THE SPINE MARCH 14, 2010
-
Read Later
READ LATERAvailable only to subscribers. SUBSCRIBE TODAY
-
Listen
ARTICLE AUDIO
- Font Size
On the front page of the Sunday Boston Globe “Ideas” section, there’s a photograph of East Belfast—or, rather, of a concrete demarcation “that separates the Protestant community from the Catholic residents on the other side of the wall.” It is called the “Peace Line,” and maybe it’s what George Mitchell, who negotiated the settlement that ended “the Troubles,” thinks of as peace.
Mitchell was Bill Clinton’s “special envoy” to those troubles, and that is why Barack Obama made him his personal emissary to Israel and the Palestinians. And, although the president will celebrate the Good Friday Agreement with visiting Northern Ireland politicians on St. Patrick’s Day later this week in Washington, Kevin Cullen—who covered the conflict in the Globe for more than 20 years—today observes, in a long article for the same paper, that “[w]hile the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland have shown a willingness to not kill each other, they have been less enthusiastic about the prospect of actually living with each other.” Cullen provides many dispiriting details. Alas.
Look, Mitchell seems disposed, by dint of character, to favor one side in a dispute rather than be fair, as arbitrators are supposed to be. This certainly was demonstrated in the baseball steroid investigation. His competence is also in question. One of the public men who went from the political trough to sup at the corporate board food line, he was designated chairman of Disney in 2004. He served barely two years, after which Disney breathed a sigh of relief.
George Mitchell will do anything to get out of a tight spot, including downgrading the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority to “proximity talks,” where he’d be running from Jerusalem to Ramallah and back, with the parties not even facing each other as they consider borders, refugees, Jerusalem, security, settlements, water, etc. For Mitchell, anything goes, just as long as he’s in the spotlight.
30 comments
I can't see what the great attraction would be for George Mitchell "to be running from Jerusalem to Ramallah and back". Perhaps he is a just loyal civil servant, doing a job that would not bring him much glory at the end. Dennis Ross was not much more successful, either. No one is going to succeed until the Palestinians decide that they want to end the occupation and create their own destiny. Sometimes, Mr. Peretz, you say things that are not very commendable or even wise. It's not Mitchell whose thinking is at fault. It's his boss, whom you helped to get elected. If he could find a way for Palestinians to show "a willingness to not kill " Israelis that would be a great deal. "Dayeno" as we say during the Passover seder.
- noga1
March 14, 2010 at 10:02pm
Marty really needs to stop writing about Ireland. Persuading the two sides to stop trying to kill each other was the whole point of Mitchell's exercise there. That 12 years after Mitchell left the Northern Irish have not yet developed the habits of unconditional neighborly love does not invalidate Mitchell and Clinton's achievement in Ireland. It would make as much sense to call Lincoln a failure because Southerners still hated Northerners in 1877, or to call the Civil Rights movement a failure because black people and white still largely lived mistrustingly apart in 1977. And if a two-state settlement is ever reached between Israelis and Palestinians, we can be damned sure that 12 years after the partition, Israelis and Palestinians will not live lives of socially integrated harmony and brotherly affection. A cessation, or even significant reduction, in the willingness to kill to achieve political aims, which is what Mitchell achieved in Ireland, is something approaching a best-case scenario with regard to the Palestinians. If Marty wants more, then either he's living in a fantasy world or he favors genocide against the Palestinians, because in the real world the only way to satisfy the expectations of peace implicit in Marty's repeated attacks on the Good Friday process is to remove either all Israelis or all Palestinians from both Israel and the Palestinian territories.
- rhubarbs
March 15, 2010 at 7:50am
"If Marty wants more, then either he's living in a fantasy world or he favors genocide against the Palestinians," I don't get it. A longing for genuine peace is genocidal wish? This is a very perverse way of reading what Marty said. Aren't you trying to create another loathsome equivalence between Israel and the Palestinians which has no grip on reality or history or record? Let me remind you that it is the Palestinian Authority that omits Israel from its curricula: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/palmatoc1.html And they never made any bones about their ultimate aim. What a disgusting, egregious and deeply slanderous way of thinking, rhubarbs.
