Foreign Policy In Focus

The same day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's received his “wildly receptive” welcome from the U.S. Congress Financial Times Associate Editor Philip Stephens wrote that “Elsewhere, Britain has been frustrated by Washington’s refusal to back publication by the international community of the essential parameters of an Israeli-Palestine peace agreement.” Translation: It is the U.S. that is preventing the major world powers from expressing the international consensus on the way forward in “peace process.” Stephens continued, “The president’s willingness to offend Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s obdurate prime minister, is a necessary but not sufficient condition for progress in the region.”

British Prime Minister David Cameron’s government has already said it might support the Palestinians when they go before the United Nations, as expected in September, and ask for a resolution affirming Palestinian statehood in the Israeli occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza. If you rely on the major U.S. media you would never sense it but what Obama likely heard in Europe last week is that the rest of the world is even more certain than the British to back the UN move. Evidently in his meeting with European leaders, Obama tried to talk the others out of supporting Palestinian statehood when the matter comes up for a vote in the UN.

“The march to isolate Israel internationally -- and the impulse of the Palestinians to abandon negotiations -- will continue to gain momentum in the absence of a credible peace process and alternative,” Obama told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a group that has become little more than a lobbying mechanism supporting the policies of Netanyahu’s governing rightwing coalition. “So in advance of a five-day trip to Europe, in which the Middle East will be a topic of acute interest, I chose to speak about what peace will require.”

President Obama didn’t exactly launch any “initiative” and his endorsement of a Middle East settlement based on the 1967 Armistice borders wasn’t nearly as bold as it is being portrayed. It is the consensus position of the vast overwhelming majority of the people and governments of the world. It has been for a long time, and everybody knows it.

The effect of the media reporting on Netanyahu’s visit to the U.S., his talk with Obama, his rapturous reception at the annual AIPAC powwow and his over the top reception by the U.S. Congress has created a delusion here in the U.S. The verbal sparring between the two leaders, the haughty lecturing tone of Netanyahu’s response to the President, and the 28 or so standing ovations the Congress gave to him are only part of the story and have to be viewed in the context of the opinion of the rest of the world. It doesn’t even adequately reflect the views of the members of Congress. Their repeated standing ovations are more a testimony to the political power of the Israeli lobby than to their private convictions. Even some of Israel’s most adamant supporters amongst them are gravely concerned over Israel’s growing international isolation.

The cable news commentators that referred to the Israeli leader’s seeming political conquest of official Washington as “political theater” got it right: members of Congress, some of whom are otherwise knowledgeable and reasonable people, falling all over themselves to applaud what most of the rest of the world – including our most trusted allies—reject.

The dynamic on display this week in Washington between the two leaders has actually left the Palestinian leadership little choice but to appeal to the international community.

"The world will blame Israel as the main culprit if violence escalates again should the Palestinians unilaterally declare their independence this autumn,” said The Financial Times Deutschland in Germany. “Whether this blame would be correct or not, a government leader must act in such a situation. The Arab revolutions have made the situation even more urgent and increased the Palestinians' impatience.

"But even before his speech yesterday, Netanyahu willfully squandered this chance … despite his promises and declarations; he apparently wanted to play the blocker and the hardliner. And it served him well -- at least domestically."

"But it's a catastrophe for Israel's foreign policy,” said the paper. “Sure, Netanyahu was applauded in Congress, and he thanked Obama repeatedly for his support of Israel. But the audience for his speech and visit weren't just US politicians, who would stand by him anyhow. Instead of an Israeli vision of a peaceful Middle East, once again only the memory of Netanyahu's many refusals will remain in the mind of the global audience."

All hands appear to be on deck to try and head off a UN resolution. “Having the U.N. General Assembly pass a resolution recognizing an independent Palestinian state will only rally Israelis around Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, giving him another excuse not to talk,” wrote New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman May 25. That’s just silly talk. Bibi doesn’t need another rationale for intransigence. He opposes any settlement based on any borderlines that doesn’t ratify the colonial conquest of Palestinian land.

That a new UN resolution will not produce a Palestinian state is so obvious that it’s curious that Obama bothered to say so, but as Retired Brigadier General Michael Herzog, a veteran Israeli negotiator has noted, “it is likely to isolate Israel and escalate Israeli-Palestinian tensions.”

