No serious observer of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should have any doubt that both the Netanyahu government and the Palestinian Authority have been pursuing self-destructive policies during the past 30 months. President Obama's failure to persuade the Israelis and Palestinians to reengage in serious negotiations has added another significant layer of uncertainty to an already untenable environment. And the decision of the PA to go to the United Nations to seek recognition of a Palestinian state is likely to make matters worse, leading both sides to further entrench themselves into longtime, hardened positions which could potentially lead to a renewed cycle of wide-spread violence.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been working hard to create a posture that suggests he is ready to enter immediately into peace negotiations, if only PA President Mahmoud Abbas would return to the negotiating table unconditionally. But then Netanyahu has set his own conditions, creating new obstacles to negotiations: He demands that Israel be recognized "as a Jewish state" at the outset of negotiations, even though this was never a requirement in previous peace negotiations with the Palestinians.
Netanyahu refuses to accept the 1967 borders as the base line for negotiating a two-state solution with some land swap. He insists that Jerusalem's future status is not negotiable and that Israel must be allowed to maintain residual forces along the Jordan River. Meanwhile, Netanyahu has refused to consider an even nominal renewal of the settlement construction freeze to test Abbas' resolve to enter into serious negotiations.
In reality, Netanyahu has said little and done less to convince the Palestinians that his professed desire for a two-state solution is genuine. He has skillfully led his public into believing that the status quo is sustainable and perhaps even beneficial for the State of Israel. Of course, the heinous and abhorrent terrorist attack in Eilat and the exchange of fire between Israel and Hamas along the Gaza border and the deteriorating relations with Egypt have shown otherwise. To be sure, Netanyahu has given the Palestinians plenty of ammunition to make the argument that there is no genuine Israeli partner. Even though Netanyahu's popularity has somewhat dimmed in the past few weeks over the civil protests, to many Israelis he remains the kind of ‘tough' leader that is needed to navigate Israel through its equally ‘tough' neighborhood. Yet in reality, he is not delivering to improve the prospects for real peace that most Israelis yearn for. As a result, Israel is becoming more isolated than ever in the international arena. Its relationship with the United States is fractured. And negative public opinion of Israel in Europe has dipped to unprecedented depths.
Tragically the Palestinians have not fared any better. They have continued their campaign to distort the history of the conflict. They have been working day-in and day-out to perpetuate the fantasy of a return of Palestinian refugees to Israel, giving Israel no reason to believe that a two-state solution will indeed be the endgame of the conflict. Furthermore, they have miserably failed to demonstrate a united front truly committed to a lasting peace. Hamas, in spite of the so-called "unity" agreement, which is faltering and has become a major liability for the PA, continues to preach the gospel of Israel's destruction and refuses to renounce violence as a means to achieve their national objective. Moreover, contrary to Abbas' revisionism in his May 16th op-ed in The New York Times, it was the Palestinians who refused to accept the UN partition plan in 1947 and it was the Arab states that declared war on Israel in 1948.
To be sure, neither side has been willing or able to agree to rules of good-faith negotiations to support their professed desire to enter into serious talks to conclude a peace agreement that meet each others' principal requirements of security and political independence.
The phenomenon of the frantic lead up to the UN General Assembly has been striking. The success of the Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad's state-building enterprise has led to rising international support for the Palestinian statehood initiative. And since the Palestinians do not believe that Netanyahu is sincere about a two-state solution, they are equally convinced that Obama's failure to persuade or pressure Netanyahu to change his posture has undercut his ability to effectively mediate the conflict.
