.)

In any case, using that speech, the Palestinians promptly inserted a precondition for talks with the Netanyahu administration that they never had in all the years of peace talks: There will be no talking until there is a total freeze on all “settlement” activity, including the building of apartment additions in the suburbs of Jerusalem. And from there, the Palestinians only dug in their heels. Repeated efforts by various representatives of the Obama administration to get the Palestinians to drop their new precondition were met with refusal after refusal after refusal. Obama opened the bottle, the genie got out, and now his administration is trying really hard to get it back inside. And they’re not nearly as smart as Bugs Bunny was. The genie is winning.

The latest iteration is Hillary Clinton’s visit. The Palestinians are being told in no uncertain terms to get back to the negotiating table.

A halt on settlement construction in the West Bank is not a pre-condition for the resumption of talks between Israel and the Palestinians, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Saturday.

“There has never been a pre-condition. It’s always been an issue within the negotiations,” Clinton said about the settlements.

But if you look at those words, and the words of Obama’s Cairo speech, there is a cognitive dissonance that explains why the Palestinians continue to use the lack of a freeze as a reason to halt negotiations. Because the Obama administration opened the door for it use. And the Palestinians have never, ever not used an excuse to refuse to negotiate with Israel.

Responding to Clinton’s remarks, a Palestinian official said Israel must halt settlement building for peace talks to resume.

Nabil Abu Rdainah, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said: “A settlement freeze and acknowledging the terms of reference is the only way towards peace negotiations.”

Because the Palestinians don’t want to negotiate. They don’t want two states, living side by side in peace. They want a Palestinian state in all of what was the British Mandate of Palestine. And now, the Obama administration has given them their Best. Excuse. Ever. They’re not giving it up anytime soon.

The Obama administration’s Israel policy to date has been a miserable failure. The two sides are no closer to peace than they were under the Bush administration, or even the Clinton administration.

Smart power. Wow. It really doesn’t work very well, does it?

Awesome: Congressional nitwit puts private ethics investigation data on public website. You have to love the internet age, because people being people, there are still just as many idiots as there were before everything was online. Only now when they make mistakes, we get to see what’s really going on behind the scenes in Congress.

Postcards from the IDF: Yossi Klein Halevi on Israeli citizens’ receipt of a postcard that details how much time they have to get to the nearest bomb shelter in the event of a missile attack. A sobering read.

No. Ya think? Best headline yet on the Iran cheat-and-retreat strategy: “Iran accused of playing games on nuclear deal.” The Telegraph wins the Keen Grasp of the Obvious award for that one.

But—but—this totally blows away the “European colonialism” argument! Genetic proof that Jews were from the land of Israel, and the man behind the science. (Of course, he’s a Jew.)

The time has come to relaunch negotiations without preconditions to reach a final status agreement on two states: a Jewish state of Israel, and a viable, independent and contiguous Palestine that ends the occupation that began in 1967 and realizes and unleashes the full potential of the Palestinian people.

Sen. Mitchell has worked hard with the parties over the past few weeks to find the right formula through which to begin these talks. We will continue that effort in the coming weeks, because it is our strong and unequivocal view that we must move beyond talking about talks and get to the hard work of addressing the core issues that separate Israelis and Palestinians.

We have reached the end of the peace talk era, according to Barry Rubin, and I agree with him. Hamas has no intention of giving up its attempt to destroy the state of Israel. Fatah has no intention of coming to peaceable terms with Israel, either, as has been shown by Mahmoud Abbas’ many references to “armed struggle” if peace talks fail, his insistence on the “right of return” (flooding Israel with millions of Palestinians descended from the original refugees), and his talk about the “Judaization” of Jerusalem. And the world simply will not accept these facts at face value, preferring instead to believe that Fatah is moderate, and Hamas will moderate someday, if only Israel gives up enough for that to happen. But that day is done.

Israel knows that if it yields territory and is attacked from that territory, no matter how great the provocation, it cannot depend on international support but can rather know it will face international condemnation.

