Netanyahu tells Obama to pound sand

[makattak]

http://hotair.com/archives/2010/04/22/netanyahu-to-obama-pound-sand/

Benjamin Netanyahu delivered an unequivocal message to the Obama administration this morning, rejecting completely a call from Barack Obama to stop building settlements in Jerusalem. The rejection creates a standoff between the two traditional allies in the region and all but halts Obama’s efforts to force Israel back to the bargaining table (via JWF):

Aides to Israel’s prime minister said Thursday that he has officially rejected President Barack Obama’s demand to suspend all construction in contested east Jerusalem, a move that threatens to entrench a year-old deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking.
The aides said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered his government’s position to Obama over the weekend, ahead of the scheduled arrival later Thursday of the U.S. president’s special Mideast envoy, George Mitchell. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the contact between the two leaders was private.
Washington had put Mitchell’s shuttle diplomacy on hold for more than a month as it awaited a reply from Israel. Aides to Netanyahu provided no information on whether the Israeli leader had offered any other concessions to the Palestinians in an effort to restart the long-stalled talks.

The AP sounds almost disbelieving in reporting this, adding in this odd paragraph:

But with Israel eager to ease tensions with its closest and most important ally, it appeared likely the Jewish state tempered its rejection with other confidence building gestures toward the Palestinians.

Really? “It appeared likely” isn’t even rumor-mongering. It’s complete fantasy by the writer. Nothing in the article reports on “gestures,” confidence-building or otherwise, and AP reporter Amy Teibel doesn’t provide even an anonymous source for the reporting. It’s nonsensical spin aimed at somehow keeping this from becoming an abject diplomatic failure by Barack Obama.
Netanyahu just taught Obama a lesson, which is that a nation that has been surrounded by terrorists and other enemies for decades isn’t going to be intimidated by an Ivory Tower academic, even if he sits in the Oval Office.  After Obama’s shameful treatment of Netanyahu on his visit to Washington DC, he could hardly have expected any better response.  Instead of cowing Netanyahu into submission, Obama has alienated him — and as a side effect, made Netanyahu more popular at home because of it.
That’s what makes Teibel’s reporting so disingenuous.  If Netanyahu was so eager to “ease tensions” with Obama, he would have found some sort of face-saving compromise for his ally.  Instead, Netanyahu just told Obama to pound sand.

First, as we have some perspective here, Micro has Bibi's popularity been increasing as he has distanced himself from Obama?

Secondly, I note with not a small amount of amusement, foreign leaders who distance themselves from Obama become more popular while foreign leaders who tied themselves to Bush got themselves elected and/or re-elected.

Looks to me like the only people Obama appealed to were the elites. Real people the world over prefer Bush.

[makattak]

Note: the statement,

But with Israel eager to ease tensions with its closest and most important ally, it appeared likely the Jewish state tempered its rejection with other confidence building gestures toward the Palestinians.

was removed from the original article without a note as to the editing.

Interesting.

[MicroBalrog]

First, as we have some perspective here, Micro has Bibi's popularity been increasing as he has distanced himself from Obama?

It's not clear to me. Among the people I hang out with, definitely. Even some of the MSM here (and generally newspapers here don't like him) sided with Bibi on this. But I don't know what the polls say.

On the other hand, the government has made a variety of gestures towards the Palestinians recently. Remember Bibi ran, and won, on a platform of reaching 'genuine peace' based on helping the Palestinians achieve economic growth and stability.

[AJ Dual]

Then what makes East Bank settlement building not among those gestures?

To cement Israel's half of the "dual control" of the area?

[MicroBalrog]

Then what makes East Bank settlement building not among those gestures?

To cement Israel's half of the "dual control" of the area?

...East Bank? You mean, West, yes?

And you do realize Israel froze all construction in The West Bank, yes? (Jerusalem isn't considered part of that).

[AJ Dual]

Now I'm confused, the article said:

Aides to Israel’s prime minister said Thursday that he has officially rejected President Barack Obama’s demand to suspend all construction in contested east Jerusalem, a move that threatens to entrench a year-old deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking.

I guess I meant "East Jerusalem". Would that not be the West Bank's/Palestinian side?

