Word: jerusalem
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Benjamin Netanyahu is clearly feeling lucky. As his skirmish with the Obama Administration over Israel's settlement activity in East Jerusalem entered its second week on Tuesday, the Israeli Prime Minister was pushing back against Washington's demands. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has put the onus on Israel to "demonstrate its commitment" to the peace process by reversing a plan to build new housing units in East Jerusalem (occupied by Israel since 1967); declaring its readiness to hold substantial negotiations with the Palestinians on all final-status issues (including Jerusalem, whose control by Israel Netanyahu has repeatedly insisted...
...easy retreat. Indeed, there's a growing belief in Washington that U.S. national interests across the region are imperiled by a failure to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a manner minimally acceptable to the Arab world - a two-state solution based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital. After the East Jerusalem settlement announcement, Biden was reported by Israeli media to have told Netanyahu behind closed doors, "What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us, and it endangers regional peace...
...with the Biden visit having highlighted differences over Jerusalem, the issue can't be easily fudged. Even if Netanyahu quietly undertakes to refrain from new construction in East Jerusalem, the move would not go unnoticed for long - and would prompt right-wing demonstrations and agitation. The right-wing settler movement is well entrenched in the government bureaucracy responsible for settlement construction, and precedent suggests they would find a way to continue building regardless even of any secret promises to the U.S. by Netanyahu. "Everything in East Jerusalem is under a magnifying glass and involves too many people and politics...
...deeper problem is that Israel's position on Jerusalem is at odds with the U.S. goal of winning agreement on a two-state solution. While a broad array of Israelis are either totally against dividing Jerusalem or want to expand Israeli settlements ahead of any peace deal, no country in the world - including the U.S. - recognizes East Jerusalem as Israeli territory. (Even George W. Bush, America's most ardently pro-Israel President, refrained from moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.) This disagreement between friends wasn't a big deal as long as there was an Israeli government...
...With reporting by Aaron J. Klein / Jerusalem...