Israel

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat speaks during a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah on January 2, 2012. Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will meet this week after more than a year of deadlock in peacemaking (Mohamad Torokman/Courtesy Reuters). That Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will meet with Jordanian and Quartet representatives on Tuesday is good news. Despite serious mutual distrust and the strong likelihood that nothing significant will emerge that day, both Israelis and Palestinians recognize that, as Winston Churchill once quipped, “To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.” That the two sides see it as in their interests to talk right now is important. With Syria burning, Iran saber rattling, and Egypt mired in internal unrest, regional uncertainties could have propelled Israelis and Palestinians to continue waiting to see how things pan out. Both Palestinians and Israelis recognize that time will not make it easier to resume negotiations. To wait much longer could make it impossible for the two sides to reengage. Conclusion of a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation deal would likely prevent Mahmoud Abbas and the Israelis from returning to the table. Reengaging in talks right now suggests that Abbas would like to at least explore whether a genuine negotiating option might exist. It is also difficult for him to say no to Jordan’s king Abdullah, the last remaining figure willing to actively support engagement with the Israelis right now. Israel has maintained that it seeks negotiations without preconditions. However, the Quartet has called on both sides to produce serious proposals for a final peace settlement on borders and security. For Netanyahu to lay down a map now of Israel’s future border with Palestine—just weeks before his Likud Party holds a snap primary election—is virtual political suicide, given that his internal challenges come entirely from his right, not his left. Resuming talks right now, while desirable, inadvertently makes the situation on the ground riskier. Having just visited Jordan, Israel and the West Bank, it is clear that all parties feel considerable anxiety about taking such a step. Abbas is returning to talks without attaining his longstanding demand that negotiations resume with an Israeli settlement freeze. Unless he can demonstrate quickly that talks produce tangible benefits for the Palestinians, he will feel compelled to break them off. Doing so would then probably add momentum to Fatah-Hamas reconciliation, making the prospects for later Israeli-Palestinian talks all the more difficult. Failure could easily lead Palestinian militants to renew violence, arguing that talks do not produce results. Israelis see these risks, and are not convinced that the steps they could adopt would alter this Palestinian dynamic. Yet they do not want to be blamed for not returning to the table, nor, like the Palestinians, do they wish to say no to the Jordanians. This means that the parties, having decided to resume discussions, must find a way to keep them themselves there. This will require serious diplomatic creativity, outside support, and political courage. Ultimately, it will require both Israeli prime minister Netanyahu and Palestinian president Abbas to take steps that may be unpopular with their core domestic political base, but are supported by their larger political constituents, the majority of whom I firmly believe still want negotiations to succeed.

There are repeated efforts to forge a unity agreement of some sort between Hamas and Fatah, leading to a new "unity government" for the Palestinian Authority. Such a coalition was briefly in force in 2007 after the Saudi-sponsored Mecca Agreement. It quickly broke down into violence and led to the Hamas coup in Gaza. What would it mean today? One immediate effect of such an agreement would be a new PA cabinet in which Salam Fayyad would no longer be prime minister. Fayyad’s presence has meant, first, transparency and a struggle against corruption. His departure almost guarantees that the integrity of the PA’s books and finances will decline. But Fayyad as prime minister not only oversees the books; he also oversees the security forces. What were once thirteen armed gangs reporting to Yasser Arafat is an increasingly professional sector, keeping order in the West Bank and working well with the Israeli army and police against terror. With Fayyad gone, it is predictable that the PA services, including the American-trained police, will tend to become more corrupt and more political, serving the interests of Fatah or of certain Fatah leaders. At a deeper level, a unity agreement would bring Hamas into the PLO and thereby compromise the PA’s and PLO’s commitment to fight terrorism and seek a Palestinian state without violence. Since the death of Arafat in 2004, the PA and PLO have abandoned terrorism and spoken out against it. But consider two recent statements [courtesy of Palestinian Media Watch], made days apart in December. First, PA president and PLO chairman Mahmoud Abbas, talking about negotiations with Hamas: we established some foundations for an agreement. Among these foundations - first, Hamas concurs with us on the following points: the first point is that the calm and the ceasefire are [in place] not only in Gaza, but also in the West Bank - that’s one. Two - the resistance must be non-violent -popular. There will be no military resistance, honestly. And we agreed on this. The third point [was] that the permanent solution is on the ’67 borders. Hamas agreed to this, too. The fourth point - that we would go to elections in May of next year. Second, the statement by the Hamas "prime minister" Ismail Haniyah on the 24th anniversary of the founding of Hamas: We say today, explicitly, so it cannot be explained otherwise, that the armed resistance and the armed struggle are the path and the strategic choice for liberating the Palestinian land, from the [Mediterranean] sea to the [Jordan] river, and for the expulsion of the invaders and usurpers [Israel] from the blessed land of Palestine. The Hamas movement will lead Intifada after Intifada until we liberate Palestine - all of Palestine, Allah willing. Allah Akbar and praise Allah. We say with transparency and in a clear manner, that Palestinian reconciliation - and all sides must know this - cannot come at the expense of [our] principles, at the expense of the resistance. These principles are absolute and cannot be disputed: Palestine - all of Palestine - is from the sea to the river. We won’t relinquish one inch of the land of Palestine. The involvement of Hamas at any stage with the interim objective of liberation of [only] Gaza, the West Bank, or Jerusalem, does not replace its strategic view concerning Palestine and the land of Palestine." So, the most one can say is that Hamas is willing to stop committing acts of terror for a while when that seems tactically smart, but ultimately the goal is a violent destruction of the State of Israel. How could there possibly be a peace negotiation if half of the PA government is committed to the Haniyah view? In the past, it was sometimes possible to argue that Hamas participation in the PA did not give it a role in the PLO--and it is the PLO with which Israel is in principle negotiating. But now Hamas is on the verge of joining the PLO as well, and according to the United Nations and the Arab League the PLO is the "sole legitimate voice of the Palestinian people." So what happens when that voice is calling for Israel’s destruction? And when Hamas joins the PLO, how can the United States possibly allow the PLO to maintain its representative office in Washington? Perhaps these negotiations between Hamas and Fatah will never bear fruit. Perhaps both sides merely wish to appear to favor "unity" while in fact neither wants it. Perhaps the elections planned for May will never take place--a reasonable bet, considering that there have been no elections for six years. Perhaps a new cabinet will be formed in Ramallah and soon collapse, as happened last time. But peace negotiations cannot occur until we know the answer--until we know the identity and intentions of those who may be governing the West Bank and may sit across the table should talks resume. So Secretary of Defense Panetta’s now famous demand "just get to the damn table" looks especially foolish today, when people who want "Palestine - all of Palestine -from the sea to the river" and say they "will lead Intifada after Intifada until we liberate Palestine - all of Palestine" may be part of both the PA government and of the PLO.  

Iceland recently recognized Palestine as a state. As I noted in The Weekly Standard, according to Iceland, Palestinian sovereignty includes 100 percent of the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem. Palestine, as Icelanders see it, includes the Western Wall of the Second Temple, Judaism’s holiest site. The judenrein policy enforced by Jordan during the years it ruled Jerusalem would thus be reinstated. And Israel in any recognizable form would anyway disappear, for the Allthingi resolution calls for all Palestinian refugees--of whom according to the U.N. there are five million--to "return" to Israel. Remarkably Iceland made this move exactly sixty-four years to the day after its ambassador to the United Nations played a key and courageous role in helping establish the State of Israel.  It is a marvelous story, told in full in the memoirs of Abba Eban (which I quote in the Standard piece). As I concluded there, "There will probably be very few Icelanders who know this story and wonder how their country fell from being a model of courage and principle to one of self-regard and mock bravery. One doubts it will be widely told in Reykjavik."

A Palestinian rides his bicycle as he passes the United Nations Works and Relief Agency (UNRWA) headquarters at Shati refugee camp in Gaza April 26, 2008. (Courtesy REUTERS/Ismail Zaydah). Since the end of the Second World War, millions of refugees have left refugee camps, and refugee status, and moved to countries that accepted them--quickly or slowly--as citizens. Post-World War II Europe was an archipelago of displaced persons and refugee camps, housing 850,000 people in 1947--Czechs, Poles, Lithuanians, Germans, Latvians, Greeks, and many more nationalities. By 1952, all but one of the camps had closed. Hundred of thousands of Jewish refugees from Europe went to Israel after 1948, and then hundreds of thousands more arrived from Arab lands when they were forced to flee after 1956 and 1967. The children and grandchildren of these refugees, born after their arrival, were never refugees themselves; they were from birth citizens of the new land, as their parents had become immediately upon their own arrival. In this process many nations and agencies have played wonderful roles, not least the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The exception to this refugee story is the Palestinians. In most of the Arab lands to which they fled or travelled after 1948 they