What does this say about a two-state solution? Israel pulls out of the West Bank, a Palestinian state is created (either on the West Bank or that plus the Gaza Strip), that state either attacks Israel or allows (and encourages) terrorists to do so across the border.

Israel has no response to defend itself that isn’t highly costly.

Bottom line: No Israeli government will make such a deal; the Israeli people will not support such a deal.

It’s not just that. The Palestinians, having had their hopes raised by Obama introducing the insistence of a complete settlement freeze, refuse to so much as talk to Israel without having that condition met. And the media place the blame on Israel for refusing to freeze “settlements,” not for the Palestinians for refusing to meet with Israel. There is also the false meme that Israel does not want to negotiate with the Palestinians, spread most willingly by the AP:

Israel’s desire to push forward with the peace process is not clear. Several months ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, under U.S. pressure, joined his predecessors in endorsing Palestinian statehood, albeit grudgingly and with caveats. But the idea is not popular with rightist members dominant in his coalition, and efforts to coax Israel into halting all settlement construction in the West Bank have not succeeded, resulting in apparent stalemate.

Note the text in bold. This is now AP boilerplate about Netanyahu and a Palestinian state. The “caveats,” by the way, are the insistence that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state, have a demilitarized state, and also sign an agreement that the establishment of the state of Palestine ends all hostilities. (Those are “caveats,” but demanding that millions of descendants of Palestinian refugees flood Israel are considered a legitimate demand.)

Israel is willing to negotiate for peace. But Israel is not willing to give up land and then see herself attacked by terrorists from that land, such as happened in Gaza. Without a true peace agreement, acceptable to both sides, there will be nothing further from Israel in the near future. And for that, we can place part of the blame on the Obama administration and its utterly clueless Middle East peace team.

You can say “Now is the time” as many times as you like. Wishing doesn’t make it so.

Obama abandons the victims of genocide: Now our president is turning his back on Darfur. He’s committing to a “softer” approach to Sudan. Because hey, it totally fits with the Obama foreign policy: Screw our allies, and give breaks to all our enemies. Even the ones that like to rape, torture, and murder with impunity. So, to the 78% of Jewish voters who voted for Obama, how’s that feeling about now? I mean, Jewish voters make up a large part of the save Darfur movements. Feeling proud of your guy, still?

Only Israel can violate UN resolutions: UNIFIL is still “investigating” those explosions in southern Lebanon, trying to determine if they’re in violation of UN Resolution 1701, which forbade Hezbollah from arming south of the Litani. But there is no such hesitation whatsoever in calling out Israel.

Williams said the use of drones was an obvious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and resolution 1701 “and not particularly helpful at a time of obvious tension in the south”.

Israel supplies evidence that Hezbollah is stocking arms, but UNIFIL must investigate. Uh-huh. No bias here. Move along. Nothing to see.

You know what isn’t brave? Criticizing Israel. Hell, everybody does it, and everybody seems to think that it’s a difficult thing to do. Jimmy Carter, Walt & Mearsheimer, and now, the president of Turkey. Because there’s so much negative impact from his countrymen for criticizing Israel. Now, if he stood up and supported Israel—well, that’d be very courageous. Also only in Bizarro World, so let’s not even pretend it might happen someday. It won’t.

Another kassam attack, another day of silence from the MSM: You won’t read about this kassam attack in the AP or Reuters until after Israel bombs a smuggling tunnel or three. Or unless Israel gets a rocket squad. Because it’s obvious that unprovoked attacks on civilians in Israel aren’t newsworthy—only Israel’s response to the unprovoked attacks. This is also one of those things that the Goldstone report didn’t bother to cover—you know, the reason why Israel went into Gaza in the first place. That’s unimportant. Well, maybe if it fell short and killed some Palestinians. I’m sure they’d blame Israel for that.

