New Peace Talks Already a Failure

9 March 2010
As US peace envoy George Mitchell held talks yesterday with Palestinian and Israeli representatives in preparation for a new round of indirect negotiations, the Israeli government announced plans to build 1,200 housing units in a settlement near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank.

This provocative Israeli step, in terms of its timing and substance, sends three key messages: The first message is addressed to the Palestinian [National] Authority [PNA] and its chairman President Mahmud Abbas that the Binyamin Netanyahu government is going ahead with its settlement construction plans, that it will not give in to any pressure aimed at stopping its plans, and that any pressure will be doomed to failure.

The second message is addressed to the US Administration to emphasize that the promise of freezing settlement construction for several months is absolutely not binding on the Israeli government, and that the US peace envoy has better give up his ambition of focusing his forthcoming round of indirect negotiation on defining the border of a future Palestinian state, because Israel alone will decide the border of this state according to its own perspective without interference from any other party.

The third message is addressed to the Arab governments and the Follow-up Committee of the Arab peace initiatives composed of the Arab foreign ministers, which gave Palestinian President Abbas an Arab cover to return to the indirect negotiations, to say that these governments have no weight whatsoever, and that their peace initiative has no value and does not command any respect from Israel.

Logic says that the Arab foreign ministers who supported the PNA's return to the negotiations should act immediately, withdraw the green light they gave to the PNA and give the red light instead. In other words, the Arab foreign ministers should immediately withdraw their support for negotiations and demand that the Palestinian party not back down on its previous demand for full and real freeze on settlement construction. However, the Arab governments will not take such a step and will, as usual, bury their heads in sand.

Dr Sa'ib Urayqat, the de facto Palestinian foreign minister and one of the architects and advocates of the plan of indirect negotiations, said in a statement to the Al-Jazeera Satellite Channel that the Israeli decision to resume settlement construction is addressed to the US mediator and that he should stand up to. Dr Urayqat seems too optimistic because the US party now pays no attention to the Palestinians. And the current US Administration fully adopts the Israeli steps for the simple reason that the negotiations dossier, or rather the dossier of the Arab-Israeli conflict in general is low on the list of the US priorities compared to the Iranian nuclear dossier, the US economic crisis, and other US domestic concerns.

We wish that President Abbas had stood by his original position of refusing to resume negotiations until Israel had agreed to completely freeze settlement construction. But he quickly backed down in response to US pressure and the threat of ceasing financial aid. He travelled to Sharm al-Shyakh seeking the Egyptian president's help to facilitate a return to the negotiations with Arab green light, which is what has happened.

It is not Israel's fault, rather, it is a flaw in the PNA leadership which has become a willing tool in the hands of the US Administration, a tool that has no weight and that commands no respect. Since Israel continues with its plans to Judaize the land and holy places without showing any consideration to any party, why should the PNA go to the negotiations, and why should it continue to entertain the illusion of peace? Let this PNA bow out now as it has become a burden on the Palestinian people. Let it open the way for other options, including the various forms of resistance. Are there any clearer signs of the failure of its option for negotiations? Given the current situation, for the PNA to retain power is more harmful to the Palestinian people than its departure, which is now in the Palestinian national interest.