While in Europe Obama was no doubt told again what he already knew: that the European Union fully backs the position that will be laid out in a General Assembly resolution. The Congressional applause had hardly died down when the EU’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, backed Obama’s stance.

“Netanyahu's rejection of peace based on the 1967 borders is self-important and arrogant…especially given that Obama explicitly stated that a variation from the 1967 borders would be possible under a mutual land swap,” Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn told Spiegel last week. “Netanyahu is suppressing the political reality and betting on a stalemate instead. For the peace process, that is deadly.

“We need to make an attempt to draw Hamas into a democratic process and bring it on to the path of freedom -- just as we succeeded in doing with Fatah during the 1990s. That would also include informal talks with Hamas.

“And that's a position we Europeans are going to maintain,” continued Asselborn. “Still, you can't just put conditions on the Palestinian side, as they're not the only source of the violence. Israel has turned the Gaza Strip into a prison. There, 1.7 million people live in an area one-seventh the size of Luxembourg. To shut its borders and to only allow certain goods into the country and hardly any out -- this is also a form of violence. In the West Bank, Israelis continue to build settlements on expropriated land. It is a constant provocation.”

One might think that it would shore up political support for the rightwing politician at home but that would be a mistake. “American Jews have been dragged over the past few days into the controversy between their government and Israel's government, and that is neither to their benefit nor to the benefit of the State of Israel,” was the editorial comment of Haaretz, considered by some to be Israel's most influential daily newspaper.

“Unlike the many American politicians who turn Jewish organizational conferences into election rallies, Obama did not make do with rousing declarations about America's commitment to Israel's security and to the unity of Jerusalem, said the newspaper. “Though he is already thinking about his upcoming presidential election campaign, Obama looked the Jewish community in the eye and told the truth.

“The refusal by Netanyahu and his political allies to recognize the 1967 borders as a starting point leads permanent-status negotiations into a dead end. From there, the road is short to violent confrontation with the Palestinians, diplomatic isolation and perhaps even economic sanctions,’ said Haaretz.

“The large Jewish peace camp in the United States must support the president and reject political activists who have turned Israel's fate into a ball on America's domestic political court. The time has come for the Jews of New York and Illinois to stand beside their worried brethren in Jerusalem and Sderot, who have welcomed Obama's message and are hoping for it to become reality. Between loyalty to Obama's way and loyalty to Netanyahu's way, they must choose loyalty to the future of the State of Israel.”

Obama “knows that, given Netanyahu's political constraints and his worldview, chances for productive negotiations with the Palestinians are practically zero,” says Carlo Strenger, Tel Aviv University philosopher and psychoanalyst and member of the Permanent Monitoring Panel on Terrorism of the World Federation of Scientists. “He also knows that the Palestinians' bid for recognition by the UN general assembly, where the US does not have veto power, is likely to receive more than two-thirds of the vote, probably including Britain and France.

“So Netanyahu is losing,” says Strenger. “But the real victims of his rightwing government's disastrous policies are the people of Israel. The specter of Israel's ever-growing isolation and increasing international pressure on it looms large. As Israeli prize-winning historian and political scientist Zeev Sternhell writes in Haaretz, ‘Israel is on the way to becoming a pariah state’.”

“The clear losers in Netanyahu’s shortsightedness, wrapped into grandiose verbal pyrotechnics, are the citizens of Israel. Once the dust of the media storm settles down, we will be faced with the stark truth: the specter of Israel’s ever-growing isolation and of increasing international pressure looms large. Once the Palestinians succeed in their bid for statehood, the Netanyahu government will be facing international criticism of its settlement policies unprecedented in force and intensity.

“The tragedy is that Israel's growing isolation and the Palestinians' unilateral move could be avoided. Instead of fighting Palestinians' bid for recognition, Israel should support it.”

Fareed Zakaria wrote May 25 in the Washington Post: “The problem is that Netanyahu has never believed in land for peace. His strategy has been to put up obstacles, create confusion and wait it out. But one day there will be peace, along the lines that people have talked about for 20 years. And Netanyahu will be remembered only as a person before the person who made peace, a comma in history.

“It was a tactical triumph for the Israeli premier,’ said the Financial Times. “But it is Israeli citizens, not the US Congress, who will have to live with the consequences of a leader who will not make the compromises needed for peace with the Palestinians – and with an Arab world reinvigorated by the wave of revolution against tyrants Israel has come to rely on.”