The Nobel Committee announced Friday that the annual peace prize was awarded to Barack Obama, just nine months into his presidency, “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”

The award cited in particular Mr. Obama’s effort to reduce the world’s nuclear arsenal. “He has created a new international climate,” the committee said.

In other words, Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize for giving a speech.

Granted, the prize itself has become less and less meaningful as the years go on (cf: Giving Jimmy Carter a Nobel to taunt George W. Bush), but I think we can safely say now that the award is utterly devoid of meaning. It was given to a man who has done nothing, in the hopes that he will eventually do something.

Life imitates the Onion. Really. I couldn’t make this up if I tried.

And the truly frightening thing is: I’m betting Obama thinks he deserves it.

Update: In honor of the Miss America President winning the prize, comments are once again open.

Update 2: I just opened registration, because I’m lazy and want those of you who emailed me to register yourselves. Quick! Before I close it again. (I’ll hold it for the rest of the day, likely.)

No room at the inn for Mad Mahmoud: Awesome. Another New York hotel canceled the banquet after finding out it was for the proud Holocaust denier. Unfortunately, he still spoke to a mostly full house at the UN.

UNRWA: We want money. That’s what we want. UNRWA is begging for more money to keep the victim class of the Palestinians going into the next generation, because hey, 61 years isn’t nearly long enough to keep paying “refugees.” Why, the UN has also been paying the millions of descendants of Jewish refugees from Arab lands, too. Oh, wait. No they’re not.

AP still doesn’t get the significance of the last name: Leonard Cohen performed in Israel, and I have to laugh at the AP headline and angle of the story: “Leonard Cohen performs in Israel, defies boycott.” Really. Just look at the last name one more time, AP. Or listen to Hallelujah again.

Well, I feel safer now: The One has chaired the UN Security Council, and got it to pass a resolution calling for an end to nuclear weapons. The next agenda calls for kittens, butterflies, and unicorns for everyone. Winged unicorns for seven-year-old girls. What Obama did not do, however, was get a resolution calling for sanctions on Iran, which is trying to build a nuclear bomb. So once again, it’s all for show.

Once again, he used the argument that there is some kind of moral equivalency between Israeli settlements and Palestinian incitement. If you dig just a little, you find that “incitement” includes the Palestinian Authority’s refusal to have a single map of Israel in its textbooks, its constant Jew-hatred in its official media, statements, and even sermons, its referrals to “Palestine from the river to the sea” (that would be where Israel is currently), and the utter refusal by the Obama administration to note that the PA reinforced its anti-Israel charter and also added more anti-Israel conspiracy theories, such as the one that Israel poisoned Yasser Arafat.

We continue to call on Palestinians to end incitement against Israel, and we continue to emphasize that America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. (Applause.)

But why do they only call on Palestinians to “end incitement”? Because, as the narrative goes, oppressed people cannot be held responsible for the terror attacks that continue every single day, by Palestinians in the West Bank, not Hamas—and so, Obama does not call for attacks on Israelis to end. Because they don’t exist.

Note the language of the next section. It could have been written by Obama’s friend and supporter, Rashid Khalidi:

The time has come — the time has come to re-launch negotiations without preconditions that address the permanent status issues: security for Israelis and Palestinians, borders, refugees, and Jerusalem. And the goal is clear: Two states living side by side in peace and security — a Jewish state of Israel, with true security for all Israelis; and a viable, independent Palestinian state with contiguous territory that ends the occupation that began in 1967, and realizes the potential of the Palestinian people. (Applause.)

And here’s the most anti-Israel statement ever uttered by a sitting president:

Now, I am not naïve. I know this will be difficult. But all of us — not just the Israelis and the Palestinians, but all of us — must decide whether we are serious about peace, or whether we will only lend it lip service. To break the old patterns, to break the cycle of insecurity and despair, all of us must say publicly what we would acknowledge in private. The United States does Israel no favors when we fail to couple an unwavering commitment to its security with an insistence that Israel respect the legitimate claims and rights of the Palestinians. (Applause.)

