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Meryl writes The unnoticed intransigence vs. the supposed intransigence, which analyzes a recent AP report about the Middle East. Meryl observes:

If you read only the mainstream media reports on Israel, you come away thinking that it is the Israelis who are the obstacles to peace, and that it is the Palestinians who are the ones who are willing to make concessions to create a Palestinian state.

That is, until you actually read what the leaders of the two nations are actually saying.

It’s a point that’s discussed in today’s Wall Street Journal, A Palestinian choice, which concludes:

Responding to Mr. Netanyahu’s speech, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs called it an “important step forward,” but offered little more than that. The Administration could help matters more by providing the Israelis with greater assurances that they won’t simultaneously demand further Israeli concessions while doing nothing serious to stop Iran — a leading patron of Hamas — from getting nuclear weapons. A Palestinian state poses enough challenges to Israeli security without it being an atomic spearpoint.

As for the Palestinians, for too long they have practiced a kind of fantasy politics, in which all right was on their side, concession was dishonor, and mistakes never had consequences. It hasn’t earned them much. Mr. Netanyahu’s speech now offers them the choice between fantasy and statehood. Judging from early reactions, they’re choosing wrongly again.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Isabel Kershner reports Netanyahu backs Palestinian state with caveats:

But beyond the idea of a state, he seemed to offer little room for compromise or negotiation.
…
“Benjamin Netanyahu spoke about negotiations, but left us with nothing to negotiate as he systematically took nearly every permanent status issue off the table,” Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian negotiator, said in a statement. “Nor did he accept a Palestinian state. Instead, he announced a series of conditions and qualifications that render a viable, independent and sovereign Palestinian state impossible.”

Now between these two paragraphs there were few more reported.

He referred repeatedly to the West Bank, the territory presumed to comprise the bulk of a future Palestinian state, by its biblical name of Judea and Samaria, declaring it “the land of our forefathers.”

Mr. Netanyahu made no mention of existing frameworks for negotiations, like the American-backed 2003 peace plan known as the road map.

He did not address the geographical area a Palestinian state might cover, and he said that the Palestinian refugee problem must be resolved outside Israel’s borders, negating the Palestinian demand for a right of return for refugees of the 1948 war and for their millions of descendants.

He insisted that Jerusalem remain united as the Israeli capital. The Palestinians demand the eastern part of the city as a future capital.

(emphases mine)

Notice that Palestinian demands are reported as a matter of course. So when Erakat mopes that Netanyahu has left it so that there’s “nothing to negotiate” he’s really saying “Netanyahu rejected our unconditional demands.”

Also note the last word of Erakat’s quote, “impossible.” In many ways Palestinian nationalism is the antithesis of Zionism. Palestinian nationalism has fundamentally been about denying (and, where possible, destroying) Jewish nationhood.

But here’s something else, Zionism has always had a “can do” ethos. Herzl famously said, “Im Tirtzu, Ein Zeh Agada” or (as it is commonly translated) “If you will it, it is not a dream.” But Palestinian nationalism, has always been “can’t do.” We can’t fight terror, We can’t change our charter. We can’t concede any part of Jerusalem.

It’s always been we can’t do it, we need someone else to do it for us. So the Palestinians have become the biggest per capita recipients of foreign aid and still don’t have a state to show for all of their terrorism and diplomatic maneuvering. Because instead of having a positive national idea, the Palestinians have had a negative one.

Howard Schneider’s dispatch in the Washington Post, Netanyahu backs 2 state goal suffers from that same perspective.

But in a prime-time address delivered at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv, he attached a weighty list of conditions dictated by his personal beliefs and by the need to satisfy his right-leaning coalition in the Israeli parliament: The Palestinian state would have to be demilitarized, with international guarantees that it remain so; it would have to cede control of its airspace to Israel; and it could be created only if the Palestinians recognize Israel as the Jewish homeland.

Netanyahu’s speech did a good job of providing a historical context to the conflict in the Middle East. In addition, it was excellent summary of Israel’s political consensus. Instead Schneider snidely refers to the as Netanyahu’s “personal beliefs” and as a sop to his “right-leaning coalition.” (President Obama’s speech in Cairo, on the other hand was an ahistorical statement of his personal beliefs and a sop to the many left wing groups who supported his election.) As with Kershner, Schneider treats Palestinian demands as sacrosanct; Israeli demands as unreasonable.

Though Netanyahu’s speech could certainly be viewed as a rebuke to President Obama, President Obama at least publicly was gracious in h is response. I have no idea if Netanyahu made the President rethink his position regarding the Middle East. Unfortunately, it appears that the media is still stuck in their old ways of thinking.

UPDATE: In his preview of PM Netanyahu’s speech, Schneider wrote:

But Netanyahu’s speech will also try to respond more directly to Obama’s effort in Cairo to “reset” U.S. relations with the Arab and Muslim world. While the speech was credited in Israel for reaffirming the alliance between the two countries and for strong language about Holocaust denial, Israeli analysts said that it also seemed to interpret key issues from an Arab perspective.

It associated Israel’s creation directly with the Holocaust, for example, rather than acknowledging the long-standing Zionist efforts to provide a Jewish homeland. It also dated the problems of Palestinians to Israel’s creation in 1948 without mentioning Arab rejection of a proposed partition plan and other events that Israelis regard as fundamental to the conflict.

(emphasis mine)

It wasn’t “Israeli analysts” who “seemed to interpret” President Obama’s speech from an Arab perspective. The Washington Post reported that that was the precisely the goal of President Obama. And taken together with the Post’s reporting of the Jewish anti-Israel influences who were important to President Obama, it’s very clear that the need for the Israeli leader to address the historical aspect of Zionism and force the President to speak honestly about that. Again, it’s not clear that it will work, but Netanyahu had no choice but to lay out Israel’s case unapologetically.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.