“History has been in the making all over the southern bank of the Mediterranean, and it won’t skip the Palestinian territory,” commented the French newspaper Le Monde. Everywhere, the ‘Arab spring’ is bringing together people with the same demands for dignity, democracy and freedom, and there is no reason why it should not reach the Palestinians, too.’

On May 28, at Group of Eight summit in the French seaside resort of Deauville, leaders of world's richest countries gave “strong support" to President Barack Obama's stance on pre-1967 borders. In a draft statement at the G8 summit in they urged Israelis and Palestinians "to return to substantive talks with a view to concluding a framework agreement on all final status issues.

"To that effect, we express our strong support for the vision of Israeli-Palestinian peace outlined by President Obama on May 19, 2011."

On the same day, over a dozen Israeli intellectuals and public figures sent a letter to European governments urging them to ”officially recognize a Palestinian State,” noting that "the peace process has reached its end,"

The letter, initiated by Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity Movement, said in part, "Peace has fallen hostage to the peace process. As Israeli citizens, we announce that if and when the Palestinian people declare independence of a sovereign state that will exist next to Israel in peace and security, we will support such the announcement of the Palestinian State with borders based on the 1967 lines, with needed land swaps on a 1:1 basis."

The letter was signed by former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg, former Foreign Ministry Director General Alon Liel, and former Ambassador to South Africa Ilan Baruch, Nobel laureate Professor Daniel Kahneman, and Israel Prize Winner Professor Avishai Margalit.

"We urge the countries of the world to declare their willingness to recognize a sovereign Palestinian State according to these principles," the letter read, adding "the Palestinian appeal to the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian State does not harm the Israeli interest and is not at odds with the peace process."

Carl Bloice, a member of the National Coordinating Committee of the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism, is a columnist for the Black Commentator. He also serves on its editorial board.

Like many people, I expected little from Obama’s performance at AIPAC. He has to straddle parallel universes: the real one, in which most countries recognize Israel as tantamount to an international scofflaw, and the American domestic political universe in which Israel is always right. The US’s real allies and the rest of the world have long wearily resigned themselves to how, as with his speech at the State Department, the President has to pander to pro-Israeli organizations and the Congress members whose support he needs on domestic issues. 

Obama congratulated himself, deservedly, for continuing to raise unpalatable issues with elections in the air, and while pandering in a traditionally nauseous way, there was some reassurance from the sound of silence in his speech.

AIPAC’s conference is a mind-numbing experience. “My country right or wrong” is a rightly derided principle. But at AIPAC ten thousand people are assembled dedicated to the proposition that someone else’s country should be supported, right or wrong, even if it flouts every principle they support at home -- and even if its civil laws on marriage  and conversion deny the branches of Judaism to which most practicing American Jews adhere.

The organizations tend to be donor-driven rather than grass roots motivated. American Jews, true to their liberal roots, voted for Obama in higher proportions than any other ethnic group -- even as a raucous minority of the community questioned Obama’s citizenship and Christianity. That minority is disproportionately represented in the counsels of AIPAC and many of the “official” organizations and tends to Republican, Likudnik hawkishness.

But they also tend to think in slogans and catchphrases, without comparing them to reality, let alone with Robert Burns’s “giftie to see oursel’s as others see us.” They have been helped to remain in their parallel universe because presidents and secretaries of state have pandered (with the notable exception of James Baker) for decades to AIPAC -- and no one notices. As is customary, dogs are biting men.

The media attention to President Obama’s address is significant since for the first time in twenty years, there is visible crack showing between the White House and AIPAC -- and Israel. It is going too far to say that Obama is biting the dog -- but he is sinking his gums into the Lobby and Netanyahu. He is doing so to the background of an American Jewish community that is split more than ever before, and certainly more so than the “official” spokesmen and organizations reveal.

While admitting there are problems with a unity  Palestinian government, “We will continue to demand that Hamas accept the basic responsibilities of peace: recognizing Israel’s right to exist, rejecting violence, and adhering to all existing agreements,” Obama did not exclude negotiations, but in effect put conditions, which Hamas has, in reality, already gone a long way to meet and is on the way to go further.