That’s a hat tip to the Stephen Walt School of OHMIGOD, Israel Lobbyists Control the Government!. That’s the implication that people are afraid to speak out against Israel, because we all know what happens to people who do that. They get on the New York Times bestseller list. Just ask Jimmy Carter, and Walt & Mearsheimer. I wonder what their lecture fees are now? Probably even higher since Walt is writing for Foreign Policy. Oh, the horrors of being silenced by The Israel Lobby. Book deals, lecture tours, income level rising—yeah, that scary lobby keeps everyone, even the president of the United States, from speaking out against Israel. Like, say, at a venue of, oh, the United Nations. Saying publicly what “everyone” was only able to say privately before today, apparently.

Note the second half of the bolded quote above: “the legitimate claims and rights of the Palestinians.” Mahmoud Abbas could have written that. Obama doesn’t actually delineate what these rights are, but these words are usually followed with “a return of all refugees,” as well as “an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.” (And as I have noted many times in the past, they don’t say “east Jerusalem.” They say “Jerusalem.” That would be what Obama was talking about when he insisted it’s time to rush ahead to “final status” issues. Only they’ve been renamed.

The time has come — the time has come to re-launch negotiations without preconditions that address the permanent status issues: security for Israelis and Palestinians, borders, refugees, and Jerusalem.

“Without preconditions” appears to be aimed at the Palestinians, who have dug in their heels since Obama’s Cairo speech. As Barry Rubin points out:

As I keep stressing the ONLY reason there have been no negotiations for six months—a point the media never points out—is that Obama introduced the demand that Israel freeze all construction on settlements. This issue had never prevented talks before but once Obama raised the ante, well the Palestinians couldn’t be less militant than America’s president.

It also wouldn’t be an Obama speech if he didn’t try to make his copyrighted approach to evenhandedness. So, in return for the Israel-bashing above, what must the world do? Why, stop bashing Israel. Recognize Israel’s legitimacy. Because it’s not like the UN’s establishment of the modern state of Israel in 1948 was enough to do such a thing. So the reverse of America doing no favors for Israel by being a staunch ally? Well, it’s obvious:

And — and nations within this body do the Palestinians no favors when they choose vitriolic attacks against Israel over constructive willingness to recognize Israel’s legitimacy and its right to exist in peace and security. (Applause.)

Get it? The flip side of America’s support for Israel is the UN General Assembly, using organizations like the UN Human Rights Council (which Obama has had us join) singling out Israel, and pretty nearly only Israel, for criticism.

Obama uses his compare-and-contrast one last time, by talking about the price paid by Israelis and Palestinians. Note the extreme contrast, which goes hand in hand with what I wrote yesterday about the risk being all on Israel:

It’s paid by the Israeli girl in Sderot who closes her eyes in fear that a rocket will take her life in the middle of the night. It’s paid for by the Palestinian boy in Gaza who has no clean water and no country to call his own.

The girl in Sderot may be murdered in her sleep by Hamas rockets. Or a shot fired at her car while driving with her family near a Palestinian town. The price paid by Palestinians? Well, kids in Gaza don’t have clean water because Hamas keeps stealing the pipes to make rockets to rain on children in Sderot. Yeah, that’s a pretty equivalent risk situtation for each side.

His claim to evenhandedness is absurd. There is no comparison between having “no country to call his own” and fearing death in your bed at night. One of these things is not like the other.

I didn’t care for the James Baker crew of the Bush 41 White House. I didn’t care for Reagan’s Baker-inspired Israel team, either. But neither Bush nor Reagan seemed willing to abandon one of America’s staunchest allies. Israeli soldiers trained American troops in house-to-house city fighting, to better survive and win in Iraq. Israel shares intel on America’s enemies with us, and gave us invaluable information on Soviet weaponry during the Cold War. If America called, Israel would be there—and yet, Barack Obama is throwing Israel under the bus. The most pro-Palestinian president ever is turning out to be the most anti-Israel president ever.

