President Obama’s speech about the Middle East, scheduled for Thursday at the State Department, has been the subject of constant speculation fueled by leaks from administration sources. Most of the speculation is over whether he will take the opportunity to spell out his ideas for a revival of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, improbably linking it to the Arab Spring protests that have inflamed the region. There have been leaks intended to make us think he was sensibly dropping the idea of promoting some sort of U.S. dictat and others that made it appear as if he would squeeze Israel.
The latest spin about the speech is in an article in today’s New York Times that quotes officials as saying:
Obama was weighing whether to formally endorse Israel’s pre-1967 borders as the starting point for negotiations over a Palestinian state — a move that would be less a policy shift than a signal by the United States that it expected Israel to make concessions in pursuit of an agreement.
While the Times claims such a stand is not a “policy shift,” the notion of a U.S. endorsement for the 1967 lines is a clear statement that the United States is prepared to pressure the Jewish state to start making concessions even before peace talks restart. While the Times goes on to say that Obama will not present a “blueprint” for negotiations, the only plan he seems to be interested in is one that aims at leaning on the Israelis who, as Prime Minister Netanyahu indicated in a speech to the Knesset earlier this week, are ready to talk.
While Obama pledged America’s undying support for Israel’s existence yesterday while hosting a “Jewish Heritage” day at the White House at which the Marine Band played klezmer music, the debate over whether or not to heighten pressure on the Jewish state illustrates the double game the administration is playing on the Middle East. With the Palestinian Authority having embraced an alliance with Hamas and making it clearer than ever that their goal of an independent state is merely a way station on the road to future conflict with Israel (as PA head Mahmoud Abbas’s op-ed article in yesterday’s New York Times illustrated), the notion that more U.S. pressure will pave the way to peace makes no sense.
What Obama seems most interested in is a statement that will buttress his attempts at outreach to the Arab world. But what the president fails to understand is that his attempt to link the struggle between Israel and the Palestinians to the Arab Spring won’t increase his influence in the region. Israel and the United States are both irrelevant to the protests. And nothing Barack Obama does will change that.
