Myth: Obama has no way forward on Mideast peace; his efforts have collapsed and are bound to fail. (Republican Jewish Coalition, Barry Rubin).

The Facts: President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu have reached a breakthrough agreement on new terms for renewing Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, a basis which is likely to be acceptable to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.

Steven J. Rosen reports in the “Mideast Peace Deal You Haven’t Heard About,” Foreign Policy, Dec. 19, 2009:

"Now, below the radar, Netanyahu is making a series of additional concessions to Barack Obama and his Mideast peace envoy, George Mitchell. Their current priority is negotiating 'terms of reference' to permit the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations (TORs in negotiators' vernacular). Dismissed by some as mere 'talking about talking,' TORs are in fact vital elements to create the parameters for serious negotiations….

"Mitchell's challenge today is to define such a framework that can bridge differences between Netanyahu and his Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas. Defying skeptics who say you can bridge a river but not an ocean, Mitchell keeps going at it, and his perseverance is paying off. While no one was watching, Netanyahu has in fact agreed to language that Mitchell can accept. With the Israeli agreement in his pocket, Mitchell is now working to bring Abbas around, according to sources close to the discussions.

"…Netanyahu has accepted a solution based on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's formulation: 'an outcome which ends the conflict and reconciles the Palestinian goal of an independent and viable state based on the 1967 lines, with agreed swaps, and the Israeli goal of a Jewish state with secure and recognized borders that reflect subsequent developments and meet Israeli security requirements.'"

The breakthrough is in Netanyahu's acceptance of the Clinton formula, which represents a recognition of the principle that Israel will ultimately have to withdraw from the West Bank, with agreed land swaps enabling Israel to retain what it defines as "settlement blocs."

Netanyahu met with Egyptian president Mubarak this week to present the agreements he has reached with the Obama administration to renew peace talks with the Palestinians, and is reported to have asked for Mubarak's help in swaying Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas to move forward with negotiations.

For more on the terms of the agreement, see “Netanyahu: No more excuses - time is ripe for Mideast peace,” Ha’aretz, Dec. 28, 2009

And for insightful commentary see Moshe Yaroni, “A Most Unlikely Source of Hope,” Zeek:

“…if Mitchell has been able to establish a framework for the talks and if the Obama Administration, now that the healthcare reform battle seems largely over, is ready to take an active role in the talks that come out of this, there is a real chance something could happen.

"To be sure, the issues themselves remain thorny and none of this addresses the issue of Gaza and the split among the Palestinians. Still, given the events of the past year, if serious talks in a realistic framework begin, that is a major step forward and would go a long way to restoring both the credibility of Barack Obama on this issue and rekindling the hope he campaigned on.”

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Will new negotiations under Obama's leadership result in the emergence of a Palestinian state living in peace and security side by side with Israel?

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad have brought about important security and economic achievements in the West Bank over the last two years in close cooperation with Israel and the U.S.

Three-time Pulitzer-prize winning New York Times foreign affairs correspondent Thomas Friedman reports that:

“…[F]or the first time since Oslo, there is an economic-security dynamic emerging on the ground in the West Bank that has the potential…to give the post-Yasir Arafat Palestinians another chance to build the sort of self-governing authority, army and economy that are prerequisites for securing their own independent state. A Palestinian peace partner for Israel may be taking shape again. The key to this rebirth was the recruitment, training and deployment of four battalions of new Palestinian National Security Forces — a move spearheaded by President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad of the Palestinian Authority.”[1]

Israeli columnist Ari Shavit reports in Ha’aretz that:

“The quiet [in the West Bank] is maintained by unprecedented cooperation between the IDF and the five Palestinian security branches. The coordination among the branches, and between them and the Palestinian Authority and Israel, has never been so close. Unlike the Oslo era, this time there is no whitewashing, overlooking and pretending. There are no revolving doors. Two Israeli field commanders…and five Palestinian field operators have achieved a security miracle in the West Bank…[T]he overwhelming majority in the West Bank [has] finally started functioning as a secular-pragmatic public. Many Palestinians [have] stopped acting and thinking as victims. Under Fayyad’s leadership they have taken their fate into their own hands and started building their future.”[2]