were often treated badly, and refused citizenship (with Jordan the major exception) or even the right to work legally. And instead of coming under the protection of UNHCR, they had a special agency of their own, UNRWA, the UN Relief and Works Agency. In the decades of its existence, it has not solved or even diminished the Palesinian refugee problem; instead it has presided over a massive increase in its size, for all the descendants of Palestinian refugees are considered to be refugees as well. Once there were 750,000; now there are five million people considered by UNRWA to be "Palestinian refugees." And UNRWA is now the largest UN agency, with a staff of 30,000. UNHCR cares for the rest of the world with about 7,500 personnel. The political background to this story is simple: only in the case of Israel was there a determined refusal to accept what had happened during and after World War II, with the establishment of the Jewish state and the increase in its population by the acceptance of refugee Jews. Of all the world’s refugees, whom UNHCR tries normally to resettle, only the Palestinians are an exception. UNRWA presides over generation after generation of additional refugees, and Arab states and leaders make believe that some day they can turn back the clock and send them--and their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren--to Israel. To say this is not necessarily to criticize the day-to-day activities of UNRWA, for it was handed a mission by the UN. There are and have always been many UNRWA officials who are reliable international civil servants. And no doubt, any change in UNRWA’s role should come slowly and carefully so as not to harm innocent people caught up in international political struggles. But UNRWA should cease to exist, and Palestinian refugees should be handled by UNHCR with the intention of resettling them. That process should begin with a redefinition of who is a refugee entitled to benefits, so that benefits are based on need rather than on status. Moreover, Palestinians who have citizenship in other countries should not be considered refugees at all--the standard practice for every other group of refugees in the world. Why, for example, should the nearly two million Palestinians in Jordan, over 90 percent of whom have Jordanian citizenship, today be considered refugees by UNRWA at all? Lest that position seem idiosyncratic, consider this: in 2010 Canada cut off its funding of UNRWA, and just now the Netherlands government has said it is considering the same action. How did they explain this? The foreign minister told parliament that Holland would "thoroughly review" its policy and the ruling party called UNRWA’s refugee definition "worrying." UNRWA, said the party spokesman, "uses its own unique definition of refugees, different to the UN’s. The refugee issue is a big obstacle for peace. We therefore ask the government acknowledge this discrepancy, which leads to the third-generation Palestinian refugees." Correction: fourth-generation, actually. It is worth noting that there are many other criticisms of UNRWA: that it overlooks terrorist group activity in some camps, or allows members of Hamas and other terrorist groups to hold UNRWA staff positions. But those are criticisms of how UNRWA is carrying out its mission, while the deeper problem is the mission itself. That mission might accurately be described as enlarging the Palestinian refugee problem forever and thereby making any Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement tremendously more difficult if not impossible to achieve. Closing UNRWA would in the end be a great favor to Palestinians who live outside the West Bank and Gaza, assuming that the needed services it provides them could be provided by other agencies or the governments of the countries in which they live. Some of those individuals will some day move to the West Bank or Gaza, but they do not need UNRWA to do that. None of them will ever move to Israel, and the existence of UNRWA helps to maintain the cruel myth that they will. The "peace process" seems stalled today; no negotiated final settlements is on the horizon. But there are many things that can be done that move toward peace, such as the building of Palestinian institutions and improvement of the economy in the West Bank. Starting the process of closing down UNRWA would be a move toward peace, as it would replace the permanent perpetuation of the Palestinian refugee problem with a process designed to reduce it in size and some day solve it.

The Dome of the Rock is seen during sunset in Jerusalem's Old City on January 12, 2011 (Baz Ratner/Courtesy Reuters). Jerusalem-- After a brief visit to Israel and the Palestinian Territories, it is clear that Israelis and Palestinians are gazing past one another, focused largely on their own internal developments and on broader regional issues. Both share a sense that the plate tectonics of the region are shifting, and both are trying to figure out how best to navigate through this changing environment. The euphoria I sensed among Palestinians the last time I visited several months ago, brought about by Mahmoud Abbas’s efforts to attain statehood recognition in New York, was burst by the Israel-Hamas deal in which Corporal Shalit was exchanged for more than one thousand Palestinian prisoners. Hamas delivered; Abbas hasn’t.  