- noga1
March 15, 2010 at 8:39am
Here is a different take on the Irish and the Jews: http://forward.com/articles/126548/
- noga1
March 15, 2010 at 8:45am
No, I am not creating another loathsome equivalence. If Marty wants more out of an Israeli-Palestinian settlement than the cold peace he condemns as failure in Northern Ireland, that's a ridiculous fantasy. The only way to make such a thing happen would be to remove one of the two peoples from the land between Jordan and the sea. I assume Marty would not remove the Israelis. The simple fact is that for the foreseeable future, even if Palestinians lay down their arms, the two peoples are not going to live together like Iowa and Nebraska. It doesn't matter whose fault this is. In condemning the Good Friday Accords, Marty preemptively condemns any conceivable two-state settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. What, then, is the alternative he favors? And can we stipulate that "The Palestinians all magically become philo-Semitic pacifist farmers" is not a realistic alternative?
- rhubarbs
March 15, 2010 at 10:29am
A cold peace would be fine by me and that is the maximum that could be expected. I also expect that any Jewish historical / religious sites in a future "Palestine" will be destroyed and / or closed off to Jewish visitors, much as Jews were only allowed up to the 7th step of the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron for about 1,000 years (+/-). But I am skeptical of even a cold peace. And the Obmanoid policies are making it even less likely. hg
- ginzy
March 15, 2010 at 10:48am
I have to say that my impression of Mitchell back in the 1990s on his Northern Ireland mission was that he was a quiet sort of guy who waited patiently until all the wild assumptions about him had been proven empty and inaccurate, and then asked people a second time if they wanted to lay out their ideas. It's not Mitchell's fault that there are deeper problems in NI than were manageable by a peace agreement, no matter how much people wanted to leave the 'Troubles' behind. If that were the case, as rhubs has noted, there would be almost no justification for any efforts to resolve any dispute anywhere.
- ironyroad
March 15, 2010 at 10:57am
'A cold peace would be fine by me and that is the maximum that could be expected. I also expect that any Jewish historical / religious sites in a future "Palestine" will be destroyed and / or closed off to Jewish visitors, much as Jews were only allowed up to the 7th step of the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron for about 1,000 years (+/-)." Dear Ginzy: No one here wants to listen patiently to such reminders of Arab antisemitism. You are speaking to people who pride themselves on their sense of proportion and universal rationality. They believe their faith in Obama's political worldview is the natural and only possible outcome of such incontrovertible common sense. I was just reading, as it happens, an excerpt from an interview with David Axelrod in which he was asked, emphatically twice: "does the intransigence of the Israeli government on the housing issue, yes or no, does it put U.S. troops lives at risk?" I see in this insanely irrational question that Jack Tapper asks exactly the kind of mindset that will eventually lead to a terrible and and well-choreographed break between US and Israel. Once you start going down that road, there will be no going back. Just as it is impossible to reverse the evil fruit of Arab propaganda in the Arab street. I'm sure the question, and its intended consequences, will be jeered at and dismissed by the fine posters at this site as moonshine, or typical Jewish paranoia, or something. How is it possible that building 1600 apartments in a neigbourhood through which passed the bus I used to take 30 years ago from Givat Ram Hebrew University campus to Mount Scopus campus "put U.S. troops lives at risk?"
- noga1
March 15, 2010 at 11:31am
Dear Noga (and please do look me the next time you visit the eastern end of the Mediterranean). How is it possible that building 1600 apartments ... "put U.S. troops lives at risk?" Why its just like we poison the wells, use Christian / Muslim blood to bake matzot, drop candy laced with anti-fertility / virility compositions in areas where Palestinian kids are playing, harvest organs from cold Palestinian cadavers and warm Haitians undergoing surgery at Israeli field hospitals, etc. etc. etc. Jews are evil and all powerful. And they have horns and pointed tails. Except for the enlightened progressive ones of course. h.