Friedman concludes: “The only way the Palestinian leadership running this show can maintain its legitimacy is if it is eventually given political authority, not just policing powers, over the West Bank – or at least a map that indicates they are on a pathway there. America must nurture this virtuous cycle: more money to train credible Palestinian troops, more encouragement for Israel’s risk-taking in eliminating checkpoints, more Palestinian economic growth and quicker negotiations on the contours of a Palestinian state in the West Bank…”

Shavit concurs: “If U.S. special envoy George Mitchell develops a creative peace plan for his president, it may be possible to avoid past mistakes. This new plan must be based on Fayyad and his way. It must bring the Palestinians closer to a state in a decisive but realistic way…it must establish a practical dynamic of hope. Obama’s challenge this autumn is to give the West Bank revolution a peace horizon…”

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[1] Thomas Freidman, “Green Shoots in Palestine II,” The New York Times, August 9, 2009.

[2] Ari Shavit, “A Peace Horizon,” Ha’aretz, August 20, 2009.

Myth: Israelis and Palestinians have not felt enough pain to do anything hard for peace. Obama should walk away from Mideast peace efforts

until Israelis and Palestinians are really hurting, and begging for US help to settle the conflict. (Thomas L. Friedman, "Call White House, Ask for Barack," The New York Times).

The Facts:

1. Not enough pain? Over the last eight years, Israelis have suffered hundreds of suicide bombings from the West Bank and Gaza, thousands of rocket and missile attacks from Lebanon and Gaza on their civilian population centers in the north and south, and mounting fears about a nuclear-armed Iran; Palestinians have suffered Israeli invasions and counter-attacks, a deepening occupation and ongoing settlement expansion. In the last few years, they’ve endured Intifada II, Lebanon War II, and the Gaza War.

2. What would likely happen if we walked away? Friedman counsels the president to leave the parties to “enjoy the status quo.” “If and when they get serious, they’ll find us.” But the status quo is a tinderbox. Friedman would have Obama wait until Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria, Iran and Israel are swallowed in the maw of a new regional war, the Palestinians radicalized and shorn of hope, the Israelis despairing and fearful. He would let extremists set the entire region aflame, and then send in the American fire brigade armed with water hoses and a two-state rescue plan—if the bloodied and embittered combatants dialed the White House 911. But who's to say there'd be anything left to salvage? By then, the two-state solution might no longer be an option, and the region might have reached an irreversible crisis, a critical tipping point.

President Obama would do well to reject Friedman’s “burn down the village to save it” strategy, built as it is on a tortured misreading of modern Middle East history – both past and future.

3. Friedman’s op-ed is best understood as a shot across the bow. Abbas could carry out his threat to resign and dissolve the Palestinian Authority, leaving Israel without a Palestinian leadership with which to negotiate a two-state deal, and an ongoing occupation of millions of West Bank Palestinians for whom Israel would now be directly responsible.

By the same token, Friedman is threatening that if Israeli and Palestinian leaders don’t do more to promote an environment conducive to successful negotiations, the US could give up on peace efforts and leave Israelis and Palestinians to face the conflict on their own. In other words, Obama would start acting more like George W. Bush, but without the disingenuous rhetoric - a kind of uber-Bush.

The problem, however, is that it’s an empty threat. The U.S., as Israel’s closest ally, would be viewed throughout the world as enabling whatever steps Israel might take in an increasingly toxic environment. The threat is not credible; the warning shot is an empty shell. And Obama will never succumb to the do-nothing (but bomb), laissez-faire approach to foreign policy.

4. As Israel's best friend and ally, it would be supremely irresponsible for the US to abandon Mideast peace efforts - irresponsible to Israel, and to our own national security interests.

"In making the case for US leadership of Israeli-Arab peace efforts, there are two basic truths," writes Lara Friedman of Americans for Peace Now. " The first is that an end to the Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab conflicts is vital to Israel's security, stability, prosperity, and very survival as a Jewish, democratic state. Thus, if the US cares about Israel, it cannot step back from this effort.