While settler violence, both against Palestinians as well as against the Israeli army, has recently increased dramatically in the West Bank, the sense that an uprising could explode at any time has dissipated. Though, one can never be sure. A Palestinian friend called it “the calm between the storms.” Meanwhile, internal Palestinian political machinations have intensified. Abbas’s repeated call for elections in various Palestinian political bodies, combined with his pledge not to run himself, has set off intense backroom Palestinian politicking. Abbas and Hamas’ Khaled Meshal failed to make significant headway in bridging their differences in their meeting in Cairo last month. Still, the pace of Palestinian reconciliation efforts has been stepped up, and no one would be surprised if a breakthrough were reached tomorrow. Yet nobody is predicting it. Fatah-Hamas meetings are slated to be held this month, as are intensive meetings that will explore the prospects of bringing Hamas inside the PLO, the supreme Palestinian political organization representing the interests of Palestinians worldwide. The central question yet remains: on whose terms would they agree? Meanwhile, Israeli officials are watching regional developments with alarm. They see the potential for Assad’s downfall to roll back Iranian influence in the Arab world. They also fear that Syria’s instability could spill over into Jordan or Lebanon or indeed directly over their shared border. And Israeli officials continue to fret over Egypt, seeing developments there trending against Israeli interests. Yes, the Israelis have been able to return their ambassador to Cairo, and nobody is threatening to tear up their peace treaty tomorrow. Nonetheless, Israeli officials worry about the political successes so far of the Muslim Brotherhood and of the more extremist Salafist parties, and they see developments in Egypt constricting Israeli freedom to maneuver concerning Gaza. While some in Israel are arguing that the regional unrest should lead Prime Minister Netanyahu to redouble his efforts to reach out to Mahmoud Abbas, the snap Likud primary that Netanyahu recently called for late January will push him further away from any peacemaking efforts in the next few months. He wins no points from the hard right in Likud by making gestures toward the Palestinians right now, even if larger national interests might argue for drawing the Palestinians back to the table lest broader regional issues render such talks impossible. Yet above all, Israeli officials are most worried and most focused on Iran. They are not convinced when President Obama and other senior American officials insist on every occasion that all options remain on the table and that an Iranian nuclear weapon is unacceptable. Instead, the Israelis seem to suspect that the United States may be prepared to live with an Iranian bomb. U.S. and Israeli officials have intensified their crisscrossing of the Atlantic in their efforts to overcome what appears to be a profound absence of mutual trust between the two sides. So far, the numerous exchanges have not succeeded in forging a strategic agreement on how to handle the Iranian threat. Let’s hope Israel and the United States reach some understanding soon, lest one side acts having miscalculated the intentions of the other.

With the Palestinian Authority still negotiating for a unity government with Hamas, and elections now scheduled for May 2012, it is worth asking whether Hamas has changed. Has the effect of the Arab Spring, where Islamist parties have won elections in Tunisia, Morocco, and Egypt, led Hamas to turn away from terrorism toward the ballot box or to moderate any of its positions? Here is what the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyah, Gaza’s “prime minister,” told a huge rally in Gaza on December 13: We affirm that armed resistance is our strategic option and the only way to liberate our land, from the [Mediterranean] sea to the River [Jordan]. God willing, Hamas will lead the people... to the uprising until we liberate Palestine, all of Palestine. So, the commitment to terrorism and the absolute refusal to accept the existence of Israel remain. Indeed, this was a call for the violent destruction of the Jewish State. Those who, like Secretary of Defense Panetta, continue to say “just get to the damn table” are blinding themselves to the most obvious problems of the “peace process.” Putting aside the fact that it is the Palestinians, not Israel, who are refusing to go to the table, is it worthwhile negotiating with half of the Palestinian polity when the other half is announcing such goals, and any agreement that might be reached cannot be implemented? In fact the Haniyah statement raises once again another issue: should a terrorist group still committed to violence be permitted to contest the elections? In 2006, the United States and the Quartet said yes, because a group might in theory abandon violence after winning and then be a suitable participant in democratic politics. Perhaps there are circumstances, in some places, where that theory would apply, but it should not be applied to Hamas, in 2012; Hamas has shown that it will not abandon its goals or its methods. Given that Hamas is a part of the Muslim Brotherhood, here is a question about other Brotherhood groups, affiliates, or sympathizers coming to power in other Arab lands: will they denounce Hamas for such statements and call for a peaceful settlement? Will they say they agree with PLO leader and PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s rejection of terrorism? How they talk about these issues, and how they treat Hamas leaders, will tell us a good deal about the political paths they will take. It is not the only litmus test, but it will be a useful one.  