One hopes that he realizes that the key phrases he used, such as the need to accept Israel’s “right to exist,” were introduced by Israeli leaders precisely because they were unacceptable to Palestinians. He might even have noticed how quickly Israel switched from refusing to negotiate because the authority was divided, to refusing because it is united! It is like demanding that American Indian tribes accept that their dispossession was right and goes beyond acceptance of the obvious fact of Israel’s existence and its now nearly universal acceptance as an established state. 

Such phrases have traditionally been used in the Levantine blame game in which the purpose of negotiations is not to reach a solution but to blame the other side for failure. But there is always a way to wiggle -- a phrase that would irk some Israelis would be for the Palestinians to recognize Israel’s “right to exist under UN Decisions!”

One hopes that the president is now playing this game with Netanyahu. One also hopes he harbors grudges. For the world’s most benefitted welfare queen to publicly dress down the president of its benefactor at the White House should give most Americans some frisson of indignation. 

While in the real world, Obama’s insistence on the 1967 boundaries as a basis for negotiation for land swaps has been generally accepted, Palestinians irate at this admitted denial of the “inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by force,” may have missed, along with nuance-free AIPACers, his endorsement of the Palestinian people’s “right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state,” which presumably implies that in return for giving up some of the settled area, the Palestinian state will have a land bridge between Gaza and the West Bank. One can see why he might not have chosen to spell that out for AIPAC!

While he stated a fact, “No vote at the United Nations will ever create an independent Palestinian state,” he did not state a principle. He said, “The United States will stand up against efforts to single Israel out at the UN or in any international forum. Because Israel’s legitimacy is not a matter for debate.” He did not say that the US would veto a UN acceptance of Palestine as a member state.

Indeed, he challenged the sloganeers with reality. “The number of Palestinians living west of the Jordan River is growing rapidly and fundamentally reshaping the demographic realities of both Israel and the Palestinian territories. This will make it harder and harder – without a peace deal – to maintain Israel as both a Jewish state and a democratic state.” Secondly he pointed to how atavistic the old obsession with territory as security is since “technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself in the absence of a genuine peace,” and finally, he pointed to the changes in Israel’s neighbours, so peace can no longer be bought with few local kleptocrats. “Going forward, millions of Arab citizens have to see that peace is possible for that peace to be sustained.”

If the US is retain influence in the region, it can no longer pay exclusive attention to Israeli public opinion while sending a few billion to local rulers. It, and Israel, have to show ordinary Arab citizens that they are serious about peace. Obama cannot regret the consequences to Palestinians of occupation while carrying on passing the ammunition to Israel.

It is unlikely that Netanyahu will voluntarily relinquish the not so secret Likud desire for an Arab-free state all the way to the Jordan. Obama has, perhaps deliberately and adroitly, maneuvered the Israeli Prime Minister into insulting the President of the US. He now has to follow up and show that there are consequences for Israel.

Obama balked at his best opportunity, which was the UN resolution on the settlements. He should stop equivocating and come out plainly with a declaration that if Netanyahu continues to refuse to come to terms with reality in the region, then he cannot take a US veto in the Security Council against Palestinian membership for granted nor even a nay vote in the General Assembly against a declaration of statehood. 

Ian Williams has written for newspapers and magazines around the world. He is currently writing a book on the Americans who blame the UN for all the US's ills. For more by Ian Williams visit Deadline Pundit.

I spoke to Richard Goldstone several times after his eponymous Report came out, and it was obvious that the personal slander and vilification from so many in his own community was wearing him down. He was certainly naive and did not expect the excreta storm that would head his way.

He had always been a person of integrity and his editorial in the Washington Post, allegedly “retracting” the Report named after him is saddening. If it had appeared the day before, one would almost suspect it of being an April Fool’s parody.

Indeed, the wording of the editorial, while confused and evasive, was eloquently indicative of heavy pressure -- not least since only two days before at a debate at Stanford University, he is reported as maintaining that “all the investigations showed that, thus far, the facts were as they were reported.”

One cannot help wondering what happened in the next two days to change his mind. Did his daughter, ex IDF and self-confessed Israeli patriot, pull the family chains? It certainly betokens a personal tragedy, since it will detract from his reputation and integrity in the human rights and international law field, with no chance at all of earning the forgiveness of the rabid and vindictive Zionists who have been hounding him mercilessly for two years.