Second, “Middle East peace should be viewed through the lens of American national security interests, and [viewed] this way, the US can and indeed perhaps should 'want it' - want an end to the Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab conflicts - more than the parties. Looking at it through this lens, the US dare not step back from the effort to achieve peace.”

5. Here’s a better idea: the US should propose a detailed two-state framework to the parties now, with a deadline to work out a mutually acceptable formula with intensive American, Arab and international help. After a decade of growing Israeli and Palestinian insecurity, thanks to the benign neglect now championed by Friedman and practiced by Bush, Obama's new Mideast peace initiative must come not after, but before the next even more catastrophic clash of arms.

(See the related "Myth: Obama's Mideast peace policy has failed," and "Myth: American Jews disrespect Israeli democracy when they suggest Obama should press Israeli and Palestinian leaders to accept a US peace plan.")

For more insight, read the following:

1. Lara Friedman, "Tom Friedman: so wrong (and so glib)," Americans for Peace Now

2. David Halperin, “To Do Nothing is an Insane Policy,” Israel Policy Forum

3. Richard Silverstein, "Friedman Advises Obama to Wash His Hands of Israel-Palestine," Tikun Olam

4. Letters to the New York Times: "Mideast Path: Step Up or Step Back?"

Myth: The Fatah Congress called for violence & terror, all of Jerusalem, an absolute right of return, proving Israel has no Palestinian peace partner.

Myth: “The resolutions of the recent Fatah [Congress] speak of using violence, [taking] all of Jerusalem, an absolute right of return…The Fatah platform…has buried any chance of coming to an agreement with the Palestinians in the next few years…” - Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman

“Fatah has once again left the door open for terrorism…It used classic language justifying violence against civilians – ‘Fatah adopts all legitimate forms of struggle with clinging to the option of peace.’…Another unaccountable resolution stated a refusal to negotiate with Israel until it ceded all of Jerusalem to the Palestinians.” - Abraham Foxman, National Director, Anti-Defamation League

The Facts – In Brief:

• Fatah renewed its commitment to negotiating peace with Israel based on a two-state solution and the Arab Peace Initiative.
• The Arab Peace Initiative does not call for a right of refugee return to Israel but rather for an agreed solution to the refugee problem.
• The Fatah platform also called for nonviolent forms of resistance to support negotiations with Israel, or in the event that the negotiations are unsuccessful. It endorses “resistance by all legitimate means,” leaving out the option of armed struggle. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas made his position very clear: “We must not stain our legitimate struggle with terror.”
• The Arabic text of his speech confirmed that he referred to East Jerusalem, not to "all of Jerusalem."

More Facts:

1. Former Knesset Member and Israeli Diplomat Colette Avital: “[T]he deeply-seated mistrust, the habit of reading first and foremost the bad elements in any Palestinian document, makes it easy to misinterpret some of the resolutions negatively. Thus, for days our media reported that the Palestinians were not ready to give up on violence and that the resolutions called for the continuation of armed struggle as a strategy. The truth is that the Bethlehem platform calls for 'resistance by all legitimate means,' and leaves out the option of armed struggle. When reading a political document, as some of us have been taught, it is important to read every word in its context, but also to consider what has been left out.

"Abbas himself made his position very clear: 'We must not stain our legitimate struggle with terror,' he said.

"On Jerusalem, too, our media hurried to report that Abbas had demanded sovereignty over all of Jerusalem. Yet reading the text in Arabic, one discovers that the expression used by Abu Mazen refers to east Jerusalem, commonly referred to as the 'Arab side.' To make this even clearer, the call on Israel to return to the 1967 borders is an implicit recognition of Israel's sovereignty over west Jerusalem.

"The congress also endorsed the 2002 Arab [peace] initiative. Interestingly, but not known to every one, the initiative does not call for a right of return of the refugees. Here too, my humble advice to all the skeptics is to read the text as formulated. It clearly states that there should be a 'principled and agreed upon solution' for the refugee problem.

"Finding the dark side of things provides good pretexts to those who refuse progress."