His friend Rashid Khalidi must be a happy, happy man today. I sure would love to see the tape the LA Times refused to release. I think it would explain a lot of the UN speech.

“Simply put, it is past time to talk about starting negotiations. It is time to move forward,” Obama told reporters before a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Um. I do believe that it has been the Palestinians who have refused to sit down and talk with the Israelis, but let’s move on.

Obama told Abbas and Netanyahu that, “The only reason to hold public office is to get things done,” and that everyone “must take risks for peace,” Mitchell said.

Everyone must take risks for peace? What risks, pray tell, will the Palestinians be taking? What risks will America be taking? The only risk for the Obama administration is that once again, peace will not break out in the Middle East, and The Anointed One will not win his coveted Nobel Prize. (I think perhaps he wants to be the first sitting President to win one. Maybe that’s his hurry.)

The risks for the Palestinians? Hm, let’s think. Wait, give me a minute. Um.

Nope. I can’t think of any.

The risks for Israel? Let’s see. Terror attacks, rockets in every town and city in Israel, chemical weapons dropped on her citizens, sniping from the Palestinian side of the border—Israelis will risk life and limb if the peace process does work, but the Palestinians refuse to stop fighting. So you see, it isn’t “everyone” that must take risks for peace. It’s only Israel that will be taking the risks. Funny how it always works out that way.

And there have been pretty much no moves by the Palestinians to hold up their end of the Road Map, although that doesn’t stop the president from pretending the Palestinians are actually doing something.

“Palestinians have strengthened their efforts on security, but they need to do more to stop incitement and to move forward with negotiations,” Mr. Obama said on Tuesday. “Israelis have facilitated greater freedom of movement for the Palestinians and have discussed important steps to restrain settlement activity. But they need to translate these discussions into real action on this and other issues.”

End incitement? You mean like amending the Fatah Charter, or not accusing the Israelis of poisoning Yasser Arafat? Or maybe even not calling for the “return” of third- and fourth-generation “refugees” to their ancestral homes?

Obama needs to do more in order to move forward with negotiations. He needs to actually read what the Palestinians are saying. But that would totally screw up the narrative. And the potential Nobel Peace Prize.

Sucks to be you, Part 1: The anti-Israel (some might say “anti-Semitic” Egyptian minister of culture lost his bid to become the director of UNESCO. Gee, guess building those synagogues for the six Jews left in Egypt just didn’t convince the west that he’s changed. Or maybe it’s just the year of the woman—a Bulgarian woman won the job. I will point out that Israel did not oppose the Egyptian’s election, at least, not publicly. It was a private election. I’m guessing they didn’t vote for the bastard who said that he only wanted Israeli books burned that “insult Islam.” Oh, that makes it all better, then.

Sucks to be you, Part 2: What’s a dictator to do? First, the Helmsley Hotel chain cancels Mad Mahmoud’s banquet reservations and tells him he’s not welcome in any of their hotels. Then the Libyan mass-murderer-slash-dictator finds himself barred from most hotels in the city (on top of being banned in NJ, and yay, Garden State!). So he’s decided to sleep at the Libyan embassy. And Mad Mahmoud is going to be staying at the Essex House—unless the protests get too overwhelming for the hotel.

Sucks to be you, Part 3: Lowered expectations you said, lowered expectations you got! Obama told Israel that it needed to make “important steps to restrain settlement activity.” I do believe that goes into Netanyahu’s column as a “win.” Poor, poor Stephen Walt. He must be so disappointed today. Then again, he can use this as more proof of that invincible Israel Lobby in his next book. And I’m thinking that Barack Obama’s having a very, very bad day today overall. Not that I think that’s a good thing, because his screwing up international relations is a very bad thing for America. Maybe he’ll use this as a teachable moment, and learn from it.

Naaaaaaaah. Just kidding.