- ginzy
March 15, 2010 at 11:39am
The return of Obama as Gd or at least the son of Gd -- http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/15/weekinreview/15baker.html?partner=rss&emc=rss Note the cross and the halo. hg
- ginzy
March 15, 2010 at 12:11pm
"I can't see what the great attraction would be for George Mitchell "to be running from Jerusalem to Ramallah and back". Perhaps he is a just loyal civil servant, doing a job that would not bring him much glory at the end. Dennis Ross was not much more successful, either. No one is going to succeed until the Palestinians decide that they want to end the occupation and create their own destiny. Sometimes, Mr. Peretz, you say things that are not very commendable or even wise. It's not Mitchell whose thinking is at fault." I agree with this 100% but then it goes off the rails. "It's his boss, whom you helped to get elected." How the hell is Obama at fault that the Palestinians have not decided that they want the occupation to end? And Marty helped get Obama elected? Yeesh, Bush is the one who got Obama elected. If Marty devoted every issue to getting McCain elected there is not a chance in hell McCain would have been elected. And even if McCain would have been elected, things would be exactly as they are now, except the economy would be in worse place in the US and there would be no hope of health insurance. For the vast majority of Americans US elections do not revolve even remotely around Israel. A job and health care for my family is a hell of a lot more important than whether 1,600 houses are or are not built in Jerusalem. I am with Ginzy that I support a cold peace, I just don't see how Obama's policies are remotely jeapardizing that. The US has interests outside of Israel (namely oil, oil, and more oil, and Iraq and Afghanistan). For whatever reasons it has been deemed necessary to go through the kabuki dance that is called the peace talks just so we can point to something to all the Sheiks and oil princes that something is going on, thereby mollifying the motherf-ers. Name on concrete thing the US has done that has prevented Israel from defending its borders. I am getting a little tired of everything being the US's fault.
- blackton
March 15, 2010 at 4:34pm
Somehow I don't think Marty would have pushed as hard for Obama had he known how he would turn out to be on Israel. Marty loves Israel and has a very justified concern for its future and the survival of 50% of the Jewish people. As yet he does not hesitate to express these feelings and commitment but there may come a day, soon, that such sentiments may be deemed unAmerican, if Obama persists in scapegoating Israel for Palestinian rejectionism and thus fueling a wave of demonization of Israel in the World. Consider what mr. cookie's not so subtle warning to Marty on another thread: "but it is significant that Peretz' first, last, and only response, even when Israel pokes the eye of his own country the United States of America, is move blame away from Israel and onto whomever. Sad but expected." 03/15/2010 - 2:50pm EDT | MrCookie1 http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-spine/i-make-no-excuses-the-obama-administration-was-not-all-surprised-the-israeli-decision#comments Proto-Mc·Carthyism (The practice of publicizing accusations of political disloyalty or subversion anti democratic disregard for basic civil rights)
- noga1
March 15, 2010 at 5:46pm
"if Obama persists in scapegoating Israel for Palestinian rejectionism" seems to suggest that Israel has been blameless. The announcement and the timing was really dumb and was taken as a calculated insult regardless of the legitimacy of the development (and for the record, as I have long maintained, natural growth of local areas has to be allowed, if Arab residents of Israel can build in Israel, Jewish residents of East Jerusalem must be accorded the same rights, otherwise the Palestinians themselves are guilt of apartheid). and this "thus fueling a wave of demonization of Israel in the World." Please, as though Arabs need any excuse. Noga thinks it leads to demonization, I think its intent is to mollify the Sheiks and oil princes, as an example of American even handedness. Personally, I don't think it matters in the slightest. The Palestinians are irrelevant to the long term survival of Israel, it is Iran that is the real issue. As to Iran, I haven't got a clue how to deal with them.
- blackton
March 15, 2010 at 7:31pm
Blackton, you are evidently not an expert in irregular warfare, special ops, psych-war, subversion, blockades, etc.. And neither am I. But there are many tools that can be employed to topple the clerical regime in Teheran. Obama chooses, instead, to toady to Teheran and bash Jerusalem. He has failed to help the Iranian opposition. He wants to prevent any meaningful attempt by the Israelis to respond to the nuclear threat and proxy warfare from Iran. So he has orchestrated this crisis over a housing development. A pretext can always be found. Obama's dogmatic Tier Mondiste viewpoint aside, there are powerful evil anti-Israel forces in Washington. And a lot of Jewish "useful fools" to help them. National security adviser Jim Jones is reputedly no friend of Israel. Where's he been hiding lately?
- amidut
March 16, 2010 at 9:14am
"So he has orchestrated this crisis over a housing development." Maybe, but it sure looks like Netanyahu's government handed him the score and put the conductor's baton in his hand.