Occasionally critics of the government of Israel and of its American supporters put aside polite talk and bare their souls, and that can be an edifying if deeply unattractive moment. Such a moment arose today in the New York Times, where its columnist Thomas Friedman exposed the depth of his hostility: I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby. Now, it is a fact that Americans remain extremely supportive of the State of Israel, as poll after poll has shown year after year and decade after decade. That support is near an all time high. Here is what the Gallup Poll found this year: In recent years, with no major breakthroughs in the Mideast peace process and no resolution to the Hamas vs. Fatah political rift in the Palestinian Territories, Americans’ sympathies toward the conflict’s players have leaned heavily toward the Israelis. In fact, with more than 60% of Americans sympathizing with Israel since 2010, public support for the Jewish state has been stronger than at any time other than in 1991, when Israel was hit by Iraqi Scud missiles during the Gulf War. Of course, that support is suspect to Mr. Friedman, for Gallup also found that it is higher among Republicans than among Democrats and higher among conservatives than among liberals. But what in the world except prejudice can lead Mr. Friedman to make the ugly charge that support for Israel in Congress, need support for Mr. Netanyahu in Congress, is "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby?" I would hope that in the cold light of morning Mr. Friedman would re-read what he wrote and withdraw the remark. Members of Congress in a country that is two percent Jewish stand to applaud Prime Minister Netanyahu because they, like their constituents, support Israel and want America to support Israel. Many of those standing and cheering were from districts where there are no Jews or a handful of Jews, and where Evangelical churches form the strongest base of support for the Jewish state. Now perhaps Mr. Friedman means those churches when he refers so nastily to the "Jewish Lobby," but I doubt it. I think we all know what he means, and that is why he should withdraw the ugly remark fast. He owes an apology to hundreds of members of Congress who spoke for their constituents when they applauded Mr. Netanyahu, and to the millions of Americans Jews and Christians whom they faithfully represent.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad welcomes a Kuwaiti official as Kuwait's Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser al-Mohammad al-Sabah watches before an official meeting in Tehran (Morteza Nikoubazl/Courtesy Reuters) Kuwait City Iraq...Iran.    Iran...Iraq. It is fair to say that Baghdad and Tehran combine to make for a certain amount of national neuroses in Kuwait.  So it is fortuitous that I am in Kuwait as the last American combat forces depart Iraq and the “coming confrontation with Iran” discussion is heating up in Washington, Jerusalem, and no doubt capitals throughout the Middle East.  The fact that Kuwaitis are worried about both countries is not news.  The Kuwaitis remain concerned—as they should be—that post-Saddam Iraq may yet pose a threat to their security.  According to Kuwaitis, there are enough Iraqis who believe that Kuwait is, indeed, the 19th province of Iraq to produce anxiety about what a Baghdad without the restraining power of American forces might do. On Iran, there is concern, but it is of an entirely different sort than the debate—if you can call it that—going on in Washington.  Of course, the Kuwaitis don’t want Iran to develop nuclear technology, but their concern is deeper and poses a more difficult policy dilemma for them and their allies, primarily the United States.  From Kuwait City, the Iranian drive to develop nuclear technology is not a function of crazed mullahs hell-bent on dropping the big one on Tel Aviv.  Rather, it is the result of Iranians’ belief in their own exceptionalism, which drives an expansionary foreign policy in Tehran’s quest to influence the region.  In other words, from the perspective of Kuwaitis, the clerical regime in Iran—bad though it may be—is not the problem; Iran is the problem.  In other words, it does not matter who is in charge in Iran and what their particular worldview happens to be, as long as Tehran isn’t the regional hegemon, it will not be satisfied with the status quo in the Gulf and beyond. It strikes me that this analysis, which is entirely plausible given what we know about Tehran’s foreign policy under the Shah, throws into question the underlying logic of regime change in Iran.  There may be good reason why the clerical regime is a threat to regional peace and stability, but even if the regime is “replaced” (I think that is the new term of art) and there is a change in Iran’s approach to the region, that shift may only be temporary.  If that is the case, then regime replacement seems to be a pretty bad course—a waste of resources and lives.  Still, that insight neither resolves the problem that Iran continues to present nor restrains the Israelis who have a far more acute sense of the Iranian threat than Americans and Kuwaitis. So what is the answer?  The Kuwaitis will tell you it isn’t war.  Other than a few diehards left in Washington it is unlikely that the United States will try its hand at engagement again.  What was wrong with containment? Somewhere along the line it was declared dead. Yet containing Iran (and Iraq) was relatively cheap and it largely worked.  The Iranians were unable to alter the regional order in its favor.  This failure is, no doubt, the reason why the Iranians are developing a nuclear capacity.   Why can’t the United States and its allies contain a nuclear Iran? Didn’t Washington contain a nuclear capable Moscow? To be sure, some will say that it is because Iranian leaders have a worldview that makes them uncontainable—i.e. that they are irrational.  I don’t buy it.  I think they are bad people, but I don’t think they are undeterrable and uncontainable.  This isn’t a popular position to take in Washington these days, but ask the Kuwaitis.  They don’t want to live with the consequences of yet another war on their doorstep.  They’d prefer to marshal the resources of the region and the United States to keep the Iranians in the proverbial box.  I am with them.  