("It's time to talk to Fatah," Colette Avital , The Jerusalem Post, 8/19/09. Avital is Director-General of the Berl Katznelson Center and International Secretary, Israel Labor Party; she is a Former Labor Knesset Member and former Israel Consul General in New York.)

2. Lafer international fellow Mohammad Yaghi of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (a leading centrist to center-right pro-Israel think-tank) concludes his analysis of the Fatah Sixth Congress which convened in Bethlehem during August, as follows: “Fatah renewed its commitment to achieve a peaceful settlement with Israel through negotiations, a departure from old principles that relied heavily on armed struggle.”

“The congress also sanctioned 'all legitimate forms of struggle while working toward peace and without limiting the option of peaceful negotiations,' noting that among the accepted forms of resistance are 'mobilizing popular resistance against settlements, boycotting Israeli products, escalating an international campaign to boycott Israel, and reactivating Fatah relations with the Israeli peace camp.' The political program makes very clear that armed struggle is not on the table at this time.

"Fatah, however, did not forswear violence as a future option. According to the PLO news agency WAFA, the congress issued a brief statement to this effect: 'While Fatah is clinging to the option of a just peace and is seeking to achieve it, it won't abandon any of its options. Fatah maintains its belief that resistance, in all its forms, is a legitimate right for occupied peoples facing their occupiers.' Some Fatah members immediately downplayed the statement, saying it was added in response to opposition parties that have accused Fatah of abandoning armed struggle.

"Salah Tamari, a member of the Fatah Revolutionary Council and former governor of Bethlehem, agrees: 'All calls for armed struggle are for publicity and election purposes.' Other credible sources commented that 'the calls for armed struggle drew too much giggling from the congress's members.' According to [Nabil] Shaath, although the program maintains the Palestinian right to all forms of resistance, it clearly states that resistance should be used within the boundaries of international law and only when all Palestinian factions approve it.”

(PolicyWatch #1569, Fatah Congress: Will New Resolutions Mean a New Direction?, By Mohammad Yaghi, August 14, 2009)

3. Ha’aretz Editorial: We do have a partner, 8/7/09:

“Fatah's new platform, and chairman Mahmoud Abbas' speech, won sweeping support from the more than 2,200 delegates who came from throughout the Palestinian Diaspora. From Bethlehem, they sent Jerusalem an unequivocal message: The Palestinian national movement's strategic choice is still two states for two peoples.

“Although Fatah's first convention in 20 years was held in the shadow of the Israeli occupation and an impasse in the peace process, the movement committed itself to the diplomatic option and the principles of the Arab peace initiative. Fatah formally distinguished itself from Hamas and joined the Arab and international consensus on a political solution - namely, the establishment of a contiguous Palestinian state on the basis of the June 4, 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and a just solution to the refugee problem by agreement with Israel, on the basis of UN Resolution 194.

“It is only natural for Israel not to accept Fatah's platform, just as the Palestinian leadership objects to Likud's platform. But Fatah's approach to the peace process refutes the right-wing argument that ‘there is no Palestinian peace partner.’”

4. Eric Fingerhut, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, August 11, 2009: “In his speech to the conference…newly re-elected Fatah chairman and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas did stress that the Palestinians would focus on 'nonviolent' resistance….

“Nathan Brown, a political science and international affairs professor at George Washington University and an expert in Palestinian reform…said [the Fatah platform] should be viewed as akin to a U.S. political party platform that might contain some ‘red meat language’ to satisfy the political factions in a ‘large and diverse movement’ like Fatah but isn't necessarily followed by the party leaders.

“Brown said what was more important was whether the Fatah leaders elected at the assembly would form a ‘coherent’ organization dedicated to a diplomatic solution and whether they continue to ‘do what the Israelis want them to be doing’ on security and other issues…”

5. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that “the rhetoric we hear from the Fatah Congress and the stances taken there are unacceptable to us, but we need to realize that there is no solution for the Middle East but a [peace] agreement. I advise Abu Mazen to enter into serious negotiations with us, and I advise the Americans under the leadership of President Obama to lead a process such as this in the Middle East, including the Palestinians, Syria, and additional countries.” (Ynet, 8/9/09)