- ironyroad
March 16, 2010 at 11:18am
amidut, a blockade is an act of war so I don't think we are at that point especially since it will rally the people around Ahmed. Where is the toadying? That is just silly to say we are, unless your definition of toadying is different than the dictionary. It is that kind of hyperbole that is useless in debate. The Obama administration is absolutely not toadying up to Iran. There is massive resistance inside of Iran towards the regime, the trick of supporting it without looking like you are directly involved is difficult and we can't look like we are directly involved in trying to overthrow them, the vast majority of Iranians are suspicious of the US and its motives. The point of special ops, psych-war, subversion is to be under the radar, so you have no way of knowing if the Obama administration is engaged in it. Anyway, the Bush administration had 8 years to topple the Iranians, I didn't hear anyone claiming they were toadying up to the Iranians because they didn't. And Bush was far more guilty leading up to today, he had 2 chances to take out Iran, first was to invade them and not Iraq because as we all know they are the true threat, and two, after the election and before the inauguration he also could have taken out the facilities while Obama could have condemned it etc. mitigating the international blowback. And don't forget, Bush supported the coup against Chavez and it blew up in our face and now Chavez is stronger than ever, while Obama handled the coup in Honduras perfectly, with a staunchly faithful and Democratically elected government now in place there.
- blackton
March 16, 2010 at 11:57am
irony, this is a stupid pissing match. I dunno about Netanyahu, he has managed to alienate every US President there is. What bothers me is not the no. I could not care less about Jewish housing in a Jewish neighborhood, it was the US asked Israel not to build and Israel said "screw you, no." The announcement was damn dumb and was taken as a direct insult, so now the Obama administration is trying to get Netanyahu to buckle under. At this point, they are all acting like asses.
- blackton
March 16, 2010 at 1:10pm
Irony prefers to be distracted by the housing project in Jerusalem. Puzzling. I'm sorry that this discussion has little to do with Ireland, where I would appreciate more insight into their standoff. Blackton rightly criticizes Bush. Maybe Obama is deploying "dark arts" against the Iranian regime. Maybe not. But he is in a much better position to do that than the Israelis. Obama's apparent failure to do so, his lack of open support for the Iranian opposition, his unwillingness to support an Israeli raid, and his public abuse of Israel only makes it more likely that the Israelis could launch a risky desperate solo attack on Iranian nuclear and other military targets. The Israelis and the Sunni Arabs are not drawing optimistic conclusions from Obama's behavior. Meaningful open support for the Iranian opposition is less likely than bombing raids to rally Iranians behind A'jad. Mossadegh was a long time ago. Also, Abbas Milani drew less than fearful lessons from the Mossadegh crisis in a TNR article a few months ago. I don't have it handy at the moment.
- amidut
March 16, 2010 at 1:13pm
irony, this is a stupid pissing match. I dunno about Netanyahu, he has managed to alienate every US President there is. What bothers me is not the no. I could not care less about Jewish housing in a Jewish neighborhood, it was the US asked Israel not to build and Israel said "screw you, no." The announcement was damn dumb and was taken as a direct insult, so now the Obama administration is trying to get Netanyahu to buckle under. At this point, they are all acting like asses.
- blackton
March 16, 2010 at 1:26pm
irony, this is a stupid pissing match. I dunno about Netanyahu, he has managed to alienate every US President there is. What bothers me is not the no. I could not care less about Jewish housing in a Jewish neighborhood, it was the US asked Israel not to build and Israel said "screw you, no." The announcement was damn dumb and was taken as a direct insult, so now the Obama administration is trying to get Netanyahu to buckle under. At this point, they are all acting like asses.
- blackton
March 16, 2010 at 2:14pm
sorry about the triple posting, my connection went on the fritz
- blackton
March 16, 2010 at 2:25pm
OK OK OK
- ironyroad
March 16, 2010 at 3:58pm
"Maybe, but it sure looks like Netanyahu's government handed him the score and put the conductor's baton in his hand." Whether orchestrated or genuinely felt, Obama's response was a disproportionate reaction. I read today something about the logic of "justified" over reaction. The comment was made about another subject but the examples are applicable to Obama's conduct in this matter: Let's say Obama's reaction is, at root, a reaction to Israel's tactless announcement about the building expansion in a Jewish neighbourhood in Jerusalem. "OK, let's just take that as unproblematic, but note that something's being a reaction to something else doesn't yet enlighten you about the moral quality, the justification or otherwise, of the reaction. If you put ants in my breakfast cereal and I react by protesting, that would seem to be OK. But if I lend you a book you've asked to borrow and you react by shredding it before my eyes, that wouldn't. If Brian says a friendly hello to Amelia and Amelia reacts by kissing Brian long and suggestively in the presence of Brian's wife Molly, the whole situation is a bit more complicated and one may need to know more before saying what's good about Amelia's reaction, if anything, and what isn't good about it." http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2010/03/narrative-of-humiliation.html
- noga1
March 16, 2010 at 5:21pm
Ok Noga, I agree that proportionality is an issue. Not the only one, but still. So, what do you consider the appropriate response to a public declaration of "fuck you anyway" by a member of the government to your major ally when that ally's second-most senior leader is visiting your country to express its support for you?
