US Abandons Demand For Settlement Freeze: Claims Netanyahu Too Weak

The New York Times reports thatthe pressure on Israel to renew its self-imposed moratorium on settlements has been removed

After three weeks of fruitless haggling with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Obama administration has given up its effort to persuade the Israeli government to freeze construction of Jewish settlements for 90 days, a senior administration official said Tuesday.

The decision leaves Middle East peace talks in flux, with the Palestinians refusing to resume direct negotiations absent a moratorium, and the United States struggling to find another formula to bring them back to the table. It is another setback in what has proved to be a star-crossed campaign by President Obama.


The administration decided to pull the plug, officials said, because it concluded that even if Mr. Netanyahu persuaded his cabinet to accept a freeze — which he had not yet been able to do — the 90-day negotiating period would not have produced the progress on core issues that the United States originally had sought.

“We made a strong effort, and everyone tried in good faith to resume direct negotiations in a way that would be meaningful and sustainable,” said a senior American official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the administration’s internal deliberations, which are continuing. “But the extension wasn’t actually going to do that.”

Of course, that does not mean that other pressures will not be imposed on Israel to make other unilateral concessions--all in the interests of coaxing wallflower Abbas back to the peace waltz.

Left unsaid is that were indications that if Obama would commute Pollard's sentence and have him released, a freeze might have been possible. In any case, the deciding factor may have been that with the new law requiring putting the freeze to an actual vote, pressure alone on Netanyahu would not have been enough.

And apparently pressure is all that Obama had up his sleeve after all, after being requested to actually put in writing what would be offered to Israel in exchange.

Now comes the spin. But rather than just say the latest setback is Israel's fault, the narrative will be that this is an indication of how weak Bibi is:

In the short run, analysts said the failure raised questions about Mr. Netanyahu’s capacity to negotiate a final deal.

“It revealed a degree of weakness in his coalition,” said Daniel C. Kurtzer, a former American ambassador to Israel. “This was such an attractive deal for him, but he still couldn’t get his cabinet to buy into it without attaching conditions to it that were unacceptable to Washington.”

Netanyahu is weak? Even after the Carmel fire, polls indicate that Netanyahu's approval rating has gone up--unlike Obama's, which went down after the BP oil spill.

Actually, Obama's numbers have been going down in general, to the extent that his approval rating is tied with Bush! Just what we are to make of that, the New York Times does not say.

Also worthy of note, while the usual "senior American official speaking on condition of anonymity" tells us that Abbas and his team negotiated in good faith (during the short time that Abbas actually sat down to negotiate)--the fact is that Abbas actually increased the demands to be made of Israel:

But the Palestinians also shifted their position, insisting that a settlement freeze must include East Jerusalem as well as the West Bank. Israel’s initial 10-month moratorium included only the West Bank. The United States never asked Mr. Netanyahu to expand it to Jerusalem, and analysts said Mr. Netanyahu would never have been able to persuade his right-wing cabinet to go along with it.

And this is supposed to be "good faith"? No mention of what Abbas offered in return--but that is only because true to form Abbas never has offered any concessions in return for the concessions he demands of Israel.

The New York Times concludes:

David Makovsky, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said, “It’s the end of a phase for the administration: ‘We’re not focusing on the appetizers anymore; we’re focusing on the main course.’ ”

If that is accurate, one could ask why it is that the administration made such a big deal and pushed so hard on the settlements to begin with.

Let's face it, the prospects of Obama continuing to insist on making these peace talks a priority are not appetizing at all.

Technorati Tag: Mideast Peace Talks.