[MicroBalrog]

While, from a legalistic standpoint, East Jerusalem is part of the 'occupied territories', it's always had a separate status in actual reality. Currently Israel has placed a freeze on construction in TWB, but has not ended construction in Jerusalem.

Israel's government is firmly comitted to the notion of the Palestinian State and stopping construction in the territories.

The only question is really the precise conditions under which this state will be formed.

[Tallpine]

I was of the understanding that there already is a Palestinian state, and its name is "Israel" 

Weren't all the native non-Jews offered full citizenship?

Are there not full blooded Arabs serving in the the Israeli parliament ?

[roo_ster]

I was of the understanding that there already is a Palestinian state, and its name is "Israel" 

Weren't all the native non-Jews offered full citizenship?

Are there not full blooded Arabs serving in the the Israeli parliament ?

True, and this future Pali State will be Judenrein.

The irony being that Israel is the one compared to S Africa's apartheid policies.

[roo_ster]

Somebody just leaked a map that details the new Pali state after a joint Hamas/PA meeting.  Sort of like a cartographic Thunderdome.

[MicroBalrog]

I was of the understanding that there already is a Palestinian state, and its name is "Israel" 

Weren't all the native non-Jews offered full citizenship?

Are there not full blooded Arabs serving in the the Israeli parliament ?

...and?

Israeli-Arabs are an entirely-different bird from Palestinians.

JFRuser:

It's simply entirely untenable to maintain civilian control over the West Bank for any long-term time period. It's just a massive insane drain on ISrael's economy and armed forces, and by now everybody in the country who isn't a settler knows it.

[Tallpine]

Israeli-Arabs are an entirely-different bird from Palestinians.

I think I know what you mean 

Aren't "Palestinians" basically illegal immigrants?

[MicroBalrog]

Palestinians are people who live outside the Green Line and hold no Israeli citizenship. They hold no citizenship because Israel has never actually formally annexed The West Bank or Gaza. Conversely, people who live inside Israel proper are Israeli-Arabs.

There's a variety of differences, but chief among them is the fact that Israeli-Arabs have all of the rights I have, and then some (being exempt from the military draft), and have, as a group, no desire to receive national independence.  Palestinians naturally want their national sovereignty (as I would, too). THey're mistreated in various ways by the Army, although it's nowhere near the OMG APPARTHEID portrayed by the various anti-Israeli factions.

[Tallpine]

Weren't the Palestinians rasing heck even before the Israeli annexation in 1967/1972? I forget which war ?

[MicroBalrog]

Weren't the Palestinians rasing heck even before the Israeli annexation in 1967/1972? I forget which war ?

Some of them were, yes. But I don't really see your point.

[Tallpine]

Some of them were, yes. But I don't really see your point.

The point is that I don't really see the so called Palestinians' point.

[MicroBalrog]

The point is that I don't really see the so called Palestinians' point.

No? You don't?

Let me explain it in a brief way: Yes, possibly the fathers or grandfathers' of current Palestinians allowed Jordanians to attack ISrael through their land, or even fought in the Jordanian Army. This doesn't mean the current Palestinians don't deserve sovereignty, or that they don't get mistreated often.

Tell you what. If some guy came in and built a house on your private field, what would you do?

That's what the settlers do. A large proportion of settler outposts are squatting private Palestinian land.

If a foreign military came into Montana - say, Chinese - and built a road over your land and declared that you couldn't drive on that road, but Han Chinese people could, what would you do?

Now, naturally, this doesn't justify attacks on Israeli civilians and so forth. But the desire of Palestinians to not live in a reality where this happens is entirely understandable. Their desire to have a state is also entirely understandable. Their opposition to the settlement project is also entirely understandable, given the behavior of many settlers, the purpose of the project, and the means through which the Israeli military attempts to protect the project.

[Tallpine]

Now, naturally, this doesn't justify attacks on Israeli civilians and so forth.

I just thought that the Palestinians were attacking Israeli civilians long before the occupation and settlements ever occured. 

[MicroBalrog]

I just thought that the Palestinians were attacking Israeli civilians long before the occupation and settlements ever occured. 

Yes, there was a variety of nasty stuff that went on. On both sides. But again, most of te people who live in the West Bank now have nothing to do with what people did in the 1950's (which was that Jordan and Egypt sponsored a series of terrorist attacks on Israel), or the 1967 plan (which Israel pre-empted) of the Jordanians and their allies to invade Israel.