Secretary of Defense Panetta addressed the Saban Forum, the annual meeting of Israeli and American journalists, officials, and former officials, on Friday evening. What he said is no mystery; why he said it is a considerable one. The transcript is here. What he said was that Israel is largely to blame for its troubles. No doubt he and other Obama administration officials and spokesmen would deny that, but the journalists present had it right. The Washington Post headline was “Panetta Chides Israel Over Stalled Peace Process.” The New York Times reported that “Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta spoke sternly on Friday to America’s closest ally in the Middle East, telling Israel that it is partly responsible for its increasing isolation and that it now must take “bold action” — diplomatic, not military — to mend ties with its Arab neighbors and settle previously intractable territorial disputes with the Palestinians." “Get to the damn table,” Mr. Panetta shouted, as if it were Israel rather than the PLO that has been refusing to come to the table. But there was worse. Secretary Panetta repeatedly said Israel should trust the United States to stop Iran from getting a bomb and said again, in the old mantra, that all options are on the table. Then he was asked how long a military attack might postpone Iran from getting a bomb. Here was the reply: SEC.PANETTA: Part of the problem here is the concern that at best, I think – talking to my friends – the indication is that at best it might postpone it maybe one, possibly two years. It depends on the ability to truly get the targets that they’re after. Frankly, some of those targets are very difficult to get at. That kind of, that kind of shot would only, I think, ultimately not destroy their ability to produce an atomic weapon, but simply delay it – number one. Of greater concern to me are the unintended consequences, which would be that ultimately it would have a backlash and the regime that is weak now, a regime that is isolated would suddenly be able to reestablish itself, suddenly be able to get support in the region, and suddenly instead of being isolated would get the greater support in a region that right now views it as a pariah. Thirdly, the United States would obviously be blamed and we could possibly be the target of retaliation from Iran, striking our ships, striking our military bases. Fourthly – there are economic consequences to that attack – severe economic consequences that could impact a very fragile economy in Europe and a fragile economy here in the United States. And lastly I think that the consequence could be that we would have an escalation that would take place that would not only involve many lives, but I think could consume the Middle East in a confrontation and a conflict that we would regret. So we have to be careful about the unintended consequences of that kind of an attack. Now, if that is the secretary’s view he is duty bound to say it secretly to the president in the Oval Office. But it is astonishing that he would say this on the record, for consumption in Tehran as well as in Jerusalem and all Arab capitals. For who, reading those words, really can believe that “all options are on the table?” Who can believe Panetta hasn’t already made up his mind and will fight any decision to use force? Note his comment that how long a strike would delay Iran’s program “depends on the ability to truly get at the targets that they’re after. Frankly, some of those targets are very difficult to get at.” In plain English, what he was saying--as news stories put it--was that "US says strike on Iran could miss nuclear sites." How reassuring for the Iranian regime. How can such comments possibly help the president’s declared policy of pressuring Iran to slow down or abandon its nuclear program? The ayatollahs must gauge the impact of sanctions and the prospect of a military strike, so is it not obviously useful to keep them afraid of such a strike? Should not the secretary be saying, on the record, something like this: Look, use of force is always a last resort. But the United States is a superpower, and Iran is not, and I have no doubt whatsoever of our ability to complete any mission regarding Iran upon which the President may decide. I hope the regime there knows that. We are not afraid of Iran but they ought to be very afraid of the United States. Or words to that effect. How can it be the role of the secretary of defense to undermine the declared policy toward Iran? One wonders if the White House cleared this speech. If not, one hopes there will be hell to pay. If there is not, or if it was indeed cleared, we are learning something anew: that the declared policy that “all options are on the table” is simply not credible. Not here, not in Jerusalem, not in Gulf capitals, and alas not in Tehran.

With the exception of Ron Paul, every one of the Republican candidates on the stage at Constitution Hall is a strong supporter of the alliance between the United States and Israel. In Tuesday night’s debate as in previous outings, they stated in compelling terms their understanding of why the friendship and cooperation between Israel and our country is of great value to us. For the most part they did not blink at the possibility of a military strike on Iran as a last resort and as an outcome preferable to permitting Iran to become a nuclear weapons state. To these necessarily conditional statements--conditional because the precise situation months or years down the road is of course unclear, and will depend in large part on what actions the United States takes in the interim--Mitt Romney added a specific promise. He would, he said, make a visit to Israel his first foreign trip. This promise will be attacked by the usual suspects, from the New York Times to Democratic Party spokesmen defending the Obama Administration to Arab diplomats. And among the things they will say is that it is a gimmick. In his nearly three years in office, President Obama has never visited Israel though he visited both Cairo and Riyadh very early on. President Bush visited Israel only in his seventh year in office, though Israelis did not much complain because he was so clearly and strongly supportive of the Jewish State year after year. President Clinton first visited in October 1994, after nearly three years in office. President Reagan never visited Israel, nor did President George H.W. Bush. President Carter visited in March 1979, after twenty-six months in office. Typically a president’s first visit abroad is to Canada. So what Romney has promised would be a first. It would be a remarkable signal to the Middle Eastern states and to the Europeans that the Obama era of distancing from Israel is over. At a moment of instability in the region it would visibly restore one solid pillar: the American-Israel alliance. For the Turks wondering how far to go in their new hostility to Israel, the Iranian ayatollahs thinking about whether our pledge to stop their nuclear weapons programs is real, Jordanians and Moroccans asking if we will support moderate reform against the forces of radicalism--the list is long--the symbolic power of such a visit would be immense. I am glad that neither Romney nor any other candidate promised to move the U.S.Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, for that is indeed a gimmick. This promise has been made many times before but once in office presidents keep postponing it and postponing it--and then they leave office. Such a pledge is simply not credible. Romney’s promise is so easy to keep that he would have to do it, as he must have known when he made it. As noted he’ll be attacked for it: he’ll be accused of pandering and of risking our relations with the Arab world. But the gesture of making Israel his first foreign trip would instantly communicate more effectively than any other that a foreign policy radically different from that of President Obama was now in place. Any Republican who replaces President Obama in 2013 should "take the pledge" and make similar travel plans.