- ironyroad
March 16, 2010 at 5:40pm
"So, what do you consider the appropriate response to a public declaration of "fuck you anyway" Does that mean that you swallowed the whole '"fuck you anyway" narrative? An uncomplicated yes or no will suffice as an answer, thank you.
- noga1
March 16, 2010 at 7:39pm
Not necessarily, but the other "narrative" (oh dear!) seems to on the lines of "Look, I'm sorry Mr Vice-President, but a senior minister in my cabinet, who is a bit of a crazy but he sort of holds my government's fate in his hands, didn't realize you were here today -- you know how these things slip through the cracks -- and he chose today -- yes I know it's silly, yes, exactly the day you are here -- to, well, to announce we were building another few -- well a bit more than a few really -- housing units in East Jerusalem -- now let's all keep calm around here . . ." One is reminded of Peter Sellers as the president in Dr. Strangelove on the phone to the Soviet premier: "Well Dimitri, the thing is . . ."
- ironyroad
March 16, 2010 at 9:26pm
I take that as a Yes to my question. BTW, I never warmed up to Dr. Strangelove. So your quote is lost on me.
- noga1
March 16, 2010 at 9:48pm
I meant that there are two obvious options, "fuck you" or utter incompetence. Either the Interior Ministry did know that Biden was down the street, and chose to make the announcement anyway to embarrass the PM and give the finger to Biden (1) or minister Yishai and/or his key advisors didn't know, or didn't care, and just carried on their merry way (2). I honestly don't know (how could I?). On the one hand, my more suspicious self says it's (1), and anything else is just delusion. And yet. And yet. On the other, I'm reminded of Henry Adams in The Education, in the chapters where he writes about being with his father in the U.S. embassy in London during the Civil War. He describes how he just assumed the actions of the Brits (supporting the Confederacy in various ways) and their defense of those actions were pure machiavellian gaming. And then, decades later, when more information came out Adams finally realized how little Palmerston, Russell, etc were really thinking about context or consequences and how often sheer incompetence and mental laziness lay behind their apparently tactically planned actions.
- ironyroad
March 16, 2010 at 10:12pm
Having just written a book comparing the Northern Ireland and Oslo peace processes, [Thomas Mitchell,"When Peace Fails: Lessons from Belfast for the Middle East (McFarland, 2010)], I feel I'm more qualified than Marty Peretz to comment on this. Peretz's ignorance can be demonstrated by his use of the definite article before "peace wall." Actually there are dozens of these walls separating nationalist and unionist neighborhoods in Belfast and other cities because the demographic layout of Northern Ireland resembles a checkerboard--there are loyalist enclaves within nationalist West Belfast and nationalist enclaves within unionist East Belfast. Mitchell was successful because the situation was ripe for negotiations and agreement because the Sinn Fein leadership had decided that terrorism/armed struggle was counterproductive. It took them several more years to convince the IRA (their armed wing) to disarm. Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and some factions within Fatah haven't yet decided that terrorism is counterproductive. Nor are many Israelis yet ready to comprise on freeing the West Bank. Marty by his own admission is a Netanyahu backer--a Likudnik. Therefore he is about as unbiased as having someone from Fatah commenting on the conflict. Mitchell will fail, but so would James Baker, Henry Kissinger, or anyone else.
- tmitch57
March 17, 2010 at 12:00pm
"Nor are many Israelis yet ready to comprise on freeing the West Bank. " I think you are wrong in this. Even ginzy has indicated that he would accept such a solution for a genuine peace agreement. I think he reflects a more general willingness to compromise, the key word being "genuine peace". There is no point in making concessions that cut deeply into the national identity for a promise of peace which the Palestinians have never been able to sustain or live up to. Israelis are interested in results, facts on the ground, not some dreamy utopian future generated by delusions and emotional neediness. Why is it necessary to always balance a severe judgment of Arab rejectionism with an equally severe judgment of Israeli rejectionism when there is no equivalence whatsoever, either in words or practice?
- noga1
March 18, 2010 at 9:16am