Again, I'm amused by this view that many Americans seem to have that the pro-Israeli position is OMG ANNEX ALL TERRITORIES when this isn't even the position of Israel's right-wing.

[Tallpine]

Okay, so the barbarians have been doing nasty stuff for three generations.

[MicroBalrog]

Okay, so the barbarians have been doing nasty stuff for three generations.

And?

[kgbsquirrel]

No? You don't?

Let me explain it in a brief way: Yes, possibly the fathers or grandfathers' of current Palestinians allowed Jordanians to attack ISrael through their land, or even fought in the Jordanian Army. This doesn't mean the current Palestinians don't deserve sovereignty, or that they don't get mistreated often.

Tell you what. If some guy came in and built a house on your private field, what would you do?

That's what the settlers do. A large proportion of settler outposts are squatting private Palestinian land.

If a foreign military came into Montana - say, Chinese - and built a road over your land and declared that you couldn't drive on that road, but Han Chinese people could, what would you do?

Now, naturally, this doesn't justify attacks on Israeli civilians and so forth. But the desire of Palestinians to not live in a reality where this happens is entirely understandable. Their desire to have a state is also entirely understandable. Their opposition to the settlement project is also entirely understandable, given the behavior of many settlers, the purpose of the project, and the means through which the Israeli military attempts to protect the project.

*headscratch* So why did people start setting up shop on someone elses turf to start with? (This is actually one part of the world that I never had to deal with in my old job so my knowledge is practically zip.)

[MicroBalrog]

Before I go on, I'd like to stress I'm not trying to make any kind of peacenik point. I am not arguing, as some radical leftists do, that OMG ISRAEL IS APPARTHEID STATE. My views are fairly moderate on this issue (as a matter of fact, I voted for Likud in the last elections and I am seriously considering becoming a registered member of that party).

At any rate, you must understand that settler ideology is a mutated version of Zionist ideology: to wit, early Zionists believed that Jewish presence in Eretz-Israel had to be established by the practice of 'establishing facts on the ground'. For this, the early Zionists purchased or homesteaded land and built farms, homes, etc. on it. This worked fairly well, and the Israeli government continued this process with land that was seized in 1948. In 1967, there was an attempt, sponsored by the government, to establish the same process in The West Bank and Gaza. It's failed pretty roundly, in terms of the fact that the world has not accepted the legitimacy of our claims there, and Israel has de-facto recognized that we will eventually have to leave most of the settlements.

The settlers divide into two groups of people – those who live in the settlements because of the cheap land there, and those who live there because they believe in an ideology called Religious Zionism. I.E. these people believe that it is their divinely-inspired duty to reclaim more and more land by the methods outlined above. The term for this is 'capturing hills'.

Because of this, the settler movement continues building as much new settlements as they can on as many locations as they can, in order to establish Jewish presence. While the settler leadership formally condemns illegal construction, there remain groups of people who continue 'capturing hills':

I.E. people who go out and build homes, and entire small villages, without permission from the relevant authorities, and sometimes without being concerned whether a given Palestinian owns the land or whatnot. There's been repeated examples of the more… insane individuals physically assaulting Palestinians, IDF troops, attacking military vehicles, vandalizing Palestinian property, etc.

Right now, the government has been clamping down on settler activity in general, going so far as to prohibit all new construction in the West Bank.

[MicroBalrog]

Another thing to consider is that – because how the smaller settlements are spread all over the West Bank – it's almost impossible to secure the people who live there. They keep traveling between the settlements – they need to, for their daily needs and jobs etc. We can't build a physical wall that'll firmly separate them from the Palestinians. So the Army needs to constantly mess around TWB, enforcing a semblance of 'order', setting up roadblocks, getting shot, beating up rock throwers (of both stripes, etc. etc.). This is still less effective than just having a wall between us and them, and of course it costs inane amounts of money.

[Tallpine]

How big is the West Bank area, anyway?

My impression is that it's not much bigger than our rural "neighborhood" (300 sq miles).  That's not much land to fight over.

Seems like it's great value is being a place from which to launch attacks on Israel?