Fifteen percent of the entire annual steel consumption of the State of Israel is now being targeted at the construction of a Sinai fence. If this barrier ever has a name, perhaps it could be called the Arab Spring Memorial. The demise of the Mubarak regime has left the Egyptian army focused on Egypt’s largest cities, and the Sinai has become an even more lawless place. Bedouin smugglers, Hamas terrorists, and African migrants seeking to cross into Israel now face Egyptian police or military action only in the aftermath of a serious incident, such as occurred in August when terrorists struck near Eilat. But a lawless Sinai is a nightmare for Israel, so it has decided to build a serious barrier to infiltration (as an excellent article in Haaretz describes). Until now, all that has separated Israel from Sinai was a barbed wire fence that would not have defeated a boy scout. This new Sinai fence will ultimately be 240 kilometers long, from Gaza in the north to Eilat at its south end. About one hundred kilometers will be finished by January, and the rest by the end of next year. Israel is constructing a fifteen-foot high metal fence, to be supplemented by army patrols, observation balloons, and sensitive electronic backup. The lesson Israel learned from the fence it has built to stop Palestinian terrorists from the West Bank is that these measures work. The wave of suicide bombings a decade ago, blowing up cafes and buses in the so-called second intifada, was stopped in large part by the physical separation of Israel from the West Bank in just the way it will soon be separated from Sinai. And while the building of the fence to stop West Bank terrorists produced endless Palestinian and international wailing, every inch of the Sinai barrier is being built inside "Green Line" Israeli territory. There can be no Egyptian or international complaints this time. Will good fences make good neighbors? Certainly this fence can help avoid difficult problems for Israel and the Egyptian military, with which it seeks good relations. After any terrorist attack from the Sinai, Israel will want to seek out and strike or capture the perpetrators--who may have slunk back across into Egyptian territory. Thus Israel would have to choose between violating Egyptian sovereignty or seeing the terrorists escape. Stopping these attacks can thus not only save lives in Israel but also avoid diplomatic incidents that might get out of hand. This barrier is no more an answer to restoring law and order in the Sinai than the West Bank fence is to building Palestinian democracy. Just as only Palestinians can choose to reject Hamas and other terrorist groups and build the institutions of a democratic state, only Egypt can in the end provide economic opportunities other than smuggling for Sinai Bedouins, and only Egyptian forces can prevent Egyptian, Palestinian, and international terrorists from operating in Sinai. Israel’s only option is to fence itself off, defend itself, and wait for better days. The bulldozers constructing the Sinai fence are not building a path to peace, but they are saving lives and buying time. These days, that’s quite an achievement.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu speaks during a news conference in Ankara September 2, 2011. Davutoglu said Turkey was reducing its diplomatic presence in Israel and suspending military agreements after details emerged of a U.N. report on an Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound ship that killed nine Turks (Stringer/Courtesy Reuters). INSTANBUL -- So far I have been in Turkey four days and try as I might to avoid it at all costs, it keeps coming up.  What is “it”?, you ask?  It is the subject of Turkey-Israel relations.  Perhaps my Turkish interlocutors believe that, because I am an American and I live and work near and inside the Beltway, I must want to discuss the consequences of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead, the notorious Davos Smackdown, and the infamous Mavi Marmara incident.  I don’t really, but I will because I am both polite and my hosts have brought up the topic and just in case anyone hasn’t noticed I am interested in the political effects of narratives. The Turkish account of where their relationship went wrong with Israel is all-at-once principled, self-righteous, rife with head-spinning ironies, and a certain amount of bravado.  The latter is manifested in the declarations that “Israel needs Turkey more than Turkey needs Israel,” and “Turkey is more strategically important to the United States than Israel.”  The Israelis and their supporters respond that whatever anyone says, “Israel actually really is strategically important to the United States.”  Never mind the fact that if either country was actually confident in their strategic value to the United States they would not need to declare it much less get into a spitting contest over it.  Still, any way you look at it, you have to give this one to the Turks. The breadth and depth of Ankara’s reach from the Balkans, the Caucuses, Central Asia, South Asia, the Levant, and North Africa is unparalleled even if “zero problems” turned out to be a zero.  Washington may not always like what the Turks are doing everywhere, but they are well-positioned to play a constructive role in places where American and Turkish interests overlap.  