Indeed, reading the editorial reminded me of Comrade Rubashov in Arthur Koestler’s “Darkness At Noon” -- a true believer doing one last duty for the group he had lived with for so many years. It reads like a “confession” rung out from someone trying to free hostages near and dear to him by giving the kidnappers what they want while trying to hold on to one’s own integrity and dignity. Sadly, of course, those who attacked his morals and probity before, will never, ever forgive him for telling the truth originally -- and like Rubashov, he will be shown no mercy once his confession has served its purpose for the cause.

It suited the Lobby to highlight Goldstone, a Zionist and judge whose international reputation made it even more difficult than usual to bury the message especially among Jews. However, those other members are distinguished jurists in their own right who were commissioned by the United Nations Human Rights Council and whose report became the property of the UN General Assembly, neither of whom are likely to drop the report just because complicit Israeli ministers misinterpret Goldstone’s editorial with the same liberty that they misinterpreted the original report -- which after all simply asked the parties to conduct credible investigations.

The core “retraction” in the editorial is the sentence, “If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document,” which is about as retractable as a rubber band. It certainly does not substantiate Netanyahu’s reaction “Everything we said was proved true,” although it does raise suspicions that Avigdor Lieberman’s attribution of the editorial to “diplomatic efforts on behalf of Israel,” might conceal some heavy advocacy conveying difficult-to-refuse offers.

Goldstone is a lawyer, and this imprecisely flexibly wording of “different document,” could mean almost anything. If he knew about the ferocity of the tribal scapegoating that was to follow? If he knew that the report was going to spur Israel into mounting a series of pseudo-independent investigations into events that they refused to look into earlier? It certainly is far from an unequivocal retraction of the original, which is not “his” to retract since it was, after all, the product of a team including three others, commissioned by the United Nations Human Rights Council. 

His claim that Israeli investigations “also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy,” does not contradict his early report, which never suggested that. The My Lai massacre, for example, was no less a war crime because the Pentagon did not directly order it.

His most wrenching default is when he says “the most serious attack the Goldstone Report focused on was the killing of some 29 members of the al-Simouni family in their home. The shelling of the home was apparently (my italics) the consequence of an Israeli commander's erroneous interpretation of a drone image, and an Israeli officer is under investigation for having ordered the attack. While the length of this investigation is frustrating, it appears that an appropriate process is underway, and I am confident that if the officer is found to have been negligent, Israel will respond accordingly.”

Looking at the abysmal track record of Israeli investigations -- and bearing in mind that it was the original Goldstone Report that brought about the apology for an investigation he refers to here, Judge Goldstone really has to explain to his own conscience on what grounds he is “confident” of an appropriate response, let alone how the finding of “negligence” came about.

Throughout, he is upsettingly equivocal. “While I welcome Israel’s investigations into allegations, I share the concerns reflected in the McGowan Davis report that few of Israel’s inquiries have been concluded and believe that the proceedings should have been held in a public forum. Although the Israeli evidence that has emerged since publication of our report doesn't negate the tragic loss of civilian life, I regret that our fact-finding mission did not have such evidence explaining the circumstances in which we said civilians in Gaza were targeted, because it probably would have influenced our findings about intentionality and war crimes.”

But then later he says “McGowan Davis has found that Israel has done this to a significant degree.” How significant is “significant” if after two years, “few of Israel’s inquiries have been concluded” and if the proceedings, conducted by the same military body that defends the military, are carried out in private?

In the face of that, his second thoughts about calling upon Hamas calling for its own inquiry are totally gratuitous. Surely he never expected them to. But they did let him and his colleagues in to investigate themselves, which Israel did not, and which, as he reiterates, refused to present evidence to his committee.

Even though it is unlikely that the UN bodies will drop the report, Goldstone’s pseudo-retraction has provided the opportunity for Israeli “Hasbara” to trumpet its misinterpretations. It does a disservice to international justice and humanitarian law and tries to accord to Israeli leaders the impunity which he had spent his career fighting, in South Africa, Rwanda, the Balkans and Central America.

It is a tragedy that such a career should end this way, generating as much sorrow as anger. Sorrow for the damage it has done to the universality of justice, and anger at the unscrupulous manipulation of familial and tribal loyalties that likely brought it about.

For more by Ian Williams visit Deadline Pundit.

It’s tough being a naked superpower when the caterpillars munch away your fig leaf.  

In real terms it makes Chamberlain at Munich look like a stickler for principle. The President and Secretary of State of the United States have been pleading and pressuring over Israeli settlements, which Washington opposes.

