This is why there will never be peace. Mahmoud Abbas quite plainly is insisting on never, ever budging an inch on Palestinian demands.
No to acknowledging Israel as a Jewish state. No to resettling refugees within “Palestine.” No to land exchanges. No to everything except a return to the 1949 Armistice lines and the flooding of Israel with millions of the descendants of Palestinian refugees.
And the media call Netanyahu the intransigent one. This, in spite of Netanyahu’s repeated calls to talk with Abbas directly. And Abbas’ repeated insistence on preconditions for any talks.
When you read the reports of Abbas refusing all alternatives to unilaterally declaring a state, notice what is missing. The words that described Netanyahu, for instance. Where is “defiant”? Do a google search on the words netanyahu + defiant. Look what comes back:
Binyamin Netanyahu defiant ahead of meeting with Barack Obama …
Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu defiant on 1967 borders
Defiant Netanyahu to Outline Peace Plan (they changed the headline to “Israeli Prime Minister” but the page title remains “Defiant”)
The double standard on Israel is particularly galling these days, as Mahmoud Abbas slams the Obama administration on a daily basis with no penalty, the PA says that Obama will be responsible if their bid to unilaterally declare a state explodes in their faces, and Hamas is giggling in the background, waiting for this all to blow up so they can try to move forward in the West Bank.
Another word missing: “Demand.” Abbas is making demands, and the media are not even labeling them as such. He is demanding a state without negotiated borders, without having had elections in years, without having control over the western portion of the would-be state of Palestine, and without having an economy in place that would be substituted for the economy of handouts that the Palestinians have lived on these past sixty-plus years. About the only place I’ve found “demand” linked with Abbas is on Fox News.
This is what the AP musters as description of Abbas’ intransigence. Note the headline, which is as evenhanded as possible:
Palestinians undeterred in UN statehood bid
Note the choice of word: “undeterred”. Not “defiant”. Not “intransigent”. Not “stubborn” or “stiff-necked”. No, those are all descriptions of the other side. The Palestinians? They’re just a bunch of reasonable guys trying to get their state off the ground, in spite of big bad Israel’s attempts to stop them.
Obama and Abbas met for more than 45 minutes Wednesday evening. The White House wouldn’t say whether Obama directly asked the Palestinian leader to abandon his plans to pursue full U.N. membership, saying only that he reiterated his opposition to the statehood bid and the U.S. intention to issue a veto.
Let us remember that Hillary Clinton harangued Benjamin Netanyahu for 45 minutes after a municipal official pushed through paperwork as usual for new housing in Jerusalem apartments. The details of that harangue were leaked to the media. Here, nothing is leaked, nothing is admitted, nothing is said.
So far there was no indication that Abbas was ready for compromise despite intense pressure, but his aides said they were not setting deadlines for the Security Council to consider the application. And they left the door open for a Plan-B request to the General Assembly for an upgrade of their current status as a permanent observer to a nonmember observer state.
What a reasonable guy! He left the door open. He’s not ignoring the president of the United States, the most powerful man in the world. He’s not refusing to help Obama on this issue. He’s leaving the door open! But wait, there’s more!
Saeb Erekat, another senior aide, echoed that sentiment, saying the pursuit of U.N. membership would not be slowed: “We will not allow any political maneuvering on this issue,” he said
That persistence has put the Palestinians on a collision course with the United States and Israel. A frustrated President Barack Obama told world leaders during his Wednesday U.N. speech that “there are no shortcuts” to peace.
They’re simply mocking Obama now. And why not? Obama has given them no reason to fear him. But remember this, the next time Obama or his people go after Israel. Of course, that won’t be until after the 2012 elections, because Obama has discovered that there are limits to how far he can bully the Jewish state before American Jews stop donating to the cause.
In the meantime, the press, the EU, and the Obama administration give the Palestinians a pass. Every so often, I think that if only Israel had better PR, if only Israel put forth its case in a better way, things would be different. And then events overshadow my thinking. Because Israel is, quite literally, the Jew of the world. And the world has never been a friendly place for the Jews.
That’s the other reason the Palestinian push for statehood has become inexorable. The few moments of guilt for the Holocaust passed a long time ago. The world has returned to its reflexive attitude toward Jews. The world does not like us. So of course, it takes the part of the Palestinians, because they’re not Jews. Even better, they hate the Jews, and are trying to destroy the Jewish state. It’s a win-win for the world’s Jew haters.
The thing is, we’re not going anywhere. Deal with it.