Needless to say, the Israelis don’t even have relations with many of the countries in these regions, making it hard to see Israel as a major strategic asset in anything other than the considerably narrower and technical areas of intelligence cooperation, military technology, and homeland security.  Important stuff, but altogether of a different and scale and magnitude than the kind of opportunities that Turkey brings to the table. The Turks shouldn’t get too big for their britches, however.  Israel, unlike Turkey, is genuinely popular in the United States. For good or bad, Americans—especially Christian evangelicals—tend to identify with Israelis and their cause, making it good politics for members of Congress to support Israel.  An energetic, well-resourced, determined, and perfectly legitimate lobby also helps.  This means that while the Turks may be correct that they are the superior strategic partner, the political risks associated with the Turkey-Israel row are far greater for Ankara.  For all these reasons, it is a good time for the Israelis to apologize, for the Turks to ratchet down the rhetoric, and for everyone to move on.  I know that most of the time it is not about me, but at least if the Turks and Israelis can forge a new relationship, I won’t have to talk about it so much.

The announcement that Dennis Ross is leaving his post creates a serious problem for the Obama administration. Ross has spent decades working on the "peace process" and knew almost every influential Israeli and Palestinian official. He also knew almost every influential American Jewish leader. The former pattern of acquaintances has not enabled Ross to get anywhere in the Middle East due mostly to errors made by President Obama and his initial Middle East envoy George Mitchell. Once they posited that a total Israeli construction freeze, including in Jerusalem, was a necessary precondition for negotiations, the possibility of talks was gone. The Palestinians could henceforth accept no less, but no Israeli leader could offer such a freeze. There have been many other errors, and both Israeli and Palestinian leaders have been saying off the record for about two years that they did not understand what the White House was up to. The good personal relations that president Bush maintained with top Israeli and Palestinian officials were lost. And it seems clear now that there will be no progress in the "peace process" next year--a year in which there will be an American election, very likely an Israeli election, and even possibly a Palestinian election (though history suggests betting against that one). But with the diplomacy frozen, Ross’s departure is not a diplomatic problem for the White House; it is instead a problem for the Obama re-election campaign. For Ross was the only official in whom most American Jewish leaders had confidence. As most of them are Democrats who have long accepted Ross’s faith in the "peace process," they viewed his role as the assurance that a steady, experienced, pro-Israel hand was on or near the tiller. When the White House did something that clearly harmed U.S.-Israel relations (such as the recent Sarkozy-Obama exchange on how difficult it is to deal with Prime Minister Netanyahu, where Sarkozy called Netanyahu a liar and Obama appeared to agree), or made foolish demands of Israel (such as the 100 percent construction freeze), and when the tone of the relationship clearly became far worse than it had been under Clinton or Bush, Jewish leaders comforted themselves that Dennis was still there. He was the person to whom they reached out, or who reached out to them and comforted them; he explained that things were not so bad really and that the President really cared about all this and had the warmest concern about Israel. No one else in this administration can now fill that role, as the President enters an election year with a powerful need to maintain the 78 percent support he had last time in the Jewish community. Thus the political problem. While as noted Ross’s departure does not in itself create a diplomatic problem, it does highlight once again the degree to which this administration has mismanaged affairs in the region. It has lost the confidence of Israeli and Palestinian leaders, and more broadly of Arab leaders, all of whom believe that American influence in the region is declining. It has presided over three years in which Israelis and Palestinians have not even been sitting together at the table, which would have calmed nerves even if it produced little or no progress. And it does not seem to know where to go next. The dates the Quartet has suggested for the Israelis and Palestinians to move forward--territorial proposals in January, and a final agreement by the end of 2012--seem designed to get everyone through the Christmas/New Year’s holidays and the round of 2012 elections. I don’t know why Mr. Ross is leaving and leaving now, but with the diplomatic situation that grim, who can blame him? And who can blame him if he has tired of being the facade of wonderful Obama-Israel relations behind which the actual political and diplomatic relationship steadily became colder and more distant.