But who are they pleading with? Who are they cajoling and pressuring? Not the Israeli president building the settlements, but President Mahmoud Abbas of Palestine, to withdraw the Security Council resolution which expresses the sentiment of the entire world -- including the US -- that the settlements are illegal. In real terms it makes Chamberlain at Munich look like a stickler for principle.

To head off this disastrous dilemma heading to impale its Middle Eastern policy, the US had drafted an ineffectual and in any case non-binding statement that admitted to the “illegitimacy” of settlements in the West Bank, but spent more space condemning ineffectual rocket attacks from Gaza.  

But Abbas had no option but to go ahead and put the resolution to the vote. It won 14 to one, with US Ambassador Susan Rice casting a veto.

The administration was scared that it would either be forced to support its own policy in the Security Council and thus risk an excreta tempest from AIPAC -- or that it would veto a resolution that it agrees with and humiliate itself in front of the rest of world, including its real allies in NATO. 

“We reject in the strongest terms possible the legitimacy of the continued settlement building,” inveighed Rice, while ferociously condemning them as “folly,” bad for Israel as well. However that just reinforced the international message that the Israeli tail was wagging the American dog to vote against its own policy.

A positive vote would have sent a serious signal to Netanyahu not to trifle with his only protector and major paymaster. However, all Netanyahu has had to do is to refer to the even more crazed ideologues who surround him, who will not hear of “concessions” on settlements. But poor Abbas, beleaguered by WikiLeaks showing him trying to kill the Goldstone Report under US pressure and showing what most Palestinians regard as an overflexible, indeed supine, negotiating posture in the peace talks, is assumed not to have a domestic constituency he has to care for.

One would have thought that after Tunisia, Egypt, and Bahrain, this administration would have picked up some hints about diplomacy, not least that diktats and dollars to proxy dictators does not make for stable relationships. But the world’s rapidly attenuating super power was reduced to covering for a coalition of deranged rabbis, likudnik-inclined millionaires, Neocons and evangelical Christian Zionists in the UN Security Council.

It did so in front of a Security Council packed with most of the General Assembly members who have expressed their negative views on settlement over and over again to vote on a resolution sponsored by a wide geographical and ideological range of states -- including many EU and NATO members. The resolution was moved by Lebanon, whose ambassador eschewed inflammatory rhetoric and merely cited successive Security Council resolutions, World Court opinions and Geneva Conventions on the issue not to mention Israel’s own commitments under the Quartet’s “Road Map.”

Tip O’Neill’s dictum “All politics is local” is not always true. For a start, polls show that most American Jews oppose Netanyahu and his settlement policy. But more cogently, the masses of Arab citizens on the streets of their rapidly reforming countries bitterly oppose the settlements, and will draw their own conclusions from the Obama policy.

To stop AIPAC huffing and puffing, the Obama administration is about to lose Egypt, Tunisia and much of the rest of the Middle East and erase the last faint hopes of the region that the US can in any way give genuine support to democracy or international law. The disillusionment is going to be all the more profound because of the betrayal of the spirit of Obama’s early speeches in Istanbul and Cairo. Instead of sending serious signal to Netanyahu not to trifle with your only protector, he is now confirmed in his obduracy. And Arabs and other world citizens are even more convinced of US duplicity. 

Obama also has yet another crisis coming. The UK, on behalf of France and Germany as well, promised to do all it could to welcome Palestine as a UN member by this September, thereby pushing yet another hot button for AIPAC -- and thus the administration.

In his Turtle Bay blog at Foreign Policy, Colum Lynch writes that though it was "a move aimed at avoiding the prospect of having to veto a stronger Palestinian resolution calling the settlements illegal,"

The U.S. informed Arab governments Tuesday that it will support a U.N. Security Council statement reaffirming that the 15-nation body "does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity," . . . But the Palestinians rejected the American offer [though it] remained unclear whether the Palestinian move . . . is simply a negotiating tactic aimed at extracting a better deal from Washington.

Still, the U.S. offer signaled a renewed willingness to seek a way out of the current impasse, even if it requires breaking with Israel and joining others in the council in sending a strong message to its key ally to stop its construction of new settlements.

Lynch adds:

The U.S. concession comes as the Middle East is facing a massive wave of popular demonstrations that have brought down the leaders of Tunisia and Egypt.

Cause and effect? What do Focal Points readers think?